Storm as a Model for Measuring Understanding of Electrical Field
Miriam Martínez Muñoz, Jose Antonio Gutiérrez de Mesa and Lourdes Jiménez
Department of Computing, UAH, Alcalá de Henares, Spain
Keywords: Virtual Laboratory, Technologies, Education, Teaching, Physics, Learning.
Abstract: This work forms a part of an investigation project whose main objective is to understand the impact that the
use of Information and Communication Technology has on the teaching and learning processes. Work has
been done particularly on implementing a teaching proposal which includes the use of new technologies for
comprehensive learning to advanced level students. We propose to analyze the use of technological
resources such as a simulator as part of specific teaching strategies in actual settings and the impact that
they cause in the understanding of the concepts of physics. With this work we try to demonstrate that, with
the utilization of a storm simulator, the students of physics improve their learning process, on one hand they
understand this physic phenomenon and on the other hand, assimilate better the concepts related to
Electrostatics.
1 INTRODUCTION
Numerous studies (‘Cell phone video recording
feature as a language learning tool’ by Mr. Nicolas
A. Gromik, Qatar University) realized with students
in Secondary Obligatory Education and in diverse
careers demonstrate a change of attitude towards
some subjects with the utilization of ICT (computer,
scientific cinema, audio-visual tools); and an
improvement in the learning of these subjects.
Analyzing the results obtained in these studies, it is
possible to verify that statistically significant
differences are obtained in the average performance
of the students, between the groups of pupils with
whom there is implemented a strategy of education
that uses technological IT resources and another
group, in which a boarding is realized from the
traditional education (Wenning, 2005), (Alanís,
2000).
With this work we try to demonstrate that, with
the utilization of a storm simulator, the students of
physics improve their learning process, on one hand
they understand this physic phenomenon and on the
other hand, assimilate better the concepts related to
Electrostatics (Rosado, 2001); (Palomo, 2006).These
concepts are difficult to reproduce in class and in a
real laboratory. To cover this necessity the solution
adopted by some education centers, especially
universities is the use of laboratories in which
students complete their formation and do
investigation work which can improve or optimize
the existing implantations. These laboratories,
virtual laboratories are called simulators.
Recently, virtual laboratories have been
attracting much attention as one of simulating
method for not only various social and economic
phenomena but also science researches (Nobuhide,
2001).
The mean objetives of this is:
Understanding the impact of the use of the new
technologies in the processes of the teaching and
learning of the students in the subject of physics.
Other secondary objectives that can be achieved are:
 Development of students’ high-level computer
skills and competence (student expertise) in
information and communication technology and in
physics
 Analyze the use of specific technological
recourses as part of strategy in teaching that tries to
help comprehensive learning.
 Determine if the use of external representation
(images, animations, simulations and actual
experiences) help to understand the concepts of
physics.
The following analysis, which is done in section 2,
from our experience, intends to demonstrate how the
use of determined technical resources in a didactic
unit, “Electrical Field”, helps to improve the
understanding of disciplinary concepts. Especially,
in section 3 demonstrates the influence of external
representations (images, animations, simulations)
59
Martínez Muñoz M., Gutiérrez de Mesa J. and Jiménez L..
Storm as a Model for Measuring Understanding of Electrical Field.
DOI: 10.5220/0003947700590062
In Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems (ICEIS-2012), pages 59-62
ISBN: 978-989-8565-11-2
Copyright
c
 2012 SCITEPRESS (Science and Technology Publications, Lda.)

used to register analyze and explain the phenomena
of Electrical Field, which are intended to improve
the concepts of electrical load, electrical potential,
thunder, lightning and beam. Finally, section 4
includes the results with an analysis and conclusions
in section 5.
2 THE SYSTEM
This experience has the objective of understanding
of the impact of the use of the new technologies in
the processes of the teaching and learning of the
students in the subject of physics.
This experience tries to:
- Analyze the use of determined technological
recourses as part of strategy in teaching that tries to
help comprehensive learning.
- To determine if the use of external representation
(images, animations, simulations and actual
experiences) help to understand the concepts of
physics.
Physics is considered by the majority of students and
people in general as a difficult and abstract science.
What contributes to this concept is the complexity of
physics itself the use of a scientific and mathematic
language with unfamiliar terminology and the latch
of interest of the students caused by the
disconnection between physics as studied in the
classroom and the phenomena which we observe
outside it.
Virtual physics laboratories (applets, simulator,
virtual reality, cinema …) try to serve the resources
that new computer technologies and Communication
offer and to start an interest in the student in a
passionate science which is nevertheless considered
traditionally difficult for the student (Cabera et al.,
2000). The physics laboratory does not just only
give the students an important number of self
assessment questionnaires and activities to be
performed with the use of applets, but also
incorporates the tool generator so that the said
questionnaires are made on line by the teachers
themselves.
When the students are asked about this science
they say it is an interesting subject but very difficult
because there are lots of physics phenomena they
can not observe in their life and they can not
imagine these phenomena, so they don’t learn
important concepts (Perez, 2005).
In this work we centre on exposing a
methodology that facilitates to the pupil the follow-
up of the didactic chosen unit. Let's sense
beforehand our experience in the incorporation of
the Technologies of the Information and the
Communication (ICT) as supports to the teaching of
our matter in order which the pupils could acquire
the knowledge of suitable form. With the utilization
of these tools the students can be acquiring the
knowledge following their own pace of learning, so
that departing from very different levels it is
possible to come to the final claimed level.
Figure 1: Electrical storm simulator.
Figure 2: Storm description.
This java applet is a storm simulator where we
can development all the important concepts about
Electrostatics (Electrical loads, potential difference,
electrical field, Law of Coulomb and electrization of
the matter).
The pupils can modify the dampness and
temperature up to achieving that the cloud is loaded
ICEIS2012-14thInternationalConferenceonEnterpriseInformationSystems
60

electrically. When the potential difference between
the cloud and land overcomes the electrical field
allowed of the air an electrical discharge is produced
followed by beams and thunders.
3 THE EXPERIMENT
The mean objective of this project is to show that the
use of a simulator helps to improve the
understanding of the disciplinary concepts in the
subject of physics. In a classroom or in a real
laboratory, teachers can not reproduce some
important physics phenomena, but with virtual
laboratory (in this case, applets) they can.
The goal of this project is to show that the use of
a simulator of Electrical Storm (it has been
developed by the authors of this article) helps to
improve the understanding of the disciplinary
concepts in the subject of physics in a group of
students in the third year in a teachers training
college.
This developed didactic unit was chosen because
they were made up of within physics. However in
general a deep understanding about the same was
not reached. Principal concepts are shown in the
following image:
Figure 3: Developed concepts with the simulator.
The numbers of students who took part in the
experience were 20, the total number of students
enrolled in this subject. 18 students had never
studied physics and 12 of them hadn’t studied
mathematics for several years. And their age was
between 20 and 40 years old. These items made
explanations were slower and the teacher had to
explain the didactic unit deeper.
The tests for the didactic units “Electrical Field”
were carried out at the beginning of the first term. At
the beginning, students were asked to take a written
test of 10 questions, so the teacher could know the
knowledge of them about these concepts. The theme
was expanded for two weeks through magisterial
classes and the students were asked to take a written
test of 10 questions again. During the following
week the simulator of electrical storm was used
where students could do another test. After this
another test of 10 questions is planned to see if the
objective has been reached.
This way it was possible to compare the results
from the two previous texts done by students to
check them with the use of the virtual laboratory.
But this isn’t the end of the experiment. Two
months later, student did again a test of 10 questions
with the principal concepts about “Electric Field”.
We could observe students hadn’t forgotten many
things.
4 THE RESULTS
The results obtained by students in the third year of
the teachers training collage in the 3 steps of the
investigation are:
Evolution
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
St ude nt s
Figure 4: Results after each questionnaire.
This graphics shows how the students improved
their knowledge about electric concepts. In fact, they
got better results after using the simulator than after
the class. There are 4 pupils didn’t improve with the
applets and only 2 students had worse results with
the simulator than with the magisterial class.
Two months later we wanted to know if the
students could remember the most important electric
concepts.
As we can observe in the figure 5, two months
later, 75% of the students obtained punctuation
StormasaModelforMeasuringUnderstandingofElectricalField
61

equal or higher than 5; this means that
visualteaching gets good results.
Persistence of the know ledge
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Students
Figure 5: Results after 2 months.
We wanted to know if the using of ITC could
improve their interest about the science. The
students not only answered tests about important
concepts, but also about their attitude towards this
science. They were asked to answer 2
questionnaires, before the investigation and after.
Attitude towards the sciences
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
Students
Figure 6: Results after 2 months.
These graphic shows students don’t like very
much studying physics, in fact, they weren’t
interested in it but, after using ICT, their interest
towards physics changed.
5 CONCLUSIONS
By analyzing the data of the completed experiences,
significant statistical achievements in the
performance of the students that took part in the
experimental group are observed. An appreciable
impact in the use of ICT for the understanding of the
different didactic units is shown.
This work has permitted us to know the impact
that the use of new technologies has in the process
of teaching and learning. It is observed that the
application of technological resources to represent
physical phenomena in actual settings contribute to
improve comprehensive learning of the concepts of
physics in the students. Development of students’
high-level computer skills and competence (student
expertise) in information and communication
technology and in physics has improved.
We believe that these positive results are due to
the pupils can see and handle a physical
phenomenon that the teachers can’t reproduce
neither in class nor in a real laboratory. In such way
they don’t have to imagine the process. It is not a
question of replacing the magisterial classes with
ICT, but to completing them when it is possible.
In turn, the results show that, the use of a visual
methodology helps to fix and support for a long time
the learned knowledge.
The experience in the study provides the setting
for the aspects of pedagogic didactics that lay the
foundation of educational practices whose teaching
strategies include the use of the TICS to impart
comprehensive learning that contribute to the
formation of the students.
It is not a question of replacing the figure of the
professor neither in the classroom nor the
magisterial classes. With TICS we want that the
students not only learn the obligatory concepts in
class but also like the science and the investigation.
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Wenning, C. J., Implementing inquiry-based instruction in
the science classroom: A new model for solving the
improvement-of-practice problem, Journal of Physics
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Alanís, A., Estrategias docentes y estrategias de
aprendizaje, Contexto Educativo 10 (2000).
Cabero, Julio, et al. (coords), Las nuevas tecnologías para
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(2000).
Pérez, A., Evaluación nacional de actitudes y valores
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Rosado, L., Didáctica de la Física (UNED, Madrid,
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