Children Doing Physics : How to Foster the Natural Scientific Instincts in Children

Children Doing Physics: How to Foster the Natural Scientific Instincts in Children prepares future teachers to help children learn foundational concepts in physics. Activities and experiments within each chapter encourage teachers and children to tinker, build, model, articulate, and measure. The text helps educators develop confidence in conducting physics experiments in the classroom and enhances science content knowledge. 

The text explores what scientists do, how students learn, and how to teach by participating directly in scientific inquiries. It employs a collaborative, practice-based, and reflective approach to pique interest and promote active learning. The book is aligned with the core ideas of physical sciences identified in the Next Generation Science Standards. 

The second edition features expanded coverage on chemistry, includes a new chapter on fluids, updated discussions and explanations of key content, new appendices, and a glossary, discussion suggestions, and quizzes in each chapter. 

Children Doing Physics is well suited for required physics courses for teachers. It is also a useful resource for classroom teachers or home schooling parents who want to incorporate physics instruction into their lessons.

E.J. Bahng earned her Ph.D. in science education at Arizona State University. She has worked as a classroom teacher and is an associate professor in the School of Education at Iowa State University. She teaches a graduate course in the nature of science and science methods courses in elementary education.

John Hauptman earned his Ph.D. in experimental high energy physics at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Iowa State University and conducts research in particle physics. He is the author of Particle Physics Experiments at High Energy Colliders.