What is Difficult in Learning Physics and What We Can Do About It: The Case of Wave Optics

The questions of what students find difficult in physics and how physics teachers and faculty can help them learn easier and deeper underlie the whole discipline of PER. These important questions will be addressed in the light of the recent findings of our research group on high school students’ understanding of wave optics. Wave optics, a good representative of a difficult topic for high school students, was investigated since 2018 in a research project conducted at the Faculty of Science, University of Zagreb. Secondary school students’ understanding of wave optics was investigated first through 27 demonstration interviews and later with a newly constructed instrument, the Conceptual Survey of Wave Optics (CSWO), administered to 224 students. The results of the interviews and of the CSWO suggested some possible origins of student difficulties, and the existence of several distinct levels of difficulties. The implications of the findings for the teaching of wave optics and physics in general are discussed.