Conceptions of second year university students of some fundamental notions in chemistry

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Abstract
This research is a follow‐up to our earlier study in which we assessed the knowledge and conceptions of fundamental notions in chemistry of first year undergraduate students at the time of entry into university. It examines to what extent, after one year of study at university level, the conceptions of the students have evolved and how their knowledge of scientific theory has progressed. We have found that the conceptions of the students are often modified in the right way, but sometimes in the wrong way as well, and the results obtained seem to indicate that the ambitious aim of teaching (better acquisition of important notions by students) is far from being attained. The study also shows that for some notions the teaching of chemistry has too formal a character. To rectify this situation, we propose that practical work must include problems that are not only chemical in nature.

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