Abstract
Physics is rarely attractive to students, being perceived as a science that gives answers to questions that no one would ever ask; on the contrary, physics is driven by curiosity, is fascinating, and scientists have fun studying it, discovering, and understanding natural phenomena. Unfortunately, students rarely imagine that. The research in education has shown that a radical change of paradigm is necessary and that an “inquiry-driven” approach can help to change the image of physics and to give a more realistic perception of how physics proceeds. When questions come from them, students do want to find answers and they can personally experience the scientific method that leads to a validated interpretation of results. It is important to engage and surprise students, showing unexpected phenomena that naturally drive curiosity and questions, but also to touch emotional chords, traditionally not associated with science. Theatre owns most of the ingredients that are needed to perform an effective communication: people who attend a show are well disposed and relaxed and are in an environment that naturally stimulates emotion and an open-minded attitude. These are only some of the reasons that can explain the success that the pairing of scientific theatre and education had in recent years and continues to have, witnessed by inquiry-based science educational projects that will be presented in this chapter.
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Notes
- 1.
Personal quote inspired by some interviews with high school students.
- 2.
Sentence repeated during the show “Let’s throw light on the matter” [13].
- 3.
Here and in the following, the titles of the shows are translated in English. Apart from a case discussed later, the project is national, so the shows and titles are in Italian.
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Acknowledgement
The great adventure of the Show of Physics would never have been possible without the total collaboration with Marco Giliberti and Nicola Ludwig who are friends, colleagues, and co-authors of all the shows described in this chapter and deserves all my gratitude. I also thank all the theatre directors who worked with us in these years with patience and interest, and the Physics Department of the University of Milan that made all this possible. A special thanks to Maria Giulia Marini who involved me in the amazing project of this book, and to Marcello Re for his support and suggestions.
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Carpineti, M. (2023). Theatre as a Tool for an Inquiry-Based Physics Teaching. In: Varsou, O. (eds) Teaching, Research, Innovation and Public Engagement . New Paradigms in Healthcare. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-22452-2_6
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