Listed below are some student physical science misconceptions, grouped under the four main standards of the NGSS for grades 9–12 physical sciences (chemistry). The list is not intended to be exhaustive, but rather a summary of some of the more common prior ideas we identified from our analysis of the student response patterns to the items on all of our field tests, which totaled more than 500 items.

Standard HS-PS1: Matter and its Interactions

• Students exhibit confusion between everyday usage of scientific terms and application of these terms.
• Atoms can be seen with a microscope; atoms are microscopic versions of elements—hard or soft, liquid or gas.
• Electrons in an atom orbit its nucleus like planets in our solar system orbit the sun.
• Students have difficulty accepting the notion of “empty” space; there must be air, dust, or other gases – “something” -- between particles. No space is completely empty, both within atoms (as between nuclei and electron clouds) or between particles in solids, liquids.
• Secondary students can depict the solid state as an ordered arrangement of molecules but do not give reasons for why it holds together or is incompressible.
• The particles of a solid never move.
• Particles are mini-versions of the substances they comprise and possess the same properties.
• The expansion or contraction of matter is due to corresponding changes in the constituent particles, and not the space between the particles.
• There are no bonds in elementary substances, e.g., in a piece of pure gold.
• There is much confusion among students about regarding the arrangement of and trends within the Periodic Table, along with confusion of terms and categories used to discuss the Periodic Table. Students confuse periods (rows) and groups (columns), unaware that columns are vertical and periods are horizontal, likely due to a lack of understanding of nomenclature.
• An element is a particular kind of chemical, and all molecules are atoms/molecules of the same substance.
• Behavior of electrons and different types of and energies involved in bonding prove difficult for students to grasp and adequately explain.
• There is confusion between bond being material links rather than forces.
• Students often memorize chemical equations without sufficient understanding.
• Students often describe the result of a chemical reaction as something, i.e., a new substance simply “appears” or “is produced” while something else “disappears” or “is used up” without understanding the events in a chemical reaction, including that the rearrangement of atoms to produce a new substance is involved.
• There is often the notion of existing matter being destroyed and new matter created in a chemical reaction, and that energy is “used up”, “caused by”, or “made by” something in these reactions.
• Students do not always comprehend that the total number of atoms, not the number of each kind of atom, is always conserved, and the total number of molecules is always conserved.
• When studying a reaction at equilibrium in which there is no longer an observable change, students do not appreciate that a dynamic process is at work.
• Students have a wide range of topic-specific difficulties associated with understanding types of chemical reactions that occur under different conditions, i.e. combustion reactions, acid-base reactions, and redox processes.
• Students have difficulty in making the distinction between noble gas stability and nuclear stability or the stability of the nucleus of an atom and the chemical stability of an element.

Standard HS-PS3: Energy

• Students do not always understand that one form of energy cannot be transformed into another form of energy; it is often described as a “product” or by-product of a process or situation.

Selected References for Grades 9–12 Physical Science (Chemistry) Misconceptions

Barker, V. (2004). Beyond Appearances: Students’ Misconceptions about Basic Chemical Ideas. A report prepared for the Royal Society of Chemistry. (2 nd edition) (Retrieved from http://modeling.asu.edu/modeling/KindVanessaBarkerchem.pdf).

Boo, Hong‐Kwen. (1998). Students' Understandings of Chemical Bonds and the Energetics of Chemical Reactions. Journal of Research in Science Teaching 35(5), 569 - 581.

Butler, M. (2015). Misconceptions of Atomic Structure. (Retrieved September 21, 2016 from http://www.slideshare.net/MikaelaAshley/misconceptions-of-atomic-structure).

Denby, D. (2014). Chemical energetics: words matter. Education in Chemistry, the Royal Society of Chemistry. (Retrieved from https://eic.rsc.org/cpd/chemical-energetics-words-matter/2000004.article).

Driver, R., Squires, A., Rushworth, P., & Wood-Robinson, V. (1994). Making sense of secondary science: Research into children's ideas. New York, New York: Routledge.

Hacker, S. (2014). Education in Chemistry (Retrieved from https://eic.rsc.org/section/cpd/understanding-equilibrium-a-elicate-balance/2000012.article).

Intel Teach Program (2013). (Retrieved from http://www.intel.com/content/dam/www/program/education/us/en/ documents/project-design/atoms/small-misconceptions-about-the-structure-of-atoms.pdf).

Necor, D., (2011). Students’ Level of Conceptual Understanding in the Trends of the Periodic Table of Elements Basis for Remedial Activities. (Retrieved October 11, 2016 from http://www.pinoychemteacher.org/content/Convention2011/OralPresentations/NecorOP.pdf).

Nakiboglu, C. and Tekin, B. (2006). Identifying Students' Misconceptions about Nuclear Chemistry. A Study of Turkish High School Students. Journal of Chemical Education 83 (11), 1712 – 1718. (Retrieved from http://pubs.acs.org.ezp-prod1.hul.harvard.edu/doi/pdf/10.1021/ed083p1712).

Pozo, J. I. and Gomez Crespo, M. A.. (2005) The Embodied Nature of Implicit Theories: The Consistency of Ideas About the Nature of Matter, Cognition and Instruction, 23(3), 351–387. Project 2061 AAAS Science Assessment. (Retrieved from http://assessment.aaas.org/items/SC102002#/0).

Salame, I., Sarowar, S., Begum, S., and Krauss, D. (2011). Students’ Alternative Conceptions about Atomic Properties and the Periodic Table, Chem. Educator, 16, 190–194.
Stojanovska, M. et al.. (2012). Addressing Misconceptions about the Particulate Nature of Matter among Secondary-School and High School Students in the Republic of Macedonia, Creative Education, 3(5), 619-631.

Taber, K.S. (2000) Chemistry Lessons for Universities: a Review of Constructivist Ideas, University Chemistry Education, 4(2), 64 – 72. (Retrieved from http://stoa.usp.br/qfl3501/files/313/1394/chemistry%252Blessons%252Bfor%252Buniversities.pdf).

Yan, F., & Talanquer, V. (2015). Students’ Ideas about How and Why Chemical Reactions Happen: Mapping the conceptual landscape. International Journal of Science Education, 37(18), 3066–3092. (Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1080/09500693.2015.1121414).

The test in this section contains items related to 9 of the grades 9–12 Disciplinary Core Ideas (DCIs) in physical sciences (chemistry) from the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). Listed below are the DCIs as stated in the NGSS.

HS-PS1.A.i:

“Each atom has a charged substructure consisting of a nucleus, which is made of protons and neutrons, surrounded by electrons.”

HS-PS1.A.ii:

“The periodic table orders elements horizontally by the number of protons in the atom’s nucleus and places those with similar chemical properties in columns. The repeating patterns of this table reflect patterns of outer electron states.”

HS-PS1.A.iii:

“The structure and interactions of matter at the bulk scale are determined by electrical forces within and between atoms.”

HS-PS1.A.iv:

“A stable molecule has less energy than the same set of atoms separated; one must provide at least this energy in order to take the molecule apart.”

HS-PS1.B.i:

“Chemical processes, their rates, and whether or not energy is stored or released can be understood in terms of the collisions of molecules and the rearrangements of atoms into new molecules, with consequent changes in the sum of all bond energies in the set of molecules that are matched by changes in kinetic energy.”

HS-PS1.B.ii:

“In many situations, a dynamic and condition-dependent balance between a reaction and the reverse reaction determines the numbers of all types of molecules present.”

HS-PS1.B.iii:

“The fact that atoms are conserved, together with knowledge of the chemical properties of the elements involved, can be used to describe and predict chemical reactions.”

HS-PS1.C.i:

“Nuclear processes, including fusion, fission, and radioactive decays of unstable nuclei, involve release or absorption of energy. The total number of neutrons plus protons does not change in any nuclear process.”

HS-PS3.D.i:

“Although energy cannot be destroyed, it can be converted to less useful form; for example, to thermal energy in the surrounding environment.”