Using thermal cameras in secondary physics to support learning about energy

Energy is among the most useful ideas in science and engineering, and it plays a key role in the many of the most important socio-scientific issues that students will face throughout their lives. The usefulness of energy for making sense of problems and phenomena is fundamentally based upon its status as a conserved quantity, yet energy conservation is very difficult to observe. Physics teachers often ask students to accept that energy is conserved, even though this idea runs counter to most of students’ everyday experiences. Thermal cameras play an indispensable role in exposing dissipative processes that obscure energy conservation in real-world phenomena. Yet simply giving students thermal cameras is unlikely to lead to productive learning. In this chapter, we discuss and provide empirical support for pedagogical approaches for using thermal cameras to investigate phenomena so that students are supported in developing a deeper understanding of energy conservation and dissipation.