Educational Practices in Sommerfeld School: A Case of Scientist Education from the View of Nature of Science

This study sought to discover what aspects of the nature of science (NOS) should be emphasized to nurture great scientists. To this end, educational practices in the Sommerfeld school, regarded as highly successful in scientist education, were analyzed and compared with past and present educational practices. Sommerfeld school’s educational practices include lecture, seminar, colloquium, seminary, and out-of-class education. Common features of the educational practices include (1) open-mindedness based on pleasant relationships, (2) challenging and specific problem-centered learning, (3) intellectual coherence of various topics, and (4) pursuit of shared opinions about problems. Furthermore, explicitly or implicitly, several aspects of NOS—tentativeness, empirical nature, theory-ladenness, creativity, and social dimension—relate to these features. Comparison with other scientist education reveals that the culture of social consensus based on criticism might have contributed significantly to Sommerfeld school’s educational success. Study results imply that science professors should work to improve an understanding of social consensus based on criticism.