THE PROBLEM OF PRE-SERVICE SCIENCE TEACHERS ON NEWTON'S LAWS TOPIC: A CASE STUDY

Newton's Laws is one of the topics in Physics that must be mastered by pre-service science teachers in Indonesia. This study aims to investigate the problems encountered by pre-service science teachers on Newton's Law topic, especially in drawing a free-body diagram. The method used in this research is a descriptive method. Samples were taken from three universities in Java, Indonesia. The total number of samples used was 230 pre-service science teachers consisted of 35 male (15.22%) and 195 female (84.48%) students. Data were collected based on written tests and interviews. The results showed that most pre-service science teachers still have difficulties in drawing a free-body diagram Newton's Law topic. Pre-service science teachers think that physics is a difficult subject with too many formulas, and they still fmd it difficult to understand the concept of physics while studying in high schools. These findings can be used as a reference or as an initial description of the problems of pre-service science teachers on Newton's Law topic so that lecturers can determine the appropriate learning strategies when teaching in class. The suggestion from this study is that lecturers who teach pre-service science teachers are expected to provide a re-explanation of the basics of physics such as how to draw free-body diagrams before they learn the concepts of physics at the next level.