A Method of Teaching Electrostatics in School

Extract

The object of the paper was to suggest for the teaching of electrostatics a leading idea, which should readily co-ordinate all the facts, introduce no misleading inferences, and guide the course of learners in the direction of the most recent investigations—in all which respects the notion of attraction and repulsion is at least a partial failure. The leading idea or fact referred to is, that almost all electrostatic distributions, however complex, can be analysed into one or more repetitions of a certain simple system, which is called in the paper “an electrostatic system,” and which may be described as follows:—Two equally and oppositely electrified conducting surfaces, facing each other, separated by any dielectric, and insulated from each other. A complete study of one system of this kind, and of the very simple ways in which the establishment of one such system often necessitates the establishment of others, is therefore the fundamental study of electrostatics.