This use of the term "student's misconceptions" reflects a knowledge transmission view of teaching rather than a constructivist view. Among science educators there has been an undue emphasis on changing student views into views accepted by the scientific community. This overemphasis mirrors the preoccupation with transmitting the "right answer" found in many classrooms and deflects attention away from the origin and justification of scientific views. There are three central factors in helping students move from their common sense methodology to a scientific one. First, students need to be skeptical about what seems evident. Second, they need opportunities to imagine alternative possibilities. And third, they need practice in employing some of the criteria used in science to validate their alternative ideas. A case study of the teaching of waves to high school students in an introductory physics course demonstrates how the origin and justification of the scientific concept of a wave can be focused within a constructivist perspective of science teaching. (Contains 28 references.) (PR)