Physicist and science educator who in the 1960s initiated a more practical approach to teaching through experiment with equipment
A luminary of physics teaching, John Lewis transformed science lessons, consigning dusty textbook learning to history and heralding a new physics course that enthused students through specially devised experiments.
Lewis’s passion for bringing physics alive became clear in the early 1960s, when it won him scholarships to visit North America and Russia to learn the best way to present physics to students.
Realising the need for more science equipment in schools, he pioneered the design of apparatus for physics practical work and had it made by the laboratory suppliers Philip Harris. He then persuaded Esso to lend schools the money