Earth Science, Density, and the College Freshman

McKinnon, Joe W.

doi:10.5408/0022-1368-xix.5.218

Cited by 11 publications

(10 citation statements)

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“…Many studies [2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16] have documented difficulty with density at a variety of ages, and a few of those [2][3][4][5][6][7] support our observation that the difficulty persists into college.…”

Section: Prior Worksupporting

confidence: 83%

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Similar Density Questions with Very Different Results

Lindow¹,

Carbone²,

Wagner³

2014

2013 Physics Education Research Conference Proceedings

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While developing a standardized fluids assessment covering buoyancy and pressure, we discovered deficiencies in student understanding of density. In particular, many college students do not recognize that density is a fixed property of a solid substance, such as aluminum or gold. We added questions to our diagnostic exam to probe the extent of student difficulties. In one of our questions, only 50-60% of students (depending upon class) recognize that the density of gold is a fixed value. When similar questions from an existing diagnostic 1 are used, however, 88-100% of students correctly identify the density of a piece of wood and of a diamond as fixed values. In this paper we discuss the differences between these questions and how those differences affect student responses.

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Section: Prior Worksupporting

confidence: 83%

“…This difficulty highlights how "memorized equations are not sufficient for student understanding or for arriving at the correct answer" [4].…”

Section: Prior Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Similar Density Questions with Very Different Results

Lindow¹,

Carbone²,

Wagner³

2014

2013 Physics Education Research Conference Proceedings

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Other students may base this conclusion explicitly on a mass dependence of the volume of fluid displaced (VFD) on the object's mass (V mass) [3,6,[9][10][11][12]17] or density (density) [11][12]17].…”

Section: Prior Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Students with this belief might suggest that fluid in a wider container but the same depth can support more weight [4]. demonstrate a lack of awareness of conservation of volume by saying that reshaping or reorienting a constant-volume object can affect VFD (shape) [3,16]. Or, students may argue that reshaping an object to make it "flatter" will increase buoyant force because of the greater horizontal surface area experiencing an upwards force from the fluid (flatter) [4,14].…”

Section: Prior Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…We interviewed eight students at the end of the fall, 2010 semester, and we have analyzed longanswer explanations given by students taking drafts of our assessment. Distractors for our questions are based on conceptions identified by these methods, and by other studies [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16]. Since few of those studies [1][2][3][4][5] involve students above the age of 15, 1 we wondered which difficulties identified in those studies would persist into college.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Exploring Student Difficulties with Buoyancy

Wagner¹,

Carbone²,

Lindow³

2014

2013 Physics Education Research Conference Proceedings

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Our research group is developing a standardized fluids assessment, covering buoyancy and pressure. Understanding buoyancy requires a battery of skills and knowledge, and we have designed questions to probe understanding of background concepts such as density, incompressibility, and volume of fluid displaced. In this paper we will describe some of the buoyancy-related assessment questions, the misconceptions they probe, and the preliminary results from the beta version of the assessment.

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“I think of it that way and it helps me understand”: Anthropomorphism in elementary students' mechanistic stories

Tang,

Hammer

2024

Science Education

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How anthropomorphic reasoning functions in scientific thinking has been a controversial topic. There is evidence it is problematic as well as evidence it can play productive roles, for scientists and for students. In science education, however, the prevailing view remains that it is an impediment. For this study, we have chosen examples of what we claim are productive instances in elementary students' reasoning, and we analyze them to understand how anthropomorphisms functioned to support scientific thinking. We argue that one productive role is to support temporary shifts from mechanistic reasoning to more general storytelling, in particular to fill gaps as students work to explain phenomena. That is, we propose that children may come to mechanistic explanation as a form of storytelling. Part of their value is in allowing students to “invent science” based on their existing knowledge, supporting them to understand science as sensemaking.

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Earth Science, Density, and the College Freshman

Cited by 11 publications

References 0 publications

Similar Density Questions with Very Different Results

Similar Density Questions with Very Different Results

Exploring Student Difficulties with Buoyancy

“I think of it that way and it helps me understand”: Anthropomorphism in elementary students' mechanistic stories

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