Surveying students’ conceptual knowledge of electricity and magnetism

Maloney, David P.; O'Kuma, Thomas; Hieggelke, Curtis; Heuvelen, Alan Van

doi:10.1119/1.1371296

Cited by 516 publications

(567 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…To understand abstract scientific concepts, students are required to build mental models where they internalize and organize knowledge structures (Dede, Salzman, Loftin, & Sprague, 1999). Unlike what happens in other Physics' conceptual areas, when dealing with electromagnetism, students' mental models should include abstractions and invisible factors for which students have no reallife references (Maloney, O'Kuma, Hieggelke, & Van Heuvelen, 2001). The relevance of presenting learning materials not only through words but also through visual assets to fully understand the nature of scientific phenomena and processes was reported by Dori, Hult, Breslow, and Belcher (2007).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Experimenting with electromagnetism using augmented reality: Impact on flow student experience and educational effectiveness

Ibáñez

Serio

Villarán

et al. 2014

Computers & Education

456

184

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Educational researchers have recognized Augmented Reality (AR) as a technology with great potential to impact affective and cognitive learning outcomes. However, very little work has been carried out to substantiate these claims. The purpose of this study was to assess to which extent an AR learning application affects learners' level of enjoyment and learning effectiveness. The study followed an experimental/control group design using the type of the application (AR-based, web-based) as inde-pendent variable. 64 high school students were randomly assigned to the experimental or control group to learn the basic principles of electromagnetism. The participants' knowledge acquisition was evaluated by comparing pre-and post-tests. The participants' level overall-state perception on flow was measured with the Flow State Scale and their flow states were monitored throughout the learning activity. Finally, participants' perceptions of benefits and difficulties of using the augmented reality application in this study were qualitatively identified. The results showed that the augmented reality approach was more effective in promoting students' knowledge of electromagnetic concepts and phenomena. The analysis also indicated that the augmented reality application led participants to reach higher flow experience levels than those achieved by users of the web-based application. However, not all the factors seem to have influence on learners' flow state, this study found that they were limited to: concentration, dis-torted sense of time, sense of control, clearer direct feedback, and autotelic experience. A deeper analysis of the flow process showed that neither of the groups reported being in flow in those tasks that were very easy or too difficult. However, for those tasks that were not perceived as difficult and included visualization clues, the experimental group showed higher levels of flow that the control group. The study suggests that augmented reality can be exploited as an effective learning environment for learning the basic principles of electromagnetism at high school provided that learning designers strike a careful balance between AR support and task difficulty.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Experimenting with electromagnetism using augmented reality: Impact on flow student experience and educational effectiveness

Ibáñez

Serio

Villarán

et al. 2014

Computers & Education

456

184

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Physics teaching in both high school and college places an emphasis on problem solving [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8], and although students demonstrate reasonable competence in traditional assessments of problem solving skills, there is evidence that understanding of fairly fundamental concepts is weak or lacking following completion of introductory courses [9][10][11][12][13][14]. Students in introductory physics courses solve problems largely using a process termed means-ends analysis, whereby they search for equations containing the quantities in a problem and try to reduce the "distance" between the goal state and their current state in the solution process [5,8,15,16].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Conceptual problem solving in high school physics

Docktor

Strand

Mestre

et al. 2015

Phys. Rev. ST Phys. Educ. Res.

146

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Problem solving is a critical element of learning physics. However, traditional instruction often emphasizes the quantitative aspects of problem solving such as equations and mathematical procedures rather than qualitative analysis for selecting appropriate concepts and principles. This study describes the development and evaluation of an instructional approach called Conceptual Problem Solving (CPS) which guides students to identify principles, justify their use, and plan their solution in writing before solving a problem. The CPS approach was implemented by high school physics teachers at three schools for major theorems and conservation laws in mechanics and CPS-taught classes were compared to control classes taught using traditional problem solving methods. Information about the teachers' implementation of the approach was gathered from classroom observations and interviews, and the effectiveness of the approach was evaluated from a series of written assessments. Results indicated that teachers found CPS easy to integrate into their curricula, students engaged in classroom discussions and produced problem solutions of a higher quality than before, and students scored higher on conceptual and problem solving measures.

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“…Both quantitative and qualitative research methods were used. The research tools included pre-tests, posttests, surveys, and focus groups.The current longitudinal assessment effort used similar methods and tools.Each test (pre-, post-, and retention) consisted of 25 multiple-choice conceptual questions 5 from standardized tests (Maloney et al, 2001;Mazur, 1997; McDermott and the Physics Education Group, 1996) augmented by questions that the instructors and researchers devised. There were two types of conceptual questions, A and B (see Appendices I and II).…”

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confidence: 99%

How Much Have They Retained? Making Unseen Concepts Seen in a Freshman Electromagnetism Course at MIT

et al. 2007

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The introductory freshmen electromagnetism course at MIT has been taught since 2000 using a studio physics format entitled TEAL-Technology Enabled Active Learning. TEAL has created a collaborative, hands-on environment where students carry out desktop experiments, submit web-based assignments, and have access to a host of visualizations and simulations. These learning tools help them visualize unseen electromagnetic concepts and develop stronger intuition about related phenomena. A previous study has shown that students who took the course in the TEAL format (the experimental group) gained significantly better conceptual understanding than those who took it in the traditional lecture-recitation format (the control group). The present longitudinal study focuses on the extent to which these two research groups (experimental and control) retain conceptual understanding about a year to 18 months after finishing the course. It also examines students attitudes about whether the teaching format (TEAL or traditional) contributes to their learning in advanced courses. Our research has indicated that the long-term effect of the TEAL course on studentsÕ retention of concepts was significantly stronger than that of the traditional course. This research is significant because it documents the long-term cognitive and affective impact of the TEAL studio physics format on learning outcomes of MIT students.KEY WORDS: conceptual understanding; electromagnetism; longitudinal study; retention; undergraduate physics education; visualization INTRODUCTIONStudies of how much conceptual understanding college students retain from their science courses are quite rare. Related studies include Barufaldi and Spiegel (1994), and Martenson et al. (1985). As Halpern and Hakel (2003) have discussed, educators need to provide students with education that lasts a lifetime. Thus, instructors need to adopt teaching and learning strategies for long-term retention in order for their students to remember what they have learned beyond the end of the semester.Beginning in 2000, the introductory freshmen electromagnetism course (E&M) at MIT has been taught using a new approach-Technology-Enabled Active Learning (TEAL). This study was reported by Dori and Belcher (2005a, b). The objective of the TEAL Project was to reform a mandatory largeenrollment physics class in order to increase studentsÕ conceptual understanding of electromagnetism and decrease failure rates in the course. The problems with passive learning in large classes were identified and researched over a decade ago (Hake, 1998;McDermott, 1991;Redish et al., 1997;Sokoloff and Thornton, 1997 stronger intuition about, and create more robust conceptual models of electromagnetic phenomena.In the previous study (Dori and Belcher, 2005a, b) we used pre-and post-tests which were administered to students taking the class in the TEAL format and to those taking the class in the traditional lecturerecitation format. We showed that students who took the course in the TEAL format gained significantly bett...

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Surveying students’ conceptual knowledge of electricity and magnetism

Cited by 516 publications

References 20 publications

Experimenting with electromagnetism using augmented reality: Impact on flow student experience and educational effectiveness

Experimenting with electromagnetism using augmented reality: Impact on flow student experience and educational effectiveness

Conceptual problem solving in high school physics

How Much Have They Retained? Making Unseen Concepts Seen in a Freshman Electromagnetism Course at MIT

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