The development of the concept of momentum in primary school children

Raven, Ronald J.

doi:10.1002/tea.3660050305

Cited by 29 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…Although Osborne points out that 'momentum' is often mislabelled as 'force', we thereby found a productive role of actual lay use of 'momentum' from the point of view of science education. This finding complements the previously identified close relation between, on one hand, physicists' dynamics, and on the other children's and pupils' gut dynamics involving momentum (Espinoza, 2004;Raven, 1967). In contrast, 'kraft', corresponding to 'force' as a physical quantity, was found to be used in a wide range of senses in everyday Swedish, including many idiomatic expressions, which do not adhere to the physics sense of the word.…”

Section: Is There a Trend Towards Increased Use Of 'Momentum' Outsidesupporting

confidence: 84%

“…In line with the empirical findings of Raven (1967), children embrace a productive intuition of momentum at an early age, saying that the bigger and the faster an object, the more "oomph" it has. Related to the idea of a "generalized momentum" (diSessa, 1993), large and fast objects will tend to continue doing whatever they do, a basic idea of inertia.…”

Section: Educational Implicationssupporting

confidence: 52%

“…The idea that physicists' dynamics resonates with children's gut dynamics with regards to momentum has received empirical support. Through simple experiments, Raven (1967) provides evidence that young children, down to the age of five years, have developed an intuition of momentum, even before they have grasped the ideas of mass and velocity. In addition, Espinoza (2004) conducted a teaching experiment at high school level, where he compared traditional mechanics teaching, where the concept of force is introduced before momentum, to a novel approach, where momentum was introduced before force.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Taking Advantage of the “Big Mo”—Momentum in Everyday English and Swedish and in Physics Teaching

2014

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Section: Is There a Trend Towards Increased Use Of 'Momentum' Outsidesupporting

confidence: 84%

Section: Educational Implicationssupporting

confidence: 52%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Taking Advantage of the “Big Mo”—Momentum in Everyday English and Swedish and in Physics Teaching

2014

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“…Work by Ehri and Muzio indicated problems that students had with angular velocity (Ehri and Muzio, 1974) while work by Saltiel investigated different frames of reference (Saltiel and Malgrange, 1980). Some important work on momentum has been done by Raven who indicates that, despite a Piagetian analysis which suggests that the concept of momentum is more difficult than that of either mass or velocity, children were able to cope with the concept in an informal and "global" manner (Raven, 1968). This is by no means the only work that supports the idea of using such compound concepts before teaching the prior ones.…”

Section: The Scope Of the Problemmentioning

confidence: 99%

Confronting dynamics misconceptions

Brna

1987

Instr Sci

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This paper starts from the assumption that learning is promoted through confronting students with the inconsistencies entailed by their own beliefs. The issue is explored in the domain of Newtonian dynamics in the context of one or more moving particles. Previous work is used as the basis for the construction of a programme of work that is undertaken by a group of students. This programme entailed the development of a computer-based modelling environment called DYNLAB. The underlying design principle is that students should be able to model the agencies involved at a level which permits them to express some of their explicit (possibly mistaken) beliefs about relevant concepts. Other, implicit, beliefs should also be detectable through use of the system. The results derived from observation suggest that computer-based modelling facilities can provide advantages over approaches exploiting other media. In particular, such systems can be used to promote the kinds of intellectual conflict that are believed to be beneficial. Starting with misconceptionsIn one of the best known pieces of recent work on misconceptions in science, diSessa described a program called TARGET (diSessa, 1982). This was used as part of the Brookline Project, which attempted to evaluate the effect of providing 6th grade elementary school children with the programming language LOGO. The TARGET program entailed the manipulation of a DYNATURTLE.The DYNATURTLE of diSessa is an extension of the idea of the normal LOGO turtle, a small robot whose state is characterized in terms of its position and its heading, in that its state incorporates velocity information. Its position is changed by changing its velocity. The commands that change its heading are L for LEFT 30 °, R for RIGHT 30 °, and the command that changes its velocity is K for KICK one unit.Six students were each given up to ten hours with the DYNATURTLE in which they were asked to hit a target with the DYNATURTLE moving as slowly as possible. The DYNATURTLE starts from rest and the target is 45 ° from the heading of the DYNATURTLE. An analysis of the students revealed some interesting tendencies.In particular, the students tried a particularly Aristotelian strategy of kicking the DYNATURTLE when it was pointing toward the target and still moving with a component of velocity at right angles to the target's direction as shown in figure 1.

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“…The whole issue about whether or not the acquisition of schema can be accelerated has led to needless controversy and is a good example of the kind of issue Furth's book may help clarify. Raven's (1967) excellent study of the concept of momentum in chil dren contributed additional information to the Piagetian corpus of research; it is profoundly different from the concept studies reported in the first half of this review. Raven's colorful analysis of the sequence of concepts necessary for understanding momentum illustrates the kind of research so badly needed to make Piaget's very general description of concrete opera tions useful in curriculum development.…”

Section: Piagetmentioning

confidence: 67%

1: Learning Studies in Science Education

Belanger

1969

Review of Educational Research

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The usual textbook definition of learning is "change in behavior." If this definition is adopted as the search criterion for identifying pertinent items for review in the science education literature, several difficulties are immediately encountered. The conceptualization of learning in this way could be used to subsume studies in evaluation, for example in curriculum evaluation where presumably the curriculum serves as a means for some modification of behavior. Or studies in attitude change or any study where achievement is measured might be appropriately included. However, if an attempt is made to narrow the range by adopting a notion such as Ausubel's "Meaningful Verbal Learning" or Piaget's notion of learning, in the broad sense, as simply another term for intelligence, then very few studies in science education could be identified as within either domain. Thus, the immediate problem is deciding what to review.

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The development of the concept of momentum in primary school children

Abstract: Evidence favoring the conceptual sequence 4'momentum+conservatwn of matter+proportional use of mass and velocity+velocity" ispresented. Theoretical issues can be resolved via well-designed research !

Cited by 29 publications

References 9 publications

Taking Advantage of the “Big Mo”—Momentum in Everyday English and Swedish and in Physics Teaching

Taking Advantage of the “Big Mo”—Momentum in Everyday English and Swedish and in Physics Teaching

Confronting dynamics misconceptions

1: Learning Studies in Science Education

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