Using the Bifocal Modeling Framework to Resolve “Discrepant Events” Between Physical Experiments and Virtual Models in Biology

Abstract

In this paper, we investigate an approach to supporting students' learning in science through a combination of physical experimentation and virtual modeling. We present a study that utilizes a scientific inquiry framework, which we call ''bifocal modeling,'' to link student-designed experiments and computer models in real time. In this study, a group of high school students designed computer models of bacterial growth with reference to a simultaneous physical experiment they were conducting, and were able to validate the correctness of their model against the results of their experiment. Our findings suggest that as the students compared their virtual models with physical experiments, they encountered ''discrepant events'' that contradicted their existing conceptions and elicited a state of cognitive disequilibrium. This experience of conflict encouraged students to further examine their ideas and to seek more accurate explanations of the observed natural phenomena, improving the design of their computer models. IntroductionThe nature and role of school science laboratories have been subject to widespread controversy in the research community (NRC 1996), especially regarding the benefits of physical, virtual, and combined laboratories (Olympiou and Zacharia 2012;Triona and Klahr 2003;Zacharia 2007). The popularity of simulation environments such as PhET (Perkins et al. 2006) has led policy-makers and scholars to question the real value of physical laboratories-especially in the face of the associated costs and logistics. A wave of research studies within the past 10 years has explored: (a) What are the advantages of physical laboratories relative to virtual laboratories and manipulatives, (b) whether the latter can replace the former (Triona and Klahr 2003), and (c) in what ways virtual models can simulate complex phenomena and permit student experimentation in domains that might otherwise be costly, impractical, or dangerous (Finkelstein et al. 2005;Jaakkola and Nurmi 2008;Jaakkola et al. 2011;Klahr et al. 2007; Perkins et al. 2006;Resnick and Wilensky 1998).The literature comparing hands-on or physical models (PM) with virtual models (VM) for science learning has sought to establish rules for choosing one modality over the other or for ordering them as distinct phases in a sequential process (de Jong et al. 2013). Zacharia and Anderson (2003) found that combining physical and virtual models increased teachers' learning of content knowledge in physics. Zacharia and Constantinou (2008) virtual laboratories led to greater conceptual understandings than did either type singly. For example, Liu (2006) compared groups of female high school students utilizing computer simulations and/or hands-on laboratory activities in chemistry. Controlling for time-on-task, the combination of both PM and VM was more effective than either option alone. But interesting interactions between content learning and epistemology were observed for this composite approach: There was a correlation between students' understanding o...

Mediating and perspective-taking manipulatives: Fostering dynamic perspective-taking by mediating dialogic thinking and bolstering empathy in role-play and reflection for microteaching

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“…Combining the self-performed microteaching role-play performance and the reflective discussion with the 3D animation was further expected to have a bifocal modeling function (Bilkstein et al, 2016) in which the learners refer to both physical and virtual learning environments in order to conduct investigations into similar phenomena; however, the 3D animation in this study did not allow the learners to simulate anything like computational models of scientific phenomena on their computers (e.g., Bilkstein et al, 2016;Peppler et al, 2020a); the 3D animation in this study merely replayed the role-play and allowed them to reflect on their role-play performance from multiple first-person viewpoints. Nevertheless, the 3D animation maintains a potential to be a valuable resource for training student teachers to investigate the phenomena regarding dialogic teaching when they find discrepancies between their perceptions during the performance and their reflections when they change their viewpoints between a teacher's viewpoint, a bird-eye's viewpoint and multiple students' viewpoints.…”

Motivating and Shaping Scientific Argumentation in Lab Reports

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É possível Recomendar Objetos de Aprendizagem Físico-Virtuais?

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