TY - JOUR
T1 - Effects of simulation-based formative assessments on students' conceptions in physics
AU - Park, Mihwa
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 The Author(s).
PY - 2019
Y1 - 2019
N2 - Background: The paper presents effects of simulation-based formative assessments on students' conceptions in physics. In the study, two topics-motion in two dimensions and conservation of energy-were selected to explore students' conceptions in physics, and related assessment tasks incorporating computer simulations and formative assessment questions were developed. Material and methods: The participant students were first-year college students with majors related to science or engineering. Analytic rubrics were developed to capture the students' normative and non-normative ideas revealed in their responses, and a holistic rubric was applied to categorize the responses into four response models. Results: The results demonstrated that, overall, students predicted and explained the given scientific phenomena with more valid scientific ideas after experiencing a computer simulation. However, the results also indicated that students' non-normative ideas were still present even after experiencing computer simulations, especially when they were required to consider an abstract scientific concept such as energy dissipation. Conclusions: The finding can be explained with knowledge-in-piece perspectives (diSessa, 1993), that students' naive knowledge is fragmented, and thus they do not demonstrate a coherent understanding of abstract science concepts across different situations.
AB - Background: The paper presents effects of simulation-based formative assessments on students' conceptions in physics. In the study, two topics-motion in two dimensions and conservation of energy-were selected to explore students' conceptions in physics, and related assessment tasks incorporating computer simulations and formative assessment questions were developed. Material and methods: The participant students were first-year college students with majors related to science or engineering. Analytic rubrics were developed to capture the students' normative and non-normative ideas revealed in their responses, and a holistic rubric was applied to categorize the responses into four response models. Results: The results demonstrated that, overall, students predicted and explained the given scientific phenomena with more valid scientific ideas after experiencing a computer simulation. However, the results also indicated that students' non-normative ideas were still present even after experiencing computer simulations, especially when they were required to consider an abstract scientific concept such as energy dissipation. Conclusions: The finding can be explained with knowledge-in-piece perspectives (diSessa, 1993), that students' naive knowledge is fragmented, and thus they do not demonstrate a coherent understanding of abstract science concepts across different situations.
KW - Computer simulation
KW - Conceptual understanding
KW - Formative assessment
KW - Misconception
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85073684187&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.29333/ejmste/103586
DO - 10.29333/ejmste/103586
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85073684187
VL - 15
JO - Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education
JF - Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education
SN - 1305-8215
IS - 7
M1 - em1722
ER -