Students’ ideas in novel situations: misconceptions or fragmented pieces of knowledge?

Since the mid-1970s a large body of research in science education has focused on identifying students’ ideas and difficulties in understanding science across a wide student age range. Whilst this research has informed the design of instructional approaches and curriculum development, it has contributed little to our understanding of how students reason when presented with a novel situation and the knowledge they draw upon to understand that situation. Currently there are two main perspectives on the nature of students’ knowledge: that of misconceptions and that of knowledge in pieces (p-prims). From the former perspective students’ knowledge is perceived as being theory-like and stable with students’ ideas being context-independent whereas the latter perspective sees students’ knowledge as composed of smaller, loosely organized, elements with their activation and subsequent arrangement into ‘strings’ being dependent upon the context of the situation students are trying to understand. In this cross-age study, conducted in Greece, students (n=166) aged 10 to 17 years were asked to make predictions about novel situations and then explain how they arrived at those predictions. We report here on a number of ideas identified in students’ explanations by considering how they can be seen either as misconceptions or, alternatively, as situated acts of construction involving the activation and arrangement of smaller p-prims. Although our purpose was not to judge the merits of one perspective over the other, we were better able to understand and interpret the ideas identified in students’ explanations in terms of p-prims already documented in the literature. Our results showed that students’ ideas were not theoretically grounded but rather appeared to be composed of independent ‘pieces of knowledge’ strung together in response to the contextual features of the novel situation they were presented with. Further research is now needed to better understand the nature of students’ knowledge and reasoning and how these could be directly linked to teaching approaches

Extending the Role of Analogies in the Teaching of Physics

Research in physics teaching has supported the use of analogies as an effective instructional tool that can be used to facilitate students’ understanding of physics concepts. The effectiveness of analogies lies in that they allow students to form cognitive links between what they already know and what they are learning, harmoniously integrating, in this way, the new physics concepts into their existing knowledge. In this paper, it is suggested that analogies could be extended to provide physics teachers with a diagnostic form of assessment that can reveal both the misconceptions their students may hold, the prior knowledge upon which such misconceptions are based, as well as knowledge sources that can be productively used in the teaching process. This suggestion arises from the findings of a cross-age study in which students, from five different age groups, were asked to make predictions about a range of situations they had not previously encountered (novel situations) and explain the reasons that led them to make those predictions

From the known to the unknown: the role of spontaneous and self-generated analogies in students’ predictions about novel situations

The use of analogies as reasoning tools that play a key role in human cognition at all ages has been of interest to educators, scientists, and philosophers ever since Aristotle. Indeed, research has consistently found that analogies provided by teachers can, and do, play an important role in facilitating student understanding of scientific ideas. Despite the effectiveness of teacher provided analogies little research has been undertaken on the use, and effectiveness, of student self-generated analogies in helping them to understand novel situations. This article reports on a cross-age study of student prediction-making in novel situations that investigated the basis and justification that students provided when asked to make predictions about novel situations. The study investigated whether they self-generated analogies (SGAs) in order to make their predictions and, in particular, whether such predictions and justifications were based on their use of SGAs

Preliminary findings regarding students’ predictions in novel situations: the role of self-generated analogies in non-scientific reasoning

This small scale pilot study was the first stage of a larger cross age study designed to investigate students’ predictions in novel situations and the role that self-generated analogies play in non-scientific reasoning. The study used a mixed method approach composed of a combination of interviews and questionnaires. Thirteen, sixteen and twelve students were recruited from Year 4, Year 9 and Year 11 (aged 9-10, 15-16 and 16-17 years) respectively from three different schools in Greece. Nine student focus group interviews were conducted in combination with the administration of a six pictorial item questionnaire. All interviews were audio-tape recorded and additional data were also collected through the use of written responses to the questionnaire. Students’ responses were analysed to ascertain whether their predictions drew on the use of analogies and, if so, the nature of the analogy that was used. It emerged that there were many similarities among students’ predictions as well as the analogies they used to explain the latter. Also, preliminary findings suggest that in many cases when students demonstrated non-scientific reasoning they drew on analogies which made them make a prediction which is not compatible with the scientific view. It also emerged that the analogies used by students in Years 4 and 9, when presented with the same novel situations in which they were required to make a prediction, were, in many cases, similar irrespective of their year group. Whilst students in Year 11 did make use of those similar analogies the frequency with which they drew on analogies, to make predictions, appeared much less that for the two younger student groups. This study found that students regularly make use of analogies, rather than scientific thinking, and that teachers need to be more aware of the nature of the analogies used and how, and why, these analogies can, in many cases, lead students to make scientifically incorrect predictions

The pandemic’s precipitate: Reconsidering biology and health literacy

The world is currently living through an unsettling and strange time as it is subjected to the COVID-19 pandemic; a new infectious disease for which, at the time of writing, there is neither vaccine nor cure available. This article discusses the need to promote biology and health literacy from childhood to elderhood to address the challenges related to COVID-19. Such a literacy would imply the achievement of a level of knowledge and development of skills that, when applied, would help in decision-making and enable the individual to take actions that would improve both their personal and public health

Students’ misconceptions and different approaches to conceptual change: from theory to practice.

A great body of research in science education has focused on identifying difficulties students experience in learning particular topics or specific concepts in science and, in some cases, propose a way to deal with them. These difficulties have been variously described in the literature as misconceptions, alternative frameworks, naïve and intuitive theories with authors having a preference for one term over another according to their philosophical and epistemological positions. In turn, these different views have been reflected on the ways that these difficulties can be confronted with the most popular and prevalent method in science education being that of conceptual change. The purpose of this lecture is to discuss the different approaches to students’ difficulties in understanding science, how these have shaped the way conceptual change is fostered and by using examples, their implications for instruction in science classrooms

Primary School Students’ Ideas of the Day/Night Cycle and alteration of Seasons: An exploration of Inconsistencies in Students’ responses

Since the early 80s, a significant part of research in science education has focused on identifying students’ ideas across a wide range of scientific topics and ages. This research has found that children form ideas about several physical phenomena at a very early age, before receiving any formal education, from events they experience and observe every day in the natural world. These ideas are usually in conflict with the scientific account and have thus been termed as mis-, alternative, pre-, pre-instructional, prior, naive and intuitive conceptions. Amongst the topics that have received attention is that of elementary astronomy which has been seen as a fruitful and attractive area in investigating how students, especially of younger age, combine practical observation of their own world with views that they have been taught, cultural artefacts and information, developing thus their ideas and understanding of related phenomena. The present paper presents the results of a study which investigated Greek primary school children’s ideas about day/night cycle and alteration of seasons. A total number of 35 students from the fifth and sixth year of their primary education were asked to explain these two astronomical events and provide a drawing of their ideas. Their ideas and drawings revealed considerable apparent inconsistencies in terms of related concepts like the shape of Earth and its motion. For example, many of the students expressed the idea that the Earth is moving relative to the Sun to explain the day and night cycle but stated that the seasonal cycle is the result of the Sun moving relative to the Earth. A great deal of this apparent inconsistency could be explained by the Knowledge-in-Pieces (KiP) framework, according to which knowledge is viewed as a complex system composed of fundamental elements that are cued into an active state in response to a question, and its context, thus giving rise to students’ ideas. The paper discusses students’ ideas in these two basic astronomical events while also draws on the KiP framework and knowledge elements identified in the literature to account for the inconsistencies in students' ideas of day/night cycle and alteration of seasons. The findings of the study underscore the need to further examine the role of the knowledge students bring with them to learning events, in and outside the science classroom, and how this knowledge is likely to affect their understanding of phenomena

From the Didactic to the Heuristic Use of Analogies in Science Teaching

Extensive research on science teaching has shown the effectiveness of analogies as a didactic tool that, when appropriately and effectively used, facilitates the learning process of abstract concepts. This seminar does not contradict the efficacy of such a didactic use of analogies but switches attention and interest to their heuristic use in approaching and correctly understanding what was previously unknown. Such use of analogies derives from research with 10 to 17-year-olds, who, when asked to make predictions in novel situations and to then provide explanations about these predictions, self-generated analogies and, by reasoning on their basis, made a scientifically compatible prediction. This heuristic use of analogies can be used in revealing how students approach situations they have not considered before as well as sources they draw upon in doing so and can productively be used in science teaching

Students’ predictions in novel situations and the role of self-generated analogies in their reasoning

This cross age study was designed to investigate students’ predictions in novel situations and the role that self-generated analogies play in non-scientific reasoning. The study used a mixed method ap-proach. Data was collected through the conduction of group interviews which were audio-tape rec-orded and additional data was collected through the use of written responses in the questionnaire. There were 37, 31, 29, 35 and 34 students recruited from Year 4, Year 6, Year 7, Year 9 and Year 11 (aged 9-10, 11-12, 12-13. 14-15 and 16-17 years) respectively from ten different schools in Greece. Students’ responses were analysed to ascertain whether their predictions drew on the use of analogies, and if so, the nature of the analogies that they used and whether the ideas used in the explanations of their predictions could be understood from a p-prims or a misconception perspective. The study found that students regularly make use of analogies, rather than scientific thinking in order to make their predictions. It also emerged that there were many similarities among students’ predic-tions as well as the analogies they used to explain the latter. In many cases this students’ non-scientific reasoning was based on their experiential knowledge which led them to make a prediction which is not compatible with the scientific view. However, according to the findings, there were cases in which analogical reasoning led some of them, more frequently the older (secondary education) ones, to make correct predictions. The study suggests that teachers need to be more aware of the nature of the analogies used and how, and why, these analogies can, in many cases, lead students to make scientifically incorrect or correct predictions

Pair-mentoring: a project to improve the achievement and attitude in science of students aged 16 in England

Within England there has been a growing recognition of the need to increase students’ attainment in science especially amongst disadvantaged students whose schools receive additional state funding to support their education. There is, in England, currently no paired mentoring programme in which undergraduates, studying STEM subjects, are paired up with disadvantaged students (aged between 15-16) while they are studying towards their science GCSEs (public examinations). This peer-mentoring project in which students, from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds, are paired with undergraduate students was designed and implemented in order to help improve both their academic achievement in science and their attitudes towards studying science and related subjects in the post compulsory phase of their education up to, and including, university level. The project is a comparative study involving a control (n=42) and intervention (n=42) group from across four state secondary schools in England. Unlike previous evaluations of mentoring projects, that relied solely upon participants’ (mentors, mentees and programme coordinators) self-evaluations, this study uses student school test and public examination data as a measure of academic achievement in addition to questionnaires to investigate their attitudes towards science. This paper reports on the way that this project was designed, issues arising in its implementation, as well as preliminary results regarding its effectiveness