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Asia-Pacific Forum
on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 10, Issue 1, Article 1
(June, 2009) |
Part of a student’s prior knowledge in physics problem solving tasks should be mathematical knowledge and skills relevant to the intended physics content. In case the students lack the requisite mathematics competencies, physics teachers should feel obliged to facilitate the “sharpening" of these skills by providing remediation. It is incumbent upon physics teachers to employ problem solving approaches that utilize mathematical tools that are appropriate to their students' grade-levels and not be driven by the desire to merely solve the problem irrespective of students' prior understanding of the mathematics employed. These rote approaches are unsatisfactory for the more conceptually challenging types of problem solving that we want our students to be able to do. If any mathematics competencies are necessary for physics problem solving tasks, it would be prudent to teach these competencies first and then, through much simpler examples that could provide a bridge to the main problem solving task, introduce the students to the physics problem. Such mathematics competencies should not be too complex since the mathematics could obscure the message intended through the physics problem solving task.
Where such mathematics competencies prove to be complex, enough time should be given for students to practise the mathematics skills until some level of proficiency is noted. In cases such as this, we recommend that students be given practice exercises that largely involve real life situations for the purpose of enhancing appreciation of the relationship between the mathematics concepts taught and the physics problem they are required to solve. In addition, there are computer technologies that can illustrate some of the problems in practical and visualisable ways (for example, Interactive Physics). Also, working in collaboration with mathematics teachers so that, whenever possible, they can use some of the relevant physics problems in their mathematics classes. These, complemented by the teaching of other skills that enhance meaningful learning, such as metacognitive reflections or questioning such as constructive peer and student-teacher argumentations, will contribute towards successful use of mathematics in physics problem solving tasks and more widely accessible knowledge structures that students can more meaningfully connect across subject areas and disciplines.
