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Asia-Pacific Forum
on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 10, Issue 2, Article 3 (Dec., 2009) |
We conducted this project by involving students enrolled in Purdue’s PHYS 162 and PHYS 163, the two-semester introductory-physics sequence mainly populated by physics majors. We conducted the first interview with 16 volunteer students in PHYS 162 in fall 2004. At the beginning and the end of the spring, 2005, we conducted the second and third interviews with 6 volunteers from the original group of 16. There were several reasons why we lost some of our interview participants. A few of interviewees were majoring in engineering. They were taking PHYS 162 because it counted as an honors course. However, their engineering course and PHYS 163 were at the same time in the spring, 2005. The physics department and engineering department decided that Physics 162 was adequate to count for Physics 152, mechanics for science and engineering majors, instead of having to take both PHYS 162 and 163; thus, there was no need to take Physics 163, and so they dropped the class. One student had not decided about his major, so physics was something he picked up just to have a major to start with.
The Purdue physics course is a two-semester introductory physics sequence for physics majors. The course, PHYS 162, which covers particles, kinematics, and conservation laws, is taught in the fall semester. PHYS 163, which covers mechanics, heat, and kinetic theory, is taught in the spring semester. The structure of the course is different than many other physics courses. During the fall semester, PHYS 162 consists of two lecture sessions, either small-group work or computer-laboratory sections, and workshops in a computer laboratory. Whether the small-group work or computer laboratory were held was decided by the instructor.
Lectures meet on Mondays, and Wednesdays. During lectures, students are actively involved in their learning. Students interact with each other and with the instructor instead of sitting, listening, watching the instructor, and taking notes. In addition, the instructor performs hands-on experiments.
Small-group work, which is called “recitation” in all traditional physics courses, meets on Tuesdays, and Thursdays. It has three sections which meet on the same day. Each section has about 24 students and is divided into 8 small groups. A traditional recitation is run by a teaching assistant solving problems in front of the class, whereas the small-group work sections in PHYS 162 are run by the instructor, a teaching assistant, and a student helper who has already taken these courses. Each small group has a small white board on which to solve physics problems. After they solve the physics problems, they share their solutions with the class by presenting their solutions. The purpose is to have students be actively involved. Teaching assistants, the instructor, and student helpers are the facilitators.
The computer-laboratory session has three sections as does the small-group work session. All computer sections are scheduled at the same time that the small-group work sections meet. The instructor decides when they will have the computer laboratory or the small-group work. Students always stay in their section of the small-group section. Each student has a computer which he/she can use and write his/her own simulation program. They use a computer program which is called VPython. Again, the instructor, a teaching assistant, and a student helper are present in each computer-laboratory section.
Workshops are held in the same computer laboratory on Fridays to help students with their difficulties understanding the content covered during classes. These workshops are problem-solving and help sessions. Also, they are for students to catch up. There are three sections in a day as well. In each workshop section, the instructor, and a teaching assistant are present. Moreover, not only the instructor, but also the teaching assistants hold office hours for students.
During the spring semester, everything is the same except for an additional lecture per--week and student helpers (they are not available during the Spring semester). Lectures meet on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays at the same time as in the fall semester.
There are three 1-hour exams and a 2-hour final exam for each course. In addition, students are supposed to do homework, computer problems and daily quizzes. Daily quizzes, which happen in all semesters, are given in lecture to identify whether students understand the concepts, and also for attendance, for which credit is given.
Theoretical framework for the study: constructivism
Constructivism is used to describe a large number of different theories which fall under the general thinking that knowledge is constructed (Philips, 1995). Rather than receiving knowledge as a transmission of information that is already complete and ready to use, students construct their knowledge on the foundation of what they have previously learned. Students approach a situation with prior knowledge influencing them (Hoover, 1996). For example, students in a physics class will apply what they already know about how objects react when they are sitting in a car going around a sharp turn (Churukian, 2002). The different theories of constructivism are often delineated by adjectives which describe their primary focus. There are three types of constructivism thoughts which are personal, radical, and social. Personal constructivism (Bodner, Klobuchar, & Geelen., 2001) and social constructivism are appropriate for this study since assistance in the process of problem solving was provided and this situation is directly related to “expert help” framed in Vygotsky’s (1978) social constructivismand some students invented their ideas while solving problems.
In Vygotsy’s social constructivism, the More Knowledgeable Other (MKO) is a part of constructing knowledge and it happened in this study. MKO is someone who has a better understanding or a higher ability level than the students with respect to a particular task, a physics problem solving in this study. The MOK can be a teacher, or an older adult, but this is not necessarily the case (Galloway, 2001). The researcher was the MKO in this study because she was assisting the students to solve the physics problems.
Personal Constructivism is that learners actually invent their ideas (Stromnen, 1992). That is, “learners assimilate new information to simple, pre-existing notions and modify their understanding in light of new data.” He believes that in the process of assimilation the learner’s ideas gain in complexity and power, and, with appropriate support, learners can develop critical insight into how they think and what they know about the world.
We began the data collection by recording a think-aloud physics problem-solving protocol, interviewing students to elicit the inner thoughts or cognitive processes that illuminate what is going on in their heads during solution of a physics problem. There was no need to conduct a training session for think-aloud protocol because during small group work, they were solving problems by using think-aloud skills with their peers on the small white board.
The physics problem-solving protocol with the volunteer students was three times throughout fall 2004, and the spring, 2005, semesters. The physics problem-solving protocol provided an opportunity to gain information about how students approached a physics problem (like an expert or not) and how they used physics principles while they were solving physics problems. The duration of a student interview varied depending upon how long a participant took to solve a physics problem. In general, it was between 25 minutes to 45 minutes. Physics problem--solving protocols are listed in Appendix A, B, and C.
The analysis in the following sections has the results of three one-on-one in depth interviews with each of six students and information from the 1st and 2nd interviews with one additional who chose not to participate in the 3rd interview. These students were given a physics problem in each interview. In the first interview, a problem involving the concept of the momentum principle, which leads to Newton’s Third Law, was administered. In the second interview, a problem involving the concept of the work-energy principle was given. In the last interview, a problem related to the angular momentum principle was given.
In addition, the rubric was used for the data obtained from the physics problem-solving protocol had four parts. It was adapted it from Foster’s study (Foster, 2000), with some modifications, and added some parts were added to it because it was not totally appropriate for the study. According to Foster, the problem-solving ability coding rubric has four dimensions with sub-codes which are listed in Tables 1 through 4 in Appendix D. The first dimension is general approach (GA) which assesses the student’s initial qualitative approach. The second dimension is specific application of physics (SAP) which is the assessment of the students domain-specific knowledge. The third one is logical progression (LP) which codes a student’s cohesiveness of the solution. The final dimension of the coding rubric is appropriate mathematics (AP) which accounts for a student’s level of mathematical ability to transfer the mathematics to the new context of physics.
