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Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 18, Issue 2, Article 1 (Dec., 2017) |
Physics is generally regarded as a difficult subject in science because it deals mainly with abstract explanations through a mathematical format (Osborne, 1990). So, there is a belief that to understand physics students must be knowledgeable in mathematics. This is also evident in many physics textbooks, which presents lots of mathematical calculation. Physics contents, therefore, are delivered to students through memorization of physics equations and correctly apply them in solving problems with mathematical skill. Regarding this, teaching physics is teacher-centered, which places emphasis on lecture method. Students regard doing laboratory as for verifying the physics equations the teacher introduced to them. The consequence of mathematical calculation in physics is that the people have a notion of physics being accurate subject and do not have a room for speculative imagining. However, the use of mathematics to represent physics concepts should be the end point in teaching physics rather than the starting point (Mulhall & Gunstone, 2008; 2012).
In Bhutan, the Department of Curriculum and Research Development (DCRD) (2009a, 2009b) states the rationale of teaching physics for high school Bhutanese students as to equip students with basic knowledge of physics principles enough for using as a sound foundation to pursue a higher degree. Students are expected to comprehend complex scientific terms, facts, concepts, principles, theories, and laws related to physics. They should be able to apply such learning to solve the problems related to physics in real-life situations. Students need to acquire basic skills in conducting physics investigation such as handling apparatus, observing, recording, drawing diagrams and graphs, and interpreting and generalizing the results. Students should also have good mathematical skill for problem solving and reasoning and have scientific attitudes. Learning experiences in physics should provide an opportunity for students to investigate and do scientific enquiry. They should be able to pose questions and develop scientific hypothesis and discuss and recognize many faces of science. Students should make inference and generalization from the experiment and verify laws from it.
Photoelectric effect plays a crucial role in presenting students about the photon model of light, which is a prerequisite in learning other topics in physics such as the interaction of light and matter, atomic energy level, and lasers. Although there is a general consensus in the importance of photoelectric effect phenomena among teachers and educators, only few hours devoted to teaching this topic. The minimal instructional time devoted to the photoelectric effect topic is based on the ground that this topic is straight forward and simple. Moreover, the photoelectric effect topic does not receive proper attention in secondary school teaching. The photoelectric effect is taught mainly through lecture mode, where a teacher describes the experiments and results without any laboratory practices. At the end, in most cases, student answers questions by reading the information given in the handout without deep understanding of the photoelectric effect phenomena (Steinberg & Oberem, 1996).
Although there were studies conducted in exploring the conception of photon model of light held by the students, a few studies were conducted with the photoelectric effect topic (Klassen, 2011). McKagan et al. (2009) found that many physics textbooks contain misconceptions related to the explanations of photoelectric effect and the students faced difficulties in understanding even the basic aspects of photoelectric effect. According to Steinberg and Oberem (1996, 2000), even though the university students who had completed a course on photoelectric effect, they attributed the Ohm’s law (V = IR) to explain the photoelectric effect. They failed to understand the relationship between emissions of photoelectrons and intensity and frequency of light and had a misconception that a photon is a charged particle. Finally, the students failed to make prediction from the observation of photoelectric effect experiment.
The learning cycle was developed by Robert Karplus in 1960s under the Science Curriculum Improvement Study (SCIS) program. It is based on the constructivist philosophy, that is, a constructivist learner is conceived as one who construct their own knowledge by linking the new concepts with what they already knew (Applefield, Huber, & Moallem, 2000). The Karplus’s learning cycle was consisted of three stages: Exploration, Invention and Discovery.. The Karplus’s learning cycle was successfully applied in different educational settings, and consistently researched and revised over by many educators.
During 1980s, the Biological Science Curriculum Study (BSCS) developed the 5E learning cycle based on Karpuls’s learning cycle and presented that the 5E learning cycle was effective in helping students improve scientific understanding and reasoning, interest in science, and attitudes to learn science. The 5E learning cycle consists of: Engagement, Exploration, Explanation, Elaboration and Evaluation. In Engagement, students are motivated to learn by exposing to a given problem or situation, which leads them to disequilibrium in their mental states. In Exploration, the process of cognitive equilibration is initiated. Students should be able to explore the targeted phenomena and subsequently establish the relationships or patterns in the observed phenomena with their own understanding. In Explanation, the concepts, processes or skills are made comprehensible and clear. At Elaboration, all of students’ misconceptions are clarified and students are encouraged to transfer their learned concepts to a new but related situation. In Evaluation, students are given opportunity to evaluate their process and product of learning. To be remark, the informal evaluation takes place throughout the learning process not just at the Evaluation stage at all (Bybee et al., 2006).
The constructivist methods have been employed in Chang (2008) and found that the students taught using constructivist methods were found to have a deeper comprehension of the learning process and outcomes, and as a result, became more critical than those in traditional classes. In particular to 5E learning cycle, Ornek and Zziwa (2011) demonstrated the use of low-cost materials with the 5E learning cycle to show students ways to measure “gravity” by observing and analyzing the trajectory of projectile motion in 2D and study the relationship between different factors such as air resistance and friction. Also, students can learn to plan and conduct scientific investigations through studying the motion of a ball or a marble to measure “g”. This allows students to realize there is not just one fixed investigation method to follow while conducting investigations. In addition, Samsudin, Suhandi, Rusdiana, Kaniawati and Costu (2016) developed an Active Learning Based-Interactive Conceptual Instruction (ALBICI) model through PDEODE*E tasks (stands for Predict, Discuss, Explain, Observe, Discuss, Explore, and Explain) for promoting pre-service physics teachers’ understanding on electric field concepts. The ALBICI model consists of four phases; 1) Conceptual focus 2) Use of texts 3) Research based materials (PDEODE*E tasks) 4) Classroom interactions. The effectiveness of ALBICI model was evaluated by a Field Conceptual Change Inventory (FCCI) and PDEODE*E tasks. The findings suggested that ALBICI teaching model enhanced pre-service physics students’ conceptual understanding and reduced most of their misconceptions despite a few misconceptions still occurred.
Some phenomena in physics are not easy for students to comprehend because of its abstractness, complexity, time-consuming to observe or too dangerous to do experiments in classroom settings. In similar, for the abstract phenomena in physics as the photoelectric effect, the difficulty for physics teachers is placed on helping students visualize the phenomenon. One solution is the utilization of simulation in teaching. Many physics topics, which are abstract and difficult to teach, can be made simpler and clearer with good simulation. Also, good simulation can help present the hard-to-conduct or dangerous experiments in physics (Bozkurt & Ilik, 2010).
Well-designed simulation incorporated with a constructivist teaching and learning environment can provide a platform for students to develop scientific understanding through active construction of concepts. Students can learn the targeted phenomena presented via the simulation by manipulating parameters in experiments until they discover relationships or patterns between variables and understand the targeted phenomena. It helps students link their prior knowledge with the new ones (Jimoyiannis & Komis, 2001). Not only turn an abstract phenomenon into concrete one, simulation can also speed up or slow down the phenomenon. It can promote students to learn actively and enhance their problem solving and higher order thinking skills (Smetana & Bell, 2012). Simulation can also help teach some laboratories that cannot be conducted in schools because of limited resource (Bozkurt & Ilik, 2010). A student-centered, inquiry based simulation has a potential to engage students in inquiry learning and scaffold them to more understandable and meaningful understanding about the scientific phenomena (Smetana & Bell, 2012). Students can actively engage with inquiry based simulation through formulating questions, developing hypotheses, collecting data to test hypotheses, and developing explanations or theories (Rutten, van Joolingen, & van der Veen, 2012).
Commonly, there are two objectives of teaching the photoelectric effect phenomenon in modern physics: a) to help students correctly predict the results of the photoelectric experiment, and b) to make students be able to use the results from experiment to explain the photon model of the light (McKagan et al., 2009). Some physics educators had tried to create the simulations on photoelectric effect to accomplish those learning objectives, but they faced the difficulty to accomplish the second learning objective as mentioned earlier. Steinberg and Oberem (2000) created and applied the interactive simulation called Photoelectric Tutor. This simulation was successful in achieving the first learning objective, but 60% of the students learned with the photoelectric tutor could not achieve the second learning objective. Mckagan, Handley and Perkins (2009) conducted the Physics Education Technology Project (PhET) and created the simulation based instruction within the Research-based Curriculum for Teaching Photoelectric Effect. This simulation was successful with the first learning objective, but the result for second learning objective was still ambiguous. Therefore, there is a room for improving the simulation on photoelectric effect to enhance students’ ability to use the results from experiment to explain the photon model of the light.
Many studies presented that a well-designed game can be an effective support for teaching and learning (Anderson & Barnett, 2013; Clark et al., 2009; Honey & Hilton, 2010). There are many advantages of using game in education. Hyvonen (2011) asserted that game could yield several positive impacts on students’ cognitive, effective, social and physical development. Anderson and Barnett (2013) stated that game could promote students’ higher order thinking and learning through interactive play. Regarding the affective domain of learning, interactive game helps promote student deep learning process with competence, autonomy, and relatedness, which is one requirement for intrinsic motivation (Przybylski, Rigby, & Ryan, 2010). One challenge for a game designer is to optimize the game players’ intrinsic motivation and, at the same time, not to deviate from the learning goals. Game helps reluctant learners to engage themselves through tangible, experienced and non-textually mediated representations (Anderson & Barnett, 2013; Clark et al., 2009).
There are many desirable characteristics of a good game. The good game should keep students’ attention and makes students focus on the complex and abstract contents (Anderson & Barnett, 2013; Clark et al., 2009). Students should play a game and learn contents embedded in the game with enjoyment (Wernbacher et al., 2012). The good game should create immersive environment and adaptive control for students to learn the contents embedded in it (Wernbacher et al., 2012).
In teaching science by game, students should be required to immerse themselves in the scientific phenomena presented in a game (Mohanty & Cantu, 2011). Corresponded with the constructivist theory, students playing a game should have the opportunity to link their intuitive knowledge with the new scientific knowledge embeded in the scientific phenomena in the game environment. The environments in the game, therefore, should let students observe and interprete the patterns hidden in the scientific phenomena in the game. Studenets, as the game players, must be able to construct their knowledge by themselves after played game.
This study incorporates of simulation and game with the 5E learning cycle into the learning unit for teaching the photoelectric effect for grade 12 students. The created learning unit aims to help students visualize the abstract scientific phenomenon as the photoelectric effect through the simulation. The simulation should help student understand the abstract scientific concepts through simulated experiments and appropriate visuals and media (Singh, Moin, & Schunn, 2010) and digital representation (Anderson & Barnett, 2013). Students learned with this simulation have an opportunity to visualize, explore, and formulate the potential scientific explanations for the photoelectric effect phenomenon. The simulation and game are sequenced and embeded in the the 5E learning cycle, which is a constructivist learning environment. In the constructivist learning environment, a teachers accepts a variety of students’ hypotheses, ideas, and answers. Students are encouraged to actively interact with learning activities and materials and construct knowledge by themselves (Rezaei & Katz, 2002; Wankat & Oreovicz, 1993).
