Fotou, Nikolaos
(2016)
Students’ analogical reasoning
in novel situations: theory-like
misconceptions or p-prims?
Physics Education, 51 (4).
pp. 1-13.
ISSN 0031-9120
Abstract
Over the past 50 years there has been much research in the area of students’
misconceptions. Whilst this research has been useful in helping to inform
the design of instructional approaches and curriculum development it has not
provided much insight into how students reason when presented with a novel
situation and, in particular, the knowledge they draw upon in an attempt to
make predictions about that novel situation.
This article reports on a study of Greek students, aged from 10 to 17
years old, who were asked to make predictions in novel situations and to
then provide, without being told whether their predictions were correct or
incorrect, explanations about their predictions. Indeed, their explanations
in such novel situations have the potential to reveal how their ideas, as
articulated as predictions, are formed as well as the sources they draw upon
to make those predictions.
We also consider in this article the extent to which student ideas can be
seen either as theory-like misconceptions or, alternatively, as situated acts
of construction involving the activation of fragmented pieces of knowledge
referred to as phenomenological primitives (p-prims). Our findings suggest
that in most cases students’ reasoning in novel situations can be better
understood in terms of their use of p-prims and that teaching might be made
more effective if teachers were more aware of the p-prims that students were
likely to be using when presented with new situations in physics.
| Item Type: |
Article
|
| Keywords: |
Students; analogical; novel situations; theory-like;
misconceptions; p-prims; |
| Academic Unit: |
Faculty of Social Sciences > Education |
| Item ID: |
8567 |
| Depositing User: |
Dr Nikolaos Fotou
|
| Date Deposited: |
08 Aug 2017 09:44 |
| Journal or Publication Title: |
Physics Education |
| Publisher: |
IOP Publishing |
| Refereed: |
Yes |
| URI: |
|
| Use Licence: |
This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available
here |
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