Epistemological resources for thought experimentation in science learning

Thought Experiments (TEs) are reasoning processes that are based on 'results' of an experiment carried out in thought. What is the validity of an experiment- that has not been actually executed- for knowledge about the physical world? What are the features that make it distinctive and how do we integrate it into learning environments to support such thought processes? This study suggests that a thought experiment draws on three epistemological resources: conceptual-logical inferences, visual imagery and bodily-motor experience. We start by stating how students' TEs are related to recent research on learning science and then proceed to describe the nature of TEs. The central part of the paper deals with cognitive theories and empirical examples of visual imagery and bodily imagery. It also deals with how these enable implicit knowledge about the world to be retrieved. Students may have, but are not aware of, such knowledge for it is hidden when learning is only based on formal representations. We show that imagination is structured, goal-oriented, based on prior experiential imagery and internally coherent. Students can, for example, mentally rotate objects at constant velocity. Students can 'zoom in and out' to inspect imaginary situations, transfer objects, predict paths of imaginary moving objects and imagine the impact of forces on mechanical systems. We show that the TEs are powerful because of these capabilities. We further claim that these are not exploited by school learning environments and offer a first step towards understanding imagery in science learning.     

Science education and affect

Thought experiments are tools often used by physicists. Learning authentic physics then also means that students need to develop a familiarity with the reasoning processes of thought experiments. This study examines the nature of learning processes that involve communication about image‐based micro‐worlds in optics. The results of this study show that students’ investigations often have the structure of thought experiments. Thought experiments that use computer‐based microworlds are powerful because they capitalize on the human capability for imagery that allow learners to ‘see’ the physical processes and construct qualitative understandings. In this study, the structure of students’ activities as thought experiments arose from their collective efforts which started with the construction of an optics simulation. In the course of the activities, students’ understanding evolved from fragmented views of optical situations to system views that included multiple components. Collaborative thought experiments are therefore emergent phenomena, triggered by the events as a whole rather than being pre‐designed. In the course of the activities, students who participated in collective problem solving gradually adopted shared graphical representations and meanings.     

The Nature and Role of Thought Experiments in Solving Conceptual Physics Problems

This study describes the possible variations of thought experiments in terms of their nature, purpose, and reasoning resources adopted during the solution of conceptual physics problems. A phenomenographic research approach was adopted for this study. Three groups of participants with varying levels of physics knowledge—low, medium, and high level—were selected in order to capture potential variations. Five participants were selected within each level group and the study was conducted with fifteen participants in total. Think aloud and retrospective questioning strategies were used throughout the individually conducted problem solving sessions to capture variations in the participants’ thinking processes. The analysis of the data showed that thought experiments were actively used cognitive tools by participants from all there levels while working on the problems. Four different thought experiment structures were observed and categorized as limiting case, extreme case, simple case, and familiar case. It was also observed that participants conducted thought experiments for different purposes such as prediction, proof, and explanation. The reasoning resources behind the thought experiment processes were classified in terms of observed facts, intuitive principles, and scientific concepts. The results of the analysis suggested that thought experiments used as a creative reasoning tool for scientists can also be a productive tool for students. It was argued that instructional practices enriched with thought experiments and related practices not only reveal hidden elements of students’ reasoning but also provide students opportunities to advance their inquiry skills through thought experimentation processes.     

Physical versus virtual manipulative experimentation in physics learning

The aim of this study was to investigate whether physical or virtual manipulative experimentation can differentiate physics learning. There were four experimental conditions, namely Physical Manipulative Experimentation (PME), Virtual Manipulative Experimentation (VME), and two sequential combinations of PME and VME, as well as a control condition (i.e., traditional instruction with absence of PME or VME). Undergraduate students' understanding of physics concepts in the domain of heat and temperature was tested in a pre- and posttest design that involved 182 participants assigned to the four experimental groups and 52 participants assigned to the control group. Conceptual tests were administered to assess students' understanding before, during and after instruction. The analyses revealed that the four experimental conditions were equally effective in promoting students' understanding of concepts in the domain of heat and temperature and better than the control condition; hence, manipulation, either physical or virtual manipulation, and not physicality, as such, at least in a context like the one of the present study, is important in physics learning.     

Learning experimentation through science fairs

Experiments are essential for both doing science and learning science. The aim of the German youth science fair, Jugend forscht, is to encourage scientific thinking and inquiry methods such as experimentation. Based on 57 interviews with participants of the competition, this study summarises students’ conceptions and steps of learning about experimentation, taking into account age disparities. Five distinct subdomains of learning were identified in which learning processes may occur. These subdomains are procedure, purpose, material, control, and time. The three separate age groups used slightly different concepts but all the participants took the same or very similar steps of learning independent of their age. Two main reasons for conceptual developments could be detected: Firstly, the participating students had the opportunity to work using methodology similar to the commonly accepted scientific path of knowledge. Secondly, due to communication processes during the competition, a purposive reflection of their own project was promoted. With respect to different educational levels, experimentation proves to be a complex scientific framework that will be learnt step by step throughout students’ education. We therefore argue for a stronger anchoring of research experiments embedded in open or authentic inquiry to be included in science lessons at school.     

The Context of Thought Experiments in Physics Learning

This paper takes a cognitive perspective in an attempt to analyze mental mechanisms involved in contextual learning. In the following, it is suggested that contextualized environments evoke mental mechanisms that support reasoning about what if, imaginary situations – utilizing a powerful mental mechanism known from the history of physics as thought experiments (TEs). Thought experiments are associated with visualization of data and imagery that originate in implicit knowledge. This paper suggests that thought experiments rely on sensory memories constructed by the learner during past experience. Such sensory memories are activated by the context. The first part of the paper deals with the definition, nature, incidents, and experimental data related to implicit knowledge and TEs. Empirical results are then analyzed in order to explore the role of sensory memories and underlying schemata in TEs, thereby suggesting a set of embodied schemata that act as implicit assumptions and provide context-dependent epistemological primitives that underlie imaginary events in a manner that will statistically match the outer world.     

Probing Pre- and In-service Physics Teachers’ Knowledge Using the Double-Slit Thought Experiment

This study describes the use of the double-slit thought experiment as a diagnostic tool for probing physics teachers’ understanding. A total of 9 pre-service teachers and 18 in-service teachers with a variety of different experience in modern physics teaching at the upper secondary level responded in a paper-and-pencil test and three of these teachers were interviewed. The results showed that the physics teachers’ thought experiments with classical particles, light, and electrons were often partial. Many teachers also suffered a lack of the basic ideas and principles of physics, which probably hindered thought experimenting. In particular, understanding the ontological nature of classical particles, light and electrons seemed to be essential in performing the double-slit experiment in an appropriate way. However, the in-service physics teachers who had teaching experience in modern physics were more prepared for the double-slit thought experiment than the pre-service teachers. The results suggest that both thought experiments and the double-slit experiment should be given more weight in physics teacher education, even if experience in modern physics teaching at upper secondary school seems to some extent to develop teachers’ abilities.     

Effects of experimenting with physical and virtual manipulatives on students' conceptual understanding in heat and temperature

This study aimed to investigate the comparative value of experimenting with physical manipulatives (PM) in a sequential combination with virtual manipulatives (VM), with the use of PM preceding the use of VM, and of experimenting with PM alone, with respect to changes in students' conceptual understanding in the domain of heat and temperature. A pre–post‐comparison study design was used which involved 62 undergraduate students that attended an introductory course in physics. The participants were randomly assigned to one experimental and one control group. Both groups used the same inquiry‐oriented curriculum materials. Participants in the control group used PM to conduct the experiments, whereas, participants in the experimental group used first PM and then VM. VM differed from PM in that it could provide the possibility of faster manipulation, whereas, it retained any other features and interactions of the study's subject domain identical to the PM condition. Conceptual tests were administered to assess students' understanding before, during, and after the study's treatments. Results indicated that experimenting with the combination of PM and VM enhanced students' conceptual understanding more than experimenting with PM alone. The use of VM was identified as the cause of this differentiation. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 45: 1021–1035, 2008     

'Lesson Rainbow': the use of multiple representations in an Internet-based, discipline-integrated science lesson

This paper presents the development and evaluation of a web‐based lesson—Lesson Rainbow. This lesson features multiple representations (MRs), which purposefully deliver concepts in relation to distinctive disciplinary subject areas through story‐based animations that are closely related to learners’ life experiences. The researchers selected 58 2nd‐year junior high school students as the participants (32 males and 26 females). A quasi‐experimental method together with semi‐structured interviews was utilised. This research project was intended to investigate students’ conceptual progress, and to evaluate the use of MRs and of situated learning components in the design of Lesson Rainbow. The statistical results indicated that: (1) students’ science concepts significantly increased (t= 3.84, p < 0.01) through the use of Lesson Rainbow, and (2) students thought that the use of MRs in this web‐based lesson was an effective pedagogical tool inasmuch as it allows for the learning of specific theoretical viewpoints in addition to the necessary background information. Lesson Rainbow employing MRs helps learners to understand the meanings of, and interrelationships between, different kinds of external representations. This kind of design facilitates their understanding of the correspondence between abstract symbolic expressions and real‐world situations.     

Analysing cognitive or non‐cognitive factors involved in the process of physics problem‐solving in an everyday context

Recently, the importance of an everyday context in physics learning, teaching, and problem‐solving has been emphasized. However, do students or physics educators really want to learn or teach physics problem‐solving in an everyday context? Are there not any obstructive factors to be considered in solving the everyday context physics problems? To obtain the answer to these questions, 93 high school students, 36 physics teachers, and nine university physics educators participated in this study. Using two types of physics problems—everyday contextual problems (E‐problems) and decontextualized problems (D‐problems)—it was found that even though there was no difference in the actual performance between E‐problems and D‐problems, subjects predicted that E‐problems were more difficult to solve. Subjects preferred E‐problems on a school physics test because they thought E‐problems were better problems. Based on the observations of students' problem‐solving processes and interviews with them, six factors were identified that could impede the successful solution of E‐problems. We also found that many physics teachers agreed that students should be able to cope with those factors; however, teachers' perceptions regarding the need for teaching those factors were low. Therefore, we suggested teacher reform through in‐service training courses to enhance skills for teaching problem‐solving in an everyday context.     

Engineering students' understanding of the role of experimentation

Resource constraints have forced engineering schools to reduce laboratory provisions in undergraduate courses. In many instances hands-on experimentation has been replaced by demonstrations or computer simulations. Many engineering educators have cautioned against replacing experiments with simulations on the basis that this will lead to a misunderstanding of the role of experimentation in engineering practice. However, little is known about how students conceptualize the role of experimentation in developing engineering understanding. This study is based on interviews with third-year mechanical engineering students. Findings are presented on their perceptions in relation to the role of experimentation in developing engineering knowledge and practice.     

Theory Matters: Representation and experimentation in education

This article provides a material enactment of educational theory to explore how we might do educational theory differently by defamiliarising the familiar. Theory is often assumed to be abstract, located solely in the realm of ideas and separate from practice. However, this view of theory emerges from a set of ontological and epistemological assumptions of separating meaning from matter that are taken to be foundational, when this need not be the case. Drawing upon what variously might be termed materialist, performative or post‐human positions, the article suggests that it is possible to re‐enact theory as a matter‐ing practice—of matter and meaning. The assumption of a separation that divides theory from practice is challenged in this article, which suggests that theory matters by being entangled with the material and that a separation of matter from meaning is an effect. This approach enacts things as matters of concern by contrast with the representation of objects as matters of fact. In this way, educational theory becomes a form of responsible experimentation rather than simply a representation of others. Some implications for education are outlined.     

试探物理常数与物理规律和实验的关系

物理常数是具有实在意义的物理概念,产生于对物质认识和物理理论构造等过程。它们描述着物质及其运动的性质、临界点、极限、相互作用和关系,物理规律与实验发现丰富着物理常数的物理意义和实在意义。对于它们的深刻理解,有利于提高对物理常数本质的认识,探讨物理常数可能承载的自然界信息,开展积极的物理常数教学。     

Middle school students’ learning of mechanics concepts through engagement in different sequences of physical and virtual experiments

ABSTRACT

Physical and virtual experimentation are thought to have different affordances for supporting students’ learning. Research investigating the use of physical and virtual experiments to support students’ learning has identified a variety of, sometimes conflicting, outcomes. Unanswered questions remain about how physical and virtual experiments may impact students’ learning and for which contexts and content areas they may be most effective. Using a quasi-experimental design, we examined eighth grade students’ (N?=?100) learning of physics concepts related to pulleys depending on the sequence of physical and virtual labs they engaged in. Five classes of students were assigned to either the: physical first condition (PF) (n?=?55), where students performed a physical pulley experiment and then performed the same experiment virtually, or virtual first condition (VF) (n?=?45), with the opposite sequence. Repeated measures ANOVA’s were conducted to examine how physical and virtual labs impacted students’ learning of specific physics concepts. While we did not find clear-cut support that one sequence was better, we did find evidence that participating in virtual experiments may be more beneficial for learning certain physics concepts, such as work and mechanical advantage. Our findings support the idea that if time or physical materials are limited, using virtual experiments may help students understand work and mechanical advantage.     

物理学习中创新思维的特点及其表现

物理学创新思维过程表现出了及强的灵活性、创造综合性,创造结果具有新颖性、独创性。物理学习过程中的理解与应用、联想与发散、判断和优选等都具有创新思维特点。抓住这一特点,对在教学中提高学生的创新思维具有一定的意义。     

新型大学物理实验仪器探讨

为加强大学物理实验室的建设,我校购进了大量的新型大学物理实验仪器,对物理实验教学起到了积极的促进作用。所以对新型大学物理实验仪器的探讨就显得重要。新型大学物理实验仪器多在传统仪器原理的基础上应用传感器设计而成,该类仪器使实验变得简单方便、一目了然,大大提高了实验的效率,减小实验的误差,使实验起到更好的效果。但它们在优化...     

输水渠道横断面设计水深测试及计算(综合性)实验

输水渠道横断面设计水深测试及计算实验结合“灌溉排水工程学”及“水力学”等学科的知识,在实验过程中,通过对实验数据的测试、分析及计算和渠道模型实物的观摩,加深了对渠道设计原理的理解,与课堂上的理论教学起到了良好的互动作用。     

Effects of Animations in Learning—A Cognitive Fit Perspective1

Information technology (IT) artifacts such as animations are increasingly used in educational institutions. Researchers caution that, if we are to derive benefits from animations and other such IT artifacts, we must understand how to use it optimally. In this study, we look at the effects of animations in supporting learning processes. IT‐enabled animations dynamically depict changes in events and are used in the classroom as external representations to elaborate on the knowledge content transferred in the classroom. Research in related disciplines has investigated the effects of using these animations on student learning outcomes and has reported conflicting results. We propose that the theory of cognitive fit in information systems could reconcile these conflicting findings and offer some insight into how these animations might be used most beneficially. We conduct laboratory‐based experiments to test our ideas. Our findings indicate that these representations are superior to text‐based representations and reduce students' cognitive load only in learning tasks where animations have a good cognitive fit. We discuss the implications of our findings for the use of animations and other external representations in the classroom and for future research on the role of Technology Mediated Learning.