BACKGROUNDStudents frequently hold a number of misconceptions related to temperature, heat and energy. There is not currently a concept inventory with sufficiently high internal reliability to assess these concept areas for research purposes. Consequently, there is little data on the prevalence of these misconceptions amongst undergraduate engineering students. PURPOSE (HYPOTHESIS)This work presents the Heat and Energy Concept Inventory (HECI) to assess prevalent misconceptions related to: (1) Temperature vs. Energy, (2) Temperature vs. Perceptions of Hot and Cold, (3) Factors that affect the Rate vs. Amount of Heat Transfer and (4) Thermal Radiation. The HECI is also used to document the prevalence of misconceptions amongst undergraduate engineering students. DESIGN/METHODItem analysis, guided by classical test theory, was used to refine individual questions on the HECI. The HECI was used in a one group, pre-test-post-test design to assess the prevalence and persistence of targeted misconceptions amongst a population of undergraduate engineering students at diverse institutions. RESULTSInternal consistency reliability was assessed using Kuder-Richardson Formula 20; values were 0.85 for the entire instrument and ranged from 0.59 to 0.76 for the four subcategories of the HECI. Student performance on the HECI went from 49.2% to 54.5% after instruction. Gains on each of the individual subscales of the HECI, while generally statistically significant, were similarly modest. CONCLUSIONSThe HECI provides sufficiently high estimates of internal consistency reliability to be used as a research tool to assess students' understanding of the targeted concepts. Use of the instrument demonstrates that student misconceptions are both prevalent and resistant to change through standard instruction. KEYWORDS: concept inventory, heat, misconception INTRODUCTIONIn their seminal work "How People Learn" (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2000) the authors emphasize the critical role in teaching of building from students' current conceptual framework. Since learning may be viewed as a process in which students fit new ideas 412 413 101 (July 2012) 3 Journal of Engineering Education into their existing mental structures, a flawed conceptual framework hinders students' ability to integrate and understand what is being taught. Part of effective instruction, therefore, entails engaging students in ways that uncover their existing conceptual frameworks, and then repairing any misconceptions. Traditional instruction often bypasses these steps, with the result that students leave their courses with many of their misconceptions intact. Decades of research in the sciences demonstrate the modest levels of conceptual change fostered in many classrooms (Center for Development and Learning, 2000;Deslauriers, Schelew, & Wieman, 2011;Lightman & Sadler, 1993;Sahin, 2010;Smith, diSessa, & Roschelle, 1993;Suping, 2003) and more limited studies in engineering indicate a similar pattern (Krause, Decker, & Griffin, 2003;Miller et al., 2006;Steif, Dollar, & D...

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This study examines the effectiveness of inquiry-based activities for addressing student misconceptions related to four concept areas in the thermal sciences that have been identified as both important and difficult for students to master: (1) temperature vs. energy, (2) factors that affect the rate vs. the amount of energy transferred, (3) temperature vs. perceptions of hot and cold and (4) the effect of surface properties on thermal radiation. Students' conceptual understanding was assessed using the newly developed Heat and Energy Concept Inventory (HECI). In the control sample, student performance on the overall HECI improved from 49.2% correct to a post-instruction performance of 54.4% correct. Using inquiry-based activities, the mean performance on the HECI improved from 46.6% correct prior to instruction to a postperformance score of 65.7%. Significant learning gains were found in each of the targeted concept areas when the activities were used. The study also examined the impact of the activities on near vs. far transfer of learning and found statistically significant improvements for both, but larger learning gains on HECI items involving near transfer.

Erin received her PhD at Iowa State University with funding from a NSF graduate fellowship before taking a NRC postdoctoral position at NIST. She joined the faculty at Bucknell in 2004 and has taught courses across the curriculum.Dr. Michael J. Prince, Bucknell University Dr. Michael Prince is a professor of chemical engineering at Bucknell University and co-director of the National Effective Teaching Institute. His research examines a range of engineering education topics, including how to assess and repair student misconceptions and how to increase the adoption of researchbased instructional strategies by college instructors and corporate trainers. He is actively engaged in presenting workshops on instructional design to both academic and corporate instructors. Dr. Katharyn E. K. Nottis, Bucknell UniversityDr. Nottis is an Educational Psychologist and Professor of Education at Bucknell University. Her research has focused on meaningful learning in science and engineering education, approached from the perspective of Human Constructivism. She has authored several publications and given numerous presentations on the generation of analogies, misconceptions, and facilitating learning in science and engineering education. She has been involved in collaborative research projects focused on conceptual learning in chemistry, chemical engineering, seismology, and astronomy.

We have created analogous versions of our inquiry-based activities for misconception repair in heat transfer to ease faculty adoption into just about any type of instructional situation. Activities now work as laboratory experiments, in-class demonstrations, collaborative studio sessions, or simulations that can be assigned as homework. In our paper, we discuss each of these modes in detail and how they may be accessed through the AIChE Concept Warehouse. We also have measured the impact of each of these modes on the conceptual understanding of students; we know from previous work that studentconducted experiments are effective at repairing misconceptions. In our presentation, we will share the effectiveness of the alternate modes of presentation, as well as data on how easy these new modes are for faculty and students to use. We invite everyone who is teaching a heat transfer course or another course where ideas about radiation heat transfer, or factors influencing the rate and amount of heat transfer, to access these activities and freely use them in class.