Exploring the Shift in Children’s Incline Motion Predictions: Fragmentation and Integration of Knowledge as Possible Contributors

Abstract

Recent research with primary school children has indicated that while younger children believe a light ball will roll down an incline faster than a heavy ball-matching their beliefs about horizontal motion-older children believe the heavy ball will roll down faster-matching their conceptions about fall. Tentative suggestions regarding the cause of this age shift were made, but no clear conclusion could be reached. The present research aimed to resolve this issue by addressing the subjectivity of children's predictions. Children (N = 210) aged 5-11 completed a paper-based task where the trajectories of a heavy and a light ball needed to be contrasted for three motion dimensions-horizontal, fall and incline-to address how trajectory predictions compare. The findings suggest that a declining salience of the horizontal dimension in the reasoning process appears to contribute to the age-related shift. It is proposed that these developmental changes in making predictions about object motion can be explained on the basis of fragmentation and knowledge integration. The importance of this work lies in contributing towards clearer models of how commonsense theories of motion develop across childhood. This, in turn, bears implications for curriculum structures and teaching approaches in primary science.

Incline Height and Object Weight: Examining the Fluidity of Children’s Commonsense Theories of Motion

“…With increasing age, heaviness is seen as more crucial in this regard. In the first instance, this is in agreement with other studies demonstrating the same shift in perceptions (Hast, 2014;Hast & Howe, 2013a, 2017. But not only does the vertical element of inclines seem to increasingly gain salience over the horizontal element, the predictions also appear to be increasingly embedded in more flexible knowledge structures.…”

“…This is comparable to the shift in predictions across age that noted in previous research, where younger children were more likely to associate lightness with faster motion down inclines but with increasing age were more likely to associate it with heaviness (e.g. Hast, 2014;Hast & Howe, 2013a, 2017.…”

“…Mou, Zhu, & Chen, 2015). As a result, perceptions of light-asfaster are more prevalent and persistent, as might be expected from their predictions about motion along horizontals (Hast, 2014;Hast & Howe, 2012, 2013aInhelder & Piaget, 1958). On the other hand, older children's predictions show a more intricate consideration of different pieces of information, quite possibly within more complex theoretical structures akin to Vosniadou's interpretation.…”

“…It is plausible that this is supportive of a lack of ability to systematically incorporate multiple variables, and that this competency only emerges at some point during middle childhood (cf. Baroody, Lai, Li, & Baroody, 2009;Hast, 2014;Howe, Nunes, & Bryant, 2010;Wilkening, 1981).…”

“…Recent research has attempted to evaluate the representations of knowledge in the particular development of children's commonsense theories of motion (Hast, 2014;Hast & Howe, 2012, 2013a. There seems to be a fairly clear picture as far as horizontal and vertical motion are concerned, and that these two aspects are clearly differentiated in children's reasoning.…”