Facilitating Students’ Problem Solving across Multiple Representations in Introductory Mechanics

Nguyen, Dong-Hai; Gire, Elizabeth; Rebello, N. Sanjay; Singh, Chandralekha; Sabella, Mel; Rebello, Sanjay

doi:10.1063/1.3515244

Cited by 21 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 4 publications

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“…The importance of using visualizations in physics has been researched extensively. Studies by Nguyen et al [22][23][24][25] pointed out that many traditional mathematics and physics courses focus insufficiently on graphical representations. In addition, they argued that representational difficulties often arise because students do not activate the appropriate mathematical knowledge.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Student difficulties regarding symbolic and graphical representations of vector fields

Bollen

Kampen

Baily

et al. 2017

Phys. Rev. Phys. Educ. Res.

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The ability to switch between various representations is an invaluable problem-solving skill in physics. In addition, research has shown that using multiple representations can greatly enhance a person's understanding of mathematical and physical concepts. This paper describes a study of student difficulties regarding interpreting, constructing, and switching between representations of vector fields, using both qualitative and quantitative methods. We first identified to what extent students are fluent with the use of field vector plots, field line diagrams, and symbolic expressions of vector fields by conducting individual student interviews and analyzing in-class student activities. Based on those findings, we designed the Vector Field Representations test, a free response assessment tool that has been given to 196 second-and third-year physics, mathematics, and engineering students from four different universities. From the obtained results we gained a comprehensive overview of typical errors that students make when switching between vector field representations. In addition, the study allowed us to determine the relative prevalence of the observed difficulties. Although the results varied greatly between institutions, a general trend revealed that many students struggle with vector addition, fail to recognize the field line density as an indication of the magnitude of the field, confuse characteristics of field lines and equipotential lines, and do not choose the appropriate coordinate system when writing out mathematical expressions of vector fields.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Student difficulties regarding symbolic and graphical representations of vector fields

Bollen

Kampen

Baily

et al. 2017

Phys. Rev. Phys. Educ. Res.

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“…As Meltzer puts it [1], a range of diverse representations is required to "span" the conceptual space associated with an idea. Since traditional courses which do not emphasize multiple representations lead to low gains on the Force Concept Inventory [24,25] and on other assessments in the domain of electricity and magnetism [26][27][28], in order to improve students' understanding of physics concepts, many researchers have developed instructional strategies that place explicit [8,14,[29][30][31][32] or implicit [16,[33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40] emphasis on multiple representations. Van Heuvelen's approach, for example [14], starts by ensuring that students explore the qualitative nature of concepts by using a variety of representations of a concept in a familiar setting before adding the complexities of mathematics.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Case of two electrostatics problems: Can providing a diagram adversely impact introductory physics students’ problem solving performance?

Maries

Singh

2018

Phys. Rev. Phys. Educ. Res.

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Drawing appropriate diagrams is a useful problem solving heuristic that can transform a problem into a representation that is easier to exploit for solving it. One major focus while helping introductory physics students learn effective problem solving is to help them understand that drawing diagrams can facilitate problem solution. We conducted an investigation in which two different interventions were implemented during recitation quizzes in a large enrollment algebra-based introductory physics course. Students were either (i) asked to solve problems in which the diagrams were drawn for them or (ii) explicitly told to draw a diagram. A comparison group was not given any instruction regarding diagrams. We developed rubrics to score the problem solving performance of students in different intervention groups and investigated ten problems. We found that students who were provided diagrams never performed better and actually performed worse than the other students on three problems, one involving standing sound waves in a tube (discussed elsewhere) and two problems in electricity which we focus on here. These two problems were the only problems in electricity that involved considerations of initial and final conditions, which may partly account for why students provided with diagrams performed significantly worse than students who were not provided with diagrams. In order to explore potential reasons for this finding, we conducted interviews with students and found that some students provided with diagrams may have spent less time on the conceptual analysis and planning stage of the problem solving process. In particular, those provided with the diagram were more likely to jump into the implementation stage of problem solving early without fully analyzing and understanding the problem, which can increase the likelihood of mistakes in solutions.

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“…Integration between the mathematical capability and physics is quite important to decrease concept error [6]. Based on another research, the difficulties with graphical and functional representations were due to students' inability to apply mathematical knowledge into physics contexts [10].…”

Section: Results Of Interview Such Asmentioning

confidence: 99%

Student’s concept ability of Newton’s law based on verbal and visual test

Setyani¹,

Cari²,

Suparmi³

et al. 2017

Int. J. Sci. Appl. Sci.: Conf. Ser.

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<p class="Abstract">Newton’s law is a foundamental concept that needs to be studied and understood correctly. Concept presentation in different representation will help the student to understand the concept that being learned. Student’s ability to present Newton’s law in different representation indicate the quality of student’s concept ability. This research aims to describe student’s concept ability of Newton’s laws based on the student’s ability of verbal and visual (pictorial and graphical) problem solving. The method of this research is qualitative with the sample of 71 students of physics education from IKIP PGRI Madiun (14 students) and Sebelas Maret University (57 students). The instrument used in this research were conceptual test and interview. The result showed that more student provide incorrect answer to the physics conceptual problem. Percentage of the incorrect answer for First Newton’s law problem is 69 %, Second Newton’s law problem is 71 %, and Third Newton’s law problem is 76 %. The students do not understand the language of physics correctly, they undergo incorrect physics concept, and so they only understand few physics concept of Newton’s law.</p>

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Facilitating Students’ Problem Solving across Multiple Representations in Introductory Mechanics

Cited by 21 publications

References 4 publications

Student difficulties regarding symbolic and graphical representations of vector fields

Student difficulties regarding symbolic and graphical representations of vector fields

Case of two electrostatics problems: Can providing a diagram adversely impact introductory physics students’ problem solving performance?

Student’s concept ability of Newton’s law based on verbal and visual test

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