Students' courses of action differed by instrumentation: photogate and tape-timer groups centred on numbers and dots with motion concepts rare, while probeware groups centred on motion concepts¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study (2 entries) · qualitative r2 · q2
Currency · newest study 2018 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q2 i? Video analysis of the three labs shows discourse focused on reading numbers (photogates), interpreting dots (tape timer) or making sense of position, velocity and acceleration (probeware). → Jonte Bernhard 2018 q2 i? Students in the photogate and tape-timer labs experienced a human–technology (–world) relation through numbers and dots rather than a human–technology–world mediated experience of the phenomenon. → Jonte Bernhard 2018 (2)

Evidence¶

Jonte Bernhard 2018¶

Jonte Bernhard. (2018). What matters for students' learning in the laboratory? Do not neglect the role of experimental equipment! Instructional Science. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11251-018-9469-x

q2 · i? · qualitative · r2

Analysis of about 15 h of video from three, two and eight recorded groups in the photogates, tape timer and probeware labs respectively. In the tape timer lab students used the tape only as an indicator of time for a fixed distance, determining "the average velocity and not the instantaneous velocity", and motion concepts featured very rarely.

"In the photo-gate lab, the discourse of all groups consistently centred on reading and noting the numbers (the times tA, tB and tAB) from the electronics box, as illustrated in Excerpt 1."

Jonte Bernhard 2018 (2)¶

Jonte Bernhard. (2018). What matters for students' learning in the laboratory? Do not neglect the role of experimental equipment! Instructional Science. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11251-018-9469-x

q2 · i? · qualitative · r2

The author's interpretation of the photogate and tape-timer transcripts: students lacked the conceptual resources to interpret numbers and dots, resembling "conceptually blindfolded" discourse. In contrast, in the probeware lab students' discourses consistently centred on making sense of motion concepts such as position, velocity and acceleration.

"It is clear that the student did not perceive the "world" through a human–technology–world mediated experience, but numbers and dots produced by the measurement technology. This is a human–technology (–world) experience (cf. Ihde 1979, 1991)."

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• Probeware affords measurement of acceleration at the cart's highest point after an upward push, permitting the fallacy that acceleration is zero there to be addressed — related
• What is possible for students to perceive or discern in a laboratory depends on the measurement technology used, even when the object of learning is the same — a broader claim this one bears on
• The tape timer affords study of downward motion only, so the direction of acceleration and the acceleration at the turning point cannot be addressed — related
• Photogates do not determine the sign of velocity, cannot show zero velocity with non-zero acceleration at the turning point, and afford the Δv/Δx rather than the Δv/Δt definition of acceleration — related
• The physical stability of material artifacts such as stacked tickertape strips and worksheets stabilizes students' attention, action, and knowledge use — related
• Review analysis uncovered eight mediating factors for students' understanding of graphing motion, mentioned in 127 instances across the 62 learning environments — related