Encourage learners to inhibit their immediate responses when reasoning about counterintuitive science and maths concepts¶

Strategy · All strategies
Evidence · no claims cited

Description¶

Based on the finding that inhibitory control is associated with counterintuitive science and maths reasoning, the authors suggest that "encouraging learners to inhibit their immediate responses might lead to improved counterintuitive reasoning in science and maths". This strategy asks learners to pause before answering misconception-prone problems so that naïve beliefs or misleading perceptual cues can be suppressed rather than driving the first response. The authors also propose intervention studies, including inhibitory control training, to test whether the association is causal.

Design Implications¶

Context¶

Requirements¶

• Problems known to elicit misconceptions where the intuitive response is incorrect

Constraints¶

• The article states the current evidence is correlational and that training studies would be needed to establish a causal link

Target Learners¶

• Adolescents aged 11–15 years learning Key Stage 3 science and maths

Target Learning Goals¶

• Overcoming science and maths misconceptions during counterintuitive reasoning

Affordances¶

• Inhibition Suppression Account Counterintuitive Reasoning

Related Strategies¶

Examples¶

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Key Sources¶

• Brookman-Byrne A, Mareschal D, Tolmie AK, Dumontheil I (2018) Inhibitory control and counterintuitive science and maths reasoning in adolescence. PLoS ONE 13(6): e0198973. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0198973