Eric BaileyEric BaileyTamecia JonesTamecia Jones

Jennifer SteinmanJennifer Steinman

ED 342 – Final ProjectED 342 – Final Project

Circuit City : Classroom

Using Urban Planning Techniques and Movement of

Traffic To Teach Electric Theory

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Agenda

• Prototype• Demonstration

• Understanding the Prototype

• User Scenario for the Classroom

• The Landscape / Immersion in Problem• Prior Experience

• Tech Challenge Observation

• Literature Review

• Design Process

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Prototype Overview and Objectives

• The prototype is an interactive exhibit which helps students to understand circuit current theory and transfer to real world

• Here we will use the social, cultural, and physical metaphor of city planning and cars traveling over streets or within a larger context of a city to explain the flow of current through a circuit

• The form is both a physical artifact and a mini-curriculum on electricity

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Relation to Elementary Science Education

General Skills Across K-12 Span

Early Elementary Upper Elementary/Middle

Secondary

Recognition Recognition Recognition

Categorization Categorization Categorization

Explanation Explanation

Conceptualization

Mathematical Proof

Target skills of the prototype

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How does the project accomplish the objective?

• Uses cars and streets to help students understand the concepts of electricity

• Cars symbolize electricity flow

• Problem-solving can occur within the urban planning context

• Expandable to learner’s competency growth

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Prototype Affordances

• Visualization of concepts of electricity• Typical electrical instruction uses batteries and light bulbs

but the flow of electricity can not be seen because it is invisible

• Inquiry based context • Drives conversation between students and teachers

• Sensory motor

• Based on real-world experiences

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User Scenario Overview

• Ages: Ms. Saraniti’s 5th Grade Class

• Context: Single lesson in science class

Parallel vs Series Circuits

Part of electricity unit

• Scenario: Ground in real-world problem

Explain theory of electricity

Use prototype to highlight concept

Prototype is highly contextual

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Full Circuit City Curriculum

ConceptVisible Example of

Circulating CurrentElectric Particle Car

CircuitRoad loop with cars moving in one direction

Switch Road block, bridge; road open or closed

Current # of cars passing a point per unit of time

Battery Gas; mechanism injecting energy

Resistance Road conditions; hazards, curves, potholes

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Agenda

• Prototype• Demonstration

• Understanding the Prototype

• User Scenario for the Classroom

• The Landscape / Immersion in Problem• Prior Experience

• Tech Challenge Observation

• Literature Review

• Design Process

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Immersion in Problem

• Experience with Engineering Summer Camp

• Tutoring engineering students in electrical engineering coursework

• Tech Museum of Innovation in San Jose• Furby Surgery Workshop

• Tech Challenge Engineering Workshops• Observations / videos of workshops

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Key Findings From Tech Challenge Workshop Video

• Switching between a representation and actual elements or analogy is hard for all grade levels

• Manipulation alone is not enough for understanding

• Students have problems understanding series and parallel beyond battery example 

• Students can do series circuit and parallel circuit, but not combinational; this shows students do not grasp concepts

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Salient Literature

• Gibbons, P., McMahon, A., Weigers, J. 2003. Hands-On Current Electricity: A Professional Development Course. Journal of Elementary Science Education, Vol. 15, No. 2, pp. 1-11.

This article describes a teacher professional development on how to teach electrical circuits to their students. It begins with understanding their own misconceptions, correcting them, and then expanding their models to create lessons for their students. It confirms our traveling car analogy.

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Learning Theories

• Theory of Conceptual Change

• Structure Mapping Theory of Analogical Thinking

• Mental Models

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Conceptual Change Model

• Science education learning theory

• Instructor facilitates a discrepant event that contradicts the learner’s existing conceptual framework and provides a teaching moment through reactions of surprise or motivation to correct the discrepant events.

• These four conditions must occur:

1. Dissatisfaction with existing conceptions

2. A new (alternative) conception must be intelligible

3. A new (alternative) conception must be appear initially feasible

4. A new (alternative) concept should suggest the possibility of fruitful research (testing) program.

Posner et al. (1982)

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Conceptual Change Variations

• A process that enables students to synthesize models in their minds, beginning with their existing explanatory framework, (Vosniadou, 2002)

• Repair of misconceptions, (Chi and Roscoe, 2002)

• The reorganization of diverse kinds of knowledge into complex systems in students’ minds, (diSessa, 2002)

• Conceptual change results from changes in the way that students use the tools in various contexts, and the change actually occurs at the societal level, (Ivarrson, Schoultz, and Saljo, 2002)

Suping, S. Conceptual Change Among Science Students. 2003.

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Structure-Mapping Theory

• The structure-mapping analogy asserts that identical operations and relationships hold among nonidentical things. (Gentner & Gentner, 1983).

• Base domain = known domain

• Target domain = domain of inquiry

• Analogy has components:

- Object Relationships

- Object Attributes or surface features

• This is successful under these two conditions:– Preservations of relations – relational predicates, and not object attributes,

carry over into analogical mappings

– Systematicity – predicates are more likely to be imported into the target into the target if they belong to a system of coherent, mutually constraining relationships, the others of which map into the target.

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Instructional Analogies and Mental Models

• Di Vesta, F., Zook, K. (1991). Instructional Analogies and Conceptual Misrepresentations. Journal of Educational Psychology. Vol. 83, No. 2, pp. 246-252.

This article discusses the issues around young/novice and adult/expert learners in successfully mapping from the base domain to the target domain, and how constraints will help the learner see the goal of the analogy. It is important to discriminate between relevant relations and superficial attributes of the object.

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Mental Model Resources

• Clement, J., Steinberg, M. (2002). Step-Wise Evolution of Mental Models of Electric Circuits: A “Learning-Aloud” Case Study. The Journal of the Learning Sciences. 11 (4). Pp 389-452.

• Gentner, D., & Gentner, D. (1983). Flowing Waters or Teeming Crowds: Mental Models of Electricity. In D. Gentner and A. L. Stevens (Eds.), Mental Models. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

• Hadzigeorgiou, Y., Savage, M. 2001. A Study of the Effect of Sensorimotor Experiences on the Retention and Application of Two Fundamental Physics Ideas. Journal of Elementary Science Education. Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 9-21.

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Agenda

• Prototype• Demonstration

• Understanding the Prototype

• User Scenario for the Classroom

• The Landscape / Immersion in Problem• Prior Experience

• Tech Challenge Observation

• Literature Review

• Design Process

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Design Structures

• Sensori-motor Experience

• Visualizations

• Real-World Application

• Embed in Community Context

• Problem-Based Learning

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Integration of Theory into Design

ObjectiveDevelopmental

/Learning Theory

Design Structures Solution

Conceptual Change

Structure-Mapping

Mental Models

Sensori-motor Experience

Visualizations

Real-World Application

Embed in Community

Context

Problem-Based Learning

Interactive

Expandable

Interchangeable

Problem-based Activities

Develop understanding of concepts of electricity and allow transfer to real world

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• First Pass at Analogy Sketch

Prototype Sketches

• Interchangeable components

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• Conceptual Sketches for Parallel Unit of Instruction

Prototype Sketches

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Prototype Sketches