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An Interactive Procedural Environment for Learning Electromagnetic Waves and Radioactivity in Secondary School: The RadiationWorld
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Akpinar, Yavuz Bal, Volkan Baslanti, Ugur |
| Copyright Year | 2014 |
| Abstract | This study reports an ongoing research and software development project. The research studies the manipulatable interfaces of computer proceduralisation of a science subject matter, namely the electromagnetic waves and radioactivity, where eighth graders pose many problems. To overcome children’s difficulties within electromagnetic waves and radioactivity and to prevent misconceptions from developing, an architecture of an interactive procedural environment is proposed. Introduction There is an extensive literature concentrating on students’ conceptions (understandings) of scientific phenomena. This is due to the importance of those conceptions in the learning and teaching processes. Children come into class with alternative understandings and as Osborne and Freyberg (1985) point out they are usually strongly held, even if not well known to teachers, and are often significantly different to the views of scientists. On the other hand, these preconceptions are amazingly tenacious and resistant to extinction and teachers often subscribe to the same alternative conceptions as their students (Wandersee, Mintzes and Novak, 1994). It is also important to note that, while researchers are focusing on the existence and nature of students’ understandings of scientific concepts, at the same time, there is an ongoing debate among researchers about how to name this phenomenon. Even though the term misconception is the dominantly used term, as Wandersee, Mintzes, and Novak (1994) list, some researchers prefer terms like; alternative conceptions, mistake, prescientific conceptions, naive beliefs, erroneous ideas, spontaneous reasoning, preconceptions, etc. In this study the originally used term misconception was preferred in describing students’ diverse understandings of radioactivity and related topics. It is evident in the literature that students hold various misconceptions on radioactivity. Millar (1994) cites the findings of various researchers on this issue where Riesch and Westphaul (1975) note a confusion in many pupils’ thinking between radioactive forms of transfer and those involving diffusion or movement of the radioactive material itself. Kaszmarek, et.al. (1987) note that many of their samples involving second year medical students consider objects inside a room where X-rays were administered would themselves continue to emit radiation afterwards; and Eijkelhof (1990), on the other hand, showed the presence in many students’ reasoning of a largely undifferentiated concept of radiation/ radioactive material (see also Millar, 1994). Alsop (2001), in his study with 30 non-science university undergraduates, investigated the existence of some misconceptions. He also found out that majority of the students have an undifferentiated radiation and radioactive matter concept. Additionally, following misconceptions can be summarized from his study: • Viewing radioactivity as having a quintessentially eternal and never stopping property. • The effects of radioactivity were conceptualized in terms of contamination and not irradiation. • Living things would become radioactive after exposure to radioactivity. |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/download/article-file/115825 |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
