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- Airey, John, 1963-, et al.
(author)
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Developing Students’ Disciplinary Literacy? : The Case of University Physics
- 2018
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In: Global Developments in Literacy Research for Science Education. - Cham, Switzerland : Springer. - 9783319691978 - 9783319691961 ; , s. 357-376
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Book chapter (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In this chapter we use the concept of disciplinary literacy (Airey, 2011a, 2013) to analyze the goals of university physics lecturers. Disciplinary literacy refers to a particular mix of disciplinary-specific communicative practices developed for three specific sites: the academy, the workplace and society. It has been suggested that the development of disciplinary literacy may be seen as one of the primary goals of university studies (Airey, 2011a).The main data set used in this chapter comes from a comparative study of physics lecturers in Sweden and South Africa (Airey, 2012, 2013; Linder, Airey, Mayaba, & Webb, 2014). Semi-structured interviews were carried out using a disciplinary literacy discussion matrix (Airey, 2011b), which enabled us to probe the lecturers’ disciplinary literacy goals in the various semiotic resource systems used in undergraduate physics (i.e. graphs, diagrams, mathematics, language).The findings suggest that whilst physics lecturers have strikingly similar disciplinary literacy goals for their students, regardless of setting, they have very different ideas about whether they themselves should teach students to handle these disciplinary-specific semiotic resources. It is suggested that the similarity in physics lecturers’ disciplinary literacy goals across highly disparate settings may be related to the hierarchical, singular nature of the discipline of physics (Bernstein, 1999, 2000).In the final section of the chapter some preliminary evidence about the disciplinary literacy goals of those involved in physics teacher training is presented. Using Bernstein’s constructs, a potential conflict between the hierarchical singular of physics and the horizontal region of teacher training is noticeable.Going forward it would be interesting to apply the concept of disciplinary literacy to the analysis of other disciplines—particularly those with different combinations of Bernstein’s classifications of hierarchical/horizontal and singular/region.
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| 10. |
- Airey, John, 1963-, et al.
(author)
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What does it mean to understand a physics equation? : A study of undergraduate answers in three countries
- 2019
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In: Bridging Research and Practice in Science Education. - Cham, Switzerland : Springer. - 9783030172183 ; , s. 225-239
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Book chapter (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In this chapter we are interested in how undergraduate physics students in three countries experience the equations they meet in their education. We asked over 350 students in the US, Australia and Sweden the same simple question: How do you know when you understand a physics equation? Students wrote free-text answers to this question and these were transcribed and coded. The similarity of the answers we received across the three countries surprised us and led to us treating all the answers as a single “pool of meaning”. Qualitative analysis resulted in eight distinct themes: significance, origin, description, prediction, parts, relationships, calculation and explanation. Drawing on diSessa’s theory of knowledge in pieces, we argue that each theme represents a different disciplinary aspect of student understanding of physics equations. Educationally, we wondered how best to highlight the more holistic view of equations that analysis of the combined datasets revealed. This prompted us to write a set of questions that reflect the original data with respect to the eight themes. We suggest that when students meet a new physics equation they may ask themselves these questions in order to check their holistic understanding of what the equation represents. In continuing work we are asking our same original question to a cohort of physics lecturers in order to consolidate the themes we have already identified and to look for further themes. We are also trialling the themes and related questions that we generated in teaching situations. Here, we are interested in whether students perceive the questions as helpful in their learning. ReferencesAirey, J. (2012). “I don’t teach language.” The linguistic attitudes of physics lecturers in Sweden. AILA Review, 25, 64–79. doi:10/1075/aila.25.05airAirey, J., & Larsson, J. (2018). Developing Students’ Disciplinary Literacy? The Case of University Physics. In: Tang K-S, Danielsson K. (eds) Global Developments in Literacy Research for Science Education. Springer, Cham, Switzerland, pp 357-376. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-69197-8_21Airey, J., & Linder, C. (2009). A disciplinary discourse perspective on university science learning: Achieving fluency in a critical constellation of modes. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 46(1), 27-49. doi:10.1002/tea.20265Bernstein, B. (2000). Pedagogy, symbolic control and identity: theory, research and critique. Rowman and Littlefield, LanhamBogdan, R. C., & Biklen, S .R. (1992). Qualitative research for education: An introduction to theory and methods. 2 edn. Allyn and Bacon, Inc, BostonChin, C., & Brown, D. E. (2000). Learning in Science: A Comparison of Deep and Surface Approaches. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 37(2), 109-138. doi: 10.1002/(SICI)1098-2736(200002)37:2<109::AID-TEA3>3.0.CO;2-7diSessa, A. A. (1993). Toward an epistemology of physics. Cognition and Instruction, 10(2 & 3), 105-226. doi: 10.1207/s1532690xci1002&3_2diSessa, A. A. (2018). A Friendly Introduction to “Knowledge in Pieces”: Modeling Types of Knowledge and Their Roles in Learning. In: Kaiser G., Forgasz, H., Graven, M., Kuzniak, A., Simmt, E., & Xu B. (eds) Invited Lectures from the 13th International Congress on Mathematical Education. ICME-13 Monographs. Springer, Cham. doi: 10.1007/978-3-319-72170-5_5 Domert, D., Airey, J., Linder, C., & Kung, R. (2007). An exploration of university physics students' epistemological mindsets towards the understanding of physics equations. NorDiNa, Nordic Studies in Science Education, 3(1), 15-28Eichenlaub, M., & Redish, E. F. (2018). Blending physical knowledge with mathematical form in physics problem solving. In: Pospiech, G., Michelini, M., &Eylon, B. (eds) Mathematics in Physics Education Research. Springer. arXiv:1804.01639Hechter, R. P. (2010). What does 'I understand the equation' really mean? Physics Education, 45 132-133. doi: 10.1088/0031-9120/45/2/F01Hegde, B., & Meera, B. N. (2012). How do they solve it? An insight into the learner's approach to the mechanism of physics problem solving. Physical Review Special Topics Physics Education Research, 8:010109. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevSTPER.8.010109Hsu, L., Brewe, E., Foster, T. M., & Harper, K. A. (2004). Resource Letter RPS-1: Research in problem solving. American Journal of Physics,72(9), 1147-1156. doi: 10.1119/1.1763175Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi: 10.1017/CBO9780511815355Lising, L., & Elby, A. (2005). The impact of epistemology on learning: A case study from introductory physics. American Journal of Physics,73, 372-382.doi:10.1119/1.1848115Marton, F., & Booth, S. (1997). Learning and awareness. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, NJMarton, F., & Säljö, R. (1976). On qualitative differences in learning. II - outcome as a function of the learner's conception of the task. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 46, 115-127. doi: 10.1111/j.2044-8279.1976.tb02980.xMay, D. B., & Etkina, E. (2002). College physics students’ epistemological self-reflection and its relationship to conceptual learning. American Journal of Physics, 70(12),1249-1258. doi: 10.1119/1.1503377Nordling, C., & Österman, J. (2006). Physics Handbook. 8 edn. Studentlitteratur, Lund, SwedenRedish, E. (1994). Implications of cognitive studies for teaching physics. American Journal of Physics, 62(9), 796-803. doi: 10.1119/1.17461Sherin, B. L. (2001). How students understand physics equations. Cognitive Instruction, 19, 479-541. doi: 10.1207/S1532690XCI1904_3Swedish Research Council (2017) Good Research Practice. Swedish Research Council, StockholmTuminaro, J. (2004). A Cognitive framework for analyzing and describing introductory students' use of mathematics in physics. PhD Thesis. University of Maryland
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