Investigating the influence of assessment questions on student epistemological resources in physics
Kelli Shar
University of Tampa
Physics/Philosophy Dual Major
Mentored by Dr. J.T. Laverty
Assessment is a fundamental aspect of education and usually is considered as a route to obtain information about student learning. Instead, this project explores the ability of physics assessment questions to send information to the students about what it means to know and do physics. We focused on determining what messages about "knowing" physics are sent to students through assessment questions and how to write assessment questions that send productive messages to students. To do this, we analyzed recordings of students completing a variety of introductory level physics problems and compared their reasoning and written work, looking for what the student interpreted as "doing" physics meant in each question. We hope to use this information to generate writing guidelines for educators that send the right ideas about what it means to know physics through assessments.
Acknowledgments
NSF, Study Participants