Learning to Deflect: Conceptual Change in Physics During Digital Game Play

How does deep conceptual change occur when students play well-designed educational games? To answer this question, we present a case study in the form of a microgenetic analysis of a student’s processes of knowledge construction as he played a conceptually-integrated digital game (SURGE Next) designed to support learning about Newtonian mechanics. Grounded in the Knowledge In Pieces framework of conceptual change (A. diSessa, 1993), we analyze the processes through which the student, Jamal, developed an expert-like understanding of deflections, a phenomenon that has been previously identified as challenging to understand for novice physics learners. We also explore the key characteristics of SURGE Next supporting these conceptual change processes. Our analysis shows that Jamal’s learning involved iterative refinement of his conceptual understanding through distributed encoding (A. diSessa, 1993). That is, as Jamal advanced through the game levels in SURGE Next, he developed a progressively more distributed sense of mechanism (A. diSessa, 1993) and was able to identify and operationalize the roles of the direction and magnitude of an object’s initial (or previous) velocity in determining the velocity resulting from the application of a new impulse. We also discuss the methodological and design implications of our findings for future research on digital games for learning.

[1]  Orit Parnafes.  What Does “Fast” Mean? Understanding the Physical World Through Computational Representations , 2007 .

[2]  Andrea A. diSessa,et al.  Changing Minds: Computers, Learning, and Literacy , 2000 .

[3]  Philip H. Mirvis.  Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience , 1991 .

[4]  M. Hammersley,et al.  Case Study Method: Key Issues, Key Texts , 2000 .

[5]  Marcia C. Linn,et al.  The Knowledge Integration Perspective , 2013 .

[6]  Igal Galili,et al.  Learners' knowledge in optics: interpretation, structure and analysis , 2000 .

[7]  A. diSessa.  Toward an Epistemology of Physics , 1993 .

[8]  Andrea A. diSessa.  An Overview of Boxer. , 1991 .

[9]  B. White.  ThinkerTools: Causal Models, Conceptual Change, and Science Education , 1993 .

[10]  J. Roschelle,et al.  Misconceptions Reconceived: A Constructivist Analysis of Knowledge in Transition , 1994 .

[11]  Hans Niedderer,et al.  A learning pathway in high‐school level quantum atomic physics , 1998 .

[12]  S. Gelman,et al.  Mapping the Mind: Domain Specificity In Cognition And Culture , 1994 .

[13]  Pamela Jordan.  Basics of qualitative research: Grounded theory procedures and techniques , 1994 .

[14]  D. Hestenes,et al.  Force concept inventory , 1992 .

[15]  D. Kuhn.  Microgenetic Study of Change: What Has It Told Us? , 1995 .

[16]  D. Hestenes.  Modeling games in the Newtonian World , 1992 .

[17]  Douglas B. Clark,et al.  Games, Learning, and Society: Prediction and Explanation as Design Mechanics in Conceptually Integrated Digital Games to Help Players Articulate the Tacit Understandings They Build through Game Play , 2012 .

[18]  David Hammer,et al.  Dynaturtle Revisited: Learning Physics Through Collaborative Design of a Computer Model , 1993, Interact. Learn. Environ..

[19]  Andrew Elby,et al.  How substance-based ontologies for gravity can be productive: A case study , 2013 .

[20]  Douglas B. Clark.  Longitudinal Conceptual Change in Students' Understanding of Thermal Equilibrium: An Examination of the Process of Conceptual Restructuring , 2006 .

[21]  Stella Vosniadou.  Conceptual Change in Learning and Instruction , 2013 .

[22]  A. diSessa.  An Interactional Analysis of Clinical Interviewing , 2007 .

[23]  Pratim Sengupta,et al.  Lowering the Learning Threshold: Multi-Agent-Based Models and Learning Electricity: Cognitive Tool for Scientific Inquiry , 2011 .

[24]  Patrick W Thompson,et al.  The development of the concept of speed and its relationship to concepts of rate , 1994 .

[25]  Andrea A. diSessa,et al.  Coherence versus fragmentation in the development of the concept of force , 2004, Cogn. Sci..

[26]  Lloyd P. Rieber,et al.  Seriously considering play: Designing interactive learning environments based on the blending of microworlds, simulations, and games , 1996 .

[27]  K. Crowley,et al.  The microgenetic method. A direct means for studying cognitive development. , 1991, The American psychologist.

[28]  Michael Barnett,et al.  Electromagnetism Supercharged! Learning Physics with Digital Simulation Games , 2004, ICLS.

[29]  Douglas B. Clark,et al.  The knowledge integration perspective: connections across research and education , 2013 .

[30]  A. diSessa,et al.  What changes in conceptual change , 1998 .

[31]  S. Carey.  Conceptual Change in Childhood , 1985 .

[32]  Stella Vo Sniadou.  Conceptual Change In Learning and Instruction: The Framework Theory Approach , 2013 .

[33]  Jesper Haglund,et al.  Exploring the Use of Conceptual Metaphors in Solving Problems on Entropy , 2013 .

[34]  Brian C. Nelson,et al.  Exploring Newtonian mechanics in a conceptually-integrated digital game: Comparison of learning and affective outcomes for students in Taiwan and the United States , 2011, Comput. Educ..

[35]  Celia Hoyles,et al.  Rethinking the Microworld Idea , 2002 .

[36]  Marianne Wiser.  Use of History of Science to Understand and Remedy Students' Misconceptions About Heat and Temperature , 1997 .

[37]  M. McCloskey.  Naive Theories of Motion. , 1982 .

[38]  Ayush Gupta,et al.  The Case for Dynamic Models of Learners' Ontologies in Physics , 2010 .

[39]  Susan Carey,et al.  Conceptual Differences Between Children and Adults , 1988 .

[40]  Keith S. Taber,et al.  Exploring Conceptual Integration in Student Thinking: Evidence from a case study , 2008 .

[41]  Paul J. Feltovich,et al.  Categorization and Representation of Physics Problems by Experts and Novices , 1981, Cogn. Sci..

[42]  Seymour Papert,et al.  Mindstorms: Children, Computers, and Powerful Ideas , 1981 .

[43]  M. Csíkszentmihályi.  Flow. The Psychology of Optimal Experience. New York (HarperPerennial) 1990. , 1990 .

[44]  Douglas B. Clark,et al.  Disciplinary integration of digital games for science learning , 2015, International Journal of STEM Education.

[45]  Barbara Y. White,et al.  Designing Computer Games to Help Physics Students Understand Newton's Laws of Motion , 1984 .

[46]  M. Chi,et al.  Naive Physics Reasoning: A Commitment to Substance-Based Conceptions , 2000 .

[47]  L. Schauble,et al.  Cross-Domain Development of Scientific Reasoning , 1992 .

[48]  Pratim Sengupta,et al.  Learning Electricity with NIELS: Thinking with Electrons and Thinking in Levels , 2009, Int. J. Comput. Math. Learn..

[49]  Mason Wright,et al.  From Agents to Continuous Change via Aesthetics: Learning Mechanics with Visual Agent-based Computational Modeling , 2012, Technol. Knowl. Learn..

[50]  Ibrahim A. Halloun,et al.  Common sense concepts about motion , 1985 .

[51]  S. Carey.  The Origin and Evolution of Everyday Concepts , 1992 .

[52]  R. Yin.  Case Study Research: Design and Methods , 1984 .

[53]  H. Simon,et al.  How to Study Thinking in Everyday Life: Contrasting Think-Aloud Protocols With Descriptions and Explanations of Thinking , 1998 .

[54]  Tamer G. Amin.  Conceptual Metaphor Meets Conceptual Change , 2009, Human Development.

[55]  J. Roschelle.  Learning by Collaborating: Convergent Conceptual Change , 1992 .

[56]  James D. Slotta,et al.  Misconceived Causal Explanations for Emergent Processes , 2012, Cogn. Sci..

[57]  Stella Vosniadou,et al.  International handbook of research on conceptual change , 2013 .

[58]  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi,et al.  Learning, “Flow,” and Happiness , 2014 .

[59]  Uri Wilensky,et al.  Inventing a “Mid Level” to Make Ends Meet: Reasoning between the Levels of Complexity , 2008 .

[60]  Carol L. Smith,et al.  Teaching for Understanding: A Study of Students' Preinstruction Theories of Matter and a Comparison of the Effectiveness of Two Approaches to Teaching About Matter and Density , 1997 .

[61]  Pratim Sengupta,et al.  Learning Natural Selection in 4th Grade with Multi-Agent-Based Computational Models , 2012, Research in Science Education.

[62]  David Hammer,et al.  Misconceptions or P-Prims: How May Alternative Perspectives of Cognitive Structure Influence Instructional Perceptions and Intentions , 1996 .

[63]  Matthew B. Miles,et al.  Qualitative Data Analysis: An Expanded Sourcebook , 1994 .

[64]  Laurie D. Edwards,et al.  Microworlds as Representations , 1995 .

[65]  E. Spelke,et al.  Domain-specific knowledge and conceptual change , 1994 .