|
Session:
|
|
|
Paper Type:
|
Invited
|
|
Title:
|
Epistemology Mediating Conceptual Knowledge: Constraints on Data Accessible from Interviews*
|
|
Meeting:
|
126th AAPT National Meeting: Austin, TX |
|
Location:
|
Grand Ballroom A |
|
Date:
|
Monday, Jan. 13 |
|
Time:
|
1:30PM
|
|
Author:
|
Michael C. Wittmann, Univ. of Maine
207-581-1237, wittmann@umit.maine.edu
|
|
Co-Author(s):
|
Rachel E. Scherr
|
|
Abstract:
|
A student's epistemological stance (be it knowledge as memorized information, knowledge from authority, or knowledge as invented stuff) may constrain that student from reasoning in productive ways while also shaping the inferences a researcher can make about how that student reasons about a particular phenomenon. We present an example of an individual student interview on charge flow in wires in which the student's epistemological stance appears to strongly affect the results of the interview. In the first part of the interview, the student's use of memorized knowledge prevents the researcher from learning whether she is capable of any detailed reasoning about current. In the second part of the interview, her use of constructed knowledge provides the researcher with a picture of her reasoning about the physical mechanisms of charge flow. The interview discussed in this talk is analyzed from two other perspectives in the other talks in this session.
|
|
Footnotes:
|
*Supported in part by NSF grant #REC-0087519 and grant #DUE-9652877, and FIPSE grants #P116B000300 and #P116B970186.
|
|
