Eric Bailey

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Circuit City Classroom Using Urban Planning
Techniques and Movement of Traffic To Teach
Electric Theory
Eric Bailey Tamecia Jones Jennifer Steinman
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Agenda

• Prototype
• User Scenario for the Classroom
• Hands-on experience
• Understanding the Prototype
• The Landscape / Immersion in Problem
• Prior Experience
• Tech Challenge Observation
• Literature Review

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Prototype Overview

• The design product is an interactive exhibit
  which helps students to understand circuit
  current theory. 
• Here we will use the social, cultural, and
  physical metaphor of city planning and cars
  traveling over streets or within a larger context
  of a city to explain the flow of current through
  a circuit.
• The form is both a physical artifact and a
  mini-curriculum on electricity.

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Prototype Objectives

• Develop understanding of concepts of electricity
  and allow transfer to real world

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Relation to elementary science education
General Skills Across K-12 Span
Early Elementary Upper Elementary/Middle Secondary
Recognition Recognition Recognition
Categorization Categorization Categorization
Explanation Explanation
Conceptualization
Mathematical Proof
Target skills of the prototype
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How does the project accomplish the objective?

• Uses cars and streets to help students understand
  the concepts of electricity
• Cars symbolize electricity flow
• Problem-solving can occur within the urban
  planning context
• Expandable to learners competency growth

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Prototype Affordances

• Visualization of concepts of electricity
• Typical electrical instruction uses batteries and
  light bulbs but the flow of electricity can not
  be seen because it is invisible
• Inquiry based context
• drives conversation between students and teachers
• Sensory motor -
• Based on real-world experiences

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User Scenario Overview

• Ages Ms. Saranitis 5th Grade Class
• Context Single lesson in science class
• Parallel vs Series Circuits
• Part of electricity unit
• Scenario Ground in real-world problem
• Explain theory of electricity
• Use prototype to highlight concept
• Prototype is highly contextual

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Full Circuit City Curriculum
Concept Visible Example of Circulating Current
Electric Particle Car
Circuit Road loop with cars moving in one direction
Switch Road block, bridge road open or closed
Current of cars passing a point per unit of time
Battery Gas mechanism injecting energy
Resistance Road conditions hazards, curves, potholes
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Agenda

• Prototype
• Hands-on experience
• Understanding the Prototype
• User Scenario for the Classroom
• The Landscape / Immersion in Problem
• Prior Experience
• Tech Challenge Observation
• Literature Review

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Immersion in Problem

• Experience with Engineering Summer Camp
• Tutoring engineering students in electrical
  engineering coursework
• Tech Museum of Innovation in San Jose
• Furby Workshop
• Tech Challenge Engineering Workshops
• Observations / videos of workshops

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Key Findings From Tech Challenge Workshop Video

• Students have problems understanding series and
  parallel beyond battery example 
• Engineering elements are abstract
• Switching between a representation and actual
  elements or analogy is hard for all grade levels
• Manipulation alone is not enough for
  understanding
• Students can do series circuit and parallel
  circuit, but not combinational, do not understand

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Salient Literature

• Gibbons, P., McMahon, A., Weigers, J. 2003.
  Hands-On Current Electricity A Professional
  Development Course. Journal of Elementary
  Science Education, Vol. 15, No. 2, pp. 1-11.
• This article describes a teacher professional
  development on how to teach electrical circuits
  to their students. It begins with understanding
  their own misconceptions, correcting them, and
  then expanding their models to create lessons for
  their students. It confirms our traveling car
  analogy.

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Learning Theories

• Theory of Conceptual Change
• Structure Mapping Theory of Analogical Thinking
• Mental Models

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Conceptual Change Model

• Science education learning theory
• Instructor facilitates a discrepant events that
  contradict the learners existing conceptual
  framework and provides a teaching moment through
  reactions of surprise or motivation to correct
  the discrepant events. These four conditions
  must occur
• Dissatisfaction with existing conceptions
• A new (alternative) conception must be
  intelligible
• A new (alternative) conception must be appear
  initially feasible
• A new (alternative) concept should suggest the
  possibility of fruitful research (testing)
  program.
• Posner et al. (1982)

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Conceptual Change Variations

• A process that enables students to synthesize
  models in their minds, beginning with their
  existing explanatory framework, (Vosniadou, 2002)
• Repair of misconceptions, (Chi and Roscoe, 2002)
• The reorganization of diverse kinds of knowledge
  into complex systems in students minds,
  (diSessa, 2002)
• Conceptual change results from changes in the way
  that students use the tools in various contexts,
  and the change actually occurs at the societal
  level, (Ivarrson, Schoultz, and Saljo, 2002)

Suping, S. Conceptual Change Among Science
Students. 2003.
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Structure-Mapping Theory

• The structure-mapping analogy asserts that
  identical operations and relationships hold among
  nonidentical things. (Gentner and Gentner,
  1983).
• Base domain known domain
• Target domain domain of inquiry
• Analogy has components
• Object Relationships
• Object Attributes or surface features
• This is successful under these two conditions
• Preservations of relations relational
  predicates, and not object attributes, carry over
  into analogical mappings
• Systematicity predicates are more likely to be
  imported into the target into the target if they
  belong to a system of coherent, mutually
  constraining relationships, the others of which
  map into the target.

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Instructional Analogies and Mental Models

• Di Vesta, F., Zook, K. (1991). Instructional
  Analogies and Conceptual Misrepresentations.
  Journal of Educational Psychology. Vol. 83, No.
  2, pp. 246-252.
• This article discusses the issues around
  young/novice and adult/expert learners in
  successfully mapping from the base domain to the
  target domain, and how constraints will help the
  learner see the goal of the analogy. It is
  important to discriminate between relevant
  relations and superficial attributes of the
  object.

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Mental Model Resources

• Clement, J., Steinberg, M. (2002). Step-Wise
  Evolution of Mental Models of Electric Circuits
  A Learning-Aloud Case Study. The Journal of
  the Learning Sciences. 11 (4). Pp 389-452.
• Gentner, D., Gentner, D. (1983). Flowing
  Waters or Teeming Crowds Mental Models of
  Electricity. In D. Gentner and A. L. Stevens
  (Eds.), Mental Models. Hillsdale, NJ Lawrence
  Erlbaum.
• Hadzigeorgiou, Y., Savage, M. 2001. A Study of
  the Effect of Sensorimotor Experiences on the
  Retention and Application of Two Fundamental
  Physics Ideas. Journal of Elementary Science
  Education. Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 9-21.

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Developmental /Learning Theory
Design Structures
Solution
Objective
Sensori-motor Experience Visualizations Real-Wor
ld Application Embed in Community Context Proble
m-Based Learning
Develop understanding of concepts of electricity
and allow transfer to real world
Expandable, Interactive Prototype Auxiliary
Activities
Conceptual Change Structure-Mapping Mental
Models
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Reflections on Design Process

• Immersion
• Observation
• Literature Review
• User scenario 1
• User scenario 2
• Prototype

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Prototype Sketches

• Interchangeable components

• First Pass at Analogy Sketch

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Prototype Sketches

• Conceptual Sketches for Parallel Unit of
  Instruction

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Prototype Sketches