Overcoming Students' Misconceptions in Earth Science Education
Abstract
The University of Minnesota's Introductory Geology Program recently began to develop and use geologic concept surveys. Designed to measure changes in student knowledge and confidence through the semester, these surveys clearly demonstrate the remarkable tenacity of students' prior knowledge and misconceptions in surviving or resisting course instruction, unless instruction is specifically designed to counteract those misconceptions. Students do not simply absorb new information and knowledge, but interpret it in light of their previous understanding of how things work. They use this previous understanding to interpret, revise and often dismiss new information presented in class. This filtering process is one of the most important, if often overlooked, barriers to effective instruction. The present study demonstrates that classroom `interventions', targeted to specific misconceptions can overcome this barrier. Once students believe that their previous understanding is incorrect or incomplete and inadequately explains phenomena, they are more likely to understand, accept and use a new interpretation in subsequent explanations. These ideas are well known in education departments, but are less well established in the earth science field. Compared to physics and mathematics, earth science education also suffers from a relative lack of research on students' prior knowledge and misconceptions, the basis on which successful `interventions' rely. The present study presents a suite of common earth science misconceptions and demonstrates the effectiveness of targeted `interventions' in overcoming them, compared to traditional instruction methods. The results clearly demonstrate the importance of instructors knowing what knowledge or concepts students bring to their courses, as well as the remarkable effort still needed to identify and document students' perceptions of how the Earth works. This work is sponsored in part by the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE), U.S. Department of Education.
- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2006
- Bibcode:
- 2006AGUFMED53A0853K
- Keywords:
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- 0810 Post-secondary education;
- 0820 Curriculum and laboratory design;
- 0825 Teaching methods;
- 0840 Evaluation and assessment;
- 0850 Geoscience education research