Download Tapping Preconception

Tapping Into Student Preconceptions
Tapping into Student
Preconceptions
• Students start any unit of
study with pre-existing
ideas or models.
• By knowing students’ prior
ideas, the teacher can
design learning experiences
to target incorrect models
and replace them with
correct ones.
Why are preconceptions
important to understanding?
• Some student
preconceptions can
prevent the
acceptance of the
correct scientific
model.
• Teaching without
reflection on student
prior knowledge can
enhance student
misconceptions.
An ESBD Sample Unit
Scientific Revolution: The
Theory of Plate Tectonics
Unit Overview
• Looking at plate
tectonics through a
historical and scientific
lens.
• Students construct
their own
understanding by
collecting evidence,
modeling true scientific
process.
Enduring Understandings
• The theory of plate tectonics was once a
new idea; it is now widely accepted by
most scientists because of the evidence
that has been collected which supports it.
• Continents are part of the earth’s plates;
when the plates are moved the continents
also move.
• The intense heat of the earth’s core is
responsible for the movement of the
tectonic plates.
• Over millions of years the continuous
movement of the Earth causes the
continents (landmasses) to merge and
divide repeatedly.
Essential Questions
• How did the theory of plate tectonics evolve?
• What is the mechanism that drives the
movement of the continents? What is its fuel?
• What allows the continents to move?
• What evidence supports the theory of plate
tectonics?
• Why did competent scientists reject the idea
of continental drift?
• Why is this theory a revolution?
Preconception Survey
• If you were looking down on the earth from space
200 million years ago what would it look like?
• What does the ocean floor between North America
and Europe look like?
• Describe what is under the continents.
• Describe what happens to the ocean floor when
the continents move during continental drift.
• What allows the continents to move?
• Where does the energy needed to move the
continents come from? Explain how this energy
moves the continents.
Sample student responses:
What does the ocean floor between
North America and Europe look like ?
• Student ideas about the ocean floor fall into
several different categories.
• The replacement of these ideas with the actual
ocean floor topography is an important step in
their understanding of seafloor spreading.
Katie
Ben
Carissa
Describe what is under the
continents.
• Students often believe that the
continents are floating on the surface of
the ocean and move like floating rafts.
Brynn
David
Carissa
Nina
What allows the continents
to move?
• Student easily integrate that the plates
allow the continents to move but their
model is often very different from the
actual model.
Hanna
Describe what happens to the ocean
floor when the continents move.
• Student models showed the stretching
and pushing together of the ocean floor
when continents move.
Cooper
Where does the energy needed to
move the continents come from?
• Student understanding of this concept
varies from gravity to the heat of the sun.
• More often though, students have used
the heat of the interior of the earth but
have incorrect ideas about how the heat of
the earth moves the earth’s crust.
Nina Preconception
Confronting Student models and
replacing Misunderstandings
• Analysis of the
origin of student
ideas is key for
students to replace
their
misunderstandings.
Nina-Preconception
Nina Postconception
Nina-Postconception
Ben-Preconception
Ben Postconception
Cooper-Preconception
Cooper Postconception
Hanna-Preconception
Hanna Postconception
David-Preconception
David Postconception
Brynn-Preconception
Brynn Postconception
Nina