Is Using Discrepant Events an Effective Teaching Strategy to Promote Conceptual Change?

Dr. Foley, SED 690, December 17, 2007 Miha Lee’s Position Paper Page 17 of 18

Is Using Discrepant Events an Effective Teaching Strategy to Promote Conceptual Change?

Miha Lee

California State University, Northridge

Outline

1.  Introduction …………………………………………………………………………………………… 3

2.  The Cognitive Conflict Strategy…………………………………………………………………...... 4

2.1.  The Conceptual Change Model

2.2.  Discrepant Events

2.3.  Positive Effects of Inducing Cognitive Conflict

3.  Problem Recognition: Seeing is not always believing. ……………………………………………… 7

3.1.  Responses to Discrepant Events

3.2.  Conditions for Recognition of Meaningful Cognitive Conflict

4.  Conflict Resolution: Rome was not built in a day. …………………………………………………… 11

4.1.  New Theories for Conceptual Change

4.2.  My Suggestions

5.  Conclusion ………………………………………………………………………………………. 15

6.  Reference…………………………………………………………………………………………. 19

1.  Introduction

This semester I have been learning about the theory of conceptual change in Dr. Foley’s theory class. However, the more I learn the more I feel confused. What could be the practical instructional strategy I can use to promote conceptual change in my classroom? Research papers about conceptual change appeared to me too theoretical and vague (diSessa, 1993; Strike & Posner, 1992). The studies only talked about failures of intended learning and misconceptions or alternative conceptions. Then, what should we do not to fail to teach scientific conceptions? Research doesn’t give a direct and clear answer and rarely takes into account real classroom conditions.

On the other hand, in Dr. Herr’s method class, I was asked to come up with new discrepant events as teacher demonstration in order to develop students’ need to know. According to Dr. Herr, students tend to pay more attention if something does not behave the way they expect it to. Such discrepant events engender curiosity and stimulate a "need to know", so those who have a need to know are likely to investigate further. Thus, he urged us to employ discrepant events in an effort to capture student interest and provide motivation to learn science.

I found using discrepant events a useful way to put students into a state of cognitive conflict to help students change their naïve ideas since conceptual change theories emphasize students’ dissatisfaction with their current ideas generated by presenting anomalous data (Strike & Posner, 1992). The word ‘discrepant’ means ‘inconsistent’ with students’ naïve ideas. If students resolve their cognitive conflict generated by discrepant events in an intended way, they will give up their misconceptions and develop deep understanding of scientific conceptions. Therefore, it seemed that making sense of discrepant events could be equal to conceptual change.

However, I questioned the efficacy of using discrepant events as a teaching strategy to foster knowledge change because from my teaching experience I have learned that acquiring science conception is not as easy or simple process as the classical conceptual change model sounds (Posner, Strike, Hewson, and Gertzog, 1982). I have provided my students with as many demonstrations and first hand laboratory experiences of chemistry as possible, but many of them had difficulty understanding, later even remembering, underlying concepts. Moreover, I have learned that misconceptions are persistent, and conceptual change is not a simple replacement of them with new conceptions.

So, I decided to explore in this paper how effective the cognitive conflict strategy of using discrepant events is for conceptual change and what conditions are required for the strategy to promote conceptual change.

2.  The Cognitive Conflict Strategy

2.1.  The Conceptual Change Model

Since the role of students’ prior knowledge began to attract educators’ interest, many attempts have been made to change their alternative ideas into scientifically accepted ones. One of those approaches has been the conceptual change model that involves the teacher making students’ alternative frameworks explicit prior to designing a teaching approach that is intended to promote dissatisfaction. Students’ dissatisfaction with current beliefs can be induced by presenting anomalous data from texts, events and the teacher. Then, a new scientific conception that can explain the anomaly is introduced and competes with the existing theory leading to a state of cognitive conflict in learner’s mind. When students resolve the conflict, they replace their old theory with new theory (Duit & Treagust, 2003; Kang, Scharmann & Noh, 2004; Limon, 2001; Posner et al, 1982; Strike & Posner, 1992).

Especially, Posner et al. (1982) argued that the competing new conception should be intelligible, plausible, and fruitful. An intelligible conception is sensible if its meaning is understood by the learner; plausible means that in addition to knowing what the conception means, the learner finds the conception believable; and, the conception is fruitful if it helps the learner solve other problems or suggest new research directions.

However, outcomes of the conceptual change model seem to be somewhat between weak knowledge restructuring (assimilation or conceptual capture) and strong/radical knowledge restructuring (accommodation or conceptual exchange) (Duit & Treagust, 2003). Some researchers have raised questions about the role of cognitive conflict, but inducing cognitive conflict is still considered as an important condition for conceptual change (Chan, Burtis, & Bereiter, 1997; Kang, Scharmann & Noh, 2004; Limon, 2001).

2.2.  Discrepant Events

Generally, a discrepant event is a physical experience that surprises, startles, puzzles, or astonishes the observer. There are many ways of presenting discrepant events: computer simulation, text, video and first-hand activity. Often, a discrepant event does not appear to follow basic rules or principles of matter and energy. The outcome of a discrepant event is often unexpected or contrary to what students would have predicted. The explanation for the phenomena observed is not often easily explained without further investigation. Discrepant events stimulate students’ natural curiosity. After watching a discrepant event, they are more likely to be strongly motivated to "find out." As a result, discrepant events engage learners in the learning process. Discrepant events engage learners in inquiry. Discrepant events can be used in classrooms:

  to engage students in inquiry

  as a demonstration followed by discussion to introduce a new topic

  to engage students in science processes skills

  as a small group lab activity

  as a mind-on warm-up to stimulate critical thinking

  as a take home lab activity

  as a challenge for students to create investigative lab activities to find out more about the event (Minogue, n.d)

For conceptual change, nonetheless, discrepant events are employed to induce cognitive conflict or cognitive dissonance. When students are confronted with anomalous data from a discrepant event, they discover that their prior beliefs are inadequate to explain the new data, which may lead them to consider or invent alternative conceptions that can account for the data (Kang et al, 2004; Limon, 2001).

Chinn and Brewer (1998) pointed out four crucial elements in the cognitive conflict strategy of using discrepant events. First, students possess beliefs about how the physical world operates. Second, students can detect anomalies of discrepant events. That is, they notice when new data are incompatible with their prior beliefs. Third, students recognize that these anomalies pose a threat to their current theories. Finally, students will sometimes choose to adopt an alternative theory in response to the anomalous data from the events.

2.3.  Positive Effects of Inducing Cognitive conflict

Since its inception many attempts have been made for conceptual change by using the cognitive conflict paradigm. The usual cognitive conflict research method involves three steps: (a) identifying students’ current state of knowledge, (b) confronting students with contradictory information which is usually presented through texts, by interviewers, and by new technologies (c) evaluating the degree of change between students’ prior ideas or beliefs and a post-test measure after the instructional intervention (Limon, 2001). Some positive effects of inducing cognitive conflicts on conceptual change were reported from those studies.

First, Limón (1995, as cited in Limon, 2001) reported that introducing anomalous data to people with high prior knowledge about the content of history made it possible to develop a more elaborate and sophisticated response. They reinterpreted the anomalous data to give a wider explanation which was able to include both their initial ideas and the contradictory information. Second, Chan, Burtis, and Bereiter (1997) carried out a research in which students learned about the concept of biological evolution by using an online think-aloud method to track individual differences in students’ responses to conflict. They reported that when conflict was maximized, students performed better. To control the magnitude of conflict, they changed the sequence of presenting information. When the most contradictory information was first informed, the conflict was maximized, which engaged students in the learning process of new conception. Also, Kang, Scharmann and Noh (2004) defined and quantified the degree of cognitive conflict induced by a discrepant event, and investigated the relationship between cognitive conflict and conceptual change in learning the concept of density. They found there was a significant correlation between cognitive conflict and conceptual change.

Overall, the cognitive conflict strategy seems to be helpful for conceptual change by making students more aware of difference and reflect on new ideas. Nevertheless, it is also reported that not all students reached the state of cognitive conflict, and that conceptual change in a radical sense was rarely achieved. I think these finding are consistent with the persistence of naïve conceptions.

3.  Problem Recognition: Seeing is not always believing

3.1.  Responses to discrepant events

Why did the cognitive conflict strategy fail to promote theory change, at least to the extent it was expected? There could be many reasons for this, but one of the fundamental reasons seems that responses of students to discrepant events can be different from what the instructor expects. When students are confronted with contradictory information, they are often unable to achieve meaningful conflict or to become dissatisfied with their prior conception (Chan et al., 1997, Chinn & Brewer, 1998, Kang et al., 2004; Limon, 2001).

Chinn and Brewer’s psychological study (1998) proposed taxonomy of individuals’ reactions to anomalous data. According to them, there are eight types of responses to contradictory information: (a) ignoring the data, (b) rejecting the data, (c) professing uncertainty about the validity of the data, (d) excluding the data from the domain of the current theory, (e) holding the data in abeyance, (f) reinterpreting the data, (g) accepting the data and making peripheral changes to the current theory, and (h) accepting the data and changing theories. There are three dimensions of response to anomalous data that can be used to generate these eight categories: (a) whether the individual accepts the data as valid, (b) whether the individual offers an explanation for the data, and (c) whether the individual alters the current theory.

The taxonomy is parallel to Posner et al.’s three conditions of new conception for conceptual change. To induce dissatisfaction and thereby cognitive conflict, anomalous data should be believed true. Two response types of ignoring and rejection of anomalous data are caused because the data is not accepted as valid. Yet, before it happens, their meanings are understood by students. That is, discrepant events should be intelligible or sensible. The response type of uncertainty about validity of data shows that the data are too difficult for individuals to make sense of. Individuals who exclude data may or may not believe the data, but they feel no need to explain the data because they consider the data to be irrelevant to their theory. Sometimes individual who hold data in abeyance postpone their explanation of the data although they believe it true because, although they cannot explain the data at present, they believe that someday someone will work out an explanation within the framework of their current theory. So far, five response types demonstrate how discrepant events fail to cause a cognitive conflict which is supposed by the researcher or instructor.

By the way, even though anomalous data are considered plausible, students don’t always change their initial ideas. Individuals reinterpret the data or make peripheral theory change to explain the contradictory but valid information. Individuals who reinterpret data explain the data within their current theoretical framework. Individuals also accept and explain the data by making minor changes to the theory, without giving up any core components in the theory. This is often called weak knowledge restructuring, assimilation, or conceptual capture (Duit & Treagust, 2003). The final possible response to anomalous data is theory change, in which individuals find a new alternative theory fruitful and thus abandon their prior beliefs.

Chan et al. (1997) performed a study that assessed the efficacy of conflictual information and examined its relations with a knowledge-building approach to learning. From this study, they identified two major approaches to processing contradictory information: direct assimilation, which involved fitting new information with what was already known, and knowledge building, which involved treating new information as something problematic that needed to ne explained. Students who process information by directly assimilating it into their existing knowledge tend to notice surface features of new information and to persist in their preexisting conceptions. For example, in learning about plant nutrition, some students who interpreted new information based on their knowledge about animal nutrition didn’t recognize any difference between two conceptions leading to misconceptions. Alternatively, other students who questioned whether the familiar word ‘nutrition’ had the same meaning in the new situation tried to construct explanations to resolve the discrepancies. These findings showed that how students approach the learning situation affects the effect of cognitive conflict on their conceptual change. Learning by direct assimilation doesn’t induce the conflict, and thus fail to cause conceptual change.

To sum up, even though discrepant events are designed to confront students’ naïve ideas so as to cause conceptual change, it can fail to bring to learner’s mind even cognitive conflict.

3.2.  Condition for Creation of Meaningful Cognitive Conflict

The failure of inducing meaningful cognitive conflicts explains in part the unsuccessful results of the cognitive conflict strategy for conceptual change. Then, what factors influence the problem recognition from a discrepant event?

First, problem recognition calls for a certain amount of prior knowledge or background knowledge. If students have little or no knowledge about the topic, it is difficult to be aware of the differences between their theories and new ones. Limon (2001) argued that the amount of knowledge affect the extent of conceptual change by changing the degree of conflict. The more prior knowledge a student has, the more meaningful conflict can be induced. In other words, if the new conception of discrepant event is too difficult for students to comprehend, they are often not mystified by what they did not know (Chinn and Brewer, 1998). On the other hand, it is also claimed that if target prior knowledge is strongly entrenched, responses to a discrepant event could be rejection or exclusion. Likewise, prior knowledge is a key aspect to implementing successfully the cognitive conflict strategy in the classroom. If the teacher do not know deeply students’ prior knowledge and how to activate it, a meaningful conflict cannot be created.