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First year students' understanding of measurements in physics laboratory work
Includes bibliographical references (leaves 135-140).
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| Main Author: | |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Department of Physics
2015
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| _version_ | 1867613184699924480 |
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| access_status_str | Open Access |
| author | Volkwyn, Trevor Stanton |
| author2 | Allie, Saalih |
| author_browse | Allie, Saalih Volkwyn, Trevor Stanton |
| author_facet | Allie, Saalih Volkwyn, Trevor Stanton |
| author_sort | Volkwyn, Trevor Stanton |
| collection | Thesis |
| description | Includes bibliographical references (leaves 135-140). |
| format | Thesis |
| id | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/14037 |
| institution | University of Cape Town (South Africa) |
| language | eng |
| last_indexed | 2026-06-10T12:32:07.214Z |
| license_str | Not specified — see source repository |
| provenance_str_mv | Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| publishDate | 2015 |
| publishDateRange | 2015 |
| publishDateSort | 2015 |
| publisher | Department of Physics |
| publisherStr | Department of Physics |
| record_format | dspace |
| source_str | UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| spelling | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/14037 First year students' understanding of measurements in physics laboratory work Volkwyn, Trevor Stanton Allie, Saalih Buffler, Andy Physics Includes bibliographical references (leaves 135-140). Recent collaborative work by the physics education research group at the University of Cape Town (South Africa) and the science education research group at the University of York (United Kingdom) has produced a suite of research instruments which may be used to probe the procedural understanding of first-year physics students. The work has led to the development of a model for classifying students' reasoning about measurement in terms of theoretical constructs which have been termed the point and set paradigms. The model accounts for the ways in which students make decisions in the areas of data collection, data processing and data comparison during experimental work. A set of questionnaires was modified and used in this study to investigate mainstream physics students' understanding of measurement both before and after completing a full year physics laboratory curriculum. It was found that although the mainstream students both entered and exited their course with high levels of proficiency in applying the more formalistic rules of data analysis, very few shifted in their fundamental understanding of the concepts that underlie experimentation. The results further suggest that the laboratory course may have indeed impeded these students from developing a deep understanding of the nature of measurement and uncertainty. 2015-09-15T10:34:54Z 2015-09-15T10:34:54Z 2005 Master Thesis Masters MSc http://hdl.handle.net/11427/14037 eng application/pdf Department of Physics Faculty of Science University of Cape Town |
| spellingShingle | Physics Volkwyn, Trevor Stanton First year students' understanding of measurements in physics laboratory work |
| thesis_degree_str | Master's |
| title | First year students' understanding of measurements in physics laboratory work |
| title_full | First year students' understanding of measurements in physics laboratory work |
| title_fullStr | First year students' understanding of measurements in physics laboratory work |
| title_full_unstemmed | First year students' understanding of measurements in physics laboratory work |
| title_short | First year students' understanding of measurements in physics laboratory work |
| title_sort | first year students understanding of measurements in physics laboratory work |
| topic | Physics |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/11427/14037 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT volkwyntrevorstanton firstyearstudentsunderstandingofmeasurementsinphysicslaboratorywork |