First-year university students’ conceptual understanding of electric circuits in relation to school and personal background

dc.contributor.authorCoetzee, Moreen
dc.contributor.authorCoetzee, Corene
dc.contributor.authorGaigher, Estelle
dc.date.accessioned2023-10-06T08:23:45Z
dc.date.available2023-10-06T08:23:45Z
dc.date.issued2022-12-23
dc.description.abstractThis paper reports a quantitative study about university students’ conceptual understanding of simple DC-circuits when entering firstyear physics at a South African university. The aim was to investigate how conceptual understanding relates to the students’ personal and school background. The conceptual framework was based on an existing model of the effectiveness of science education. Data were collected from 815 participants at a South African university. The conceptual understanding of DC circuits was measured in terms of performance in the well-known Determining and Interpreting Resistive Electric Circuits Concepts Test (DIRECT). Background information at school, classroom, and personal level was obtained with a questionnaire. Using Rash analysis, it was found that the students’ conceptual understanding relates significantly to the type of school attended, home language, previous achievement, their attitudes towards physics, and gender. However, contrary to expectations, the students’ conceptual understanding did not show a relationship with their exposure to practical work at school.en_US
dc.description.departmentScience, Mathematics and Technology Educationen_US
dc.description.librarianam2023en_US
dc.description.urihttp://journals.ufs.ac.za/index.php/pieen_US
dc.identifier.citationCoetzee, M., Coetzee, C., Gaigher, E. 2022, 'First-year university students conceptual understanding of electric circuits in relation to school and personal background', Perspectives in Education, vol. 40, no. 4, pp. 117-134. DOI : 10.38140/pie.v40i4.6573.en_US
dc.identifier.issn0258-2236 (print)
dc.identifier.issn2519-593X (online)
dc.identifier.other10.38140/ pie.v40i4.6573
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/2263/92729
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.publisherUniversity of the Free State, Faculty of Educationen_US
dc.rights© Creative Commons With Attribution (CC-BY).en_US
dc.subjectScience educationen_US
dc.subjectConceptual understandingen_US
dc.subjectDC-Electric circuiten_US
dc.subjectContextual factorsen_US
dc.subjectSDG-04: Quality educationen_US
dc.subjectDetermining and interpreting resistive electric circuits concepts test (DIRECT)en_US
dc.titleFirst-year university students’ conceptual understanding of electric circuits in relation to school and personal backgrounden_US
dc.typeArticleen_US

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