Comparing Chemistry Students’ Abstract Ideas about Model Evaluation and Changeability with Their Contextualized Engagement in Modeling

Abstract

Modeling is an essential practice for students to develop as they prepare to make sense of and predict the natural world. Epistemic modeling knowledge, or thinking about models, is an important consideration for modeling and can support this practice. Much work has investigated this, with most focusing on categorizing students’ epistemic modeling knowledge. However, little is known about how this knowledge relates to the way students engage in modeling and build predictive scientific models, an essential component of the practice. Thus, to determine how students’ activated resources when prompted to think about models relate to those activated when engaging in modeling, this work consisted of 12 semi-structured interviews, where students (a) discussed their thoughts about scientific models, specifically with regard to evaluation and changeability, (b) engaged in building a predictive model, and (c) were prompted to evaluate and change that model. It was found that students often conceptualized model evaluation and changeability differently, activating different resources for each when asked to discuss these dimensions. Additionally, 10 out of 12 students activated different resources between discussion and engagement contexts for at least one dimension. This indicates that different epistemological contexts may elicit different types of knowledge activation with respect to modeling, providing implications for how to assess and support modeling. Specifically, direct epistemological attention is needed during model engagement in addition to supporting students in thinking about scientific models abstractly, and these contexts should be assessed separately.