High school students' perceptions and experiences of using combined RW and labatorials to understand Newton's laws of motion

Abstract

We discuss the perceptions and experiences of high school students using reflective writing and labatorials to attempt to understand Newtonian concepts of force and motion. The sequencing and content of these activities are centered on targeting students’ key difficulties related to forces and motion. Participants are 210 secondary 5 (grade 11) students, from three private schools in Montreal, who took a physics course during 2017–2018 or 2018–2019. Their ideas and opinions about forces and learning physics were investigated prior to and following the study with (a) three questions from the Force Concept Inventory; (b) a concept map focused on the relations between force and motion, and (c) pre- and post-semi-structured interviews conducted with 12 participants. The gathered data and interviews indicate that the process of combining labatorials with reflective writing improves students’ attitudes towards learning the subject.