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Undergraduate Students’ Understanding about Volcanoes: Results from the InVEST Volcanic Concept Survey
Dominike Merle-JohnsonLloyd Barrow
Alan WhittingtonUniversity of Missouri, Columbia
InVEST-Volcano Concept Survey (Parham, et al., 2010)
“Concept-intensive instrument design to explore baseline levels of undergraduate students understanding about volcanoes without the aid of support materials (textbooks, etc) at introductory geoscience courses” p-177-178.
Survey components Demographic questions Beliefs about science Students’ preferences in technology Learning styles 10 open-ended volcano questions
Research Questions Using the InVEST Volcanic Concept Survey
(Parham et al., 2010) compare two courses to determine: Is there a correlation between scores and level
confidence for each of the volcano questions? Are there any significant differences between the
students’ scores for both courses? How do our results compare with the ones
reported by Parham et al., (2010)? What alternative conceptions students still
have before being formally taught about volcanoes?
The Courses
Course A Introductory For majors and
non-majors Includes a
laboratory component
Course B Introductory For non-majors Does not have a
laboratory component
Methodology Administer a modified InVEST Volcano Concept Survey
(Parham et al., 2010) After instruction on plate tectonics, but before volcanoes. Via Blackboard
One question was modified from “draw” to “describe” Voluntary Add self-reported confidence levels for each
question 4=very confident; 3=rather confident; 2= not very
confident; 1=Just a guess Did not asked computer-preference questions
Validate scoring survey Conduct statistical analyses to answer research questions. Analyzed students’ responses for misconceptions
Scoring Initially scored by first author (10% scored
by two other experts for reliability) Score reliability
Expert 1: Cronbach’s alpha= 0.95 Expert 2: Cronbach’s alpha =0.85
“Examples of idealized student’s responses” reported by Parham et al., (2010) (tables 1 & 2), and content expertise.
Scale: 0=no response or “don’t know”; 1=weak response; 2= moderate response; 3=strong/ideal response
Results: Responses to survey-Demographics
Characteristic Course A (n=99) Course B (n=85)
STEM---Non-STEM
34%---65% 59%---41%
Science Interest
45% Mode:Somewhat (scale 4/5)
52% Mode: somewhat
Earth Science Interest
43% Mode: somewhat
59% Mode: somewhat
Learned about volcanoes from
32% classroom activities---29%documentary films
49% classroom activities
Results: Comparison between courses
Confidence levels Many rated “just a guess” to why does a volcano
erupt and the role of water in volcanic eruptions.
Item Course A Course B
Question with highest mean score
Difference magma and lava
Difference magma and lava
Question with lowest mean score
Controls explosivity volcanoes
Hazards of eruptive material and environment
Total Mean and SD
14.945.84
18.695.28
Results: Comparison between courses
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Question
Mea
n s
core
Course A
Course B
Results: Correlation between scores and confidence level per question
Item Course A Course B
1) Volcanoes similarly shaped? 0.59** 0.45**
2) Difference between magma & lava 0.42** 0.35**
3) Volcano cut inside, what do you see inside?
0.51 0.44**
4) Volcano pattern around the world 0.47** 0.52**
5) Why volcano erupts? 0.4** 0.41**
6) Controls explosivity volcano 0.48** 0.58**
7) How water affects explosivity? 0.48** 0.46**
8) Describe erupting volcano & features 0.61** 0.62**
9) Hazard materials & interaction with environment
0.62** 0.71**
10) Volcano affecting 4 different scenarios
0.51** 0.57**
**p<0.01
Results: Comparison between Courses A one-way ANOVA was used to test
differences between the overall scores of both courses. Scores for both courses differed significantly for both courses, F (1, 182)=20.33, p=0.000.
Results, cont: Overall correlations
Pearson correlations shows significant correlations between total scores and: the courses (class), total confidence, and interest in how the Earth works.
Comparison with Parham et al., (2010) results
Characteristic Parham et al., (2010) Our study:
n 672 184
Avg. Total Score
64% 58%
High scores Knowledge- difference magma and lava
Knowledge- difference magma and lava
Low scores(Bloom’s Taxonomy)
Application and analysis Comprehension
No approximation of ideal response
Hazards, Affect groups of people
None
Results: Distribution scored responses
0 50 100 150 200 250
9 (An)
4 (An)
10 (App)
7(C)
6(C)
5(C)
3(C)
8(K)
2 (K)
1(K)
Score 0
Score 1
Score 2
Score 3
Comparison with Parham et al., (2010) results, cont.
“Student understanding of volcanic processes was rather limited” (p. 181).
Difference between magma and lava question had the greatest proportion of high scores.
Misconceptions Connect volcanoes with water and islands Hot or tropical climates Volcanoes form due to rocky or mountainous
terrain Random pattern
Misconceptions
Reported by others* Magma comes from the core All volcanoes have mountain shape
“New” “Magma is rocks being melted. Lava are rocks
in liquid form.” Cutting a volcano in half you see the core. Volcanoes are close to giant masses of water. Volcanoes occur also at continental-continental
plate boundaries. Volcanoes erupt due to pressure from core. The size of the tunnel to the mantle
determines explosivity. Magnitude earthquake
*http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/intro/misconception_list.html
Other interesting findings
“Is there water in volcanoes?” Water can make magma more runny Water makes volcanoes less volatile More water, more wet and it wont erupt Magma is thicker and flows slower than
lava. Water cools magma and will make it less
explosive.
Conclusions: Based on our results, students’ self-rated
confidence levels is a predictor of their knowledge on that concept.
The study found significant differences in scores between the courses assessed. Testing of variables did not show reasons for these differences. Further data/information is needed to answer this question.
Conclusions, cont. Compared with Parham et al (2010) results, our
results suggest student’s acquire or improve their knowledge about volcanic hazards and location of volcanoes, while making sense of/learning about plate tectonics.
However, the role of water in magma, the structure of a volcano, and why a volcano erupts are still topics they don’t understand well prior to learning about volcanoes.
Student struggle with comprehension questions.
Implications
Connections of other geologic topics (plate tectonics) can help students knowledge of volcanism before the formal lesson begins.
How students process what learned inside and outside classroom can have effects on how they make sense of what learned.
More emphasis/explicit explanations in classroom on why volcanoes erupt, the structure of volcanoes, and the role of water in volcanic eruptions.
Limitations
This research used only one survey collected once and at one institution.
Data obtained did not reveal why there were significant differences in both courses: Other data needs to be done.
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