Education Commons^™

Ionic Bonding Curriculum Unit: An Electrostatic Framework, Mary Frank Lamar

Theses and Dissertations--Education Sciences

This mixed methods study compared two groups of high school students’ understanding of the ionic bond and the dissolving process. A 5 lesson curriculum unit was developed using Taber’s electrostatic framework (1997) focusing on the electrostatic forces between ions compared to a molecular framework (business-as-usual) and the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS Lead States, 2013). The lessons were developed to integrate spatially integrated experiences. Experimental (new curriculum unit) and business-as-usual (criss-cross method) students had their spatial skills tested before and after learning about the ionic bond using the Purdue Spatial Visualization-Rotations Test (PVST-Rot; Bodner & Guay, 1997). Students’ content was …

Spatial Reasoning And Understanding The Particulate Nature Of Matter: A Middle School Perspective, Merryn L. Cole

Theses and Dissertations--Education Sciences

This dissertation employed a mixed-methods approach to examine the relationship between spatial reasoning ability and understanding of chemistry content for both middle school students and their science teachers. Spatial reasoning has been linked to success in learning STEM subjects (Wai, Lubinski, & Benbow, 2009). Previous studies have shown a correlation between understanding of chemistry content and spatial reasoning ability (e.g., Pribyl & Bodner, 1987; Wu & Shah, 2003: Stieff, 2013), raising the importance of developing the spatial reasoning ability of both teachers and students.

Few studies examine middle school students’ or in-service middle school teachers’ understanding of chemistry concepts or …