Question characteristics and students’ epistemic framing

Abstract

Problem-solving is an important skill for undergraduate physics students. In addition to having the basic skills and background knowledge, students’ epistemic framing can play an important role in their ability to solve physics problems. As part of a bigger effort in understanding how to help instructors to better facilitate students’ work, we would like to find out when students proceed through problems in similar ways and the potential relationship between question characteristics and students’ framing to these questions. In this study, we use a two-dimensional theoretical framework (CAMP framework: Conceptual Physics, Algorithmic Physics, Conceptual Math, Algorithmic Math) to analyze and compare different students’ framing to the same set of questions of research-based tutorials in upper-division electricity and magnetism. We present a case study of comparing the self-reported framing of two students as they work through the same set of tutorial problems. Preliminary analysis suggests a correlation between question characteristics and student epistemic framing.