Fostering Physics Comprehension in Secondary School Students

Abstract

Science's pivotal role in advancing human civilization underscores its significance. Metacognition –-understanding how we think about our thinking –proves pivotal in achieving groundbreaking discoveries in science. Achieving this requires robust metacognitive skills to observe and reconcile conflicting theories and data to derive meaningful conclusions. While there has been considerable exploration of metacognition within the broader context of scientific inquiry, limited research has been conducted to understand metacognition in secondary school science education. This experimental study investigates the impact of metacognitive intervention on adolescents' conceptual understanding of Newton's laws of Force and Motion. It employs a thought experiment framework, guiding participants to reflect on phenomena related to force and motion through various representations. In this process, participants, with or without metacognitive interventions, made predictions using an independent object perspective in the pre-training and a first-person physical experience during the bodily training phase. Additionally, it explores correlations between individual metacognitive abilities and learning outcomes. Surprisingly, the findings contrast prior research involving adults, revealing that secondary school participants (N = 36) did not exhibit improved learning outcomes with metacognitive support. Furthermore, only minimal correlations emerged between their metacognitive skills and learning outcomes. In response to these unexpected results, this study concludes by offering practical recommendations for optimizing metacognitive support tailored to secondary school science education. These insights offer valuable guidance to educators and researchers aiming to enhance the effectiveness of metacognitive interventions in this educational context.