Abstract
Lab activities typically involve phenomena that are invisible to the naked eye. For example, in thermodynamics transfer of heat and temperature changes are perceived by the sense of touch or indirectly observed by the use of thermometers. New tools can be introduced to increase the opportunities for talking science. In this paper, we explore affordances and semiotic resources related to infrared (IR) cameras, including color imaging, numerical values and the form of the tool itself, as used by undergraduate students and instructors in chemistry, representing a scientific community at two different levels of expertise, in investigation of a thermal phenomenon. The participants come to attend to thermal aspects of what happens when a salt (sodium hydroxide) is exposed to air, with and without the use of IR cameras. Video data were gathered and transcribed multimodally. Results show that the IR cameras afford a focus on the disciplinarily relevant thermal aspects of the phenomenon in both groups of participants, but that the students’ discussion, coordinated by their embodied engagement with the IR cameras, was limited to cumulative talk, where they do not challenge each other, and static use of the technology. This is contrasted with the instructors who shared their knowledge with each other and explored the phenomenon both spatially with the IR cameras, and verbally through exploratory talk. We suggest that this difference in the use of novel technology may be due to differences in experience of lab work and understanding of the studied phenomena, and that a shift between cumulative and exploratory talk may be an indicator of learning.
Highlights
Hacking (1983, p. 186) quotes the poem In commendation of the microscope by 17th century writer Henry Powers, in arguing for the need to describe how technology widens the scope of what can be observed: ‘We ought to have some understanding of those astounding physical systems “by whose augmenting power we see more/than all the world has ever done before”.’This paper is a contribution to the emerging research field of visualization technology in science education (e.g. Linn & Eylon, 2011), in particular we deal with infrared (IR) cameras in learning thermodynamics.In everyday life, we interact with thermal phenomena through the sense of touch
The affordance of the IR camera is really the affordance of the many semiotic resources coordinated in the use of the tool, for example, the colors that give the image displayed on the screen a meaning that is relevant to the studied content
The types of talk used by the participants with and without the camera The results show that the students shifted in talk, from exploratory talk, without access to IR cameras (Sequence 1), to cumulative talk, with access to IR cameras (Sequence 2)
Summary
This paper is a contribution to the emerging research field of visualization technology in science education We interact with thermal phenomena through the sense of touch. Our senses are complemented by tools like thermometers, which give access to the phenomena in an indirect way (Hacking, 1983). The introduction of IR cameras offers new ways of measuring and visualizing thermal phenomena (see Figure 1). The image on the camera is displayed through different colors or nuances to show the temperature variation of the surfaces at which the IR camera is aimed. The temperature is indicated as a number in the corner of the display and colors and temperature are combined as a vertical scale, on the right side of the screen
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