Worksheet analysis for revealing students’ understanding of simple DC circuits

Abstract

Worksheets are the guideline for students to learn as they can write their own idea, notes, questions, and understandings within the worksheet. Therefore, it is easy to investigate students’ understandings about the topics. In this study, researchers aimed to elicit 70 Thai high school students’ correct understanding and misconceptions of simple DC circuits from their responses on the worksheet. The participants came from 2 schools and attended the simple DC circuits activity. Participants were asked to setup the 3 resistors series and parallel circuits then write down their response to these questions: 1) Which resistor will be burnt first? 2) Sorting amount of the current passing to each resistor and 3) Sorting amount of the potential difference across each resistor. By analysing students’ responses on the worksheet, 3 common misconceptions as 1) Clashing current misconception 2) Stored up and used up current misconception and 3) Closer circuit misconception were found.