Miller-Young, Janice (2013) “Calculations and Expectations: How engineering students describe three-dimensional forces,” The Canadian Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning: Vol. 4: Iss. 1, Article 4.

This paper resulted from my original project in the 2009 Nexen Scholars program.  I am posting it here because I thought the think-aloud protocol was particularly useful, and others may want to consider using it in a study.

The purpose of this inquiry was to determine the difficulties students in a first-year engineering class experience in learning to visualize 3D statics problems from 2D drawings. The main data source was think-alouds using two visualization problems. Think-alouds are a type of verbal protocol and are a mainstay in cognitive psychology. They are used to infer mental models by observing students while they are actually engaged in mental activities. In short, participants are asked to talk out loud about what they are thinking, while engaged in a task which could normally be carried out alone.  One advantage of this type of interview protocol is that students’ thinking is captured in “real time”, rather than a retrospective reflection.  However, the logistics of conducting and recording think-aloud protocols are a little more complicated if you do it during the semester, as I did.

The data from the think-aloud interviews was triangulated with data from individual course work, and gave me new insights into the types of visualization problems students initially struggle with in my class.  See the paper for more details and references.