Reasoning with External Representations in Elementary Astronomy

This experiment investigated the effect of the presentation of two culturally accepted external representations of the earth-a map and a globe- on children’s reasoning in elementary astronomy. Eighty four children from grades 1 and 3 were interviewed individually. First, the children were given a pre-test which determined their internal representations by asking them to make drawings and play-dough models of the earth and indicate where people live. The children were then divided in two experimental groups: Half of the children were presented with a globe, and half with a map. In both groups the children were asked to answer another set of questions about the earth, in order to determine how the external representations influenced their responses. In the pre-test children constructed relatively consistent models of the earth. However, when an external model was presented the children used this model to reason with. This often resulted in internally consistent responses as students relied on their incompatible prior knowledge to answer questions the answers to which could not be provided directly from the external model. We concluded that the use of an external representation is not an act of ‘direct cultural transmission’, but a constructive process during which the information that comes from the culture is interpreted and influenced by what is already known