Investigating student understanding with a screening-target methodology*

One of the goals of physics instruction is to help students improve their reasoning. Research from cognitive psychology suggests that to reason productively, students need to possess content understanding (i.e., mindware) and apply appropriate reasoning strategies. We are developing an instrument designed to assess student content understanding and their reasoning consistency through a screening-target methodology. Screening questions probe student conceptual understanding, while target questions require students to apply this understanding in situations that present reasoning challenges. By comparing performance on these questions, we can pinpoint more specifically factors that contribute to student response patterns. We will present data from student interviews and discuss implications for research, assessment development, and instruction.