UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SANTA CRUZ DYNAMIC VISUALIZATIONS AS TOOLS FOR SUPPORTING COSMOLOGICAL LITERACY Dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in EDUCATION By Zoë Elizabeth Buck June 2014 The dissertation of Zoë Buck is approved: ________________________________ Professor Doris Ash ________________________________ Professor Jerome Shaw ________________________________ Professor Joel Primack ________________________________ Professor Eduardo Mosqueda _________________________________ Tyrus Miller Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies Copyright © by Zoë Elizabeth Buck 2014 TABLE OF CONTENTS FIGURES ............................................................................................................................................. V DISSERTATION ABSTRACT ......................................................................................................... VI ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .................................................................................................................. IX INTRODUCTION: COSMOLOGY, VISUALIZATIONS AND RESEARCH OVERVIEW .............. 1 COSMOLOGY AS FUNDAMENTAL SCIENCE CONTENT ................................................................................... 2 DEFINING COSMOLOGICAL LITERACY ............................................................................................................ 5 VISUALIZATIONS AS LEARNING TOOLS FOR PRESENTING COMPLEX COSMOLOGY CONTENT ............. 11 COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY AND CONCEPTUAL CHANGE .............................................................................. 14 Conceptualizing visualizations from the CCT perspective ....................................................... 20 Moving Past Conceptual Change Theory ......................................................................................... 22 CULTURAL-HISTORICAL ACTIVITY THEORY (CHAT) ............................................................................. 24 Visualizations as tools within the activity system ....................................................................... 29 RESEARCH OVERVIEW ................................................................................................................................... 31 Research Questions .................................................................................................................................... 31 Research Paradigm ................................................................................................................................... 34 Dissertation Summary ............................................................................................................................. 36 CHAPTER ONE: THE EFFECT OF MEDIATIONAL CUES ON LEARNER INTERPRETATION OF A COSMOLOGY VISUALIZATION ............................................................................................ 40 INTRODUCTION: DYNAMIC VISUALIZATIONS ............................................................................................. 41 Visualizations and Color ......................................................................................................................... 42 METHODS ......................................................................................................................................................... 44 Research Design .......................................................................................................................................... 44 Sample ............................................................................................................................................................. 48 Measures ........................................................................................................................................................ 50 DATA ANALYSIS AND RESULTS .................................................................................................................... 51 IMPLICATIONS AND NEXT STEPS .................................................................................................................. 56 CHAPTER TWO: COMMUNITY COLLEGE STUDENTS MAKING SENSE OF COSMOLOGY VISUALIZATIONS ............................................................................................................................ 58 INTRODUCTION: INEQUITABLE ACCESS TO SCIENCE ................................................................................. 59 Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Learners and Cosmology ............................................ 61 Methodology: Using Visualizations to Support Learners’ Competencies .......................... 64 METHODS ......................................................................................................................................................... 69 Research Context: Community College ............................................................................................. 69 Introduction of The Improvable Object ............................................................................................ 72 Data Collection and Analysis ................................................................................................................. 74 Macro-level analysis: Using scaffolding scenes to focus on learning ................................... 75 Micro-level analysis: Utterances .......................................................................................................... 84 Coding for cosmological Sense-making ............................................................................................ 86 Emergent Coding ........................................................................................................................................ 87 RESULTS ........................................................................................................................................................... 89 DISCUSSION ................................................................................................................................................... 115 Cosmological sense-making ................................................................................................................ 115 Hybrid Language ..................................................................................................................................... 118 iii Visual Analogy .......................................................................................................................................... 119 CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................................................. 121 CHAPTER THREE: CONTRADICTIONS, HISTORICITY AND LEARNING AT AN URBAN PLANETARIUM ............................................................................................................................. 124 INTRODUCTION: VISUALIZATIONS AS TOOLS TO PRESENT THE INVISIBLE ........................................ 125 Research Design ....................................................................................................................................... 126 Methodology .............................................................................................................................................. 128 METHODS ...................................................................................................................................................... 131 Data Collection ......................................................................................................................................... 131 The Case ...................................................................................................................................................... 132 Participants ............................................................................................................................................... 133 Coding and analysis: .............................................................................................................................. 135 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION ......................................................................................................................... 136 Research Question 1: Historicity and contradictions .............................................................. 136 Research Question 2: Multi-voicedness and motivation ........................................................ 151 Research Question 3: Visitors and visualizations ...................................................................... 157 A Dangerous Discourse ......................................................................................................................... 162 CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................................................. 167 Expansive Learning ................................................................................................................................ 167 Implications ............................................................................................................................................... 169 CONCLUSION: IMPLICATIONS, RECOMMENDATIONS AND NEXT STEPS ...................... 173 SUMMARY OF RESULTS ............................................................................................................................... 174 IMPLICATIONS