Students’ Criteria for Representational Adequacy

Abstract

In prior work we¹ observed that, while designing representations, students employed an iterative process of innovating, critiquing, selecting, refining, and combining representations. Prior work also cataloged a rich set of ideas for representational innovation. This chapter focuses on the ability to judge and critique the quality of representations. In a study of high school students’ critical abilities, we investigated three main hypotheses: (1) Students’ ability to critique representations is rich and generative. (2) Students’ critical capabilities are, by and large, relatively reactive and inarticulate. (3) Students’ critical capabilities are design-linked; that is, competence does not appear equally in all contexts, but shines particularly in the context of design. Data from our study support all these hypotheses, with qualifications. Most unequivocally, students seem to have a strong, uninstructed, yet scientifically cogent competence to judge the quality of representations.