Facts
How accurate can students estimate physical quantities?
Which strategies do students use when estimating?
These questions were investigated in the project "Estimate it!". A summary of the main findings and facts can be found on the following slides. The complete PhD thesis (in German) is available here.
Accuracy of Estimates
Estimation Strategies
Poster
The collection and measurement of the benchmarks by students is particularly useful when the observed physical quantities originate from the everyday world and are easily determinable.
The measured objects can be collected and displayed graphically in the classroom.
This can be done by the students themselves for example, by measuring different objects in terms of different physical quantities and recording the results in a poster, or based on prefabricated materials. Two examples of such posters can be found below.
Card Game
The card game consists of 32 playing cards with estimating tasks for length, mass, time and temperature. In different rules students can playfully test their estimating skills against each other and simultaneously improve their estimation ability.
Through additional blank cards the students themselves can develop their own estimation tasks.
The card game is available here:
App
In addition to the card game, the app offers a variety of additional estimation tasks for length, mass, time and temperature. In different game modes,the students can playfully improve their estimation skills.
Pupils can create their own estimation tasks with pictures and share them with their classmates. Especially imaginative estimation tasks are provided as updates for all players.
Estimate! - What's your estimate?
About Us
The project "Estimate it!" is carried out at the Institute of Physics Education of the Westfälische Wilhelms-University in Münster as a PhD project by Lisa Stinken-Rösner . The work is supervised by Prof. Dr. Stefan Heusler betreut.
The main goal of the project is the analysis of strategies for estimating and the accuracy of the estimates obtained.
To implement learning and teaching materials, the institute of Physics Education cooperates with Charlotte Hintzmann , which is responsible for the illustrations and the design of the card game and the app. The web development of the app was performed by Sirach Lotz .
