Importance of eliciting student ideas
An accumulation of research strongly suggests that students come to school with ideas, beliefs and experiences that are relevant to learning targeted science concepts. The cognitive structures they develop by making connections among their everyday observations, societal influences, and previous schooling may promote or hinder student learning. (National Research Council, 2003). Some experiences lead to strongly held misconceptions that resist change even in the face of instruction that is directly relevant to the concept in question. Eliciting student ideas is important for revealing existing cognitive structures and resulting misconceptions that should be addressed in assessments.
Elicitation strategies
Several strategies for eliciting student ideas have been used by science teachers and education researchers. We include here a selection of methods with brief descriptions to point out the utility of each.
Prompt Elements
Regardless of the particular strategy selected, prompts that are effective in eliciting student thinking generally share the following features.
Clearly target an idea of interest
Lend themselves to expansive answers