Tommi Kokkonen (University of Helsinki) & Lennart Schalk (PH Schwyz)

“One Instructional Sequence Fits all? A Conceptual Analysis of the Applicability of Concreteness Fading”

Abstract: According to the concreteness fading approach, instruction should start with concrete representations and progress stepwise to representations that are more idealized. Various researchers have suggested that concreteness fading is a broadly applicable instructional approach. In this talk, we conceptually analyze examples of concreteness fading in mathematics and various science domains. In this analysis, we draw on theories of analogical and relational reasoning and on the literature about learning with multiple representations. Furthermore, we report on an experimental study in which we employed concreteness fading in advanced physics education. The results of the conceptual analysis and the experimental study indicate that concreteness fading may not be as generalizable as has been suggested. The reasons for this limited generalizability are twofold. First, the types of representations and the relations between them differ across different domains. Second, the instructional goals between domains and the subsequent roles of the representations vary.

Bios: Tommi Kokkonen holds a PhD in physics education and is a post-doctoral researcher in the University of Helsinki, Finland. His research interests include conceptual change and concept learning in physics.
Lennart Schalk is the director of the research and development unit and holds a research professorship for early STEM education at the PH Schwyz (Schwyz University of Teacher Education). In his research, he tries to bridge the gap between psychological and cognitive science and educational practice in classrooms.

Analogy List Seminar | Thursday, 11th February 2021