%0 Generic %1 Baily2014Student %A Baily, Charles %A Astolfi, Cecilia %D 2014 %K teaching %T Student Reasoning About the Divergence of a Vector Field %U http://arxiv.org/abs/1407.3888 %X Expanding our knowledge of student difficulties in advanced undergraduate electromagnetism is essential if we are to develop effective instructional interventions. Drawing on an analysis of course materials, in-class observations and responses to conceptual questions, we document specific resources employed by students when reasoning about the divergence of a vector field. One common student error, which persisted in our course despite explicit instruction, is to misinterpret any "spreading out" of field lines in a diagram as representing a place of non-zero divergence. Some of these student difficulties can likely be attributed to having first learned about the divergence in a mathematical context, where there was little emphasis on graphical representations of vector fields and connections to physical situations.

@misc{Baily2014Student, abstract = {{Expanding our knowledge of student difficulties in advanced undergraduate electromagnetism is essential if we are to develop effective instructional interventions. Drawing on an analysis of course materials, in-class observations and responses to conceptual questions, we document specific resources employed by students when reasoning about the divergence of a vector field. One common student error, which persisted in our course despite explicit instruction, is to misinterpret any "spreading out" of field lines in a diagram as representing a place of non-zero divergence. Some of these student difficulties can likely be attributed to having first learned about the divergence in a mathematical context, where there was little emphasis on graphical representations of vector fields and connections to physical situations.}}, added-at = {2019-02-23T22:09:48.000+0100}, archiveprefix = {arXiv}, author = {Baily, Charles and Astolfi, Cecilia}, biburl = {https://www.bibsonomy.org/bibtex/27410f9090b2f365d9c1602f4b35a0cfd/cmcneile}, citeulike-article-id = {13267514}, citeulike-linkout-0 = {http://arxiv.org/abs/1407.3888}, citeulike-linkout-1 = {http://arxiv.org/pdf/1407.3888}, day = 30, eprint = {1407.3888}, interhash = {7839229a0240e94120bffc5233826e08}, intrahash = {7410f9090b2f365d9c1602f4b35a0cfd}, keywords = {teaching}, month = sep, posted-at = {2014-07-16 11:13:40}, priority = {2}, timestamp = {2019-02-23T22:15:27.000+0100}, title = {{Student Reasoning About the Divergence of a Vector Field}}, url = {http://arxiv.org/abs/1407.3888}, year = 2014 }