In this study, we compared students' learning from two conditions in a unit on inclined planes: Virtual-then-Physical (V-t-P) (n = 50), where students conducted a virtual lab followed by a physical lab, or vice versa in the Physical-then-Virtual condition (P-t-V) (n = 60). We analyzed students' written explanations after each lab focusing on connections they made between concepts and their use of evidence. We also analyzed students' learning using an inclined planes test to understand their overall physics knowledge at the start and end of the unit. While we found no significant differences between students' post-test scores based on condition using an analysis of covariance, findings from a repeated measures MANOVA of students' explanations showed that performing a physical lab was less effective in helping students to explain the relationships between the science concepts they were exploring as well as use data to support their ideas. We further found that students who only conducted a virtual lab performed better than students performing both types of labs no matter the sequence. However, the findings from these analyses also indicate that if using both labs, then having students do a physical lab prior to a virtual one may be more beneficial for middle school students than having them participate in the opposite sequence. Limitations, implications, and future research are discussed.

Research exploring students' learning from physical and virtual labs has suggested that on the whole, students learn science content just as well, if not better from virtual labs as they do from physical labs. However, the affordances of physical labs might support the learning of specific skills and competencies that are just as crucial for learning science. In this study, we examined students' discussions as they worked on physical and virtual labs to better understand how they learned from each, and the kinds of learning that each type of lab supported. One hundred and fifteen 6th grade students from three science teachers' classes participated in this study. We examined audio data from all available groups as they engaged in physical and virtual labs (n =14 groups; physical,n= 8 groups; virtual,n= 6 groups). We found that students conducting physical labs engaged in a significantly higher proportion of talk related to setting up apparatus and taking measurements and calculating outputs. Students who performed virtual labs, on the other hand, engaged in significantly more discussions about making predictions and understanding patterns of relationships between variables, and interpreting science phenomena. While students in the Virtual condition engaged in discussions that were more focused on the relationships between science ideas, students in the Physical condition learned science practices related to planning and carrying out investigations that are equally valuable. Our findings suggest that learning from one experimental modality may complement and supplement the relative weaknesses of the other, indicating a need for strategically combining the two. Implications and future directions are discussed.

The aim of this study was to investigate how teachers interact with students in order to prepare them to conduct research with multiple online texts as part of the process of scientific inquiry in the classroom. The specific focus of this work was on understanding how teachers used classroom dialogue to create an environment that supports the use of multiple online text-based resources as part of the process of doing science. Data collection for this study occurred in the 6th grade classrooms of two teachers in a Midwestern school district. Each of the teachers taught three science classes for a total of 150 students. A test of students' content knowledge of physics was used in order to evaluate students' understanding of the physics concepts targeted in the curriculum. An analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) revealed that the students from one teacher's classes performed significantly better on the physics test than the students of the other teacher (p<.05). To qualitatively investigate the differences between the whole class dialogue used by the two teachers, teachers' interactions with students as they prepared them to engage in research with the multiple texts were coded. Coding of the dialogue revealed that the teacher whose students exhibited higher learning outcomes engaged in more deep level facilitation strategies during whole class discussion, including setting learning goals for text interactions, connecting to prior knowledge, and discussing the use of multiple texts as part of doing science.

Physical and virtual experimentation are thought to have different affordances for supporting students' learning. Research investigating the use of physical and virtual experiments to support students' learning has identified a variety of, sometimes conflicting, outcomes. Unanswered questions remain about how physical and virtual experiments may impact students' learning and for which contexts and content areas they may be most effective. Using a quasi-experimental design, we examined eighth grade students' (N=100) learning of physics concepts related to pulleys depending on the sequence of physical and virtual labs they engaged in. Five classes of students were assigned to either the: physical first condition (PF) (n=55), where students performed a physical pulley experiment and then performed the same experiment virtually, or virtual first condition (VF) (n=45), with the opposite sequence. Repeated measures ANOVA's were conducted to examine how physical and virtual labs impacted students' learning of specific physics concepts. While we did not find clear-cut support that one sequence was better, we did find evidence that participating in virtual experiments may be more beneficial for learning certain physics concepts, such as work and mechanical advantage. Our findings support the idea that if time or physical materials are limited, using virtual experiments may help students understand work and mechanical advantage.