PHYSICS PROBLEM SOLVING

(^) rating for each group’s set of original Claims. An average closer to 1.0 would indicate a
majority of correct Claims. A number near 0.0 would indicate either mostly ambiguous
Claims or an even mix of correct and incorrect. A number near -1.0 would indicate
mostly incorrect claims. In Table 4-12 (page 160), Claim Quality is compared with the
groups’ use of Modified Claims and Alternate Claims. Instead of sorting the table by
group, or if they use or do not use Alternate Claims, I sorted them by the “Claim
Quality.” The MC and AC entries were determined by what the group typically does.
Furthermore, I divided the 14 groups in to three subgroups: The top five, the middle
four, and the bottom five in terms of claim quality. An interesting pattern emerges from
this ordering.
The top five groups in terms of Claim quality (7A, 4A, 3B, 3A, 5C) use only
Modified Claims. Groups 7A and 4A, which have the same claim quality use Modified
Claims to extend and elaborate ideas in an original correct Claim (For example, Group
4A, Table 4-17, p. 166). Of the five groups (4B, 2B, 5B, 5A, 2A) that have the lowest
Claim quality, four of these groups use Alternate Claims after incorrect initial claims (For
example, Group 4B, Table 4-15, page 164). The middle four groups, 2D, 6B, 4C, and 4D
were more difficult to interpret. Group 4C was most difficult to classify because this
group again exhibited their frenetic behavior by having no persistent pattern of how
Alternate Claims followed Claims.
There are some other observations about these three groupings shown in Table 4-
12 (p. 160). First, it is not surprising to find Groups 3A and 7A using only Modified
Claims. Their argument construction generally leads to a Claim. The Modified Claims
they use immediately follow the original Claim and serve to slightly clarify the original