Impact of representational approach on the improvement of students' understanding of acceleration

This research examined the impact of representational approach on the improvement of students’ understanding of acceleration. Subject consisted of 24 prospective physics teacher students of State University of Malang, enrolling Selected Topic of School Physics course in Semester I of 2011/2012 academic year. Using mixed-methods design, this study concluded that (1) students’ mean score of conceptual test increased significantly from 50.8% to 85.0% with very large d-effect size (1.67) and high normalized-gain (0.71), (2) students became able to use operational definition of acceleration  to analyze multi-flash motion diagram, and (3) students remediated their misconceptions of acceleration. However, few students stuck in their misconception that acceleration of a shot-up object is decreasing with its elevation, and the tension in the rope of a swinging pendulum is equal to the weight of its bob.