#846: From Intuition to Mechanism: Tracing Resource Activation in a Middle-School Electromagnetism Unit

This study explores how middle school students’ intuitive ideas about electrostatic and magnetic phenomenon can serve as productive resources for learning. Grounded in knowledge in pieces (KiP) and responsive teaching (RT) perspectives, the paper focuses on the thinking of one seventh-grade student, Reuben (pseudonym), engaged in a six-day unit on static electricity, magnetism, and electromagnetism. Data sources included classroom video, worksheets, and student-generated artifacts such as models and explanations. Through iterative coding, four productive intuitions were identified and traced across activities: force as mover, attraction/repulsion, closer means stronger, and proximity. These intuitive resources, also evident in peers’ written work, supported Reuben’s development of causal and spatial reasoning about invisible forces. Findings demonstrate how instruction can build on intuitive resources to help students develop increasingly mechanistic explanations, thereby contributing to efforts that integrate responsive teaching and resource-based perspectives in science learning.