Pre-Class Tutorial: An Instructional Strategy to Improve Student Understanding in P-V-T-S Diagrams in Thermodynamic Course D Saepuzaman*, S P Sriyansyah, I M Sari, S Karim
Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia
Abstract
The PreClass Tutorial have been used to successfully improve deep conceptual undertanding and skills to draw and interpret the PVT diagrams in Thermodynamic Courses. This study was motivated by the previous research findings that students encounter the lack of conceptual understanding to draw and interpret the PVT diagrams to describes thermal process and Cycles. The analysis of the academic responses at written test shows that some of the students conceptual difficulties as follows. First, the biggest difficulty in each PV, PT, and VT diagram is to draw an adiabatic proces. Second, The percentage of students who answer the PV diagram correctly is higher than those who answer the PT and VT diagram. Third, Students prefer understanding thermal processes with their unique characteristic, such as isobaric with constant pressure, isotherm with constant temperature, and isochoric with volume constant. Finally, lack on understanding the concept of PVT diagram also impacts students understanding on various thermal cycles. Based on these findings, we developed pre-class tutorial that facilitate students either to construct their own concepts to draw and interpret the PVT diagram. The descriptive method was used to involve 34 third-years students of Physics Education Department The increased conceptual understanding was identified from the average of students achievement score on the instrument test. The findings showed that the use of preclass tutorial effectively improves students conceptual understanding in draw and interpret the PVT diagrams to describes thermal process and Cycles
