Support for Understanding: discourse which aids the construction of a functional mental model of causal situations

Abstract

The understanding of a cause‐effect situation is a valued educational outcome. Causal understanding can be thought of as the construction of a functional mental model which represents the situation and its transformation. While the construction of such a model is not in the control of a teacher, the mental processes involved may be supported. One form of support may be to provide an explicit and specific description of the transformation of the situation. At least as far as textual discourse is concerned, this is often something which receives only cursory attention. This study sought evidence that an explicit and specific account of the transformation could help students understand causal situations. Various textual accounts of two causal situations in science were tested on 12 and 13‐year old students and their effect on understanding was assessed. There was evidence that an explicit and specific account of the transformation of the situations supported understanding. Some features which should be considered when describing causal situations are discussed.