RUME 26
2024
Omaha, Nebraska
Student Understanding of the Direction of Vector Dot Products Across Contexts and Levels
Page: 1037
As part of an effort to examine students’ understanding of vector products, we present preliminary findings from student responses to survey questions asking whether the dot product has a direction in three different contexts and three different class levels. The contexts were two vectors with labels but no values, two vectors on a Cartesian grid with specified magnitudes and directions, and the flux of a uniform electric or magnetic field through a planar surface. The three courses were the second semester of an introductory calculus-based physics course, a sophomore-level mathematical methods in physics course, and a junior-level electricity and magnetism course. Depending on the context, between 25% and 30% of introductory students were successful at determining that the dot product has no direction. Performance increased with course level.