Does transitioning to online classes mid-semester affect conceptual understanding?

Abstract

The Force Concept Inventory (FCI) can be used as an assessment tool to measure conceptual gains in a cohort of students. The FCI uses a conceptions/"misconceptions" lens rather than a context dependent perspective, such as "knowledge-in-pieces". In this study it was given to first year students ($N=256$ students) pre- and post-mechanics lectures, at the University of Johannesburg. From these results we examine the effect of switching mid-semester from traditional classes to online classes, as imposed by the COVID-19 lockdown in South Africa. Overall results indicate no appreciable difference of gain, when bench-marked against previous studies using this assessment tool. When compared with $2019$ grades, the $2020$ semester grades do not appear to be greatly affected. Furthermore, statistical analyses also indicate a gender difference in mean gains in favour of females at the $95\%$ significance level (for paired data, $N=48$).