PRE-SERVICE PHYSICS TEACHERS’ CONCEPT MAPS REPRESENTING RELATIONAL STRUCTURE OF PHYSICS CONCEPTS

In this study, a parsimonious set of quantities is developed to characterise and evaluate the quality of concept maps. It is shown here how such a set can be based on measurements of the connectivity, clustering and cohesion of concept maps. A structural model of the data is introduced so that concept maps can be evaluated and classified by using only two quantities called here richness of content (D) and quality of structure (q). The model is used in monitoring changes in the concept maps (N=33) consisting of two sets of maps (initial and final ones), made before and after teaching. Such an approach gives access to monitor changes of the concept maps during a teaching sequence.