The Teaching Experiment — What it is and what it isn’t

Much of the research investigating how a student reasons or what knowledge structures they possess and utilize has typically been done using clinical interviews. Clinical interviews are often semi‐structured and may or may not involve demonstration equipment. In the early 1980’s, mathematics researchers began using a new style of interviewing which they termed the “teaching experiment.” These two methods will be compared and contrasted within the context of sound. Two groups of students from a conceptually‐based introductory physics course were interviewed in an effort to understand how they view the production of sound in musical instruments; one group was interviewed using clinical interviews while the second group was interviewed using the teaching experiment.