Materials have been developed to support the teaching of electric circuit theory at A-level through the use of box and AVOW diagrams. The report presents the outcomes of an extensive trial of these materials which was carried out with one group of 16 students in Year 12 (i.e. in the first year of their sixth form course) in a comprehensive school. For students in the top three quartiles there is strong evidence of improvement in their problem solving skills where the circuits concerned are made up of networks of resistors. There is also evidence, though it is less strong, that the students in the experimental group as a whole acquired a better, more holistic understanding of electricity than a comparison group of Year 13 students. Despite this, however, there is no firm evidence for transfer of learning to problems which extended beyond reistance networks. The implications of these findings for teaching are discussed.
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