A 25-question diagnostic that maps the exact motion misconceptions your students carry — not just the wrong answers. Covers position, displacement, velocity, and graphical interpretation. Heatmap report delivered within 48 hours of class completion.
Standard assessments often miss the deeper conceptual errors that persist through kinematics. These patterns appear across many IB, AP, A-Level, and GCSE classrooms.
Show students a position–time graph with a curve that's high but flat. Many will say the object is moving fast — confusing position with velocity. The "hill illusion" is one of the most persistent graph-reading errors in kinematics.
Ask for the distance travelled on an out-and-back trip. Many will say zero — confusing distance with displacement. Ask for average velocity on the same trip, and many will give the average speed instead.
A student drives 60 km/h for one hour and 40 km/h for two hours. Many will say the average speed is 50 km/h — the arithmetic mean of the two speeds. The correct answer is 46.7 km/h. This error is remarkably stubborn.
Many students treat "20 metres per second" as a single flash — 20 metres at one instant. They don't parse "per second" as a continuous rate. This "per" misconception quietly distorts how they reason about speed and velocity.
The diagnostic covers core motion and kinematics concepts mapped to IB Theme A, AP Units 1–3, A-Level Mechanics Module 1, and GCSE/IGCSE Forces and Motion.
Event definitions, interval vs instant, origin shifts, position notation, coordinate systems.
Reading position and time from x–t graphs, vertical and horizontal lines, crossing graphs, "at rest" identification.
Distance vs displacement on out-and-back paths, displacement with direction, sign conventions.
Average speed on round trips, average velocity calculations, negative velocity, comparing intervals on graphs.
Instantaneous vs average velocity, turning points (v = 0), tangent vs chord on position–time graphs.
Walking speed benchmarks, meaning of "metres per second," order-of-magnitude reasoning, unit sense-checking.
Within 48 hours of your class completing the diagnostic, we send you a complete misconception analysis — actionable, teacher-readable, and ready to use in your next lesson.
Colour-coded class heatmap showing performance by question and by student performance group (A–D). See exactly where understanding breaks down across the class.
Teacher-readable summary: which misconception clusters hit hardest, what they mean, and how your class distributes across performance groups.
Mapped to the specific misconceptions your students triggered — not generic revision advice, but the exact conceptual errors to address first.
What each group (A–D) means for your students, with specific teacher action items — from "ready to extend" to "needs foundational rebuilding."
| Q# | Concept Tested | Overall | A (21–25) | B (16–20) | C (11–15) | D (0–10) | Section |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q01 | Event definition | 37% | 100% | 33% | 40% | 10% | Events & Pos. |
| Q02 | Interval vs event | 53% | 100% | 83% | 50% | 20% | Events & Pos. |
| Q03 | Origin shift (position) | 43% | 75% | 50% | 50% | 20% | Events & Pos. |
| Q04 | Time-origin shift | 43% | 75% | 50% | 30% | 40% | Events & Pos. |
| Q05 | Event notation (x, t) | 50% | 100% | 33% | 50% | 40% | Events & Pos. |
| Q06 | Read x from graph | 63% | 75% | 83% | 80% | 30% | Graph Reading |
| Q07 | Read t from graph | 70% | 100% | 83% | 90% | 30% | Graph Reading |
| Q08 | Vertical line on x–t | 33% | 75% | 50% | 30% | 10% | Graph Reading |
| Q09 | Crossing x–t graphs | 63% | 100% | 67% | 70% | 40% | Graph Reading |
| Q10 | Horizontal line (at rest) | 47% | 100% | 100% | 10% | 30% | Graph Reading |
| Q11 | Distance vs displacement | 33% | 75% | 67% | 30% | 0% | Dist. & Disp. |
| Q12 | Displacement with direction | 53% | 100% | 100% | 50% | 10% | Dist. & Disp. |
| Q13 | Avg speed (full lap) | 73% | 100% | 100% | 80% | 40% | Avg Spd & Vel |
| Q14 | Avg velocity calculation | 37% | 75% | 50% | 30% | 20% | Avg Spd & Vel |
| Q15 | Avg speed (round trip) | 37% | 75% | 17% | 50% | 20% | Avg Spd & Vel |
| Q16 | Avg velocity (two events) | 43% | 100% | 67% | 30% | 20% | Avg Spd & Vel |
| Q17 | Negative velocity meaning | 53% | 100% | 67% | 50% | 30% | Avg Spd & Vel |
| Q18 | Compare graph intervals | 50% | 100% | 83% | 50% | 10% | Avg Spd & Vel |
| Q19 | Instantaneous v concept | 53% | 75% | 83% | 50% | 30% | Inst. Velocity |
| Q20 | Turning point (v = 0) | 60% | 100% | 83% | 60% | 30% | Inst. Velocity |
| Q21 | Walking speed estimate | 60% | 100% | 83% | 50% | 40% | Estimation |
| Q22 | Meaning of 20 m/s | 57% | 100% | 100% | 40% | 30% | Estimation |
| Q23 | Time to walk 1 km | 60% | 75% | 100% | 60% | 30% | Estimation |
| Q24 | Speed Ladder benchmark | 53% | 100% | 83% | 40% | 20% | Estimation |
| Q25 | Order-of-magnitude check | 50% | 75% | 83% | 50% | 20% | Estimation |
Q01, Q08, Q11 — Overall 33–37%. Event definitions, vertical lines on graphs, and distance vs displacement are the three hardest concepts across all groups. Group D scores 0–10% on these.
Q15 — Group B: only 17%. The arithmetic mean trap on round-trip speed hits Group B students harder than Group C. This is a targeted misconception, not a general weakness.
Q10 — Group C: 10% vs Group B: 100%. "Horizontal line = at rest" on a position–time graph is perfectly understood by Group B but almost entirely missed by Group C. A sharp diagnostic boundary.
Red cells mark the highest-leverage targets. Your class heatmap is generated from your students' responses and delivered within 48 hours of class completion.
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→Class heatmap + cohort summary + remediation notes delivered to your email within 48 hours of class completion.
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The diagnostic is grounded in physics education research, including the work of Arons, Knight, and Trowbridge & McDermott. Our physics content has previously been licensed by Cengage.
If your students have moved past kinematics and are now in the forces unit, we also have a Laws of Motion diagnostic — six modular diagnostics covering Newton's laws, free-body diagrams, weight and normal force, and more. Same format, same 48-hour turnaround.
View the Laws of Motion Diagnostic →