Related papers: Exploring student difficulties with observation lo…
Maxwell's equations and the equations governing charged particle dynamics are presented for a rotating coordinate system with the global time coordinate of an observer on the rotational axis. Special care is taken in defining the relevant…
Electromagnetism (E&M) is often challenging for students enrolled in introductory college-level physics courses. Compared to mechanics, the mathematics of E&M is more sophisticated and the representations are more abstract. Furthermore,…
The estimation of the electric field in simple situations provides an opportunity to develop intuition about the models used in physics. We propose an activity aimed at university students of General Physics where the electric field of a…
The personal spatial structure of an observer is introduced as a central element in the positioning of objects in space. The link between a reference frame used by an observer and his personal spatial structure is discussed. Research on…
We examine the difficulties that introductory physics students, undergraduate physics majors, and physics graduate students have with concepts related to conductors and insulators covered in introductory physics by giving written tests and…
The concepts of the Coriolis and the centrifugal force are essential in various scientific fields and they are standard components of introductory physics lectures. In this paper we explore how students understand and apply concepts of…
Students' attitudes and approaches to problem solving in physics can profoundly influence their motivation to learn and development of expertise. We developed and validated an Attitudes and Approaches to Problem Solving survey by expanding…
Drawing appropriate diagrams is a useful problem solving heuristic that can transform a problem into a representation that is easier to exploit for solving it. One major focus while helping introductory physics students learn effective…
The inverse problem for electromagnetic field produced by arbitrary altered charge distribution in dipole approximation is solved. The charge distribution is represented by its dipole moment. It is assumed that the spectral properties of…
Defining the electric and magnetic field vectors in curved spacetime requires a proper choice of the observer's frame four-vector. Related literature shows that this fundamental issue in physics still needs to be properly resolved. In…
Identifying and understanding student difficulties with physics content in a wide variety of topical areas is an active research area within the PER community. In many cases, physics topics appear multiple times in different contexts across…
Physics education researchers have developed many evidence-based instructional strategies to enhance physics students' conceptual learning. These strategies have historically been tested using assessments such as the Force Concept Inventory…
Visual place recognition is a fundamental capability for the localization of mobile robots. It places image retrieval in the practical context of physical agents operating in a physical world. It is an active field of research and many…
Incorporating computer programming exercises into introductory physics is a delicate task that involves a number of choices that may have an effect on student learning. We present a "hybrid" approach that speaks to a number of common…
Our aim in this proposal is by using the Faraday's law of induction as a simple lecture demonstration to measure the Earth's magnetic field (B). This will also enable the students to learn about how electric power is generated from the…
We propose a unified approach to addition of some physical quantities (among which resistors and capacitors are the most well-known) that are usually encountered in introductory physics such that the formulae required to solve problems are…
Learning physics requires understanding the applicability of fundamental principles in a variety of contexts that share deep features. One way to help students learn physics is via analogical reasoning. Students can be taught to make an…
The research presented in this thesis was motivated by the need to improve introductory physics courses. Introductory physics courses are generally the first courses in which students learn to create models to solve complex problems.…
We describe how graduate students categorize introductory mechanics problems based on the similarity of their solutions. Graduate students were asked at the end of a teaching assistant training class to categorize problems from their own…
Electromagnetism, being much less intuitive than mechanics, where a lot of sources of misconceptions have been documented, has in addition to the common sources of misconceptions borrowed from mechanics other sources related to the abstract…