Related papers: When physical intuition fails
In this study, we explored the extent to which problems and instructional strategies affect social cohesion and interactions for information seeking in physics classrooms. Three sections of a mechanics physics course taught at a Chilean…
It is well-known that introductory physics students often have alternative conceptions that are inconsistent with established physical principles and concepts. Invoking alternative conceptions in quantitative problem-solving process can…
Very little is known about how the nature of expertise in introductory and advanced courses compares in knowledge-rich domains such as physics. We develop a framework to compare the similarities and differences between learning and patterns…
A goal of physics is to understand the greatest possible breadth of natural phenomena in terms of the most economical set of basic concepts. However, as the understanding of physics has developed historically, its pedagogy and language have…
When encountering novel objects, humans are able to infer a wide range of physical properties such as mass, friction and deformability by interacting with them in a goal driven way. This process of active interaction is in the same spirit…
Project Based Learning (PBL), recognized as an active learning strategy, has been linked to self efficacy of student in prior studies, including those within Physics Education Research. Meanwhile, technological advancements have…
A common hope of many physics educators and researchers is that students leave the course with a stronger sense that physics is relevant to them than when they entered the course. Multiple survey measures have attempted to measure shifts in…
The method of images (MoI) is a valuable technique for solving certain electrostatic boundary value problems consisting of charge density near conductor(s). We developed and validated an inquiry-based tutorial on MoI to help students learn…
This manuscript is written for students in introductory physics classes to address some of the common difficulties and misconceptions of the normal force, especially the relationship between normal and friction forces. Accordingly, it is…
To help faculty use research-based materials in a more significant way, we learn about their perceived needs and desires and use this information to suggest ways for the Physics Education Research community to address these needs. When…
Despite the prevalence of physics education research literature related to problem solving, recent studies have illustrated that opportunities for ``authentic'' problem solving -- conceptualized as making decisions with limited information…
We investigate the emergence of intuitive physics understanding in general-purpose deep neural network models trained to predict masked regions in natural videos. Leveraging the violation-of-expectation framework, we find that video…
Researchers have argued against deficit-based explanations of students' troubles with mathematical sense-making, pointing instead to factors such as epistemology: students' beliefs about knowledge and learning can hinder them from…
Although most teachers acknowledge the importance of taking investigative approached in students' science learning experiences, implementing them in high-school classes can be challenging for teachers. In this work, we analyzed data from…
We present a critical analysis of the classical approaches to energy subjects, based on the work-energy theorem and the conservation of mechanical energy proposed in the courses of the first years of tertiary education. We show how these…
Recent investigations have been carried out on critical analyses of beginning physics teachers confronted with questionable explanations. These studies raise the question of the choices made by teachers for their teaching once they have…
Six specific modes of reasoning about ratio and proportion have been delineated as a means of operationalizing expert practice. These modes stem from consideration of how physicists reason in context, are informed by prior work in physics…
Most physics theories are deterministic, with the notable exception of quantum mechanics which, however, comes plagued by the so-called measurement problem. This state of affairs might well be due to the inability of standard mathematics to…
An important goal of graduate physics core courses is to help students develop expertise in problem solving and improve their reasoning and meta-cognitive skills. We explore the conceptual difficulties of physics graduate students by…
What kind of problem-solving instruction can help students apply what they have learned to solve the new and unfamiliar problems they will encounter in the future? We propose that mathematical sensemaking, the practice of seeking coherence…