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Research has shown that it is challenging to change departmental culture to support the adoption of transformed teaching practices. Michigan State University is working to transform its introductory physics courses by engaging faculty in…
This chapter narrates the journey of developing and integrating computing into the physics curriculum through three consecutive courses, each tailored to the learners' level. It starts with the entry-level "Physics Playground in Python" for…
This article outlines a comprehensive redesign of an introductory physics laboratory course aimed at promoting active student engagement, enhancing scientific experimental skills and the development of expert-like attitudes. The redesign…
We discuss an inquiry-based curriculum that has been developed specifically for the introductory algebra-based physics course, taking into account the needs, backgrounds, learning styles and career goals of the students in that class. The…
This second paper in a multi-part series builds on the first, which introduced the Ways of Thinking for Engineering Design-based Physics (WoT4EDP) framework for STEM education in an introductory undergraduate physics course. Here, we apply…
Undergraduate physics education has greatly benefited from the introduction of computational activities. However, despite the benefits computation has delivered, we still lack a complete understanding of the computationally integrated…
In the U.S., introductory calculus-based courses often acts as a gatekeeper to STEM degrees. But access to the prerequisite math is far from equal--students from low-income and racially marginalized communities are far less likely to have…
We describe the development of a junior-senior level course for Physics majors designed to teach Mathematica skills in support of their undergraduate coursework, but also to introduce students to modern research level results. Standard…
Computation is intertwined with essentially all aspects of physics research and is invaluable for physicists' careers. Despite its disciplinary importance, integration of computation into physics education remains a challenge and, moreover,…
A central goal of Introductory Physics for the Life Sciences (IPLS) is to prepare students to use physics to model and analyze biological situations, a skill of increasing importance for their future studies and careers. Here we report our…
Students taking introductory physics are rarely exposed to computational modeling. In a one-semester large lecture introductory calculus-based mechanics course at Georgia Tech, students learned to solve physics problems using the VPython…
Although physics has become increasingly computational, with computing even being considered the third pillar of physics, it is still not well integrated into physics education. Research suggests that integrating Computational Thinking (CT)…
This paper describes the development of a new university physics course designed to integrate physics, education, research, and community partnerships. The coordinated system of activities links the new course to local community efforts in…
Developing expertise in physics requires appropriate integration and assimilation of physics and mathematics. Instructors and students often describe physics courses in terms of their emphasis on conceptual and quantitative problem-solving.…
We describe a way to introduce physics high school students with no background in programming to computational problem-solving experiences. Our approach builds on the great strides made by the Modeling Instruction reform curriculum. This…
In this paper, we detail the integration of Python data analysis into a first-year physics laboratory course, a task accomplished without significant alterations to the existing course structure. We introduced tailored laboratory…
Physics education research has used quantitative modeling techniques to explore learning, affect, and other aspects of physics education. However, these studies have rarely examined the predictive output of the models, instead focusing on…
In this paper, we describe how we transformed our large-enrollment introductory physics sequence for life-science students to a Lecture/Studio format and aligned the physics concepts with authentic biological applications. We have reformed…
Students taking introductory physics are rarely exposed to computational modeling. In a one-semester large lecture introductory calculus-based mechanics course at Georgia Tech, students learned to solve physics problems using the VPython…
Writing and argumentation are critical to both professional physics and physics education. However, the skill of making an extended argument in writing is often overlooked in physics classrooms, apart from certain practices like lab…