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This paper examines the educational impact of the implementation of "Changes in Energy and Momentum" from the Tutorials in Introductory Physics in five different instructional settings. These settings include (1) a completely computer-based…
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…
Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) increase students' access to research. This lesson plan describes an interdisciplinary CURE developed to be able to involve over 60 students per semester in original research using…
As research-based self-paced e-learning tools become increasingly available, a critical issue educators encounter is implementing strategies to ensure that all students engage with them as intended. Here, we discuss the effectiveness of…
For several decades, scholars have studied cooperation and its outcomes in the educational context. Yet, we lack a complete understanding of how different instructional strategies impact the relationship between cooperation and learning.…
Embedding physics problems unreal-world settings, here termed contextualized physics problems (CPP), is widely believed to foster students' interest, motivation, and learning. However, firm evidence for this claim remains scarce. To explore…
Theories developed by Tinto and Nora identify academic performance, learning gains, and involvement in learning communities as significant facets of student engagement that, in turn, support student persistence. Collaborative learning…
With the advent of high-level programming languages capable of quickly rendering three-dimensional simulations, the inclusion of computers as a learning tool in the classroom has become more prevalent. Although work has begun to study the…
Collaboration with peers both inside and outside the classroom can be an invaluable tool for helping students learn physics. We investigated the impact of peer collaboration on learning physics by examining the characteristics of women and…
We report on a project to introduce interactive learning strategies (ILS) to physics classes at the Universit\'e Pierre et Marie Curie (UPMC), one of the leading science universities in France. In Spring 2012, instructors in two large…
Engaging in meaningful collaborations with peers, both inside and outside the classroom, can greatly enhance students' understanding of physics and other STEM disciplines. We analyzed the characteristics of women and men who typically…
Assessing student performance becomes challenging when course enrollment becomes very large (~10^4 students). As part of a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) in introductory physics offered by Georgia Tech in 2013, students submitted video…
We investigate the dynamics of student behaviors (posture, gesture, vocal register, visual focus) and the substance of their reasoning during collaborative work on inquiry-based physics tutorials. Scherr has characterized student activity…
Education is a goal-oriented field. But if we want to treat education scientifically so we can accumulate, evaluate, and refine what we learn, then we must develop a theoretical framework that is strongly rooted in objective observations…
Empirical data on early network history are rare. Students beginning their studies at a university with no or few prior connections to each other offer a unique opportunity to investigate the formation and early development of social…
An increasing number of studies in physics education research use social network analysis to quantify interactions among students. These studies typically gather data through online surveys using one of two different survey formats:…
Questions of participant understanding of the nature of an activity have been addressed in anthropology and sociolinguistics with the concepts of frames and framing. For example, a student may frame a learning activity as an opportunity for…
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…
In this paper we present a step forward to improve general physics as an educational experience: the implementation of a new course component composed by innovative workshop activities based on computational modelling in the general physics…
We analyze the curriculum of the early common-years of engineering in our institute using tools of statistical physics of complex networks. Naturally, a course programme is structured in a networked form (temporal dependency and…