Related papers: Informal physics programs as communities of practi…
We present an investigation into the interdisciplinary role of physics in a physics-for-non-physicists course at Pomona College. This work is guided by prior research into introductory physics for life-science (IPLS) courses, but attends to…
The lack of diversity and the under-performance of underrepresented students in STEM courses have been the focus of researchers in the last decade. In particular, many hypotheses have been put forth for the reasons for the…
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…
In this investigation, we analyzed individual interviews with six female undergraduate physics majors at a large, public, research university in the US to understand their progression at different transition points to becoming physicists.…
The absence of women among academic staff in physics is in the focus of our research. To explore the causes of this gender imbalance, we conducted a nationwide representative survey among Ph.D. students and interviews with Ph.D. students…
We report a framework that enables the wide adoption of authentic research educational methodology at various schools by addressing common barriers. The guiding principles we present were applied to implement a program in which teams of…
The current work aims to better understand student course experiences for those who reported negative perceptions in introductory physics. We conducted semi-structured interviews with 24 students who reported negative perceptions of their…
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…
Biophysics is a subject that is spread over many disciplines and transcends the skills and knowledge of the individual student. This makes it challenging both to teach and to learn. Educational materials are described to aid in teaching…
Helping students become proficient problem solvers is a major goal of many physics courses from introductory to advanced levels. In fact, physics has often been used by cognitive scientists to investigate the differences between the…
We describe a course designed to help future educators build an integrated understanding of the different elements of physics education research (PER), including: research into student learning, content knowledge from the perspective of how…
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.…
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.…
Differentiable physics provides a new approach for modeling and understanding the physical systems by pairing the new technology of differentiable programming with classical numerical methods for physical simulation. We survey the rapidly…
Researchers in physics education have advocated both for including modeling in science classrooms as well as promoting student engagement with sensemaking. These two processes facilitate the generation of new knowledge by connecting to…
In a climate where teachers feel deprofessionalized at the hands of regulations, testing, and politics, it is vital that teachers become empowered both in their own teaching and as agents of change. This physics education research study…
This is a report on a qualitative study of students' learning where a physics computer simulation session is used to supplement lectures on the topic. Drawing on phenomenography as the analytical framework, the students' learning-focuses…
To be successful, junior faculty must properly manage their time in the face of expanding responsibilities. One such responsibility is supervising undergraduate research projects. Student research projects (either single or multi-student)…
At many physics departments a significant fraction of teaching is in support of engineers and scientists in other majors. These service courses are thus an automatic crucible of interdisciplinary interaction, and at times, strife. For…
This article tells the story of the founding of the Compass Project at UC Berkeley and describes its impacts. The Compass Project is a self-formed group of graduate and undergraduate students in the physical sciences. Its goals are to…