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We investigate student comfort with the material in an upper-division spins-first quantum mechanics course. Pre-lecture surveys probing students' comfort were administered weekly, in which students assigned themselves a "discomfort level"…
The University of Maryland (UMD) Biology Education and Physics Education Research Groups are investigating students' views on the role of physics in introductory biology courses. This paper presents data from an introductory course that…
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…
We have been investigating the difficulties that students in upper-level undergraduate courses have in determining the probability distribution for measuring energy and position as a function of time when the initial wave function is…
Technology enables a more sustainable and universally accessible educational model. However, technology has brought a paradox into students' lives: it helps them engage in learning activities, but it is also a source of distraction. During…
According to the literature, mobile devices as experimental tools (MDET) can offer educational benefits by creating authentic, real-life contexts for physics learning, enhancing student motivation through the use of familiar technology, and…
Trigonometric derivatives are fundamental in both mathematics and physics, yet their proper application, particularly the distinction between radians and degrees, poses a significant challenge for college students globally. This study…
Physics teaching in engineering programmes poses discipline-specific demands that intertwine conceptual modelling, experimental inquiry, and computational analysis. This study examines nine teaching competences for physics instruction…
This research uses 10 years of institutional data at a large public university in the USA to investigate trends in the undergraduate majors students declare, drop, and earn degrees, especially comparing physics to other disciplines. We find…
Physics education research has probed for the relevance of physics in students' everyday lives. Attitudinal and epistemological surveys have asked students if they think of or use physics in their daily lives. We have previously documented…
A large body of research shows that using interactive engagement pedagogy in the introductory physics classroom consistently results in significant student learning gains; however, with a few exceptions, those learning gains tend not to be…
Partial differential equations (PDEs) govern a wide range of physical systems, but solving them efficiently remains a major challenge. The idea of a scientific foundation model (SciFM) is emerging as a promising tool for learning…
The educational use of video and multimedia is increasing rapidly in secondary and higher education across all disciplines. Videos for physics education can be found in many universities and other educational institutions websites all over…
Academic publishing requires solving a collective coordination problem: among thousands of possible publication venues, which deserve a community's attention? A clear consensus helps scholars allocate attention, match submissions to…
Since October 2010, the Chemistry-Biology Combined Major Program (CBCMP), an international course taught in English at Osaka University, has been teaching small classes (no more than 20 in size). We present data from the Force Concept…
Creating equitable performance outcomes among students is a focus of many instructors and researchers. One focus of this effort is examining disparities in physics student performance across genders, which is a well-established problem.…
This study examines physics students' evaluations of identical, video-recorded lectures performed by female and male actors playing the role of professors. The results indicate that evaluations by male students show statistically…
We address previous hypotheses about possible factors influencing the gender gap in attainment in physics. Specifically, previous studies claim that male advantage may arise from multiple-choice style questions, and that scaffolding may…
Physics education researchers have argued that authentic physics education includes computation as part of a physics student's training, and many parties have made efforts towards this goal. However, most research on this teaching modality…
Helping students become proficient problem-solvers is one of the primary goals of physics courses. In part 1 of this article, we summarized the vast research on problem-solving relevant for physics instruction, and here we discuss a…