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Over the past year and a half we have developed an innovative approach to the teaching of `Physical Science', a general education course typically found in the curricula of nearly every college and university. The new approach uses popular…
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…
Quantum mechanics is a field often considered very mathematical, abstract, and unintuitive. One way some instructors are hoping to help familiarize their students with these complex topics is to have the students see quantum effects in…
A common learning goal for modern physics instructors is for students to recognize a difference between the experimental uncertainty of classical physics and the fundamental uncertainty of quantum mechanics. Our prior work has shown that…
In response to increasing calls for the reform of the undergraduate science curriculum for life science majors and pre-medical students (Bio2010, Scientific Foundations for Future Physicians, Vision & Change), an interdisciplinary team has…
Increasingly, the physics community is attending to issues of equity, diversity, and inclusion, both in language and action. We are more publicly recognizing our individual responsibilities as physicists to address social injustice and…
If students are to successfully grapple with authentic, complex biological problems as scientists and citizens, they need practice solving such problems during their undergraduate years. Physics education researchers have investigated…
Physics faculty care about their students learning physics content. In addition, they usually hope that their students will learn some deeper lessons about thinking critically and scientifically. They hope that as a result of taking a…
To meet National Standards recommended by the National Research Council for high school physics, inservice teachers must be integrated into the physics community. They must be empowered by access to resources of the physics community and by…
Physics has a reputation among majority of life sciences students for being very complicated and tough. If we leave students with this impression, it is likely that students see physics class as useless and irrelevant to life sciences.…
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…
One of the objectives of the undergraduate physics curriculum is for students to become aware of the connections between the fundamental principles of classical physics and their personal experience. Nonetheless, numerous studies have shown…
We present two programs that address needs to better prepare graduate students for their roles as professional physicists, particularly in the areas of teaching and education research. The two programs, Preparing Future Physicists (PFP) and…
Popular media is an unspoken yet ever-present element of the physics landscape and a tool we can utilize in our teaching. It is also well-understood that students enter the physics classroom with a host of conceptions learned from the world…
A considerable share of the literature on physics education and on education more broadly focuses on the principles which should guide the design of courses and of classroom activities. In this short article I wish to place more attention…
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…
Prior research has demonstrated how the realist perspectives of classical physics students can translate into specific beliefs about quantum phenomena when taking an introductory modern physics course. Student beliefs regarding the…
This article has as its main objective to emphasize the importance that physical spaces and architecture should have for a correct pedagogical integration of the ICT, including in this concept all the current means of communication and, in…
Environmental sustainability is a major and relevant challenge facing computing. Therefore, we must start teaching theory, techniques, and practices that both increase an awareness in our student population as well a provide concrete advice…
A Framework for K-12 Science Education: Practices, Crosscutting Concepts, and Core Ideas gives the concept of field energy a prominent role in the physical sciences sections of its recommendations for K-12 science education. I examine what…