Related papers: Cognitive Load and Situational Interest in Physics…
This paper introduces a testable model for physics-specific student engagement at the onset of task processing in response to a task-specific motivational stimulus. Empirical research provides evidence that contextual embedding of a task…
This study presents a review of the current state of research on teaching quantum mechanics in secondary and lower undergraduate education. A conceptual approach to quantum mechanics is being implemented in more and more introductory…
Sliding friction is usually introduced in high school, but rarely through activities in laboratory. A qualitative introduction to friction is presented by proposing exploration of different kind of materials in order to suggest which…
Many prominent lines of research on student's reasoning and conceptual change within learning sciences and physics education research have not attended to the role of learners' affect or emotions in the dynamics of their conceptual…
We consider active learning under incentive compatibility constraints. The main application of our results is to economic experiments, in which a learner seeks to infer the parameters of a subject's preferences: for example their attitudes…
The persistent underrepresentation of women and other gender minorities in physical science fields has been an ongoing concern. This study investigates gender dynamics in introductory physics laboratory courses, focusing on whether students…
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…
Even though there has been a tremendous amount of research done in how to help students learn physics, students are still coming away missing a crucial piece of the puzzle: why bother with physics? Students learn fundamental laws and how to…
Although an important goal of introductory physics labs is to train students in scientific reasoning and critical thinking, currently there are no standard tests in physics designed to assess such skills. We are in the process of developing…
In an era where learning is considered a problem, we decided to go for problems for the sake of learning! The purpose of this study was to throw light on the issues involved in two forms of PBL viz., Case Study Based PBL and Research Based…
We demonstrate how students' use of modeling can be examined and assessed using student notebooks collected from an upper-division electronics lab course. The use of models is a ubiquitous practice in undergraduate physics education, but…
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…
A common hope of many physics educators and researchers is that students leave the course with a stronger sense that physics is relevant to them than when they entered the course. Multiple survey measures have attempted to measure shifts in…
The large number of published articles in physics journals under the title "Comments on ..." and "Reply to ..." is indicative that the conceptual understanding of physical phenomena is very elusive and hard to grasp even to experts, but it…
Laboratory courses are key components of most undergraduate physics programs. Lab courses often aim to achieve the following learning outcomes: developing students' experimental skills, engaging students in authentic scientific practices,…
This study investigates differences in student participation rates between in-class and online administrations of research-based assessments. A sample of 1,310 students from 25 sections of 3 different introductory physics courses over two…
We investigated student reactions to two computational physics courses incorporating several videogame-like aspects. These included use of gaming terminology such as "levels," "weapons," and "bosses"; a game-style point system linked to…
The article deals with the problem of intellectual development of students in learning of physics by means of computer simulation. The main objectives of teaching computer simulation in learning of physics is the general outlook…
For this study, we compared the attitudes and beliefs about science of physical science (physics and mathematics) and life science (biochemistry and biology) students at the beginning of their university degrees using the CLASS (Colorado…
The Physics Lab Inventory of Critical Thinking (PLIC) measures three components of students' critical thinking in physics labs: evaluating data, evaluating methods, and proposing next steps. Prior work has analyzed these components in…