Bulletin of the American Physical Society
12th Annual Meeting of the Northwest Section of the APS
Volume 55, Number 6
Friday–Saturday, October 1–2, 2010; Walla Walla, Washington
Session H2: Physics Education and Outreach |
Hide Abstracts |
Chair: Lane Seeley, Seattle Pacific University Room: Science 142 |
Saturday, October 2, 2010 1:30PM - 2:06PM |
H2.00001: Investigating Students' Reflective Thinking in the Introductory Physics Course Invited Speaker: Over the past 30 years, physics education research has guided the development of instructional strategies that can significantly enhance students' functional understanding of concepts in introductory physics. Recently, attention has shifted to instructional goals that, while widely shared by teachers of physics, are often more implicit than explicit in our courses. These goals involve the expectations and attitudes that students have about what it means to learn and understand physics, together with the behaviors and actions students think they should engage in to accomplish this learning. Research has shown that these ``hidden'' elements of the curriculum are remarkably resistant to instruction. In fact, traditional physics courses tend to produce movement \textit{away} from expert-like behaviors. At Western Washington University, we are exploring ways of promoting metacognition$,$ an aspect of the hidden curriculum that involves the conscious monitoring of one's own thinking and learning. We have found that making this reflective thinking an explicit part of the course may not be enough: adequate framing and scaffolding may be necessary for students to meaningfully engage in metacognition. We have thus taken the basic approach of developing metacognition, like conceptual understanding, through guided inquiry. During our teaching experiments, we have collected written and video data, with twin goals of guiding iterative modifications to the instruction as well as contributing to the knowledge base about student metacognition in introductory physics. This talk will provide examples of metacognition activities from course assignments and labs, and will present written data to assess the effectiveness of instruction and to illustrate specific modes of students' reflective thinking. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, October 2, 2010 2:06PM - 2:42PM |
H2.00002: From induction to quantum spin: Training Students to become Physicists Invited Speaker: At Oregon State University, we have a unique approach to upper division undergraduate physics courses. These courses re-arrange the traditional content to center around conceptual and mathematical ideas in physics, with the aim of having students engage in authentic practices of physics in an interactive environment. I teach the quantum measurement course, our physics majors' first introduction to QM, occurring in the middle of their junior year. I was hired to reform the introductory courses, and am using a curricular model that mirrors these upper division courses. I will explain this QM course, and link it to the model I am using for the introductory course reform. This will build a unified view of our 4-year program aimed at teaching skills needed for success in physics, and scaffolding our physics majors from being apprentices to practicing scientists. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, October 2, 2010 2:42PM - 2:54PM |
H2.00003: Data Mining and PER: Can we learn anything about how people learn from testing and survey data? Brian Pyper Several years' worth of data collecting in PER (physics Education Research) at BYU-Idaho are yielding some interesting correlations between student characteristics, attitudes and learning outcomes. But are there implications for teaching and learning? [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, October 2, 2010 2:54PM - 3:20PM |
H2.00004: BREAK
|
Saturday, October 2, 2010 3:20PM - 3:56PM |
H2.00005: A Call To Action for Physics Departments: Findings and Recommendations of the National Task Force on Teacher Education in Physics Invited Speaker: The National Task Force on Teacher Education in Physics (T-TEP) concluded its two-year investigation of the professional preparation of teachers of physics in the U.S. T-TEP, formed by APS, AAPT, and AIP, was charged with (a) identifying generalizable, yet flexible, strategies that institutions, and in particular physics departments and schools or colleges of education, can employ to increase the number of qualified physics teachers, (b) identifying effective strategies in recruitment, models of professional preparation, and higher education systems of support during the first three years of teaching, and (c) articulating research, policy, and funding implications. In this talk, the major findings and recommendations of the T-TEP report will be discussed and ways to leverage the report to transform the physics teacher education system will be outlined. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, October 2, 2010 3:56PM - 4:08PM |
H2.00006: Solar Tutorial and Annotation Resource (STAR) Clay Showalter We have written a software suite designed to facilitate solar data analysis by scientists, students, and the public, anticipating enormous datasets from future instruments. Our ``STAR'' suite includes an interactive learning section explaining 15 classes of solar events, with over 200 images and 18 movies showing examples. Users learn software tools that exploit humans' superior ability (over computers) to identify many events. Upon completion of our tutorial, users are presented with media of various solar events and asked to identify and annotate the images, to test their mastery of the system. Previously, solar physicists manually annotated these features, but with the increasing influx of data it is unrealistic to expect specialized researchers to examine every image that computers cannot fully process. A new approach is needed to efficiently process these data. Providing analysis tools and data access to students and the public have proven efficient in similar astrophysical projects (e.g. the ``Galaxy Zoo''). Goals of the project include public input into the data analysis of very large datasets from future solar satellites, and increased public interest and knowledge about the Sun. [Preview Abstract] |
Follow Us |
Engage
Become an APS Member |
My APS
Renew Membership |
Information for |
About APSThe American Physical Society (APS) is a non-profit membership organization working to advance the knowledge of physics. |
© 2024 American Physical Society
| All rights reserved | Terms of Use
| Contact Us
Headquarters
1 Physics Ellipse, College Park, MD 20740-3844
(301) 209-3200
Editorial Office
100 Motor Pkwy, Suite 110, Hauppauge, NY 11788
(631) 591-4000
Office of Public Affairs
529 14th St NW, Suite 1050, Washington, D.C. 20045-2001
(202) 662-8700