Bulletin of the American Physical Society
20th Annual Meeting of the APS Northwest Section
Volume 64, Number 9
Thursday–Saturday, May 16–18, 2019; Western Washington University, Bellingham, Washington
Session G1: Physics Education I |
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Chair: Thanh Le, Western Washington University Room: Communications Facility 110 |
Saturday, May 18, 2019 1:30PM - 2:00PM |
G1.00001: Understanding how Undergraduate Research Experiences Support Physics Identities Invited Speaker: Gina Quan In this talk, we analyze shifts in students’ physics identities as undergraduate physics majors participating in their first research experiences. Students in the study participated in an elective seminar in which they were paired with graduate student and faculty mentors on physics research projects and participated in a weekly discussions about research. Using video data from student interviews, classroom observations, research mentor interviews, and research observations, we study how students developed identities as physicists. We highlight how interactions with other students and research mentors contributed to this development. Finally, we discuss implications for future research and programmatic design. \\ \\In Collaboration With: Chandra Turpen, Andrew Elby; University of Maryland College Park [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 18, 2019 2:00PM - 2:12PM |
G1.00002: Analyzing exams: Are multiple-choice~questions hard for the reasons we think? Dean Bretland, Peter Shaffer Exam questions are typically written to differentiate between students who can and cannot apply the concepts they are learning.~Students who score highly on an exam,~in general, do better on individual questions than those who do not.~On certain questions, however, the gap is quite large. In this talk we present an overview of a project at the University of Washington to identify and examine such questions~in introductory algebra- and calculus-based physics courses.~We hope to identify specific concepts and skills that seem to be particularly difficult for low-performing students and to develop interventions that can target those areas. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 18, 2019 2:12PM - 2:24PM |
G1.00003: Teaching Gauss's Law using Virtual Reality: Motivation and Implementation Jared Canright, Peter Shaffer, Suzanne Brahmia Virtual reality (VR) laboratory and tutorial exercises hold promise for enhancing student understanding of 3D concepts and phenomena, especially those that are otherwise difficult or impossible to experience directly. Gauss's Law poses difficulties for students that have proven resilient to many forms of instructional intervention. This work presents data that highlight particular student difficulties with the concepts underlying correct understanding and application of Gauss's Law and provide a backdrop to motivate the development of a VR learning environment on this topic. Further, we describe, from instructional and software development perspectives, the design and implementation of virtual exercises and tools to elicit and confront these difficulties in the virtual learning environment. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 18, 2019 2:24PM - 2:36PM |
G1.00004: Applying text analysis to student explanations in PER Sheh Lit Chang, Peter Shaffer Student explanations to written questions form the basis for many qualitative and quantitative studies into student understanding of physics. Explanations given by students to carefully constructed questions are categorized by one or more investigators and then interpretations are given to identify common patterns in student thinking and lines of reasoning. There are now computer programs that can quickly parse many paragraphs of text and identify common words, terms, and phrases. We are exploring their use in analysing student explanations systematically. In this paper, we describe the use of a computational text analysis program that corroborates results from prior qualitative methods of analysis in the context of two-dimensional motion and rolling motion. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 18, 2019 2:36PM - 2:48PM |
G1.00005: Investigation of student understanding of air resistance and terminal speed~ Andrew Hood, Andrew Boudreaux The topic of air resistance has received relatively little attention in terms of research-based curriculum development.~ Even though students demonstrate an awareness of air resistance, they struggle to answer basic qualitative questions.~ For example, they sometimes believe that, because mass does not appear in the air resistance force formula, it does not need to be considered.~ This is not the case for an object falling at terminal velocity, where the air resistance force is balanced by the weight force.~ At Western Washington University, a lab activity has been created to strengthen student understanding. The talk will describe the lab, and present pre and post-assessments of student understanding to evaluate the effectiveness of the lab.~ [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 18, 2019 2:48PM - 3:00PM |
G1.00006: DROP TOWER PHYSICS: A New Exciting Educational Tool William Dittrich Drop Tower Physics is a new and exciting classroom tool which will challenge, educate and captivate your students. Using the Drop Tower at Portland State University, the author has investigated and videotaped the behavior of standard physics demonstrations such as a floating cork, stack of coins, pendulum (simple, compound and chaotic), mass spring oscillator, and gyroscope. When the Drop Box is released into micro gravity, these demonstrations transition from g$=$ 9.8 m/s$^{\mathrm{2}}$ to effectively zero tor 2.1 seconds. The question to pose to yourself and your students is: How do these demonstrations behave after the transition? This question goes to the foundation of scientific exploration: hypothesis, confirmation theoretically and finally experimental comparison. In the case of Drop Tower Physics, often the results are quite different than the theoretical predictions made -- challenging the future exploration of theory and tantalizing your students. This process ultimately leads to greater understanding and attention to the topic. Join this session and experience Drop Tower Physics yourself! [Preview Abstract] |
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