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We describe a study of period changes in 59 RR Lyrae stars, using times of maximum brightness from the GEOS database. The work was carried out by outstanding senior high school students in the University of Toronto Mentorship Program. This paper is written in such a way that high school or undergraduate physics and astronomy students could use it as a guide and template for carrying out original research, by studying period changes in these and other types of variable stars.
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The ground-breaking image of a black holes event horizon, which captured the publics attention and imagination in April 2019, was captured using the power of interferometry: many separate telescopes working together to observe the cosmos in incredible detail. Many recent astrophysical discoveries that have revolutionized the scientific communitys understanding of the cosmos were made by interferometers such as LIGO, ALMA, and the Event Horizon Telescope. Astro 101 instructors who want their students to learn the science behind these discoveries must teach about interferometry. Decades of research show that using active learning strategies can significantly increase students learning and reduces achievement gaps between different demographic groups over what is achieved from traditional lecture-based instruction. As part of an effort to create active learning materials on interferometry, we developed and tested a new Lecture-Tutorial to help Astro 101 students learn about key properties of astronomical interferometers. This paper describes this new Lecture-Tutorial and presents evidence for its effectiveness from a study conducted with 266 Astro 101 students at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Quantum computing is a growing field at the intersection of physics and computer science. The goal of this article is to highlight a successfully trialled quantum computing course for high school students between the ages of 15 and 18 years old. This course bridges the gap between popular science articles and advanced undergraduate textbooks. Conceptual ideas in the text are reinforced with active learning techniques, such as interactive problem sets and simulation-based labs at various levels. The course is freely available for use and download under the Creative Commons Attribution- NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.
Developing critical thinking skills is a common goal of an undergraduate physics curriculum. How do students make sense of evidence and what do they do with it? In this study, we evaluated students critical thinking behaviors through their written notebooks in an introductory physics laboratory course. We compared student behaviors in the Structured Quantitative Inquiry Labs (SQILabs) curriculum to a control group and evaluated the fragility of these behaviors through procedural cueing. We found that the SQILabs were generally effective at improving the quality of students reasoning about data and making decisions from data. These improvements in reasoning and sensemaking were thwarted, however, by a procedural cue. We describe these changes in behavior through the lens of epistemological frames and task orientation, invoked by the instructional moves.
The dynamics of gravitating astrophysical systems such as black holes and neutron stars are fascinatingly complex, offer some of natures most spectacular phenomena, and capture the publics imagination in ways that few subjects can. Here, we describe {it AstroDance}, a multi-media project to engage deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) students in astronomy and gravitational physics. {it AstroDance} incorporates multiple means of representation of scientific concepts and was performed primarily for secondary and post-secondary audiences at $sim$20 venues in the northeastern US prior to the historic first detection of gravitational waves. As part of the {it AstroDance} project, we surveyed $sim$1000 audience members roughly split evenly between hearing and DHH audience members. While both groups reported statistically equivalent high-rates of enjoyment of the performance, the DHH group reported an increase in how much they learned about science at a statistically significant rate compared to the hearing audience. Our findings suggest that multi-sensory approaches benefit both hearing and deaf audiences and enable accessible participation for broader groups.
In this paper we put forth a model for physics course reform that uniquely uses proven, research-based active learning strategies to help students improve their physics knowledge and problem-solving skills. In this study, we compared the exam performance of students in two sections of the same introductory physics course. One section (the traditional section, N = 258) was taught by an instructor who is highly regarded for his lectures, but did not use any active learning teaching strategies. The other section (the reformed section, N = 217) was taught by an instructor who had never before taught a physics class but who was trained in physics and astronomy education research and who did use active learning teaching strategies. Students in the reformed section significantly outperformed students in the traditional section on common exam questions over the course of the semester, regardless of whether the question was conceptual or quantitative. This reform effort has been successful at improving students learning and significantly increasing the departments use of active learning strategies at the introductory level and beyond.
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