Subscribe to the gold package and get unlimited access to Shamra Academy
Register a new userModeling student pathways in a physics bachelors degree program
65
0
0.0
(
0
)
Ask ChatGPT about the research
No Arabic abstract
Physics education research has used quantitative modeling techniques to explore learning, affect, and other aspects of physics education. However, these studies have rarely examined the predictive output of the models, instead focusing on the inferences or causal relationships observed in various data sets. This research introduces a modern predictive modeling approach to the PER community using transcript data for students declaring physics majors at Michigan State University (MSU). Using a machine learning model, this analysis demonstrates that students who switch from a physics degree program to an engineering degree program do not take the third semester course in thermodynamics and modern physics, and may take engineering courses while registered as a physics major. Performance in introductory physics and calculus courses, measured by grade as well as a students declared gender and ethnicity play a much smaller role relative to the other features included the model. These results are used to compare traditional statistical analysis to a more modern modeling approach.
rate research
Read More
Physics Education Research frequently investigates what students studying physics do on small time scales (e.g. single courses, observations within single courses), or post-education time scales (e.g., what jobs do physics majors get?) but there is little research into how students get from the beginning to the end of a physics degree. Our work attempts to visualize students paths through the physics major, and quantitatively describe the students who take physics courses, receive physics degrees, and change degree paths into and out of the physics program at Michigan State University.
Covariational reasoning -- reasoning about how changes in one quantity relate to changes in another quantity -- has been examined extensively in mathematics education research. Little research has been done, however, on covariational reasoning in introductory physics contexts. We explore one aspect of covariational reasoning: ``goes like reasoning. ``Goes like reasoning refers to ways physicists relate two quantities through a simplified function. For example, physicists often say that ``the electric field goes like one over r squared. While this reasoning mode is used regularly by physicists and physics instructors, how students make sense of and use it remains unclear. We present evidence from reasoning inventory items which indicate that many students are sense making with tools from prior math instruction, that could be developed into expert ``goes like thinking with direct instruction. Recommendations for further work in characterizing student sense making as a foundation for future development of instruction are made.
This study investigates how an urban, high school physics class responded to the inclusion of a classroom set of iPads and associated applications, such as screencasting. The participatory roles of students and the expressions of their relationships to physics were examined. Findings suggest that iPad technology altered classroom norms and student relationships to include increased student agency and use of evidence. Findings also suggest that the iPad provided a connection between physics, social status, and play. Videos, observations, interviews, and survey responses were analyzed to provide insight into the nature of these changes.
In deciding on a students grade in a class, an instructor generally needs to combine many individual grading judgments into one overall judgment. Two relatively common numerical scales used to specify individual grades are the 4-point scale (where each whole number 0-4 corresponds to a letter grade) and the percent scale (where letter grades A through D are uniformly distributed in the top 40% of the scale). This paper uses grading data from a single series of courses offered over a period of 10 years to show that the grade distributions emerging from these two grade scales differed in many ways from each other. Evidence suggests that the differences are due more to the grade scale than to either the students or the instructors. One major difference is that the fraction of students given grades less than C- was over 5 times larger when instructors used the percent scale. The fact that each instructor who used both grade scales gave more than 4 times as many of these low grades under percent scale grading suggests that the effect is due to the grade scale rather than the instructor. When the percent scale was first introduced in these courses in 2006, one of the authors of this paper, who is also one of the instructors in this data set, had confidently predicted that any changes in course grading would be negligible. They were not negligible, even for this instructor.
We report results from a study designed to identify links between undergraduate students views about experimental physics and their engagement in multiweek projects in lab courses. Using surveys and interviews, we explored whether students perceived particular classroom activities to be features of experimental physics practice. We focused on 18 activities, including maintaining lab notebooks, fabricating parts, and asking others for help. Interviewees identified activities related to project execution as intrinsic to experimental physics practice based on high prevalence of those activities in interviewees own projects. Fabrication-oriented activities were identified as conditional features of experimentation based on differences between projects, which interviewees attributed to variations in project resources. Interpersonal activities were also viewed as conditional features of experimentation, dependent upon ones status as novice or expert. Our findings suggest that students views about experimental physics are shaped by firsthand experiences of their own projects and secondhand experiences of those of others.
Log in to be able to interact and post comments
comments
Fetching comments
Sign in to be able to follow your search criteria
