There is an ongoing challenge with STEM education: making physics, math, and science, in general, interesting, understandable, and retentive for college science and non-science majors, K-12 students, and the public. If not imparting detailed knowledge, at least one would like to introduce important concepts that will be remembered, appreciated,…

As students learn physics, they are often required to reason about the behavior of macroscopic and microscopic phenomena, and to synthesize prior knowledge from several different areas of physics to construct understanding of new ideas. This can be a tremendously difficult cognitive task for novice students, especially when the unfamiliar…

The incandescent bulb has been a useful tool for teaching basic electrical circuits, as brightness is related to the current or power flowing through a bulb. This has led to the development of qualitative pedagogical treatments for examining resistive combinations in simple circuits using bulbs and batteries, which were first introduced by James…

To jog around the periphery of a carousel at rest requires that the jogger experience a constant state of acceleration perpendicular to the direction of motion and directed toward the axis of rotation (centripetal). The jogger could achieve this centripetal acceleration by leaning inward, thereby using a horizontal weight component to provide the…

The effect of background color on the perception of color by students is discussed. Explanations on why students only see certain colors when viewing colored marks on a blackboard through different color filters are provided. (KR)

Kinesthetic apparatus make physics learning experiences stimulating, memorable, and influential in helping students relate natural phenomena to the laws of physics. Describes a number of experiments and demonstrations that are possible with kinesthetic apparatus, which help eradicate some traditional student misconceptions and provide students…