We previously proposed a hypothetical learning progression around the disciplinary core idea of the Solar System and its formation as a first step in a research program to begin to fill this gap and address questions of student learning in this domain. In this study, we evaluate the effectiveness of two dimensions within the learning progression,…

We introduce applications of established methods in time-series and network analysis that we jointly apply here for the kinematic study "of gesture ensembles". We define a gesture ensemble as the set of gestures produced during discourse by a single person or a group of persons. Here we are interested in how gestures kinematically relate…

This article presents the Polish project entitled 'Detektory dla Szkol' ('Detectors for Schools', throughout the paper referred to as 'the programme'). It was developed at the Education and Training Division of the National Centre for Nuclear Research (Narodowe Centrum Badan Jadrowych, NCBJ) in Poland. The programme allows the schools to borrow…

Progress is made in science by constructing many models (possibly of different complexities), testing them against measurements, and determining which of them explain the data the best. It is my observation, however, that in many introductory physics labs we provide students with the materials and methods to verify the "correct" model of…

We believe that a natural focus of the physics education research community is on understanding and improving students' learning in our physics courses. Due to the increase in technology, we can bring laboratory experiments closer to our students. It is necessary to update our laboratories technologically to get closer to the world in which our…

It's not surprising that rainbows have received a great deal of attention: in textbooks, in magazines, and on the web. They are, after all, beautiful, fascinating, occasionally awe-inspiring, even a little mysterious. They are an almost perfect blend of natural beauty and simple physics. Has everything that can be said about rainbows already been…

The principles of chemical kinetics comprise one of the core topics that appear throughout chemistry. Standard kinetics lessons typically cover reaction rates and relative rates, rate laws, integrated rate laws, half-lives, collision theory, and the Arrhenius equation. They can also introduce a discussion of mechanisms as well, which may be the…

Adequate sleep is essential for students to be able to solve challenging problems effectively. After many years of advising students to get enough sleep the night before their final exam, two studies were conducted with students in introductory physics classes to investigate their sleep habits. In the first previously published study, few students…

Teaching and learning of quantum physics at secondary level is an active field of research. One important challenge is finding ways to promote understanding of quantum concepts without the mathematical formalism that is embedded in quantum mechanics but unavailable on the secondary level. We investigated Norwegian secondary students' (N = 291)…

Learning assistants (LAs) play an important role in inquiry-oriented physics instruction in large classrooms. LAs increase the teacher-student ratio and provide timely support to student exploration. Questioning is believed to be an advantageous strategy for LAs to scaffold student learning and maintain students as the agent of knowledge…

Limiting case analysis (LCA) is important to practicing physicists. Yet, there is little concrete guidance for physics educators, and a lack of consensus in the research community about how to help students learn, and learn from, limiting case analysis. In this study, we first review existing literature to find commonalities and variations in how…

Recently Burkholder "et al." argued that class normalized gains over the entire population of courses is approximated by a Cauchy distribution, not by a normal distribution, and therefore should not be used to compare different classes because means and standard deviations cannot be calculated. They argued that multiple linear regression…

Even after research-based instruction, students who demonstrate the ability to assemble relevant conceptual knowledge on one physics question may have difficulty assembling that same knowledge on a closely related problem. Recent research has suggested that reflexive, bottom-up reasoning processes seemingly unrelated to the physics concepts…

The topic of Direct current is one of the areas where the physics students' lack of deep understanding was identified. The aim of the research was to examine the effect of the blended learning approach on students' motivation for learning physics. The sample included 128 upper-secondary school students from Novi Sad (Serbia) with an average age of…

This study examines and describes how various online remote laboratory courses, necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic, were implemented at Hankuk University in Korea in 2020. We compared four general undergraduate laboratory courses, one each for physics, chemistry, biology, and earth science, and two major-level laboratory courses taught during…