One of the most long-standing controversies in kinesiology has been that of physical activity requirements (PARs) in corresponding degree programs. Despite a recommendation from the American Kinesiology Association to include "the practice of physical activity" in undergraduate kinesiology degree programs, some programs have PARs, while…

Children's emotional, behavioral, and developmental problems can be properly identified and assessed based on observations from their teachers and parents. The Motor Behavior Checklist (MBC) was designed to assist classroom teachers and Physical Education (PE) teachers in assessing their students' motor-related behaviors. The instrument has…

This paper examines the meaning, assessment, and development of connection to nature (C2N) in two- to five-year-old children. It grows out of a Connection to Nature Workshop organized by the University of Florida, Stanford University, the North American Association for Environmental Education, and the Children and Nature Network to evaluate…

Online learning engagement detection is a fundamental problem in educational information technology. Efficient detection of students' learning situations can provide information to teachers to help them identify students having trouble in real time. To improve the accuracy of learning engagement detection, we have collected two aspects of…

For some years now, the scientific community has been studying how videogames foster acquisition of mental representations of the world around us. Research to date suggests that the efficiency of videogames as learning tools largely depends on the instructional design in which they are included. This article provides empirical evidence related to…

With the increase of childhood obesity and sedentary behavior, it is essential to discover innovative ways to motivate youth to be more active. Many Hispanic children in the United States in obesogenic environments particularly lack opportunities for physical activity (PA). Exergames (i.e., motion-based video games) may enhance PA among at-risk…

We examined the effects of three different training conditions, all of which involve the motor system, on kindergarteners' mental transformation skill. We focused on three main questions. First, we asked whether training that involves making a motor movement that is relevant to the mental transformation--either concretely through action (action…

Mechanical engineering, mechanical engineering technology, and related educational programs are not addressing in a sufficient way the principles associated with applying analytical investigations in solving actual engineering problems. Because of this, graduates do not have the adequate skills required to use the methods of applied dynamics in…

Assessment and evaluation instruments provide teachers the opportunity of shaping education in the beginning, contributing to education during the process and evaluating education at the end of the process. Textbooks, on the other hand, are resources that present the aforementioned contributions to teachers at first hand. Thus, the study aims to…

A magnetic linear accelerator (or Gauss accelerator) is a device that uses the conversion of magnetic energy into kinetic energy to launch an object with high velocity. A simple experimental implementation consists of a line of steel spheres in which the first one is a permanent magnetic sphere. If another steel ball collides with the magnetic…

Projectile motion is a common phenomenon that is used in introductory physics courses to help students understand motion in two dimensions. Authors have shared a range of ideas for teaching this concept and the associated kinematics in "The Physics Teacher" ("TPT"); however, the "Hoop Challenge" is a new setup not…

The aim of this paper is to propose a method for solving head-on elastic collisions, without algebraic complications, to emphasize the use of the fundamental conservations laws. Head-on elastic collisions are treated in many physics textbooks as examples of conservation of momentum and kinetic energy.

Many students find it difficult to apply certain physics concepts to their daily lives. This is especially true when they perceive a principle taught in physics class as being in conflict with their experience. An important instance of this occurs when students are instructed to ignore the effect of air resistance when solving kinematics problems.…

In many introductory-level physics textbooks, the derivation of the formula for the speed of transverse waves in a string is either omitted altogether or presented under physically overly idealized assumptions about the shape of the considered wave pulse and the related velocity and acceleration distributions. In this paper, we derive the named…

Slow motion video enhances our ability to perceive and experience the physical world. This can help students and teachers especially in cases of fast moving objects or detailed events that happen too quickly for the eye to follow. As often as possible, demonstrations should be performed by the students themselves and luckily many of them will…