In college level chemistry courses, reasoning using molecular and particulate descriptions of matter becomes central to understanding physical and chemical properties. In this study, we used a qualitative approach to analyzing classroom discourse derived from Toulmin's model of argumentation in order to describe the ways in which students develop…

University Modeling Instruction (UMI) is an approach to curriculum and pedagogy that focuses instruction on engaging students in building, validating, and deploying scientific models. Modeling Instruction has been successfully implemented in both high school and university physics courses. Studies within the physics education research (PER)…

The aim of this study was to investigate an adaptation of the Study Processes Questionnaire for the discipline of physics. A total of 2030 first year physics students at an Australian metropolitan university completed the questionnaire over three different year cohorts. The resultant data has been used to explore whether the adaptation of the…

In this dissertation, I investigate the effects of a grounded learning experience on college students' mental models of physics systems. The grounded learning experience consisted of a priming stage and an instruction stage, and within each stage, one of two different types of visuo-haptic representation was applied: visuo-gestural simulation…

Energy is a core and unifying concept in all science disciplines and across all grade levels. Although energy is one of the most central and richly connected ideas in all of science disciplines, students often have a great deal of difficulty understanding it. Numerous studies have been conducted on this topic finding that many students held…

In our study, we aimed to compare the impact of simulations, sequences of printed simulation frames and conventional static diagrams on the understanding of students with regard to the one-dimensional kinematics. Our student sample consisted of three classes of middle years students (N = 63; mostly 15 year-olds). These three classes served as…

Global competitiveness of the United States is often suggested as a key outcome of developing a capable science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) workforce, a goal supported by many local, state, and national programs. Examining the effectiveness of such programs, however, may require assessment techniques that are outside their…

This quasi-experimental study aims to investigate the documentary films' influence on 8th grade students' nature of science views. The study's participants were 113 8th grade students from two different schools taught by two different teachers. The study was completed over a 6-week period, during which topics related to "Cell Division and…

We observe teachers in professional development courses about energy constructing mechanistic accounts of energy transformations. We analyze a case in which teachers investigating adiabatic compression develop a model of the transformation of kinetic energy to thermal energy. Among their ideas is the idea that thermal energy is generated as a…

The purpose of this study was to examine how simulations in physics class, class management, laboratory practice, student engagement, critical thinking, cooperative learning, and use of simulations predicted the percentage of students achieving a grade point average of B or higher and their academic performance as reported by teachers in secondary…

Increased attention to the relationships between affect and learning has led to the development of machine-learned models that are able to identify students' affective states in computerized learning environments. Data for these affect detectors have been collected from multiple modalities including physical sensors, dialogue logs, and logs of…

This study aims to determine the influence of distance asynchronous teaching of Physics-I topics via intelligent tutoring systems (ITSs) on academic achievement and permanence. A Web-based learning environment was created by use of an ITS called "Turkish Intelligent Tutoring System" (TURKZOS) for such Physics-I units as work, energy, and…

People who live near wind turbines complain of symptoms that include some combination of the following: difficulty sleeping, fatigue, depression, irritability, aggressiveness, cognitive dysfunction, chest pain/pressure, headaches, joint pain, skin irritations, nausea, dizziness, tinnitus, and stress. These symptoms have been attributed to the…

A series of papers have recently addressed the mechanism by which a siphon works. While all this started as an effort to clarify words--namely, dictionary definitions--the authors feel that words, along with the misguided use of physical concepts, are currently contributing to considerable confusion and casuistry on this subject. They wish to make…

This article uses calculus to find the center of mass of a soft, vertically suspended, cylindrical helical spring, which necessarily is stretched non-uniformly by the action of gravity. A general expression for the vertical position of the center of mass is obtained and compared with other results in the literature.