SEARCH · Searcharxiv
Search indexed arXiv papers on artificial intelligence, large language models, computer vision and robotics. Read source abstracts and follow links to arXiv.
Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.
Plans are underway to redefine the International System of Units (SI) around 2018. The New SI specifies the values of certain physical constants to define units. This article explains the New SI in a way that could be used to present it to high-school physics classes.
Item Response Theory (IRT) was originally developed in traditional exam settings, and it has been shown that the model does not readily transfer to formative assessment in the form of online homework. We investigate if this is mostly due to learner traits that do not become apparent in exam settings, namely random guessing due to lack of diligence or dedication, and copying work from other students or resources. Both of these traits mask the true ability of the learner, which is the only trait considered in most mainstream unidimensional IRT models. We find that indeed the introduction of these traits allows to better assess the true ability of the learners, as well as to better gauge the quality of assessment items. Correspondence of the model traits to self-reported behavior is investigated and confirmed. We find that of these two traits, copying answers has a larger influence on initial homework attempts than random guessing.
Instilling good laboratory working attitudes in students is a difficult but very important task, especially in the first level courses. The introduction of a grade, based on the observation of work practices during laboratory sessions, can be strongly beneficial towards the acquisition of positive skills covering not only the technical aspects, but also the acquisition of both independence and team work. Explicit suggestions are given for basing the grade on specific observations and a quantitative analysis is performed to guarantee that the higher intrinsic volatility of the Performance Grade does not affect the final laboratory grade.
The teaching style "Peer Instruction", developed by Eric Mazur (Harvard University), poses a twofold challenge to teachers as well as students. While it aims to promote conceptual development in students, it also demands significant shifts in role differentiation of students and teachers, who are generally still accustomed to a lecture-style setting. In this paper, experiences with this method converge with a constructivist theory of learning to formulate thoughts and advice on how to address several perceived challenges.
The article considers the methodical aspects of informatization of physical education at a higher education institution. Besides, the article discloses the conception of the information educational environment and information technologies oriented at realizing psychological and pedagogical objectives of teaching and educating at a higher education institution. Information technologies in a higher education institution are oriented at realizing psychological and pedagogical objectives of teaching and educating. The authors of the article show the importance and possibilities of applying information technology media to the system of higher education training of specialists in the sphere of Physics. The authors consider developing the content of methodical training of future Physics teachers to be one of ways of solving the problem of informatization of education.
We use self-reported data from 2011--2014 and determine the academic profile of accepted students at physics graduate programs in the United States. We analyze the accepted students' grade point averages and physics Graduate Record Examination (GRE) scores. We also compare the physics GRE scores of accepted students to their grade point averages.
The Force Concept Inventory (FCI) was developed by Hestenes, Wells and Swackhamer, in order to assess student understanding of the concept of force. FCI has been used for over 20 years and in different countries. When applying the inventory in a new context it is important to evaluate the reliability and discrimination power of this assessment tool. In this study the reliability and discrimination power are evaluated in the context of Engineering education at a Norwegian university, using statistical tests, focusing on both item analysis and on the entire test. The results indicate that FCI is a reliable and discriminating tool in most cases. As there are exceptions, statistical tests should always be done when FCI is administered in a new context.
We offer second year students the opportunity to explore Current Topics in Biophysics in a course co-taught by a physicist and a biologist. The interdisciplinary course allows university students to engage in analytical thinking that integrates physics and biology. The students are either biophysics majors (50%) or from a diversity of science majors (about 30% life sciences). All will have taken first year courses in biology, physics and mathematics. The course is divided into: 1) The application of physical approaches to biological problems using case studies (how high can a tree grow? and biological pumps are two examples); 2) An introduction to physics concepts for which potential applications are explored (biophotonics and its application in fluorescence microscopy and photodynamic therapy is one example); and 3) Presentations from industry and university researchers who describe careers, research and clinical applications of biophysics. Over the six years the course has been offered, students have achieved a B average independent of declared major. In course evaluations, students expressed a high level of satisfaction the course overall (91% were positive). However, students expressed reservations about the open-ended nature of assignments and test questions that approach biological problems using an analytical framework grounded in physics -the real challenge when implementing an open-ended problem solving approach to pedagogy.
James Clerk Maxwell is known for his outstanding contributions to fundamental physics. These include providing the equations that govern electric and magnetic fields, establishing the basis of modern colourimetry, finding important relationships in thermodynamics, molecular science, mechanics, optics and astronomy. In his first Professorial chair in 1856 at the Marischal College and University of Aberdeen he undertook a substantial amount of teaching that laid the foundation for his later pedagogic output. This paper examines whom he taught, where his first students came from and what they did in later life, drawing material from a privately published memoir. Thumbnail portraits are included for 70% of his class. The analysis complements the usual emphasis on educational method and content. The data provide an interesting sociological survey of what Scottish University education was achieving in the middle of the 19th century and is presented as raw material for a wider enquiry.
In this chapter, we present some reflections about the learning process -and its implications in the teaching- of notions related to the phases of the Moon.
A contemporary physicist would be hard put to agree entirely with the author of a 1959 textbook on quantum mechanics, who wrote: "A second simple, one-dimensional system, somewhat divorced from reality but illustrative of the principles of the theory, is a particle in a box with finite walls." Interest in this prototypic system has not diminished over the years, and is not likely to do so in the near future, because it has now been wedded to reality and seen as a paradigm for quantum wells and other nanosystems. The treatment of this topic in standard textbooks has changed little over the last few decades, and such changes as have come to our notice leave, in our opinion, much to be desired. The purpose of this article is to enable, even encourage, other teachers to give the finite square well the attention that it deserves; to this end, the authors provide a tutorial review that is more instructive and comprehensive than the accounts presented in numerous textbooks and dispensed in still more numerous online resources, but does not make any additional demands on the mathematical abilities of the student. Given the elemental nature of the topic, the authors claim no originality; with nothing more than the winnowing fork in their hands, they can only clear the threshing floor, gather the wheat into the barn, and let others decide whether or no the chaff should be burnt with unquenchable fire.
The job of a physicist is to describe Nature. General features, hypotheses and theories help to describe physics phenomena at a more abstract, fundamental level, and are sometimes tacitly assigned some sort of real existence; doing so appears to be of little harm in most of classical physics. However, missing any tangible connection to everyday experience, one better always bears in mind the descriptive nature of any efforts to grasp the quantum. And elementary particles interact in the quantum world, of course. When communicating the world of elementary particles to the general public, the Bayesian approach of an ever ongoing updating of the depiction of reality turns out to be virtually indispensable. The human experience of providing a series of increasingly better descriptions generates plenty of personal pleasures, for researchers as well as for amateurs. A suggestive analogy for improving our understanding of the world, even the seemingly paradoxical quantum world, may be found in recent insight into how congenitally blind children and young adults learn to see, after having received successful eye surgery.
This report discusses our experience in implementing nontraditional teaching approach of General Physics and Calculus courses at Sungkyunkwan University, South Korea. We endeavour to improve the students' learning skills both inside and out-of-classroom. The teaching approach emphasizes active learning and this includes problem-based learning and guided-discovery. We also analyze the effects on and responses of the students on their learning experience.
We use the theories of identity statuses and communities of practice to describe three different case studies of students finding their paths through undergraduate physics and developing a physics subject-specific identity. Each case study demonstrates a unique path that reinforces the link between the theories of communities of practice and identity statuses. The case studies also illustrate how students progress and regress in their commitment to their subject-specific identities and their professional identities. The progression/regression is dependent on their willingness to explore different aspects of a physics professional identity and their availability to carry out such exploration. Identity status and future identity crises can manifest in students' behavior in the classroom. Allowing students to engage in more legitimate practices of the physics community, especially in the form of undergraduate research, helps students to explore their opportunities and inform the level of commitment they wish to make to physics.
In July 5th 2014 an occultation of Mars by the Moon was visible in South America. Citizen scientists and professional astronomers in Colombia, Venezuela and Chile performed a set of simple observations of the phenomenon aimed to measure the speed of light and lunar distance. This initiative is part of the so called "Aristarchus Campaign", a citizen astronomy project aimed to reproduce observations and measurements made by astronomers of the past. Participants in the campaign used simple astronomical instruments (binoculars or small telescopes) and other electronic gadgets (cell-phones and digital cameras) to measure occultation times and to take high resolution videos and pictures. In this paper we describe the results of the Aristarchus Campaign. We compiled 9 sets of observations from sites separated by distances as large as 2,500 km. We achieve at measuring the speed of light in vacuum and lunar distance with uncertainties of few percent. The goal of the Aristarchus Campaigns is not to provide improved values of well-known astronomical and physical quantities, but to demonstrate how the public could be engaged in scientific endeavors using simple instrumentation and readily available technological devices. These initiatives could benefit amateur communities in developing countries increasing their awareness towards their actual capabilities for collaboratively obtaining useful astronomical data. This kind of exercises would prepare them for facing future and more advanced observational campaigns where their role could be crucial.
Improvements in performance and approval obtained by first year engineering students from University of Concepcion, Chile, were studied, once a virtual didactic model of multiple-choice exam, was implemented. This virtual learning resource was implemented in the Web ARCO platform and allows training, by facing test models comparable in both time and difficulty to those that they will have to solve during the course. It also provides a feedback mechanism for both: 1) The students, since they can verify the level of their knowledge. Once they have finished the simulations, they can access a complete problem-solving heuristic report of each problem; 2) The teachers, since they can obtain information about the habits of the students in their strategies of preparation; and they also can diagnose the weaknesses of the students prior to the exam. This study indicates how this kind of preparation generates substantial improvements on the approval rates by allowing the students: 1) A more structured and oriented systematic study, and 2) To learn, from the feedback report of each problem that the information described in their exams should have, at each stage, a proper logical connection. Likewise, this study allows differentiating how the repetition in the use of the platform and the formality in the time invested indicate clear differences on the obtained performance.
The concept of "force" is abstract and challenging for many physics students, and many studies have revealed misconceptions that hinder students' understanding and learning in classical physics. One reason for this may be that physics textbooks do not define the concept of force in concise and consistent ways. In the present study, we have investigated how "force" is defined in physics textbooks used in upper secondary schools in Norway, and present a framework of eight categories for how the concept is defined. The framework is developed inductively from textbooks, and motivated and discussed in light of how the concept has developed historically in physics. Examples from one of the textbooks that constituted the empirical basis for the framework are given. These reveal that textbooks may present students for a multiplicity of definitions of "force" and hence contribute to students' challenges in learning and using the concept.
This paper first provides an overview of the pedagogical role of formative assessment in the undergraduate engineering classroom. In the last decade, technology-facilitated implementation of the collection and analysis of student responses has reduced the clerical burden on educators, making the practice more widespread. We discuss some of the reasons why this practice may not have yet reached its full potential in undergraduate engineering classrooms, as well as some available solutions.