Where are we after 30 years of physics education research? Andrew Kovanen This paper was completed and submitted in partial fulfillment of the Master Teacher Program, a 2-year faculty professional development program conducted by the Center for Teaching Excellence, United States Military Academy, West Point, NY, 2011. Teaching the sciences, especially physics, to undergraduate students is a formidable task even for the most seasoned instructor. Before even stepping foot inside the classroom, many students believe physics is difficult and beyond their capabilities to comprehend. Their epistemological beliefs lead them to view science as a jumble of unrelated facts and formulas to memorize (Qian, Alvermann, 2000). Even worse, many students enrolled in non-physics degree programs that require the successful completion of a physics course dread physics and may even resent the fact they have to take a course they believe has little relevance in their lives. The continuing challenge of mathematical and scientific competencies of public school high school graduates in the United States (OECD, 2010) only exacerbates the misconceptions and negative attitudes toward physics, not to mention the problems these declining competencies create once the physics course actually starts. Caught in this self-reinforcing loop, these students often finish their physics experience with a worse attitude than when they started. Unfortunately, the teaching methods of many physics instructors encourage this outcome. Physics education research (PER) started in earnest around 1980 after the publications of numerous studies that showed the traditional lecture class was generally an ineffective method of instruction (Redish, Saul, and Steinberg, 1998). Since then, a tremendous amount of effort has been put into PER. Some of the fruits of this research are well known throughout the physics education community such as Peer Instruction (Mazur, 1997), Just-in-Time Teaching (Novak, et.al., 1999), and Interactive Lecture Demonstrations (Sokoloff, Thornton, 1997). An appropriate question to ask after 30 years of PER is whether or not the research is effective at improving students’ understanding of physics. This is a bit of a loaded question and needs to be answered in two parts: the efficacy of instructional techniques and the actual use of these techniques by physics instructors. Ample evidence exists that instructional techniques based on PER are superior to traditional lecture classes. Both the Peer Instruction and Interactive Lecture Demonstration techniques were the subjects of ten-year studies (Crouch, Mazur, 2001) (Sharma, et.al., 2010) with both instructional techniques resulting in significantly better student understanding of the material as opposed to traditional lecture classes. With a vast (and growing) repository of evidence showing how instruction methods based on PER result in better student understanding compared to the traditional lecture class, one might predict that after 30 years of PER, the traditional lecture class would be on the path to extinction. Unfortunately, this prediction is far from being realized. Physics instructors, for the most part, still stick to the traditional lecture method of instruction despite knowing about the benefits of alternative instruction methods based on PER. Dancy and Henderson (2010) found in a survey of 722 physics faculty members from degree-granting institutions across the United States that 87% of them have heard of at least one PER-based instructional method and that 70% of them were interested in implementing PER-based instructional methods. It can be reasonably concluded that not only is there good dissemination of information resulting from PER, but that physics faculty members are motivated to act on that information. However, the survey also found that physics faculty members overwhelmingly still use the traditional lecture as their primary method of instruction. Additionally, physics faculty members who claimed to use PER-based instructional methods often modified the methods, sometimes to such a degree that critical components of the methods were excluded, bringing into question their efficacy. Instructor implementation is the problem. Fortunately, significant time and resources are not needed to begin fixing the problem. Physics faculties have a number of options at their disposal to help improve physics education. At the most base level, new instructors should receive some sort of physics education training before they step into the classroom. Ideally, this training would include information about PER-based instructional methods although any training would be better than the complete lack of training received by new instructors at most institutions. Physics faculty members could attend workshops such as the Workshop for New Physics and Astronomy Faculty. Physics instructors completing this particular workshop tend to change their instructional methods resulting in better student learning in their classrooms (Henderson, 2007). Maybe some brutally honest feedback of instructors’ lectures from a department head would spur some action. Or a more positive approach could be some words of encouragement and recognition of instructors attempting to implement PER-based instructional methods. There are plenty of options available, but in the end, it is the individual instructor who must act. PER continues to investigate instructional methods and insight into how students think and work. An instructional method called Science-Technology-Society (STS) aims to get students more actively involved in their physics education by posing a real societal problem and using science and technology to address the problem. Visualizations are being used to help students bridge the gap between the often microscopic “theoretical” world of physics and the macroscopic interactions they experience every day, making physics more relevant to them. The positive benefits of expressing physics with language continue to be revealed by PER. Even seemingly minute details are being researched to help physics instructors understand how students think. For example, James (2006) showed an important effect on student discourse during Peer Instruction caused by the grading of the Peer Instruction questions. Smith, Mestre, and Ross (2010) went as far as to study the eye-gaze patterns of students to get a better idea of how much time they spend studying worked-out example problems. (It’s higher than you think!) The annotated readings contain these and other important new PER from the past six years. PER, though, does not occur in a vacuum as whims of researchers needing to publish. PER is the response to longstanding problems in physics education and the utility of PER ultimately comes down to individual instructors who must make the choice of staying in their comfort zones or taking a little risk and trying something new. The answer to the original question posed is mixed. PER-based instructional methods clearly result in better student mastery of physics, but the methods aren’t being implemented. Certainly, factors exogenous to physics instructors’ spheres of influence contribute to poor student performance and negative attitudes toward physics. However, before any significant change can take place, physics instructors need to be willing to accept the fact that they themselves may be their students’ (and their own) worst enemy. References Mazur, E. (1997) Peer Instruction: A User’s Manual. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Novack, G., Patterson, E., Gavrin, A., & Christian, W. (1999) Just-in-Time Teaching. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. OECD (2010) PISA 2009 at a Glance. OECD Publishing. Accessed at http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/9789264095298-en. Qian, G., & Alvermann, D. (2000) Relationship between epistemological beliefs and conceptual change learning. Reading and Writing Quarterly: Overcoming Learning Difficulties, 16, 59-74. Redish, E., Saul, J., & Steinberg, R. (1998) Student expectations in introductory physics. American Journal of Physics, 66, 212-224. Sokoloff, D., & Thornton, R. (1997) Using ILD’s to create an active learning environment. The Physics Teacher, 35, 340-347. Annotated Readings: Casperson, J., & Linn, M. (2006) Using visualizations to teach electrostatics. American Journal of Physics, 74, 316-323. Students often have unconnected ideas and experiences about the same scientific phenomenon and have trouble bridging the gap between everyday macroscopic experiences and the microscopic world. This study used the Web-based Inquiry Science Environment (WISE) during a five-day electrostatics project to provide visuals specifically targeted to bridge the gap between the macroscopic and microscopic worlds. The authors found that both students with high prior knowledge of electrostatics and students with low prior knowledge benefited significantly from the WISE visuals although students with low prior knowledge benefited more than the high prior knowledge students. The results suggest that being able to relate microscopic phenomenon to everyday events helps students better remember and understand physics concepts. Crouch, C., & Mazur, E. (2001) Peer Instruction: Ten years of experience and results. American Journal of Physics, 69, 970-977. The authors studied the effects of Peer Instruction over 10 years in both calculus-based and algebra-based introductory physics courses at Harvard University. The study showed that Peer Instruction significantly increased student scores on the Force Concept Inventory (FCI) and the Mechanics Baseline Test and that some refinements to the Peer Instruction technique produced even further gains. There was only one control group for each group: a calculus-based class in 1990 and an algebra-based class in 1999, so it would be a stretch to call the research conclusive. However, the normalized gains on the FCI for calculus-based classes using Peer Instruction ranged between two and three times greater than the control course. The normalized gains for the algebra-based course using Peer Instruction was a little over 1.5 times greater than the control course. Interestingly, the students in the calculus-based course were more accepting of the Peer Instruction technique than students in the algebra-based course. Dancy, M. & Henderson, C. (2010) Pedagogical practices and instructional change of physics faculty. American Journal of Physics, 78, 1056-1063. The authors of this paper conclude that the dissemination of information gleaned from physics education research (PER) has been largely effective and that physics instructors are generally willing to implement changes based on PER. However, for the most part, physics instructional techniques have not changed and for those instructors who have attempted to implement a research-based instructional technique, critical portions of the technique are modified or not performed at all. Most instructors surveyed (52.7%) cited a lack of time as the reason why they did not implement more research-based instructional techniques followed by lack of knowledge or access to research-based instructional techniques (25.5%). Duda, G., & Garrett, K. (2008) Blogging in the physics classroom: A research-based approach to shaping students’ attitudes toward physics. American Journal of Physics, 76, 1054-1065. This article focuses on the attitudes of students taking an introductory physics course at Creighton University. In the study, instructors maintained course blogs in which they would post interesting topics or articles about physical phenomenon and students could comment and ask questions. The authors discovered the course blogs helped students maintain a positive attitude about physics whereas the students in control groups without course blogs saw a deterioration of attitudes toward physics. Despite the better attitudes, the students in courses with blogs earned about the same grades as students in the courses without blogs. Although the blogs did not seem to aid in conceptual understanding, the better attitudes of students resulting from the blogs may have encouraged more students to consider physics as a major rather than be totally turned off by it. Henderson, C. (2007) Promoting instructional change in new faculty: An evaluation of the physics and astronomy new faculty workshop. American Journal of Physics, 76, 179-187. The author’s research indicates the Workshop for New Physics and Astronomy Faculty is meeting its goals of introducing new physics and astronomy faculty to the latest developments in pedagogy and having participants integrate the Workshop’s ideas into their classrooms. The Workshop takes physics and astronomy faculty who typically have one or two years of teaching experience and exposes them to new instructional techniques based on physics and astronomy education research (PAER). The responses to survey questions by department chairs of Workshop attendees indicate that Workshop attendees do change their instructional style (72.4%), the students of Workshop attendees are learning better (72.6%), and that Workshop attendees have had influence on instructors who have not attended the Workshop (51.0%). However, the survey of Workshop attendees also showed that many attendees modified the research-based instructional techniques (sometimes heavily) the Workshop exposed them to, bringing into question the effectiveness of the reinvented techniques. James, M., & Willoughby, S. (2010) Listening to student conversations during clicker questions: What you have not heard may surprise you! American Journal of Physics, 79, 123132. This paper discusses the types of conversations students engage in during peer instruction using an electronic response system (“clickers”) in a freshman-level astronomy course. In this study, 38% of student conversations were standard conversations an instructor would expect from students while 62% were nonstandard. The authors conclude that clicker statistics can provide misleading feedback to instructors due in large part to the effects these nonstandard conversations have on student responses. The authors make numerous recommendations to improve the efficacy of clicker questions including the addition of a none-of-the-above response, having students rate their confidence in their responses, and making clicker questions a low-stake event. The authors also present a list of recommended conversation behaviors instructors could share with students so as to keep their discussions more meaningful. James, M. (2006) The effect of grading incentive on student discourse in Peer Instruction. American Journal of Physics, 74, 689-691. This paper discusses the impact of scoring clicker responses during peer instruction. The author compared student conversations during peer instruction for two freshman-level astronomy courses taught by different instructors. One instructor awarded three times as much credit for correct clicker responses as incorrect responses (high stakes) while the other instructor awarded equal credit for correct and incorrect clicker responses (low stakes). The peer instruction conversations in the high stakes class showed significant discourse bias where one student (often the more knowledgeable) out of a pair would dominate the conversation. The discourse bias in the low stakes class was about half that of the high stakes class. The author concludes that using high stakes clicker questions during peer instruction results in response statistics that exaggerate the level of understanding in a class making it more difficult for instructors to tailor their instruction to fit their class’s needs. Kortemeyer, G., Kashy, E., Benenson, W., & Bauer, W. (2007) Experiences using the opensource learning content management and assessment system LON-CAPA in introductory physics courses. American Journal of Physics, 76, 438-444. This paper explores the creation of LON-CAPA (an online content management and assessment system) and its effects on grades of introductory physics students. The authors conclude that online homework results in a noticeable (although not necessarily statistically significant) increase in students’ final course grades and that the grade increase comes primarily from female students. The authors offer as reasoning behind the increased grades students spending one to two hours more per week doing physics when online homework is assigned. The authors also analyzed the use of online discussion boards and found a negative correlation between the use of unauthorized third-party discussion boards and examination grades. Conversely, the use of the provided online discussion board had a positive correlation to examination grades. Sadaghiani, H. (2011) Using multimedia learning modules in a hybrid-online course in electricity and magnetism. Physical Review Special Topics – Physics Education Research, 7, 010102. This study took one section of an introductory electricity and magnetism course and introduced multimedia learning modules (MLMs) for the students to complete before select classes. This section also had its lecture time reduced from 2, 75-minute lectures per week to 2, 50-minute lectures per week. Despite less time in the classroom, students in the hybrid online/face-to-face section had an 8% higher normalized gain on the Conceptual Survey of Electricity and Magnetism than the control group. Sharma, M., Johnston, I., Johnston, H., Varvell, K., Robertson, G., Hopkins, A., Stewart, C., Cooper, I., & Thornton, R. (2010) Use of interactive lecture demonstrations: A ten year study. Physical Review Special Topics – Physics Education Research, 6, 020119. The authors conducted a study of the effectiveness of interactive learning demonstrations (ILDs) for introductory physics classes. The study was done over two periods of time: 1999-2001 and 2007-2009. During the 1999-2001 portion of the study, students exposed to ILDs showed significantly higher scores on the Force and Motion Concept Evaluation (FMCE) test than students who only had traditional lectures with normalized gains for the ILD classes being between two and four times that of the non-ILD classes. The study was repeated from 20072009 but without a control group. The normalized gains for the ILD classes were similar to the ILD classes in the 1999-2001 study. The study also found that ILDs were very labor intensive to set up and operate and that having a technician do those tasks greatly aided in the delivery of the ILD. Smith, A., Mestre, J., & Ross, B. (2010) Eye-gaze patterns as students study worked-out examples in mechanics. Physical Review Special Topics – Physics Education Research, 6, 020118. This study analyzed the eye-gaze patterns of introductory physics students when studying worked-out example problems with explanations including both textual and mathematical information. When studying the example problems, students averaged about 40% of their gaze time reading the material. However, despite the significant time spent reading the worked-out example problems, the students performed poorly on conceptual questions posed to them afterward. These results suggest the students either did not learn the conceptual information while studying the example problems or did not retain it. Stewart, J., & Ballard, S. (2010) Effect of written presentation on performance in introductory physics. Physical Review Special Topics – Physics Education Research, 6, 020120. The authors of this paper conducted a two-year study of how students in an electricity and magnetism course at the University of Arkansas expressed solutions to physics problems. The study showed that the total amount of language used and the fraction of writing (as opposed to mathematics or drawing) used in solutions strongly correlated with topic understanding. This conclusion may seem obvious, but it gives quantitative backing to making introductory physics students use language to explain their answers in order to better understand the material. Interestingly, the study also showed an inverse correlation between graphical means of expression and topic understanding. Yager, R., Choi, A., Yager, S., & Akcay, H. (2009) A comparison of student learning in STS vs those in direct inquiry classes. Electronic Journal of Science Education, 13, 186-208. The authors of this study conclude that using a model of Science-Technology-Society (STS), or teaching science and technology in context of human experiences, is a more effective teaching method than traditional direct inquiry methods. Of the five domains studied (concept, process, applications, creativity, and attitude), students in STS classes performed better in all but the concept domain, where they performed about the same as students in direct inquiry classes. Considering the primary focus of the direct inquiry classes was concept mastery, students in STS classes performing as well as those in direct inquiry classes demonstrated that the STS method of teaching does not sacrifice understanding.