Physics
Permanent URI for this communityhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2269
Browse
7 results
Search Results
Item Arguing about argument and evidence: Disagreements and ambiguities in science education research and practice(2022) Tang, Xiaowei; Levin, Daniel; Chumbley, Alexander; Elby, AndrewScience education researchers agree about the importance of evidence in science practices such as argumentation. Yet, disagreements and ambiguities about what counts as “evidence” in science classrooms pervade the literature. We argue that these ambiguities and disagreements can be viewed as falling along three fault lines: (i) the source of evidence, specifically, whether it must be first-hand; (ii) whether “evidence” must always be empirical; and (iii) the extent to which evidence is inferred, and what degree of inference transforms “evidence” into something else. In this paper, after showing how these three fault lines manifest in the literature, we argue that these three dimensions of disagreements and ambiguities are not confined to research and research-based curricula; they are also salient in teachers’ classroom practice, as illustrated by a dramatic, multi-day debate between a mentor teacher and her teacher intern. After establishing the salience of the three fault lines in both research and practice, we explore whether NGSS can provide a resolution to the teachers’ debate and to the disagreements/ambiguities in the literature. Our analysis reveals that NGSS reproduces rather than resolves those three fault lines—but in doing so, it invites a resolution of a different type. Instead of providing a single, precise, context-independent definition of “evidence,” NGSS implicitly reflects a defensible view that what counts as “evidence” depends on the epistemic aims of the practices in which the students are engaged. This implied context-dependency of what counts as good evidence use, we argue, could be made explicit in an addendum document clarifying aspects of NGSS. Doing so would provide valuable guidance to teachers, teacher educators, and researchers.Item Accounting for variability in a teacher’s epistemology: Resources and framing(2018-05-31) Lau, Matty; Elby, AndrewItem Connecting self-efficacy and views about the nature of science in undergraduate research experiences(American Physical Society, 2016-11-21) Quan, Gina M.; Elby, AndrewUndergraduate research can support students’ more central participation in physics. We analyze markers of two coupled shifts in participation: changes in students’ views about the nature of science coupled to shifts in self-efficacy toward physics research. Students in the study worked with faculty and graduate student mentors on research projects while also participating in a seminar where they learned about research and reflected on their experiences. In classroom discussions and in clinical interviews, students described gaining more nuanced views about the nature of science, specifically related to who can participate in research and what participation in research looks like. This shift was coupled to gains in self-efficacy toward their ability to contribute to research; they felt like their contributions as novices mattered. We present two case studies of students who experienced coupled shifts in self-efficacy and views about nature-of-science shifts, and a case study of a student for whom we did not see either shift, to illustrate both the existence of the coupling and the different ways it can play out. After making the case that this coupling occurs, we discuss some potential underlying mechanisms. Finally, we use these results to argue for more nuanced interpretations of self-efficacy measurements.Item Sense-making with Inscriptions in Quantum Mechanics(2016) Sohr, Erin Ronayne; Gupta, Ayush; Elby, Andrew; Dreyfus, Benjamin W.; Gupta, AyushThis document provides supporting materials for a paper submitted for review to the Physics Education Research Conference proceedings in July 2016, "Sense-making with Inscriptions in Quantum Mechanics."Item Supplementary Material: “Because math”: Epistemological stance or defusing social tension in QM?(2015) Sohr, Erin Ronayne; Dreyfus, Benjamin W.; Gupta, Ayush; Elby, Andrew; Gupta, AyushThis document provides supporting materials for a paper submitted for review to the Physics Education Research Conference proceedings in 2015 titled, “‘Because math’: Epistemological stance or defusing social tension in QM?” It includes 3 sections: (1) Introduction, (2) Transcript data, and (3) the Particle in a Box tutorial worksheet relevant to the data.Item Supplementary Materials: Kuo et al., How Students Blend Conceptual and Formal Mathematical Reasoning in Solving Physics Problems, accepted for publication in Science Education on 08/08/2012(2012-08) Kuo, Eric; Hull, Michael M.; Gupta, Ayush; Elby, Andrew; Gupta, AyushThis is supplemental material pertaining to the qualitative data presented in the manuscript: Kuo. E., Hull, M. M., Gupta, A., & Elby, A., How Students Blend Conceptual and Formal Mathematical Reasoning in Solving Physics Problems, accepted for publication in Science Education on 08/08/2012. The following material consists of 4 parts: A. The context of the study (p. 2) B. The question protocol that students were asked to answer. (pp. 3-4) C. The transcript of Alex’s interview (pp. 5-17) D. The transcript of Pat’s interview (pp. 18-31)Item Supplementary Document for IJSE paper titled, "Beyond Epistemological Deficits: Dynamics Explanations of Engineering Students' Difficulties with Mathematical Sensemaking"(2011) Gupta, Ayush; Elby, AndrewThe document serves as supplementary material for the manuscript titled, “Beyond Epistemological Deficits: Dynamic explanations of engineering students’ difficulties with mathematical sense-making,” published in International Journal of Science Education, 2011.