Physics
Permanent URI for this communityhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2269
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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 Becoming a Physicist: How Identities and Practices Shape Physics Trajectories(2017) Quan, Gina; Elby, Andrew; Turpen, Chandra; Physics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This dissertation studies the relationships and processes which shape students' participation within the discipline of physics. Studying this early disciplinary participation gives insight to how students are supported in or pushed out of physics, which is an important step in cultivating a diverse set of physics students. This research occurs within two learning environments that we co-developed: a physics camp for high school girls and a seminar for undergraduate physics majors to get started in physics research. Using situated learning theory, we conceptualized physics learning to be intertwined with participation in physics practices and identity development. This theoretical perspective draws our attention to relationships between students and the physics community. Specifically, we study how students come to engage in the practices of the community and who they are within the physics community. We find that students' interactions with faculty and peers impact the extent to which students engage in authentic physics practices. These interactions also impact the extent to which students develop identities as physicists. We present implications of these findings for the design of physics learning spaces. Understanding this process of how students become members of the physics community will provide valuable insights into fostering a diverse set of successful trajectories in physics.Item Explanatory Cohrence in the Context of the Second Law of Thermodynamics(2014) Geller, Benjamin David; Redish, Edward F; Physics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This thesis examines how undergraduate life science students experience interdisciplinary connections between introductory physics, chemistry, and biology - what the connections look like, how we foster them, and the affect that stems from them. It is about the gaps students experience between their introductory biology, chemistry, and physics coursework, and how we can draw upon students' resources for bridging them. Rather than looking at connections between physics, chemistry, and biology in the abstract, we ground this thesis in the conceptual context of the second law of thermodynamics, a rich domain for interdisciplinary investigation. Near the end of the thesis, we present an interdisciplinary second law curricular thread that leverages the resources our students have for crossing disciplinary boundaries in this context. Our hope is that other instructors will be convinced to embrace a more interdisciplinary treatment of the second law. The context of our study is NEXUS/Physics, a novel introductory physics course for life science students. We unpack the resources that NEXUS/Physics students have for thinking about entropy and spontaneity. We argue that an approach to the second law that emphasizes the interplay of energy and entropy in determining spontaneity (one that involves a central role for free energy) is one that draws on students' resources from biology and chemistry in particularly effective ways. We identify three ways in which students in NEXUS/Physics have meaningfully crossed disciplinary boundaries in the context of the second law: (1) by unpacking biochemical heuristics in terms of underlying physical interactions, (2) by locating both biochemical and physical concepts within a mathematical bridging expression, and (3) by coordinating functional and mechanistic explanations for the same biological phenomenon. These classes form a basis that spans the space of interdisciplinary connections that we have observed. In moments when interdisciplinary gaps are bridged, our students sometimes exhibit positive affect. We look at the source of this affect and how it interacts with disciplinary identity and epistemology. In doing so, we hope to suggest ways of inviting life science students to participate in physics and to see physics as a central tool for making sense of the biological world.Item More than just "plug-and-chug": Exploring how physics students make sense with equations(2013) Kuo, Eric; Gupta, Ayush; Elby, Andrew; Physics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Although a large part the Physics Education Research (PER) literature investigates students' conceptual understanding in physics, these investigations focus on qualitative, conceptual reasoning. Even in modeling expert problem solving, attention to conceptual understanding means a focus on initial qualitative analysis of the problem; the equations are typically conceived of as tools for "plug-and-chug" calculations. In this dissertation, I explore the ways that undergraduate physics students make conceptual sense of physics equations and the factors that support this type of reasoning through three separate studies. In the first study, I investigate how students' can understand physics equations intuitively through use of a particular class of cognitive elements, symbolic forms (Sherin, 2001). Additionally, I show how students leverage this intuitive, conceptual meaning of equations in problem solving. By doing so, these students avoid algorithmic manipulations, instead using a heuristic approach that leverages the equation in a conceptual argument. The second study asks the question why some students use symbolic forms and others don't. Although it is possible that students simply lack the knowledge required, I argue that this is not the only explanation. Rather, symbolic forms use is connected to particular epistemological stances, in-the-moment views on what kinds of knowledge and reasoning are appropriate in physics. Specifically, stances that value coherence between formal, mathematical knowledge and intuitive, conceptual knowledge are likely to support symbolic forms use. Through the case study of one student, I argue that both reasoning with equations and epistemological stances are dynamic, and that shifts in epistemological stance can produce shifts in whether symbolic forms are used to reason with equations. The third study expands the focus to what influences how students reason with equations across disciplinary problem contexts. In seeking to understand differences in how the same student reasons on two similar problems in calculus and physics, I show two factors, beyond the content or structure of the problems, that can help explain why reasoning on these two problems would be so different. This contributes to an understanding of what can support or impede transfer of content knowledge across disciplinary boundaries.