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With the support of a PhysTEC Recruitment Grant, Bridgewater State University (BSU) is working with two of our feeder community colleges to provide Get the Facts Out (GFO) and early teaching experiences. Due to the pandemic our community college partners are 100% online and asynchronous. The asynchronous aspect makes it very difficult to reach the students, so we re-invent how to present GFO to the introductory physics classes. Our solution was to develop video homework problems that embedded parts of our GFO presentation. BSU’s TIR Allison Daubert developed the videos which feature students in the BSU’s Physics Education Group. The video homework problems are in a central youtube channel allowing for easy assignment by the community college professors. The community college professors assign the video homework as a graded part of the course assuring all the students view the videos.

AAPT SM 21

Video Solution to GFO for Asynchronous Community Colleges Courses

video homework

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technical paper

After instruction, many students apply basic physics knowledge correctly to solve problems that require straightforward applications of that knowledge. At the same time, some students struggle to apply the same knowledge in situations that elicit alternative intuitive ideas. To recognize an inconsistency between such intuitive ideas and formal knowledge, a process of conflict detection and override must be initiated. However, for this process to be sustained, students must articulate criteria that must be satisfied to accept or reject an intuitive response. It appears that many students need explicit instruction to help them recognize that the same physics knowledge could be used 1) as a tool for solving a given problem and 2) as a criterion for checking for the validity of intuitive responses. We will describe our efforts to design instruction in an introductory calculus-based Mechanics course that focuses on the second aspect of physics knowledge.

Developing skills for validity checking of intuitively appealing responses

The ability to effectively engage in evidence-based decision-making is an important educational outcome. Over the past decade, we have developed and evaluated a lab curriculum in which all activities are designed around the theory-evidence coordination framework to advance select reasoning skills. For each lab, students address a central research question, and guided activities explicitly emphasize causal and hypothetical reasoning embedded in cycles of inquiry, reflection, evaluation, and communication of outcomes. Due to the pandemic, the labs were redesigned for online synchronous delivery where students worked in groups of four in Zoom breakout rooms. The presentation will showcase the underlying reasoning framework that can be used by others to develop their own materials, discuss how students were still able to collect data and create mathematical models in the online format, and compare learning outcome data for both the online and face-to-face settings. Access to the lab materials will also be provided. 
*Partially supported by the NSF IUSE 1431908


Comparing In-person and Online Physics Labs for Developing Scientific Reasoning

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A Free, OER, PER-based, PER-focused Curriculum for Introductory Physics

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Video Solution to GFO for Asynchronous Community Colleges Courses

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Developing skills for validity checking of intuitively appealing responses

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