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July 26–30, 2014
Tuesday afternoon
PST2C43: 5-5:45 p.m. Impact Video Tracker in the Teaching of
Physics for Engineers
Poster – Oscar Jardey, OJS Suarez Fundación Universidad Autónoma de
Colombia, Calle 13 No 4 - 21 Bogotá, AA 11001 Colombia; sistemas29@
hotmail.com
This poster aims to socialize a classroom experience and its impact on
the teaching of translational kinematics in the first courses of physics for
engineers. The experience is based on an epistemological approach of the
experiment in engineering education, supported by didactic sequences
as a set of activities with defined intentions. Methodologically based on
an experiment, traditionally a block sliding down an inclined plane (air
table), focus in comparing the results recorded by a PASCO sensor, manual
records, and records of video tracker, information is processed in the
spreadsheet with the above is written and exposes an article. The “learning
achievement” is measured and compared in two student groups—one
control and other experimental. The results show significant differences in
the writing, speaking, and conceptual organization.
PST2C44: 5:45-6:30 p.m. Exploring the Gender Gap in an
Algebra-based Physics Course
Poster – Twanelle W. Majors,* Tennessee Technological University,
Cookeville, TN 38505-0001;
Paula V. Engelhardt, Tennessee Technological University
The differences in performance of males and females in physics have been
well documented. While evaluating the effectiveness of the Learner-cen-
tered Environment for Algebra-based Physics curriculum (LEAP), results
on the Force Concept Inventory for the first semester course showed
that females in LEAP sections perform the same as males in traditional
sections, which suggests that the LEAP curriculum might be effective
in reducing the performance gap between males and females. To better
understand whether this result is due to pedagogical or assessment choices,
students in the LEAP and traditional course sections were given the
Gender FCI developed by Laura McCullough which replaces the school/
male-oriented contexts with real-life/female-oriented contexts. Propensity
scoring was used to strengthen the findings as confounding variables can
have a significant effect on estimating the effect of the curriculum. The
results from this work will be presented in this poster.
*Sponsored by Paula V. Engelhardt
D – Outreach and Informal Physics
PST2D01: 5-5:45 p.m. Impact of Informal Physics Activities on
Student Interest in STEM
Poster – Michele McColgan, Siena College, School of Science, Loudonville,
NY 12211;
Albert Andrade, Siena College
The Siena Saturday Seminars for Urban Scholars After-school Program
provides opportunities for underserved urban youth to engage in a wide
range of informal, yet authentic, real-world science, technology, engineer-
ing, art, and math projects. This poster will present the results of several
surveys given to students to determine student interest in science generally
and in physics topics specifically after participating in Siena’s urban schol-
ars 14-week program.
PST2D02: 5:45-6:30 p.m. The Analysis of Pupils’ Activities in
Children’s Science Museum with an Aspect of
Stimulating, Finding, and Fostering their Talents
Poster – Seo Bin Park, Seoul National University of Education, jungrang-gu
shinnae2-dong keumkang livingstel 407 Seoul, 0 131-872;
The importance of a science museum keeps increasing as an institute of
informal science education. We have focused the role of the children’s
science museum to help pupils learn science without verbal, logical, and
mathematical approach. We believe that the museum can stimulate, find,
and foster the various talents with which children are born. With that
background, we observed the children’s activities to match the exhibits and
talents they stimulate. As a consequence of the research, we are to suggest
This poster will present the results of student interviews and student
reflections from several project-based learning (PBL) courses at Creighton,
including an upper-division quantum mechanics course and a freshman-
level integrated calculus and physics course. The PBL courses will be
described and common themes will be presented and discussed, such as
motivation, changes in students’ epistemologies, and teaming issues. Stu-
dent suggestions for more successful implementations of PBL pedagogies
will also be discussed.
PST2C40: 5:45-6:30 p.m. Measuring the Effectiveness of
Collaborative Group Exams
Poster – Joss Ives, 6224 Agricultural Road, Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z1,
Canada;
I will report on the results of a study designed to measure the effectiveness
of an instructional strategy known as 2-stage exams or collaborative group
exams. This exam format first has the students take the exam individually.
Once all the students have handed in their individual exams, they organize
into collaborative groups of three or four and take the same exam again
with only a single copy of the exam being given to each group. Different
versions of the group exam featured different subsets of the questions from
the individual exam. Questions isomorphic to the exam questions will be
administered on the end-of-course diagnostic and comparisons, using the
relevant isomorphic question, will be made between the students that saw a
given question on the group exam and those that did not.
PST2C41: 5-5:45 p.m. Implementing Elaborative Interrogation in
an Introductory Physics Course
Poster– Robert C. Zisk, Rutgers University, 10 Seminary Pl., New Brunswick,
NJ 08901-1281;
Eugenia Etkina, Rutgers University
Elaborative Interrogation, a comprehension strategy that asks students to
read a passage from the text and respond to the prompt “Why is this true?”
for a sentence from the passage, was employed in an introductory college
physics course. In this poster, initial results with regard to student accuracy
and depth of reasoning are reported, and the effect of sentence type on stu-
dent responses is detailed. A reading survey was also conducted to address
students’ reading habits during the course. Results from the reading survey
indicate that students read more when asked to complete the interrogation
questions as compared to when they are just asked to read the text.
PST2C42: 5:45-6:30 p.m. Facilitating Students’ Transfer of
Learning Through Integration of Interdisciplinary
Contexts
Poster – Bijaya Aryal, University of Minnesota-Rochester, 300 University
Square, Rochester, MN 55904;
Robert L. Dunbar, Rajeev S. Muthyala, Starr K. Sage, University of Minneso-
ta-Rochester
We designed a module-based learning cycle for an introductory-level
physics course integrating interdisciplinary contexts. A multi-disciplinary
group of faculty contributed to the development of various teaching activi-
ties involving multiple contexts. Students were expected to learn physics
concepts and skills, and then apply the learning in various interdisciplinary
contexts in the last stage of the learning cycle. We define such applica-
tion of concepts and skills across contexts as transfer of learning. In this
presentation we report on the design, implementation and assessment of
students’ learning of physics in the learning environment. We also describe
the extent and nature of students’ ability to transfer physics in various
contexts. Moreover, we present the impact of presentation of interdisciplin-
ary contexts by instructors of different disciplines on transfer tasks and we
provide results of our comparative study on students’ spontaneous transfer
of physics learning to contexts involving science courses and non-science
courses.
