International Journal of Physics and Chemistry Education
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Development and Application of the Democratic Chemistry Classroom Environment Inventory (DCEI) in Iranian Universities
Get PDFThis article reports the development and application of the Democratic Chemistry Classroom Environment Inventory (DCEI) which assesses students’ perceptions of six dimensions of their actual and preferred classroom environment: Equality, Important knowledge, Participatory decision-making, Inclusiveness, Rights and Authority. The DCEI was field tested with a sample of 510 Iranian first and second year undergraduate students in 23 chemistry classes. Various analyses attested to each scale’s reliability, factorial validity, and ability to differentiate between the perceptions of students in different classes. The data from this instrument is equally valid in its actual and preferred versions. In addition, comparison of Iranian university students’ scores on actual and preferred forms of the questionnaire revealed that students, within a democratic education framework, were not satisfied and preferred a more positive chemistry environment on all scales. The work is unique because it is the first classroom environment study which is concerned about democratic education ideas in chemistry classrooms and provides one of the few classroom environment studies conducted in Iran
Considerations about the Presence of Nature of Science in Official Educational Documents: A Very Brief Comparison between DCN (Brazil) and NGSS (USA)
Get PDF.Nowadays the importance of History, Philosophy and Sociology of Science (HPSS) for science education is a consensus in the research area. After several years, it was built what is called today Consensus Vision of Nature of Science (CVNOS), based mostly in the works of Lederman and collaborators (2007) and also McComas (1998), among others. The CVNOS, or the “Lederman`s seven” as it is know (Matthews, 2012), was an important achievement in the area, however, only after some few years its contributions came up explicitly or effectively inside official educational documents worldwide. Nevertheless, when it became a new fashion, heated debates arose about the philosophical foundations of the CVNOS. And it paved the way for several critics (not only philosophical) over the so-called "Lederman's Seven." In this work we examined some of CVNOS impacts in the discourse of two official educational documents: the Diretrizes Curriculares Nacionais (DCN, or National Curriculum Guidelines) in Brazil (Brasil, 2013) and the Next Generation Science Education Standards in the United States (NGSS, 2013). We point out to the similarities and differences on the NOS approach in both documents, discussing its failures and achievements
Physic and Mathematics models in a co-disciplinary Study and Research Paths (SRPs) in the pre-service teacher education
No full textWe present results of an implementation of Study and Research Path (SRP) carried out into a pre- service mathematics teacher-training course at University level. A co-disciplinary SRP from the generating question Q0: Why did the Movediza stone in Tandil fall? Requires developing both physical and mathematical models to build a possible answer to this question. Some conclusions concerning on the restrictions and relevance of introducing the SRP in pre-service teachers training courses related to modeling activity at university are presented
Analysis of an Inquiry-based Electricity Laboratory for Undergraduate Students
Get PDFIt is well known in Physics Education literature that, even after attending to Introductory Physics courses (lectures and laboratory), students still have some difficulties with direct current electric circuits’ concepts. Since 2006, we are investigating the conceptual understanding of electric circuits in Brazilian college students. We observed that only ~13% of students answered correctly a question about the brightness of bulbs in simple circuits (series and parallel). This observation motivated us to adopt new laboratory guide with active learning strategies. The activities were adapted from Tutorials in Introductory Physics. We have been observing a significant gain of students learning using the mentioned question as pre and post-tests. More recently (since 2013) we have been applying the DIRECT which consists of 28 multiple choice questions on electric circuits. This test helps to identify specific difficulties which remain after instruction. In 2016, some groups of students were recorded in audio and video in order to investigate their interaction and learning process during the class. The student’s majority evaluated positively the active learning strategies used in the course, mentioning that they contribute to their learning (~78%)
A Review of Time Economic Innovative Mnemonics in Chemical Education
Get PDFIn this review article, formulae based mnemonics on chemical education have been highlighted by innovative and time economic way to enhance the interest of students' who belong to paranoia zone of chemistry. Here, I have tried to hub fifteen (15) time economic mnemonics by including thirty-six (36) formulae in the field of chemical education. This article encourages students to solve multiple choice type questions (MCQs) at different competitive examinations in time economic ground
Turkish Adaptation of the Views of Nature of Science-Form C: Validity and Reliability Study
Get PDFThe aim of this study is to adapt the nature of science questionnaire C form to Turkish in a valid and reliable manner. The questionnaire was developed by Abd-El Khalick (1998) and further amendments on the questionnaire were made by Lederman, Abd-El-Khalick, Bell, and Schwartz (2002). The process of adaptation of the questionnaire was carried out in five steps. These are: translating from English to Turkish, back translation from Turkish into English, the implementation of both Turkish and English versions with preservice science teachers, carrying out the pilot research and then the actual research. The items 1 and 4, 6, 7, and 8 after validity and reliability study were revisited and each question was separated into two and indicated as a and b (e.g. 1-a and 1-b). The questionnaire is frequently used in the nature of science research and it was previously adapted to German, Portuguese, Thai, Swedish, Vietnamese and Korean. It is hoped that the Turkish adaptation will contribute to the studies in nature of science in Turkey
Teachers’ perception of their initial preparation in teaching senior high school physics
Get PDFThis study investigated New Zealand (NZ) physics teachers’ and physics educators’ views about their Initial Teacher Education (ITE). Specifically, the study explored how well the ITE prepared physics teachers for classroom practice and to become effective teachers. The study employed mixed methods to answer the questions that were formulated to guide the study. The perspectives of the physics teacher educators and physics teachers nationally indicated that the teachers considered themselves not well-prepared in some content areas including electronics, modern physics, and atomic and nuclear physics. A significant difference in perspective also existed between teachers who were educated in NZ and those gaining initial teaching qualifications from overseas. The findings from the study suggested that the non-education degree which provided the teachers most of their content knowledge was perhaps inadequate for a teaching career. The implications for ITE of physics teachers are discussed in the paper
Students' Interpretations of Quantum Mechanics Concepts from Feynman's Sum of all Paths Applied to Light
Get PDFWe analyse part of the implementation of a didactic sequence to teach different aspects of light in a unified non traditional framework. The goal was to propose the quantum theory of light as a universal framework to describe different phenomena observed. The laws of quantum mechanics for light using Feynman´s “Sum of all Paths” approach adapted to the mathematical level of the students was proposed as a model to explain the experiences. This particular denomination of Feynman´s approach is an intentional choice to avoid the language of "integral" because the students haven't had calculus. Graphic representations and basic operations with vectors capturing the essential aspects of the theory, were used. Simulations made with the software GeoGebra(R) and Modellus were created to help students visualize the formulation. The sequence was carried out in four courses (aged 15-16). For the data analysis, an answer categorization was formulated, considering among other aspects the quantum reformulation of experiment shown herein. This analysis seeks to understand the student´s conceptualization process about quantum interpretation. The results support the conclusion that the conceptualization is complex, and slow, due to both the concepts involved and the representation systems demanded by the situations
Investigating First Year University Physics Students’ Ability to Integrate Algebraic and Kinematics Graphs
Get PDFAn important tool in the teaching and learning or study of physics is regarded as Mathematics, i.e., it will not be easy to study Physics without the basic knowledge and skills in Mathematics. Mathematics as a “language of science”, and is an expected requirement for students to study physics (Redish, 2005). He furthers argues that physicists blend conceptual physics with mathematical skills and use them to solve and interpret equations and graphs. For instance, in kinematics, different aspects from mathematics such as knowledge of functions and the solving of equations are combined with physics concepts. Many introductory physics students perform poorly on the use of mathematical skills and interpretations of graphs in physics. Two possible reasons may be as follows: i. Students lack the necessary mathematical skills needed to solve the physics problems. ii. Students do not know how to apply and relate their mathematical skills in the context of physics. These two possible reasons were investigated in a Masters Research project which probed first year university students’ interpretations of graphs in kinematics and in mathematics. This paper used the idea of Beichner’s standardized questionnaire on kinematic graphs. From this questionnaire, an equivalent questionnaire was devised in the context of Mathematical equations and graphs. The results of the investigation tend to indicate the deficiencies in the students’ mathematical conceptual knowledge as well as in the transfer of mathematical skills that they possess to solve kinematic equations and graphs. New teaching approaches in the introductory physics, a pre-requite for all STEM studies were thus recommended to enhance student performance in this subject
Writing in Physics Classes in High School: Possibilities
Get PDFThis work explores the potentiality of writing in Physics classes by means of a didactic proposal developed in High School in Brazil, which consisted of inserting writing as a means of establishing relations of sense. It were adopted elements from Vygotsky theories (1978; 1986), assuming the importance of written language in learning process and the need for intrinsic motivation for learning; and Bakhtin theories (1986), defending language as essentially dialogical.The proposal consisted of reading texts about the history of Electromagnetism, followed by questions, and writing a letter to a scientist. Interviews were conducted with some students to understand the sense they attributed to the activity. The analysis permitted to argue in favor of writing potentiality in the learning and development processes. This experience indicates relevant discussions in favor of adopting writing activities as part of Physics teaching and learning processes