Adapting to a Changing World Challenges and Opportunities in Undergraduate Physics Education (2013) / Chapter Skim
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1 Introduction: Physics Is Amazing and Practical and Must Be Taught Better
1 Introduction: Physics Is Amazing and Practical and Must Be Taught Better
Pages 8-22
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From page 8... ...
. Since then, GDP per person has increased 20-fold in the United States and other "first world" countries where circumstances allowed innovators to apply knowledge originating in various subfields of physics to societal problems.
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From page 9... ...
Addressing these challenges requires that the physics community take a close look at the issues related to undergraduate physics education and pursue paths that can lead to improved student understanding of physics, reasoning skills, and attitudes toward physics. As shown in this report, recent developments in physics education research, computer-based instruction, and social networking can guide undergraduate physics education to more positive outcomes.
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From page 10... ...
As emphasized earlier, the former are of foundational importance across all of science and engineering, while the latter are non-routine skills of critical importance in our constantly changing modern society. In STEM fields especially, these developments are forcing faculty to rethink their roles as teachers and researchers.
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From page 11... ...
The need for the physics community to engage the many challenges facing undergraduate physics education and to solve them using a research-based approach that generates sustainable improvement is the driving force for this report. Technology -- Engine of Change Disruptive applications of technology to education offer both enhancements and challenges to traditional ways of teaching, especially by offering novel learning experiences that are inexpensive and scalable.
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From page 12... ...
The deterioration of U.S. investment in undergraduate STEM education and the resultant anticipated damage to the national economy have been well docu mented in other studies, such as Rising Above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future (NAS-NAE-IOM, 2007)
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From page 13... ...
The risk inherent in the economic pressures of declining state resources was illustrated by policy changes in Texas in the Fall of 2011. The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board decided to close physics programs with fewer than 25 majors graduating in the past 5 years (Matthews, 2011; Luzer, 2011)
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From page 14... ...
These students include both future hysics majors p and those who will enroll in a physics course while they concentrate in other fields. Changing the Educational Paradigm Traditional undergraduate physics education, as practiced in much of the 20th century, centered on teaching facts and procedures using the lecture-recitation-lab oratory format to a student body largely made up of white males.
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In particular, physics education researchers -- an inter disciplinary community centered predominantly in departments of physics -- have been engaged in complementary efforts to understand how students learn physics and how to use that knowledge to improve physics teaching and learning. Much of this knowledge has been translated into practices with demonstrated improvements in student learning.
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From page 16... ...
Other physics education researchers have focused on wholesale course redesign, creating uni fied in-class activities where students work together to make sense of concepts, problems, and experimental phenomena rather than maintaining the traditional separation of lecture, recitation, and laboratories. These new tools and courses, some of which are described in Chapters 2 and 3, have been evaluated and refined through extensive research in a large number of undergraduate classes.
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From page 17... ...
c. Economic realities are pressing undergraduate physics education (and all of higher education)
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From page 18... ...
Students learn little about current discoveries and research, which they might find exciting or relevant to their lives. This theme is discussed primarily in Chapter 2, which looks at the present landscape of undergraduate physics education and issues that have been raised by the changing content of physics, the nature of 21st-century students, and the skills needed by those students for addressing modern societal issues.
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From page 19... ...
These points are elaborated in Chapter 3. Scientific Approach to Physics Education Future improvement of undergraduate physics education depends critically on a vigorous physics education research enterprise and effective application of its findings.
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Thus, this report strongly encourages faculty, departments, administrators, funding agencies, and professional societies to take a scientific approach to our own practice and to inform themselves of the research and development that can help the physics community make measurable and desirable improvements in undergraduate physics education.
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From page 21... ...
2011. The economics of education: Closing undergraduate physics programs.
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From page 22... ...
1992. Studying students studying calculus: A look at the lives of minority mathematics students in college (the Mary P
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