Researchers have reported the funds of knowledge (FK) pedagogical approach effective in engaging minority students in learning. However, there are a lack of studies connecting FK to introductory college physics or physical science classes. By using examples from regional Mexican-American lived experiences at an Hispanic-serving institution located…

The mindset literature is a longstanding area of psychological research focused on beliefs about intelligence, response to challenge, and goals for learning. However, the mindset literature's applicability to the context of college physics has not been widely studied. In this paper we narrow our focus toward students' descriptions of their…

Kinetic energy is usually the entry point for the study of energy in physics and is often perceived as unproblematic. We present evidence, however, that some learners who seem to have accepted the concept, from elementary school students to college physics majors and in-service teachers, nevertheless do not consistently attribute kinetic energy to…

We investigated the intersectional nature of race/racism and gender/sexism in broad scale inequities in physics student learning using a critical quantitative intersectionality. To provide transparency and create a nuanced picture of learning, we problematized the measurement of equity by using two competing operationalizations of equity:…

Semiconductor devices, usually made from silicon wafers, are present in the electronic gadgets that we use on a daily basis. In an introductory physics class, the textbook usually devotes a few pages to these devices and moves on. As a result, students may readily forget the material or fail to see how it relates to their lives. A solution is to…

Gay-Lussac's law states that the pressure of an ideal gas is directly proportional to its absolute temperature if the volume is constant. Students observe this relationship by taking measurements on the pressure of gas in a flask or metal sphere at different temperatures and then extrapolate the data to estimate absolute zero. In our college…

Graphs in physics are central to the analysis of phenomena and to learning about a system's behavior. The ways students handle graphs are frequently researched. Students' misconceptions are highlighted, and methods of improvement suggested. While kinematics graphs are to represent a real motion, they are also algebraic entities that must satisfy…

For the students who have just entered colleges, learning university physics would be a challenge. This paper discusses how to make students who have just finished senior high school physics won't feel difficult in learning university physics and how to guide and cultivate the students' interest in the study of physics so to stimulate the…

Physics instructors recognize the value of kinesthetic experience in learning fundamental physics concepts. We describe a kinesthetic experiment appropriate for both college and high school physics students. The experiment helps students achieve an intuitive understanding of Newton's second law in a way they find quite enjoyable. It was devised by…

I describe an effort to enhance student engagement and classroom inclusion in a sophomore Introduction to Modern Physics class, through the use of assigned student groups, cold-calling, and exposure to the work of female physicists of varied backgrounds. These approaches took minimal effort, appeared to have positive impacts, and had no…

Helping students set up equations is one of the major goals of teaching a course in physics that contains elements of problem solving. Students must take the stories we present, interpret them, and turn them into physics; from there, they must turn that physical, idealized story into mathematics. How they do so and what problems lie along the way…

In a small physics department it can be difficult to develop and maintain an environment that engages students of all levels, and encourages and facilitates student growth in curricular and co-curricular experiences. This difficulty can be amplified when the number of physics majors is small, especially with fewer than 15-20 majors in the program.…

In this project, introductory college physics students (noneducation majors) were asked to teach simple machines to a class of second graders. This nontraditional activity proved to be a successful way to encourage college students to think critically about physics and how it applied to their everyday lives. The noneducation majors benefited by…

Flipped classrooms provide students the opportunity to collaboratively solve challenging problems in class with help and scaffolding available from instructors. Because there are many ways to structure a flipped course, research on the effectiveness of flipping classrooms has produced mixed results. Therefore, it is important for researchers to…

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of strategic problem solving with peer instruction on college students' performance in physics. The students enrolled in 2 sections of a physics course were studied; 1 section was the treatment group and the other section was the comparison group. Students in the treatment group received peer…