We study student understanding of the direction of the magnetic force experienced by a charged particle moving through a homogeneous magnetic field in both the magnetic pole and field line representations of the magnetic field. In five studies, we administer a series of simple questions in either written or interview format. Our results indicate that although students begin at the same low leve...

Although there has been much research on how to help students learn physics, students still come away without a deep understanding of how physics has transformed the world around them and almost all leave with decreased expectations and a more negative attitude toward physics. We discuss an experiment to address this problem: a course weblog which discusses real-world applications of physics an...

Distance education (DE) – the method of teaching and learning in which there is a quasi-permanent separation between students and their teachers – is playing an increasingly important role in the higher education provision of many countries. This article considers in turn the motivations for teaching at a distance, the nature of distance education, the particular challenges of teaching physics ...

© 2005 American Institute of Physics, S-0031-9228-0511-020-5 T science community needs to change science education to make it effective and relevant for a much larger fraction of the student population than in the past. This need is the result of significant changes in the environment and society over the past several decades. First, society now faces critical global-scale issues that are funda...

We discuss our implementation of targeted pre-reading assignments with an associated online quiz in two science classes, one physics and one biology. Our goal was to create a pre-class assignment that helped students recognize the benefits of reading before class. Students were asked to take part in a survey about how and why they completed the pre-reading assignments. We found that 80% of stud...

Physics education researchers have compiled substantial evidence that student course outcomes can be improved if physics instructors incorporate research-based instructional strategies into their teaching. Some instructors find this evidence convincing and attempt to change their instruction. Some of these instructors are successful and some are not. This paper presents the results of a case st...

This section of AJP includes physics education research ~PER! articles. It continues the editorial process that begun with the green PER Supplementary Issues to AJP published in July of 1999–2001. The PER section ~PERS! is a response to the tension between the long-standing policy of AJP not to publish research articles and the growing interest within the AAPT community in PER. Articles in the ...