Collaborative Research: Undergraduate Students' Epistemology and Expectations of Experimental Physics

Rochester Institute Of Tech, Rochester NY

Investigators

Abstract

Within many disciplines, concerns are frequently raised about how effective laboratory courses are at connecting experimental processes with theoretical concepts, and more generally bridging the gap between the practices of the classroom laboratory and the practices of the professional scientific research and engineering laboratories. Calls to transform laboratory courses are coming from a wide variety of stakeholders, including: the physics education community; the life sciences community; and national science policy-making bodies promoting the retention of STEM majors, the development of the STEM workforce, and updated guidelines for the laboratory curriculum. Recommendations advocate that students should develop habits of mind, experimental strategies, enthusiasm, and confidence in research through improved laboratory courses. Towards these goals this research project will advance understanding of how to support students in developing experimental skills and understanding of the experimental process, through probing students' attitudes and instructors' expectations. Evaluation tools will also be developed to enable instructors to iteratively improve their courses and to give researchers insights into the effects of different course modifications on student learning. To advance understanding of how to support students in developing experimental skills and understanding of the experimental process, the research team will probe students' attitudes and instructors' expectations. The student and instructor data will be gathered utilizing the Colorado Learning Attitudes about Science Survey for Experimental Physics (E-CLASS) survey. An online platform that allows instructors to administer the survey and analyze their data automatically and seamlessly thus adding an automated survey administration and reporting system will be developed. This will allow feedback from users in order that current statements in the survey are evaluated for their usefulness. Responses from users will allow tailoring of the survey to meet the majority of instructors' goals and the report sent to back to instructors will be refined. Information on how instructors are using the data will be ascertained, e.g., how they are using it to reform courses and the details of the interventions attempted. Finally building off the ideas of institutional and instructional change a "A Guide to the E CLASS: Use, Interpretation and Course Modifications" will be developed. Through these means the use of the survey will be increased, a system will be developed to make the administration of the survey more sustainable in the long term, results will be used to help instructors tailor their courses to achieve individual goals, the validity and reliability of the survey will be increased, and progress towards answering several research questions about training students in experimental physics will be made. The project will be evaluated both internally and externally in both a formative and summative manner to ensure project success in making direct progress towards the goals. The project will include an advisory board of key professionals who will provide formative feedback and advising on key decisions. In addition, knowledge gained and the platform developed will be shared with the education research community, as it may be a new model for dissemination of these types of assessment tools. Dissemination will occur via submission of publications to journals that are instructor focused (e.g., AJP, Physics Teacher and Physical Review Special Topics-PER.) Results will also be disseminated through faculty workshops run by AAPT the American Astronomical Society and APS and the Annual Physics Department Chairs conference.