Women’s responses to an activity-based introductory physics program

Abstract

It has been said that women ought to like science courses that are hands-on, collaborative, and afford a high degree of personal attention. In this article we examine this assumption by considering some women’s responses to Workshop Physics—a calculus-based introductory course sequence in which lectures are abandoned in favor of activity-based collaborative work enhanced by the use of integrated computer tools. Early in the development of the Workshop curriculum an attitude survey revealed that pre-medical junior and senior women were more negative about their experience than either their male counterparts or freshmen and sophomore students. We explored reasons for this phenomenon by interviewing a group of women who had enrolled in Workshop Physics courses.