Learning Physics Concepts Research Articles

A user experience survey of an augmented reality android application for learning Coulomb’s law

In recent years, the COVID-19 pandemic has necessitated social distancing measures, prompting a greater interest in augmented reality (AR) as a means to facilitate accessible physics experiments for students. Recognizing this, we have recently developed an Android mobile application that harnesses AR technology. The application named CoulombsLawAR allows users to investigate how electrical charges and their distance influence the electrical force between them. The primary objective of our study was to assess students’ experiences while using this AR application. To achieve this, we engaged 156 undergraduate students from the Faculty of Chemical Engineering and Technology from University of Zagreb in the evaluation process. They were requested to utilize our AR application to complete a task specifically designed to enhance their understanding of Coulomb’s law. Subsequently, the participants were given a series of questionnaires, comprising five open-ended questions and 30 close-ended questions. These questionnaires included the System Usability Scale, User Experience, and Handheld Augmented Reality Usability Scale. In-depth analysis of the students’ feedback provided valuable insights. The majority of the participants found the application to be user-friendly, consistent in its performance, self-explanatory, and enjoyable to use. Additionally, students provided constructive feedback regarding potential enhancements that could be made to the application. Overall, the study findings indicate that the AR application we developed was well-received by undergraduate students, highlighting its potential as an effective tool for teaching and learning physics concepts.

Exploring Learning Physics Concepts Through the Local Wisdom of East Kalimantan Culture: Traditional Weapons, Sumpit

Exploring Learning Physics Concepts Through the Local Wisdom of East Kalimantan Culture: Traditional Weapons, Sumpit

The Pattern of Physics Education Students’ Diagrams and Answers in Solving Force Problems

Force diagrams or some say free body diagrams (FBDs), as physics representations, are usually employed to teach and learn physics concepts such as force. Physics education studies indicate that the use of FBDs can support or hinder students’ performance in solving physics problems. This study aims to investigate the type of representations drawn by students and the patterns of students’ answers while solving force problems. By involving 230 preservice physics teachers, questions about the application of Newton’s laws were administered to students to elicit the patterns of students’ diagrams and answers. Results were analysed into three categories: complete, incomplete, and inappropriate force diagrams. In addition, some students did not draw diagrams in solving the problems. Based on students’ answers, the percentage of students drawing incomplete diagrams (54% for horizontal problems and 42% for inclined problems) is higher than drawing complete diagrams (18% for horizontal problems and 35% for inclined problems). The percentage of students who drew inappropriate diagrams in solving horizontal and inclined problems is 20% and 10%, respectively. A few students (8% and 13%) did not draw diagrams for both questions. Students who drew complete diagrams tended to obtain the correct final answer. Some students who drew incomplete diagrams were not able to find the correct answers and even finish the problem. However, some students who drew incomplete diagrams could successfully solve the problem. The group of students who drew diagrams in the inappropriate category tended to demonstrate incorrect and unfinished answers. This study suggests that instructors should not only focus on the correctness of the diagrams but also focus on the completeness of diagrams drawn by students while solving the problems.

A Modified Peer Instruction Protocol: Peer vs. Teacher’s Instruction

Peer Instruction (PI) was introduced by Mazur to help students learn physics concepts during lectures. Besides physics, PI has also been adopted in other STEM fields. In this approach [Fig. 1(a)], students answer a related question individually after a concept has been presented. Before they revote on the same question individually, they are asked to convince others that their answer is correct during peer discussion. The percentage of correct answers typically increases after peer discussion. However, Smith et al. highlighted that the improvement may be due to copying, not because students actually learned how to reason correctly. To exclude copying, Smith et al. modified Mazur’s PI protocol by adding a second question Q2 after the students revote on the first question Q1 [Fig. 1(b)]. Q2 is “isomorphic” to Q1, meaning that it requires the application of the same concept, but the “cover story” is different. Here, we simplify Smith et al.’s PI protocol by removing the revote on Q1 [Fig. 1(c)]. Moreover, our Q1 and Q2 are similar, i.e., the same except with some information changed. Our PI protocol is thus the same as Mazur’s, except the pre- and post-discussion questions are not exactly the same. We replace PI in our protocol by teacher’s instruction (TI) to compare the effectiveness of PI with TI for a pair of similar questions involving Lenz’s law, using Hake’s normalized gain and a statistical test.

Effects of Augmented Reality Integration (ARI) based Model Physics Independent Learning (MPIL) for facilitating 21st-century skills (21-CS)

Augmented Reality (AR) based learning provides real experiences for educators and new strategies for presenting physics concepts but also provides opportunities for students to interact interactively, spontaneously, and interestingly. Previous research has shown that AR has many advantages in education, but only a few focus on Independent Learning, such as freedom in problem solving and independent learning skills in physics learning. This study develops an Augmented Reality Integration (ARI) learning application based on the Physics Independent Learning (MPIL) model on the marine physics concept. This application is to explore the influence of ARI on 21st-Century Skills (21-CS) which consists of Critical Thinking, Collaboration, Communication, and Creativity. A Quasi-Experimental Method was used, and 88 students aged 20-22 were randomly assigned to the experimental and control groups. After an intervention for 3 weeks, it was found that integrating ARI technology into physics learning can (1) significantly increase students' Creativity Thinking and Critical Thinking on Marine physics concepts; (2) guiding students to further improve in Communication, and Collaboration in solving problems contained in the ARI application; and (3) stimulate students' learning motivation to be enthusiastic about learning physics concepts.

Remote physics teaching during the Covid-19 pandemic: losses and potential gains

The Covid-19 pandemic forced the world into unknown territories of closed schools and remote teaching, and gave teachers a range of new experiences with physics teaching. We studied these experiences by using survey responses from 85 upper secondary physics teachers in Norway. We found that home-school physics instruction was characterised by a considerably lower occurrence of oral activity, collaboration and practical work than instruction in a normal situation. This suggests that students had difficult conditions for learning physics concepts and training key scientific practices, and may consequently be at a disadvantage in higher education. However, many teachers described valuable experiences that they would bring with them into their regular teaching, including home experiments and oral assessments. Such innovations can potentially enrich physics education, given that teachers are supported with tailored learning and assessment resources, and arenas for sharing new approaches within the physics teaching community.

Internet of Things (IoT) Based Free Fall Motion Instructions in Physics Subjects for Class X Students

Physics subjects are one of the most difficult materials for students to understand. According to the research that has been done, props are one of the answers to make it easier for students to understand physics lessons. Since most physical materials are directly related to everyday life, props serve as a practical medium to facilitate the learning process. Learning physics concepts is easier to understand by using props which we simulate based on real events. One of the materials in physics class is free-fall motion. In this material, when an object falls from a height and has no initial velocity, its falling velocity is calculated. In this study, we apply the Internet of Things (IoT) to the props of free fall material and by adding Ambrose's concepts namely practice and feedback, so that students can better understand the material of free-fall motion. By implementing IoT, the system can read, record, and evaluate the experimental activities performed by users, and users who already have an account can access it online through the website. The system was evaluated based on system functionality and accuracy generated by the system. Based on the test results, it was found that all functions included in the system were 100% working. Based on the three tests performed, the system achieved an average accuracy of 80%.

Audacity Software Analysis In Analyzing The Frequency And Character Of The Sound Spectrum

In the process of learning physics, experiments are needed that can help someone in gaining a deeper understanding of learning physics concepts and using technology in the learning process, especially learning sound waves. In this study, the aim is to be able to analyze the sound frequency with the help of Audacity software. Subjects used are 5 different cat sounds. The implementation of this research uses several tools such as a microphone, Audacity software on a laptop, and 5 cat sounds. This experiment was carried out by bringing the micro hope closer to the cat with 5 cm so that the sound was captured by the microphone which would later be transferred to the laptop and read by the audacity software. Furthermore, the data recorded in audacity were analyzed. From the results of the study, it can be said that a tool that can be used in practicum and can read and capture sound waves is effectively used in analyzing sound frequency, spectrum in the application of sound learning so that it can be used as one of the learning media in practicum on sound wave material at Junior high school.

Evaluation of educational applications in natural sciences

In this paper, a variety of mobile, tablet or desktop educational applications designed to teach physics concepts to 3- to 5-year-old preschoolers are presented and evaluated. The primary purpose was to investigate these applications' effect on kindergarten children and their interest in effectively learning physics concepts. The REVEAC application evaluation tool was used to evaluate the applications, which evaluates the educational content, design, functionality and technical characteristics of the application.

Publications related to virtual laboratories during the covid 19 pandemic: A bibliometric review and analysis

During the COVID-19 pandemic, virtual laboratories are instrumental in learning physics concepts. A virtual laboratory is one media that can be used as a solution to carry out concept discovery activities through simulation using computer software. This article was created to explain the trend of publications related to virtual laboratories during the COVID-19 pandemic for 2020-2021 through bibliometric analysis of the literature. The papers analyzed were obtained using the Publish or Perish (PoP) software on the Google Scholar database. The following publication trend expresses in the form of graphic visualization, which is analyzed using VOSviewer software. Overall, articles with the keyword virtual laboratory published in the late 2020-2021 period focus on its relationship with Covid 19 and evaluation. This focus of research shows that during the past year, the focus of research is how to evaluate learning through virtual laboratories.

Sequential patterns of students’ drawing in constructing scientific explanations: focusing on the interplay among three levels of pictorial representation

ABSTRACTThe purpose of this study is to investigate the process of students’ construction of scientific explanations through drawing explanatory diagrams. For this, we observed fifth and sixth graders’ drawing processes in a gifted science class involving learning physics concepts in mechanics. The analysis was carried out on three pictorial representational levels: sensory (e.g. observed materials), unseen substance (e.g. molecules) and unseen non-substance (e.g. forces). We found that there were five patterns of interplay depending on the sequential path through the pictorial representational levels. All students began drawing explanatory diagrams from the sensory level as the first step and then constructed explanations using the unseen levels based on the interplay among different levels. In the process of forming meaningful relationships among the three levels of representation, students focused on a specific phenomenon through drawing at a sensory level and extended their making sense of the phenomenon from what happened to why it happened. Based on these findings, we suggest how teachers can use the interplay among the different pictorial representational levels to guide students in generating scientific explanations through drawing.

Light Intensity Analysis Using Smartphone’s Light Sensor

Light is a form of electromagnetic energy radiation emitted in the visible part of the spectrum. This study was aimed to analyze the intensity of dynamic train light that moves constantly on a linear track using a smartphone light sensor. The method used in this research was the experimental method. The light sensor application used is available freely in the Physics Toolbox Suite on the smartphone. Experimental equipment was built using linear tracks, dynamic trains, flash light and lamp. Light sensor output produces luminosity (Ev) value versus time (s). The experimental results show that the light intensity at 3 volts with a distance of 5, 10, and 15 cm are 100, 250 and 300 cd, respectively. Whereas the intensity of light at 4.5 volts, the intensity of the light at distances of 5, 10, and 20 cm are 800 cd, 950 cd and 1200 cd, respectively. It is expected that the use of smartphones can increase students’ interest in learning physics concepts.

Developing a thirst for knowledge: How uncertainty in the classroom influences curiosity, affect, learning, and transfer

Uncertainty is a key variable in fostering curiosity, which, in turn, is associated with learning. Yet, research in educational contexts rarely takes uncertainty into account, and rarely explores uncertainty and curiosity in the context of complex instructional activities. One concern with uncertainty is that it can provoke negative affect. Providing learners with expectations of future uncertainty may attenuate their feelings of negative affect. In a study with 138 middle school students learning physics concepts, we examined the relationship between uncertainty, curiosity, learning, transfer, and affect. Some students were given an inherently uncertain form of instruction, called Invention, in which information on how to solve the problem was initially withheld, while others were given direct instruction with all the necessary information to solve similar problems beforehand (No Uncertainty condition). Some of the students receiving uncertain instruction were given expectations about feeling uncertain (Expected Uncertainty condition), and some were not (Unexpected Uncertainty condition). Students in the unexpected uncertainty condition were the most curious, while students in the no uncertainty condition were the least curious. However, giving expectations of uncertainty reduced students’ negative affect. All groups learned the content equally well, but the expected and unexpected uncertainty groups exhibited greater transfer. Further, positive affect predicted learning, above and beyond condition, and curiosity predicted transfer, but not above and beyond condition. This study extends existing research on uncertainty and curiosity by studying these constructs in real classrooms, in the context of an exploratory learning paradigm, and by considering curiosity’s effect on transfer, rather than just learning. This work also demonstrates a practical approach for educators to foster students’ curiosity and transfer.

Comparison of Simulation and Hands-on Labs in Helping High School Students Learn Physics Concepts

The purpose of the research was to determine whether PhET simulation labs or hands-on labs were more effective in helping students learn physics concepts. This measure was done by comparing quiz scores using recall, calculation, and transfer questions. Additionally, student perceptions of learning from both hands-on and simulation lab experiences were measured. Six labs were conducted with high school physics students on the topics of momentum, energy, circuits, angular momentum, pendulums, and friction. It was found that PhET simulation labs were as effective at creating student understanding, and sometimes more effective, as measured by quizzes given after the labs. Additionally, the survey data revealed that students were more engaged by hands-on lab experiences, and viewed the hands-on labs to be more effective than the simulation labs.

SIKAP MAHASISWA CALON GURU TERHADAP REPRESENTASI FISIKA

Abstract Physics concepts can be represented in multiple ways such as verbal, diagrams, graphs, mathematical equations etc. Most previous research focused on drawing and utilizing representations to help students learn physics concepts. This study aims to investigate students’ views toward physics representations while solving physics problems by involving preservice physics teachers of two universities in Kalimantan Barat. A physics representation survey was developed to measure students’ perception about physics representations. The results show that the majority of the students (above 75%) agree that representations are beneficial for them to understand physics problems and physics concepts and also to find out the best solution of a problem. Some of the students say that they remain provide representations while solving a problem even though there is no extra credit given by instructors. Some of the students feel that they face impediment to grasp representations provided in some physcis text book.Keywords: physics representations, views

Utilising Investigative Science Learning Environment (ISLE) based STEM module for enhancing students’ understanding of Physics concepts

The Investigative Science Learning Environment (ISLE) is an approach that encourages students to be active, creative and innovative in learning Science including Physics. The ISLE based STEM method helps students in solving real-life problems and involving collaborative group activities. Many students assume that learning Physics is difficult but with the ISLE-based STEM approach, the students will learn Physics theories and concepts with ease and fun. This is in line with the Indonesian government program to enhance the students’ literacy and capacity in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) among high schools and undergraduate students in Indonesia, This study has utilised the ISLE based STEM module and approach for teaching Physics concepts to the high school students at four selected senior high schools in Banda Aceh, the capital city of Aceh province, Indonesia. The results of the study were encouraging and it would leverage and enrich the current state of knowledge related to the learning Physics and Science concepts.

Light Emitting Diode (LED) as an essential prop component for STEM education in the 21st century: A focus for secondary school level

Indonesian secondary science curriculum is often late to keep up with the rapid development of technology. For instance, the widely-used LED (Light Emitting Diode) technology is not familiar as props in secondary science instructions in Indonesia. This study aims to: (1) provide professional development for teachers in developing experiments using LEDs for learning physics concepts, and (2) increase teachers’ beliefs on their knowledge on using LEDs for physics experiments. The professional development only used a single group pre- and post-test research design in the form of a two-day workshop attended by 20 science teachers from secondary level schools in the city of Banda Aceh. The workshop used Investigative Science Learning Environment (ISLE)-STEM approach, an inquiry-based physics learning that incorporate STEM education approach in active learning and collaboration. The workshop used LEDs as experimental props. From the qualitative analysis of the pre- and postquestionnaires’ responses, we found that there are positive improvements on participants’ understanding of ISLE-based STEM approach and of the use of LEDs as props. From the questionnaire administered after the workshop, we found that most of the teachers were excited about the training using LED as props and 89.4% of them feel that their knowledge increased.

This is your brain on physics

Functional MRI reveals how the human brain repurposes itself to learn abstract physics concepts.

Adding and subtracting vectors: The problem with the arrow representation

k) in generic mathematical and physics contexts. First, we replicated a number of previous findings of student difficulties in the arrow format and discovered several additional difficulties, including the finding that different relative arrow orientations can prompt different solution paths and different kinds of mistakes, which suggests that students need to practice with a variety of relative orientations. Most importantly, we found that average performance in the ijk format was typically excellent and often much better than performance in the arrow format in either the generic or physics contexts. Further, while we find that the arrow format tends to prompt students to a more physically intuitive solution path, we also find that, when prompted, student solutions in the ijk format also display significant physical insights into the problem. We also find a hierarchy in correct answering between the two formats, with correct answering in the ijk format being more fundamental than for the arrow format. Overall, the results suggest that many student difficulties with these simple vector problems lie with the arrow representation itself. For instruction, these results imply that introducing the ijk notation (or some equivalent) with the arrow notation concurrently may be a very useful way to improve student performance as well as help students to learn physics concepts involving vector addition and subtraction.

ROBOTICS AS A TOOL TO STEM LEARNING

Much has been written on the shortfalls in fully realizing the benefits of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education. STEM is important, because it pervades every aspect of our lives. Nevertheless, STEM education is considered as hard, dull, and without emotional meaning. This article examines how the use of robotics in education benefits STEM learning and how teachers can get started with a robotics program in schools. In this study, students develop their building and programming skills teamwork, and presentation skills, as well as touch on STEM subjects school students using the LEGO NXT Mindstorm programmable reconfigurable robot, to observe and learn abstract physics concepts and to perform different designed activities. Students work in teams toward the common goal of developing logical and creative solutions to problems. The results of the study indicated that there was a statistically significant difference in overall perceptions of assessments in STEM Semantics Perception Data, STEM Career Interest Scales and in the interview sessions. It is hoped that this program may set the stage for the transformation of the Malaysian education system which aspires to ensure that every student in every school in every state achieves their full potential, as stated in the Malaysia Education Blueprint 2013-2025.