Maryland Physics Expectations Survey Research Articles

Examination of undergraduate students’ physics expectations

A body of beliefs based on previous knowledge, attitudes, and experiences creates physics expectations of students about what they will learn and which skills they will use in physics lessons. Previous research indicated these views about knowledge and learning influenced physics learning by affecting their learning approaches. This research aims to investigate the physics expectations of undergraduate engineering and education students, who take various and different numbers of physics courses in Türkiye. The physics expectations of students were examined due to certain variables and they were compared with experts' ideas. In the study, the Turkish version of the Maryland Physics Expectations Survey II (MPEX II) was given to 831 engineering and education students in different universities. The results indicated the statistical differences in the physics expectations scores according to the department that was registered, the number of physics courses taken, and the reading of popular physics books. However, no significant difference was observed in the physics expectations scores according to gender, being an engineering student or education student, the year of the program, and the instructional approach of physics courses. The mean of the percentages of students who thought like experts in item by item was around 2/5; however, when expert-like thinking was considered for the overall scores, almost 12% of students answered at least half of the items like experts.

A Perspective Interrogation of Students’ Epistemological Beliefs And Anticipations of Studying Physics as an Introductory Course in Computer Science Engineering

Physics is ruminated to be the backbone of every Engineering stream. However, students pursuing computer science Engineering have an altogether different perception of the subject in terms of nature of knowledge and its future implications in their field of study. They are very apprehensive in stipulated learning of the subject as there exists a common belief that algorithm and program designing requires no prior knowledge of Physics or Physics laboratory and it is merely a superfluous subject laden upon them in their introductory year of Engineering. In this present manuscript, efforts are being made to explore their epistemological beliefs and expectations about the subject. In order to explore the anticipations and attitudes in learning Physics by these students, the Maryland Physics Expectation Survey (MPEX Survey) and the Engineering Physics Survey (EP Survey) has been tested for both their rationality and dependability. The EP Survey is specifically designed by the one author (N.H.) to determine the perceptions, beliefs and expectations of Computer Science Engineering students from the subject Engineering Physics. Parametric and non-parametric tests were applied to the clusters. A deep cluster wise analysis of all the items in both the surveys clearly pointed out to the fact that the students who liked Physics at school level have positive responses which are similar to that of experts and are highly motivated in learning the subject. However, the percentage of these students is quite low. Conversely, students who disliked Physics at school level carry the same perception while pursuing Engineering as well and they find no rationale in understanding the importance of this subject. Thus, the role of a school Physics teacher is pivotal in generating interest amongst students for the subject as otherwise the long –term implications at higher levels of study turn out to be very severe.

Ganancia en el aprendizaje del concepto de fuerza y cambio en las actitudes hacia la física en estudiantes de la Escuela Preparatoria de Tonalá

Desde la perspectiva de la educación basada en competencias, en México, el pertenecer al Sistema Nacional de Bachillerato implica la adopción de estrategias orientadas y centradas en las necesidades de los estudiantes. El objetivo de este trabajo fue evaluar la eficacia en el aula de la academia de Física de la Escuela Preparatoria de Tonalá, Jalisco, México, para el logro de actitudes favorables hacia la física y el aprendizaje del concepto de fuerza. Para ello, fue necesario el uso de los factores de concentración y de Hake, con la finalidad de conocer las tendencias en las respuestas y la ganancia en el aprendizaje de conceptos, respectivamente. Los datos fueron obtenidos a partir de la aplicación de dos cuestionarios, la encuesta sobre expectativas hacia la física y la prueba inventario sobre el concepto de fuerza, a alumnos de los cursos de Física I y Mecánica de materiales cerámicos, impartidos en el Bachillerato General por Competencias, durante el primer semestre, y en el Bachillerato Tecnológico en Cerámica, durante el segundo ciclo. El resultado del análisis da información de la baja zona de ganancia en el aprendizaje del concepto de fuerza (G = 0.000 1). El avance en el porcentaje de respuestas favorables hacia la física fue pequeño (1.2 %) en ambos programas de bachillerato, y además hubo una disminución de la pre-prueba a la post-prueba de la actitud favorable en tres grupos. Los patrones de respuesta en la zona aleatoria sugieren que los estudiantes tienen dificultad con el aprendizaje de la física.

Initial study of neutral post-instruction responses on the Maryland Physics Expectation Survey

We may be missing important information by ignoring neutral responses on epistemological surveys such as the Maryland Physics Expectation Survey.

How physics instruction impacts students’ beliefs about learning physics: A meta-analysis of 24 studies

In this meta-analysis, we synthesize the results of 24 studies using the Colorado Learning Attitudes about Science Survey (CLASS) and the Maryland Physics Expectations Survey (MPEX) to answer several questions: (1) How does physics instruction impact students’ beliefs? (2) When do physics majors develop expert-like beliefs? and (3) How do students’ beliefs impact their learning of physics? We report that in typical physics classes, students’ beliefs deteriorate or at best stay the same. There are a few types of interventions, including an explicit focus on model-building and (or) developing expertlike beliefs that lead to significant improvements in beliefs. Further, small courses and those for elementary education and nonscience majors also result in improved beliefs. However, because the available data oversamples certain types of classes, it is unclear whether these improvements are actually due to the interventions, or due to the small class size, or student populations typical of the kinds of classes in which these interventions are most often used. Physics majors tend to enter their undergraduate education with more expertlike beliefs than nonmajors and these beliefs remain relatively stable throughout their undergraduate careers. Thus, typical physics courses appear to be selecting students who already have strong beliefs, rather than supporting students in developing strong beliefs. There is a small correlation between students’ incoming beliefs about physics and their gains on conceptual mechanics surveys. This suggests that students with more expertlike incoming beliefs may learn more in their physics courses, but this finding should be further explored and replicated. Some unanswered questions remain. To answer these questions, we advocate several specific types of future studies: measuring students’ beliefs in courses with a wider range of class sizes, student populations, and teaching methods, especially large classes with very innovative pedagogy and small classes with more typical pedagogy; analysis of the relationship between students’ beliefs and conceptual understanding including a wide variety of variables that might influence each; and analysis of large data sets from a variety of classes that track individual students rather than averaging over classes.Received 21 March 2014DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevSTPER.11.010115This article is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI.Published by the American Physical Society

Changing Students’ Epistemological Beliefs and Understanding of Basic Concepts on Electric Circuits

The encouragement of more mature epistemological beliefs is important to student achievement. This study is about epistemological beliefs of students who are enrolled in introductory electricity, magnetism and waves and their understanding of the basic concepts of electric circuits. The students were divided into two groups – one with orientation and one without orientation. To determine the epistemological beliefs of students, the author utilized the Maryland Physics Expectations Survey instrument or (MPEX). The author also utilized Determining and Interpreting Resistive Electric Circuit Concepts Test (DIRECT) to establish the conceptual understanding of students and their misconceptions. To find out the changes in the epistemological beliefs and understanding of students on basic concepts of electric circuits, the pretest-posttest method was employed in the study. Results showed that the level of understanding among students with orientation was more improved than the group without orientation. While the result showed a decline in students’ over-all epistemological beliefs, slight improvements in some dimensions were seen with different dimensions improved or became worse for the two groups. It further showed that repeatedly giving orientation of experts’ epistemological beliefs helped students develop more mature epistemological beliefs that may lead to better learning outcomes. Keywords: electricity, learning, magnetism, orientation, pretest-posttest

GENDER, PERCEPTION OF LEARNING PHYSICS AND PERFORMANCE IN UNIVERSITY PHYSICS: A CASE STUDY FROM CHINA

In this study, the researcher has developed and validated an instrument focus on perception of learning physics, which builds on Maryland Physics Expectations survey (MPEX). It was administered to first-year university students in a Chinese university during the autumn semester of 2011. It was found that female students preferred physics learning by relating and by analysis, which were positively correlated to better performance in physics. Male students preferred physics learning by rote which was negatively correlated to performance in university physics. So physics learning perception differences based on the gender also exist in China. At the same time, no significant gender difference found on the performance in university physics. The results were similar to the studies in the Western countries and have pedagogical implications for instructors of university physics and potentially for other science courses. Key words: gender, perception of learning, physics education, science education.

Draw Your Physics Homework? Art as a Path to Understanding in Physics Teaching

The persistent fear of physics by learners motivated the author to take action to increase all students’ interest in the subject via a new curriculum for introductory college physics that applies Greene’s model of Aesthetic Education to the study of contemporary physics, utilizing symmetry as the mathematical foundation of physics as well as the conceptual link between physics and the arts. The author describes the curriculum and suggests how students’ drawings and written commentaries can provide insights into students’ preferred learning modalities, promote understanding of abstract concepts through visualization, and reveal students’ preexisting attitudes toward science. Outcomes align with the goals of improving students’ attitudes toward physics, indicated by their comments, written work, and results of the Maryland Physics Expectations Survey.

Students’ Beliefs and Attitudes Toward Learning in the Physics Component of the Lasallian (General Education) Core Curriculum

he Lasallian (General Education) Core Curriculum, im- plemented beginning Academic Year 2006-2007, aims to transform students’ beliefs, attitudes, and emotional reactions by providing opportunities for students to reflect on their learning experiences. This study documented the effect of the physics component of the new curriculum on students’ beliefs and attitudes by comparing the response profile of the freshmen of AY 2008-2009 with the response profile of the freshmen of AY 2005-2006 and AY 2006-2007. Pre- and Post-Course data was generated using the Maryland Physics Expectations Survey (MPEX) to determine students’ “cogni- tive expectations” – the student’s set of attitudes, beliefs, and assumptions about what sorts of things they will learn, what skills will be required, and what they will be expected to do in a physics class. Analysis of the results of the study re- vealed that the students moved towards an expert-like view in the Reality Link dimension and the Effort Link Dimension of the MPEX.

A comparison of problem-based learning and traditional lecture students' expectations and course grades in an introductory physics classroom

The purpose of this study was to compare problem-based learning (PBL) and traditional lecture students’ expectations about physics and physics learning and course grades in an introductory physics classroom. A total of 264 (PBL, n = 100; traditional, n = 164) freshman engineering students of Dokuz Eylul University (DEU) in Izmir, Turkey participated in the study. Student expectations were measured through the pre and post application of the Maryland Physics Expectations Survey (MPEX). Physics achievement data were obtained from students’ end-of-semester physics grades. Data were analyzed using the analyses of variance (ANOVA), the repeated measure and multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) statistics. Results revealed that groups did not differ in their average MPEX scores as a result of one semester of instruction. Significant differences were determined in some components of the MPEX with respect to gender and instruction type. Overall, results of this study suggest that PBL approach has no positive influence on students’ achievement in and expectations about physics and physics learning for this particular group of students. Implications of the results for physics education and further research are discussed. Key words: Expectations, introductory physics, problem-based learning, MPEX.

Modeling instruction: Positive attitudinal shifts in introductory physics measured with CLASS

Among the most surprising findings in Physics Education Research is the lack of positive results on attitudinal measures, such as Colorado Learning Attitudes about Science Survey (CLASS) and Maryland Physics Expectations Survey (MPEX). The uniformity with which physics teaching manages to negatively shift attitudes toward physics learning is striking. Strategies which have been shown to improve conceptual learning, such as interactive engagement and studio-format classes, provide more authentic science experiences for students; yet do not seem to be sufficient to produce positive attitudinal results. Florida International University's Physics Education Research Group has implemented Modeling Instruction in University Physics classes as part of an overall effort toward building a research and learning community. Modeling Instruction is explicitly designed to engage students in scientific practices that include model building, validation, and revision. Results from a preinstruction/postinstruction CLASS measurement show attitudinal improvements through both semesters of an introductory physics sequence, as well as over the entire two-course sequence. In this Brief Report, we report positive shifts from the CLASS in one section of a modeling-based introductory physics sequence, for both mechanics $(N=22)$ and electricity and magnetism $(N=23)$. Using the CLASS results and follow up interviews, we examine how these results reflect on modeling instruction and the unique student community and population at FIU.

Correlations between student discussion behavior, attitudes, and learning

An important result of physics education research is that students' learning and success in a course is correlated with their beliefs, attitudes, and expectations regarding physics. However, it is hard to assess these beliefs for individual students, and traditional survey instruments such as the Maryland Physics Expectations Survey (MPEX) are intended to evaluate the impact of one or more semesters of instruction on an overall class and improve teaching. In this study, we investigate the possibility of using the analysis of online student discussion behavior as an indicator of an individual student's approach to physics. These discussions are not tainted by the effects of self-reporting, and are gathered in authentic nonresearch settings, where students attempt to solve problems in the way that they believe is most efficient and appropriate. We calculate the correlation of both MPEX and student discussions with different measures of student learning, and find that on an individual base, student discussions are a stronger predictor of success than MPEX outcomes.

Helping physics students learn how to learn

Students’ “epistemological” beliefs—their views about the nature of knowledge and learning—affect how they approach physics courses. For instance, a student who believes physics knowledge to consist primarily of disconnected facts and formulas will study differently from a student who views physics as an interconnected web of concepts. Unfortunately, previous studies show that physics courses, even ones that help students learn concepts particularly well, generally do not lead to significant changes in students’ epistemological beliefs. This paper discusses instructional practices and curricular elements, suitable for both college and high school, that helped students develop substantially more sophisticated beliefs about knowledge and learning, as measured by the Maryland Physics Expectations Survey and by the Epistemological Beliefs Assessment for Physical Science.

Student expectations in introductory physics

Students’ understanding of what science is about, how it is done, and their expectations as to what goes on in a science course, can play a powerful role in what they get out of introductory college physics. In this paper, we describe the Maryland Physics Expectations survey; a 34-item Likert-scale (agree–disagree) survey that probes student attitudes, beliefs, and assumptions about physics. We report on the results of pre- and post-instruction delivery of this survey to 1500 students in introductory calculus-based physics at six colleges and universities. We note a large gap between the expectations of experts and novices and observe a tendency for student expectations to deteriorate rather than improve as a result of the first term of introductory calculus-based physics.