| Title: | Problem Context and Newton’s Second Law: A Further Look* |
| Meeting: | 126th AAPT National Meeting: Austin, TX |
| Location: | San Antonio |
| Date: | Tuesday, Jan. 14 |
| Time: | 4:15 p.m. |
| Author: |
Alicia Allbaugh, Kansas
State Univ. 785-532-7167, allbaugh@phys.ksu.edu |
| Co-Author(s): | N. Sanjay Rebello, Dean A. Zollman |
| Abstract: | Homework problems covering the same conceptual areas can appear quite different to students due to different situations, variables, and unknowns. To study the effects of problem context, students in a calculus-based introductory physics course (including physics majors and engineering majors from several areas) were interviewed up to four times during the first semester and twice during the second semester of the course. In these interviews, each student was asked conceptual questions related to their homework problems. From this information, students’ applications of Newton’s Second Law and the dependence of those applications on the context of the problems were assessed. This presentation will focus on the second semester topics of electric and magnetic fields. The methodology and preliminary results will be presented. |
| Footnotes: | *Supported in part by NSF grant # REC-0087788. |