Seeking to make upper secondary school physics more relevant and engaging, an online collaborative learning curriculum was designed. Each of the curriculum's lessons was structured as a goal-based scenario about human scientists on Mars. Video and audio data from the curriculum's implementation in Denmark was collected. This study utilized the…

At the beginning of 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic surprised the world, affecting activities that promote attendance, including abruptly impacting the education area. Educational institutions, from preschool to university, were required to adopt alternative teaching methods to continue their activities. Distance learning has been adopted by educators…

[This paper is part of the Focused Collection on Curriculum Development: Theory into Design.] Although curriculum design has a long tradition in physics education research (PER), it is often criticized for unclear or inconsistent methodologies. One reason is that the theory-into-practice aspect frequently remains blurred. Only a few curriculum…

This empirical study investigates the main features of curricula and contexts that favor or hinder the process of transfer of a teaching-learning sequence (TLS) from the designers' original situation to a host one. The specific research questions addressed were (RQ1) what were the changes made during the process of transfer in the new context?…

Here we demonstrate the benefits of a new curriculum for introductory calculus-based physics that motivates classical mechanics using a modified version of Hamiltonian mechanics. This curriculum shifts the initial focus of instruction away from forces and the associated vector mathematics, which are known to be problematic for students, to the…

[This paper is part of the Focused Collection on Curriculum Development: Theory into Design.] This paper discusses the theoretical framework and curriculum materials that form the basis of the Investigative Science Learning Environment (ISLE) approach to learning and teaching physics. ISLE, as a philosophical approach to learning, has two core…

The "Next Generation Science Standards" (NGSS) challenges science teachers to think beyond specific content standards when considering how to design and implement curriculum. This lesson, "Windmills by Design," is an insightful lesson in how science teachers can create and implement a cross-cutting lesson to teach the concepts…

The SCALE-UP studio physics class involves the physical redesign of a classroom to encourage more collaborative interactions and student-centered teaching, an approach shown to increase student learning on several different measures. However, research into the contextual issues involved in implementing a studio course using the SCALE-UP model…

This paper reports case studies of five Chinese secondary physics teachers' beliefs and instructional decisions in relation to inquiry-based teaching (IBT). It is part of a larger study intended to explore Chinese secondary physics teachers' beliefs and the ways in which their beliefs influence their classroom practices in the context of the…

Using Roberts' (1982, 1988, 1995, 1998, 2003) seven science curriculum emphases as its framework, this investigation into Alberta's physics program-of-study found that pre-service and novice teachers reported focusing on four of the emphases--"Structure of Science"; "Scientific Skill Development"; "Science, Technology, and…

This paper presents a rationale for utilizing HPS to teach physics and the NoS developed in the course of a project funded by the European Union. A core feature of this approach is formed by the development of historical case studies for the use in lessons. Furthermore, the learners' perspectives are explicitly taken into account. Teaching methods…

Teachers involved in the implementation of a curriculum innovation can be prepared for this task through a professional development program. In this paper, we describe essential characteristics (identified empirically and theoretically) for such a professional development program that promotes the acquisition of competences by these teachers. The…

Technology-Enabled Active Learning (TEAL) is a pedagogical innovation established in a technology-enhanced multimedia studio, emphasizing constructivist-oriented teaching and learning. In Taiwan, an increasing number of schools are adopting the TEAL notion to deliver courses. This study examines the impact of TEAL on both student performance and…

This book is intended to offer college faculty members the insights of the development of reasoning movement that enlighten physics educators in the late 1970s and led to a variety of college programs directed at improving the reasoning patterns used by college students. While the original materials were directed at physics concepts, they quickly…