Physics education
We aim to enhance learning for undergraduate and postgraduate students who study physics as their major interest or use it in related degrees.
We undertake research to develop new learning resources, investigate teaching techniques, and explore the development of students as they learn.
Themes and impacts
Major themes of our work include:
- active learning
- development of novel learning resources and activities through strategies of technology-enabled learning, inquiry-based laboratory learning, and contextualisation to learners’ interests
- self-perceptions and their effect on learning.
We have made significant impacts on learning and student engagement by:
- replacing traditional undergraduate physics lectures with in-class discussion that is facilitated by structured preparation processes
- addressing the challenge of making abstract physics accessible by innovating learning experiences
- designing, implementing and evaluating original learning resources.
We harness technology to provide new ways of learning physics, for example, the use of interactive simulations and internet-capable mobile devices.
Analysing the diversity of our students, we explore student attitudes and their effect on learning physics.
Outputs
Teaching tools we have developed include:
- 5-Minute Physics: concise and interactive online modules, with thousands of users world-wide
- Semant: automated semantic analysis of student quiz responses, which makes the active learning teaching approach sustainable for large classes
- Threshold Learning Outcomes for Physics: defining standards of knowledge and capabilities of Australian physics graduates.
