Supporting novice research students in learning to write literature reviews

BACKGROUND Students who are beginning to write about research (their own and others’) need to develop capability to create a literature review. This new type of task for them is challenging because of the high-level intellectual demands of critiquing and synthesising, as well as an unfamiliar genre and its conventions. The work described here supports Science Honours research students by giving them opportunities to practise on manageable chunks of the process involved in creating a literature review, and builds on the surprisingly-few relevant learning resources, e.g., Greetham (2021), and Davis and Morley (2018). ACTION Learning activities, contextualised within the Physics discipline, have been developed and implemented to assist students in writing literature reviews. First is some familiarisation through exposure to samples of literature review text, then structuring a review document is considered. Students have difficulties moving from a collection of notes on research papers to a cohesive, logical summary and critique of a research field. An annotated bibliography is a useful link. Students were given an example annotated bibliography for an accessible physics topic. I created this by “reverse-engineering” a published review article.  Students were asked to organise the summarised ideas into a feasible structure for a literature review. We discussed their responses, then I revealed published reviews on that topic (including the reverse-engineering source). We dissected how ideas were structured, and signposted, by the authors; students were asked to identify how logical transitions were communicated. REFLECTION Students engaged with the tasks, producing a notable range of variations for possible structure of the literature review. These variations prompted useful discussions of communication strategies. A by-product of the process of reverse-engineering a published literature review was an articulation of what is valued in the discipline’s research. Explicitly acknowledging a discipline’s research values gives clarity about what students should focus on when critiquing research literature. How common are these research values across sciences? Further work is exploring how the strategy of these discipline-contextualised learning activities could transfer across the sciences and mathematics. REFERENCES Davis, M. & Morley, J. (2018). Facilitating learning about academic phraseology: teaching activities for student writers. Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education, Special Edition: 2018 ALDinHE Conference, ISSN: 1759-667X Greetham, B. (2021) How to write your literature review. London: Macmillan Education

Using a laser pointer to demonstrate the decrease in the wavelength of light in water

Globally, COVID-19 has had a profound impact on education. During the height of COVID-19 nearly all instruction was delivered online. Online delivery of education has continued as we enter the post-COVID-19 era, and a hybrid model has emerged in which teaching is delivered face-to-face and online simultaneously. In physics education there are many opportunities for small-scale experiments to be used in the hybrid model and for online students to do their own experiments at home. An example of this is using a laser pointer to demonstrate that the wavelength of light decreases when travelling from a lower to higher refractive index medium. The decrease in wavelength cannot be observed directly but can be observed indirectly through diffraction. One such experiment is to reflect a violet laser off a CD (Hughes et al., 2022). The number of possible diffraction orders is given by the track spacing divided by wavelength. In water, with a refractive index of 1.33, the wavelength of 405 nm (violet) light is . In air,  diffraction orders are observed, but in water  as shown in figure 1 (see Abstract PDF). Dilute tonic water can be used to enable the diffracted beams to be seen in low light since violet light causes quinine in tonic water to fluoresce.  Students can use a mobile phone camera to take a photo of the diffraction orders, as seen in the figure, taken with an iPhone 12, and use a freely available image analysis program such as ImageJ (https://imagej.nih.gov/ij/) to measure the angle of the diffraction orders and compare with theory. The experiment is very cheap. The laser used to take the photo in figure 1 cost 4 AUD. REFERENCE Hughes, S. Gurung, S, & Wegener, M. (2022). Shrinking violet. Physics Education, 57, 055016. https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6552/ac793

Active learning using online interactivity

Preparation for classes and interactivity are core components of active learning. Both of these components can be implemented in ways enabled by technology, using online resources and activities. This presentation will discuss a range of online strategies to support active learning, from the viewpoint of at least a decade’s work on implementing active learning in a variety of university physics courses. A particular focus has been the development and evaluation of online learning modules.  “Five Minute Physics” was originally envisaged as lecture preparation material. Its concise text, videos/animations and quizzes with instant feedback are designed to provide students with a fundamental understanding of course material, preparing them for interactive in-class activities. Once it was proven that students actually use this resource, its content was extended.  An introductory-level service course has a complete suite of Five Minute Physics modules covering the course material. These have been consistently nominated by students over many semesters (pre-COVID, at the height of the pandemic crisis, and now), as one of the best aspects of the course.  Initially, student engagement with interactive simulations that were incorporated in Five Minute Physics varied widely. We have since integrated simulations in learning tasks, for example, small-group worksheets for tutorials. Students across a number of courses have responded very positively to use of online simulations, reporting gains from simulation-based activities, and describing how simulations helped their learning. In the rapid transition to new delivery modes prompted by COVID-19, we attempted to retain advantages of active learning – supported by technology. In recent semesters, for a first-year course with hundreds of students, consisting of lectures, tutorials and practicals, most students experienced a blend of online and face-to-face teaching. Interactive lectures have been achieved online, and in simultaneous face-to-face/online mode. Tutorials on-campus and online have used the same activities, based on online interactive simulations and small-group discussion. Student attitudes to the use of online simulations in both situations have been overwhelmingly positive. Student engagement in in-person tutorials was relatively high. In online tutorial sessions, engagement was generally lower, the productive student discussion varied dramatically, but engagement improved over the semester with tutors working to encourage discussion. As we aim to address contemporary and future challenges in physics education, technology-enabled strategies will continue to offer interesting possibilities to support active learning. REFERENCE Five Minute Physics. http://teaching.smp.uq.edu.au/fiveminutephysics

Dynamic e-learning modules for student lecture preparation

We have developed and demonstrated the effectiveness of a set of online interactive learning modules to accompany physics courses at first- and second-year university levels. Students access the modules prior to attending lectures to familiarize themselves with content which is then discussed and reaffirmed in class. Student surveys and access data show that students were much more likely to use material presented in this form, rather than a textbook, when preparing for lectures given in an active learning format. The students found that interactive simulations, videos of problem-solving approaches prepared by course staff, and quick-check immediate feedback questions were all useful tools for lecture preparation–none of which are available when using a traditional textbook for lecture preparation

Contemporary service course students: Who are they?

It’s unusual for a physics course to have large enrolment increases in recent years. However, in The Physical Basis of Biological Systems - a service course for students with interests in the biomedical and life sciences - total annual enrolment has more than doubled over the period 2000 – 2005. At the same time there has been a surge of academic interest in biology and biological physics (note the recent cover story of Physics Today by Goldstein, Nelson and Powers (2005)). This could have contributed to increasing student numbers, and could mean a different type of student is enrolling in physics. Changing academic advice to students, and changing requirements to enter some in-demand degrees, may also be affecting enrolments. In this environment, with the increasing diversity of students at university a common theme, the aim to provide appropriate learning experiences prompts the question: ‘Who are these students?’ This is important because as Sharma, Mills, Mendez and Pollard ((ed) 2005) note, In order to teach more effectively, we need to have a clear understanding of who our students are, what motivates them to study physics, … their backgrounds and … their plans. This study investigates the composition of the audience for this course and how the students are coping, in order to inform future course development. The course is offered at first-year level. It consists of lectures (delivered to hundreds of students), small-group tutorials and laboratory activities, with support from a course website. It is offered twice per year, with some variation in course material according to the different student audiences expected historically. Major client groups have been students aiming to enter Medicine and Dentistry (in Semester I), and those enrolled in Human Movement Studies (Semester II). Findings reported below draw on several sources of information - enrolment data, student surveys, and assessment results over recent years. Student types have been investigated according to their ambitions for university coursework and future careers, background - outside exposure to physics, cultural influences, including gender, and their hopes and expectations for the course

SUDDENLY SIMULTANEOUS: DUAL DELIVERY IN ON-CAMPUS AND ONLINE MODES

BACKGROUND In the rapid transition to new delivery modes prompted by COVID-19, we have attempted to retain advantages of active learning – active preparation for classes, and interactivity - supported by technology. For the last two semesters, ~15% of the enrolment in a first-year course with hundreds of students, consisting of lectures, tutorials and practicals, has been External. Most students have experienced a blend of online and face-to-face teaching, with tutorials and practicals on-campus, retreating to online occasionally. All students have common online lectures. DESIGN AND METHODS Online resources had been the focus of recent course development (Wegener et al., 2018). A natural experiment arose to compare tutorials on-campus and online (via Zoom) that use the same activities, implementing online interactive simulations and small-group discussion. The Student-Led Observation for Course Improvement team observed classes, coding indicators of student engagement, and ran surveys and focus groups. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Responses to the use of online simulations were overwhelmingly positive. Student engagement in in-person tutorials was relatively high, averaging 8.7 /10, greater than for online tutorials. Engagement in online tutorials varied significantly, with some groups having few students present, or willing to talk or type, despite experienced tutors working to encourage engagement. REFERENCE Wegener, M.J., Kenny, E.P., Lenton, I., & McIntyre, T.J. (2018) "Embedding Interactive Simulations to Enhance Active Learning", Conference of the International Society for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, Bergen, 24-27 Oct, 201

Student experiences of virtual reality - a case study in learning special relativity

We present a study of student learning through the use of virtual reality. A software package is used to introduce concepts of special relativity to students in a game-like environment where users experience the effects of travelling at near light speeds. From this new perspective, space and time are significantly different to that experienced in everyday life. The study explores how students have worked with this environment and how these students have used this experience in their study of special relativity. A mixed method approach has been taken to evaluate the outcomes of separate implementations of the package at two universities. Students found the simulation to be a positive learning experience and described the subject area as being less abstract after its use. Also, students were more capable of correctly answering concept questions relating to special relativity, and a small but measurable improvement was observed in the final exam

Personal standards: Measuring the impact of values and identity on first-year physics learning

This paper explores how beliefs about self affect learning when students could feel performance anxiety. We examine the generalisability to Australian science students of recent work in USA. The gender gap in physics performance (well-known from literature - females lagging behind males) was eliminated via a value-affirmation intervention [Miyake et al, 2010]. The theory is that those who identify with a group “known” not to perform well experience “identity threat”; if they think about values important to them personally, they perform better because of a bolstered sense of self. • Are Australian students susceptible to stereotype threat relating to gender? • Is the value-affirmation exercise proven in one context transferable to ours? • Can it improve learning performance of those who are fearful of physics, perhaps because of previous education? We measure how strongly and how commonly students endorse a negative belief that “other” people succeed, in core physics and service teaching courses. We surveyed confidence and attitudes. Statistical analysis of pre- and post- instruction results on a well-established physics diagnostic test will be presented, showing the distribution of assessment performance for randomly-assigned control vs intervention groups, and with respect to the strength of endorsement of negative beliefs. Miyake, A. et al, “Reducing the gender achievement gap in college science: A classroom study of values affirmation”, Science vol. 330 26 November 2010 pp1234-123

Seeing the Light: Science Communication and Art

A collaboration connecting a university’s Physics teaching and its art museum’s exhibition program has demonstrated the value of such partnerships. In the context of an upsurge in transdisciplinary art practice, and the need for scientists to develop skills in communicating science to non-specialists, a curator and a physicist implemented an innovative learning and assessment activity associated with a significant exhibition of contemporary art. Third-year physics students were tasked with selecting an artwork from the exhibition and explaining the physics in it to gallery visitors, via a short piece of writing. A selection of the best student-authored texts was displayed in the exhibition alongside the usual curatorial labels. In preparing for the task, students were given instruction and practice in writing about science for non-scientists, and provided with information about the artworks and the exhibition. The students’ writing enriched the visitor experience by establishing links between art and science. Students saw their science in a new context. The nature of this activity as an authentic task with a genuine reward – the opportunity for public, professional output – had a positive effect on student engagement with science communication. We discuss the impact of the activity and the transferability of the strategies used

Developing a virtual physics world

In this article, the successful implementation of a development cycle for a physics teaching package based on game-like virtual reality software is reported. The cycle involved several iterations of evaluating students' use of the package followed by instructional and software development. The evaluation used a variety of techniques, including ethnographic observation, surveys, student focus groups and conventional assessment. The teaching package included a laboratory manual, instructional support materials and the Real Time Relativity software that simulates a world obeying special relativistic physics. Although the iterative development cycle was time consuming and costly, it gave rise to substantial improvements in the software user interface and in the students' learning experience