Millikan Lecture 1998: Building a Science of Teaching Physics

Edward F. Redish

Citation: American Journal of Physics 67, 562 (1999); doi: 10.1119/1.19326

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 Millikan Lecture 1998: Building a Science of Teaching Physics
Edward F. Redish
Department of Physics, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland 20742-4111
Individual teachers of college level physics sometimes develop deep insights into how their students
learn and what elements of classroom instruction are valuable in facilitating the learning process.
Yet these insights rarely persist beyond the individual instructor. Educational methods seem to cycle
from one fad to another, rarely cumulating increasingly powerful knowledge in the way scientists
expect understanding to grow. In this paper I explore the character of our understanding of the
physical world and of teaching about it. The critical factor is using ‘‘the culture of science’’—the
set of processes that allow us to build a community consensus knowledge base. Elements of the
beginning of a base for our educational knowledge are discussed and examples given from
discipline-based physics education research. © 1999 American Association of Physics Teachers.

INTRODUCTION: WHY DOES SCIENCE rock up the hill only to have it roll down again? Why do we
CUMULATE KNOWLEDGE WHILE EDUCATION never seem to be able to share and pass down to succeeding
SEEMS NOT TO? generations what we learn about physics education? Is there
anything we can do to change this unhappy situation or is it
In 1903, Robert Millikan published the first volume of a part of the fundamental character of education and of human
two-volume reform curriculum in introductory physics.1 In beings?
the preface to this volume he makes the following statement: In order to understand the elements needed for us to cu-
mulate knowledge about physics education, we need to con-
The most serious criticism which can be urged
sider what it is about physics ~and about science in general!
against modern laboratory work in Physics is that it
that leads to successful accumulation of knowledge in those
often degenerates into a servile following of directions,
fields. In this paper I begin with a discussion of the nature of
and thus loses all save a purely manipulative value.
scientific knowledge and consider those elements that lead to
Important as is dexterity in the handling and adjust-
accumulation of knowledge. I then discuss the embedding
ment of apparatus, it can not be too strongly empha-
environment of physics education—the general principles of
sized that it is grasp of principles, not skill in manipu-
learning theory that have been developed by cognitive scien-
lation which should be the primary object of General
tists and education theorists. Next, I present examples of
Physics courses.
what sort of knowledge has been obtained from physics edu-
He goes on to discuss the character of his new course in cation research. The paper concludes with a discussion of
which lectures and laboratories are closely entwined. how a science-like physics education research enterprise fits
Priscilla Laws has already discussed Millikan’s laboratory- into physics as a whole and the value it can have for the
based course in some detail in her 1996 Millikan Lecture2 so community of physicists. Throughout, I explicitly discuss
I will not go into detail here. Fourteen years later, in 1917, those elements which are controversial, confusing, or com-
Millikan published a small volume entitled The Electron.3 monly misconstrued.
This volume includes a discussion of Millikan’s determina-
tion that it makes sense to talk about the electron as having a
fixed charge: THE PROCESS OF SCIENCE CREATES AN
ACCURATE „BUT APPROXIMATE… COMMUNITY
Here, then, is direct, unimpeachable proof that the
electron is not a ‘statistical mean,’ but that rather the MAP OF THE PHYSICAL WORLD
electrical charges found on ions all have either exactly We often say that the goal of science is to discover the
the same value or else small exact multiples of that laws of nature. This is not quite precise enough for our pur-
value. poses. It’s better to say that we are trying to create the best
The implications of Millikan’s comments on the nature of way of thinking about the world that we can. This places the
the electron have been included in nearly every introductory knowledge firmly where it really resides—in the head of the
physics text since soon after the results were published. In- scientist.
deed, the issue as to whether the electron’s charge may as- A good metaphor for the process of science is the building
sume continuous or discrete values is almost never consid- of a map. A map of the world should not be mistaken for the
ered as a possibility, his result is so well ingrained. Yet few world,5 but it can nonetheless be of great value in getting
people today know of Millikan’s reform curriculum, and his around. What is perhaps most important about the scientific
description of the issues it is meant to deal with sounds both map of the world is that it is more than just the collection of
modern and pertinent. The type of curriculum he developed the maps of individual scientists. The culture of science in-
for college physics has vanished and reappeared only to van- cludes the continual interaction, exchange, evaluation, and
ish again with maddening regularity during the nearly 100 criticism we make of each other’s views. This produces a
years since he proposed it. Melba Phillips said it best when kind of emergent phenomenon I refer to as a community
she said: ‘‘The trouble with problems in physics education is consensus knowledge base or more briefly, a community
they don’t stay solved.’’ 4 map. I visualize this as an idealized atlas of science. Just as
What is it that allows us to build our knowledge of physics an atlas contains many individual charts, the atlas of science
in a cumulative way while in physics education we seem to contains many distinct coherent but incomplete areas of
be doomed to everlasting cycles of pushing the Sisyphian knowledge. These areas are supposed to agree where they

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 overlap, but it is not clear that the entire universe can be ~2! A teacher delivering an inappropriately rigorous course
encompassed in a single map.6 No single individual, no mat- may find his students seem to learn little and to dislike it
ter how brilliant, contains a map identical to this community intensely. ‘‘Ah,’’ he is heard to remark, ‘‘but when
consensus map. This process is summarized in Fig. 1. they’re older they will realize that I was right and come
If no one individual has the complete map, why do I be- to appreciate the course and what they’ve learned.’’
lieve one exists? Real maps are constructed in a manner ~3! A teacher concerned about how little his students are
similar to the way we construct science. They are built by learning may try a number of changes to improve the
many surveyors. No one surveyor has made all the measure- situation, but find that nothing seems to help. ‘‘Oh
ments that lead to a map of the US, for example. Further- well,’’ he says, ‘‘those students are just not able to learn
more, each atlas differs in some detail from each other atlas, physics under any circumstances.’’ 12
yet we have little doubt that a true atlas could exist ~though
it would, of course, have to be dynamic and limited to a I have personally heard each of these responses from physics
preset resolution!.7 In mathematics, if we have a series of colleagues whose science and whose teaching efforts I re-
functions that get closer and closer to each other in a pre- spect.
scribed way, then we say the sequence has the Cauchy
property.8 Even if we can’t find the true limit analytically, The foundation of the map
we find it convenient to act as if such a limit exists.9 The
natural mathematical structures of sets of functions behave If we want to understand what is happening in our class-
much more nicely if we add the sets of Cauchy sequences to rooms, we have to understand our students well enough to
our space. It’s like adding the real numbers that fall in be- understand the process they go through when they learn
tween the rationals. We can never calculate them exactly, but something. Learning is a complex process. Ever since
it would be very hard to describe the phenomenon of motion Socrates,13 teachers have been developing principles of ef-
if we left them out. fective teaching and learning based on insights into human
In many areas of physics the sequence has converged—for behavior. Psychologists only began to bring scientific tools
all practical purposes. The community consensus on such to bear on the problem of human learning in the nineteenth
items as classical mechanics of the planets of the solar sys- century.14 For much of the time since then, the community of
tem or the thermodynamics of weakly interacting gases, for psychologists got itself trapped in a number of dead ends.
example, is exceedingly strong—in part because we know Freudians and behaviorists made the mistake of taking a few
the resolution that is relevant to most problems in these sub- good insights and trying to build universal theories from
jects. Just as we don’t need ~i.e., find it useful to have! a map them. One of the lessons we learn from the history of physics
of New York which specifies the cracks in the sidewalk, we is that it rarely pays to let your theory run far ahead of your
don’t need to calculate the location of a satellite to nanom- careful experiments.
eter accuracy. During the twentieth century, psychologists and educators
have made a number of fundamental steps that are beginning
to form the core of a community map to help us understand
CREATING A COMMUNITY MAP FOR EDUCATION how people learn and how they can be educated most effec-
If what we learn about physics education is to lead to a tively.
stable and growing community map, the community needs to The Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget made a major advance
document what we know and present conjectures and hy- in the science of learning in the first half of the twentieth
potheses for criticisms and questioning. This is particularly century. He began with careful observations of his own chil-
important in education.10 dren learning to make sense of the world around them and
Human behavior in all realms is beset by wishful went on to produce many volumes of experimental observa-
thinking—the tendency of people to really believe that what tions on the learning and reasoning of children and young
they want to be true is true. To some extent, the most impor- adults. The heart of what Piaget learned15 is that the mind
tant part of that process by which science builds its commu- processes sensory data to create the coherent worldview we
nity consensus knowledge base is the part that probes and take for granted.16 From this process comes the ideas of ob-
purges the wishful thinking of the individual scientist. Some jects, classifications, and more complex patterns of associa-
parts of the process critical for this task include: tion. Although the theories Piaget created have been substan-
tially modified, much of what he learned remains valid, and
d publication of results, documented with sufficient care and much of what has been learned relevant to education since
completeness that others can evaluate and duplicate them, then builds on his work. These principles are referred to as
d repetition of experiments using different apparatus and dif- constructivism. A second important idea was developed by
ferent contexts,11 followers of the Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky both in
d evaluation and critiquing of one scientist’s results by oth- psychology and in education. They pointed out the important
ers through refereeing, presentations and discussions in role of social interactions in the learning process. This work
conferences, and through follow-up evaluations and exten- has had a profound impact on modern theories of teaching
sions. and learning.17
When it comes to education, wishful thinking is not just In the past half century there has been an impressive
present, it is widespread and can take a variety of forms. growth in the understanding of cognitive processes at all
levels. Today, modern tools ~many of them created by
~1! A dedicated and charismatic teacher may, by force of physicists! permit neuroscientists to offer glimpses of a
personality, inspire her students into learning far above complete reductionist structure underlying the processes of
the norm. That teacher may then try to disseminate her cognition.18 But detailed studies of the neural paths by which
curriculum to other less charismatic individuals, only to a cat processes a visual signal are micro-variables—too de-
find the method no longer is effective. tailed and specific for us to use in solving the practical prob-

563 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 67, No. 7, July 1999 Edward F. Redish 563
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 lems of education. We need some collective variables. It is world. They are much less like mathematical theorems and
likely to be a long time before a fully reductionist description much more like heuristics. This is not a surprise, since the
of cognition is available—and even if one were, we would phenomena we are discussing are more complex and at a
still want descriptions of students and classrooms in terms much earlier stage of development.22 Indeed, some items are
that are useful for designing effective lessons. still controversial. Two facts in particular have caused some
In the past few decades, educational researchers have be- confusion.
gun to understand much about what is happening in the d Even the community consensus view of science is not per-
physics classroom. This knowledge fits well with what is
fect.
known from cognitive science and allows us to begin to d Each individual constructs science for him or herself.
identify some elements of an emerging community map.19

The framework of the map Gaps in the map of the physical world
I have selected five general principles from what psy- The fact that science does not produce a perfect map has
chologists and educators have learned. These can serve as the led some to claim that because science is not perfect, it is not
framework for our community map and help us to make truly objective. This concern of some postmodernists in a
sense of what happens in the physics classroom. variety of fields is akin to that of the philosophers who were
confused by Zeno’s paradox.23 We need be no more con-
~1! The constructivism principle: Individuals build their cerned about this lack of perfection in science than we are
knowledge by processing the information they receive, about the fact that we can never know the number p or the
building patterns of association to existing knowledge. function sin x perfectly. In a very real sense, neither p nor
~2! The context principle: What people construct depends
sin x exists.24 We can, however, know them as accurately as
on the context—including their mental states.
~3! The change principle: Producing significant change in a we need. Of course the shadow that falls between mathemat-
well established pattern of associations is difficult but ics and perfect knowledge is much slimmer than the one that
can be facilitated through a variety of known mecha- falls between physics and perfect knowledge.
nisms. For example, there is a fundamental failure of consistency
~4! The distribution function principle: Individuals show a of classical mechanics produced by the need for radiation
limited but significant variation in their style of learning reaction. The presence of a third derivative of position in our
along a number of dimensions. equation of motion implies that we should be able to set the
~5! The social learning principle: For most individuals, acceleration arbitrarily and undermines our interpretation of
learning is most effectively carried out via social inter- Newton’s second law.25 But the parameters involved indicate
actions. that if we can’t treat radiation reaction perturbatively, then
the situation usually requires a quantum treatment of the
The first three of these principles are associated with the electron’s motion. So we don’t worry about it because we
idea of constructivism and how it is implemented. Principles know classical mechanics can be thought of as an approxi-
1–4 are discussed in detail in my brief summary of cognitive mation. The value of classical mechanics today is similar to
science that appeared in this journal a few years ago.20 The that of thermodynamics as described by Einstein. It will
fifth principle summarizes the important work on group ‘‘never be proved wrong.’’ We know its limitations and the
learning coming from Vygotsky and his followers. systems in which it can be applied.
The social learning principle is particularly important for
physicists to keep in mind. Physicists as a group are highly Gaps in the map of science education
unusual in many ways. They are in the extreme tails of dis-
tributions for curiosity, intellectual independence, and math- The fact that each individual constructs science ~and ev-
ematical skills. They also tend to be highly self-sufficient erything else! for him or herself means that the teacher and
learners. I once heard David Halliday, author of a famous the teacher’s teacher have gone through the same process
textbook,21 remark that what he enjoyed most as a student that the student is going through. This has led a few educa-
was sitting down by himself alone in a quiet room with a tors to focus primarily on the student’s experience in explor-
physics text and going one-on-one with the authors of the ing and creating ideas without consideration of the correct-
book—trying to understand them and figure out what they ness of these ideas. This loses sight of two fundamental
were trying to say. Many of us have similar inclinations. points: that we are trying to educate/acculturate our students,
Physicists as a group seem to be selected for being able to not just raise their self-esteem, and that science represents
learn on their own. But in examining my personal experi- the knowledge of a community, not of an individual.26
ences of this type, I have decided that my learning on my In education as well as in science, our choices are not
own involves an ability to create an ‘‘internalized restricted to having a perfect community map or rejecting the
other’’— to take a variety of viewpoints and to argue an idea of a map. The fact that many people misuse and misin-
intellectual issue with myself. This does not appear to be a terpret Piaget’s great discovery does not make it any less
commonly found characteristic and cannot be assumed in a useful when carefully applied. Piaget and his followers have
general population of students. shown us that people take their sensory inputs and interpret
them based on cognitive structures that have already been set
INTERPRETING THE COMMUNITY MAP FOR up. Does this mean all knowledge is necessarily approxi-
EDUCATION: SCIENTIFIC CONSTRUCTIVISM mate? Does it imply that our theory of knowledge is self-
referential? OK, we can handle that. As physicists, our com-
The principles of our first draft of a community map for munity has struggled with both of these conditions in other
physics education are different in character from the laws we contexts. Zeno’s paradox troubles us no longer and we are
would write down for a community map of the physical perfectly comfortable taking limits to get derivatives. The

564 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 67, No. 7, July 1999 Edward F. Redish 564
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 theory of motion is well understood and of immense practi- for the teaching of scientists, strongly guided discovery can
cal use. As for self-referential systems, it’s well known to work extremely well. It can both reach large fractions of our
readers of this journal that quantum mechanics is self- students and be more efficient than the traditional approach.
referential in a most confusing way.27 Traditional lecture-based instruction demonstrates that a
When it comes to quantum mechanics, our community has reasonably good understanding of science can be taught to a
chosen to cut the Gordian knot of self-referential measure- select 5% of the population. Applications of pure discovery
ment difficulties. Despite much public discussion and many learning show that students weak in math can be led to dis-
statements that the Copenhagen interpretation is generally cover for themselves the simplest tools and principles of sci-
accepted, in practice the situation is more subtle. Most quan- ence. Research using McDermott’s Physics by Inquiry30 and
tum physicists do not spend a lot of time worrying about Tutorials in Introductory Physics31 ~and the work of Laws,32
measurement theory. It’s clear that the issue is complicated Thornton, and Sokoloff33 which adapts and follows her
and various mechanisms can be imagined that might produce model! shows that a large fraction of students can be helped
our apparently classical macroscopic world even though the to build a robust and functional understanding of many com-
underlying dynamics are fundamentally quantum plex topics.
mechanical.28 I expect that the construction of macroscopic In one example, McDermott and her group have shown
quantum states now being accomplished with lasers and su- that with three hours of carefully guided instruction in a
perconducting systems will eventually lead us to a much recitation-like small-group environment facilitated by gradu-
better understanding of what the real nature of quantum pe- ate assistants, 85% of the students in a calculus-based phys-
culiarities are ~and that there are bound to be some very ics class can be taught to construct the pattern of light pro-
interesting and exciting surprises!. I am delighted that a duced on a screen by any combination of bulbs and any
small fraction of our community is engaged in vigorously shaped mask. The success rate of traditional instruction with
probing these issues. I am even more delighted that the dif- the same students is 25%.34 The work of Thacker et al. dem-
ficulty has not prevented the rest of us from getting on with onstrates that using McDermott’s methods, preservice el-
the business of understanding and using quantum mechanics ementary school teachers can learn to analyze the qualitative
in a practical ~if incomplete! fashion. behavior of complex circuits more effectively than honors
I propose that we treat the idea of constructivism in the physics majors in traditional instruction.35 Many more ex-
same manner. We consider the principles stated above as amples exist in the published literature. ~See the article cited
working hypotheses to be refined and tested by observation in Ref. 19.!
and experiment. When it’s possible, we avoid those areas in
which their application would be debilitating. When it’s not,
we rely on our experience and common sense. I refer to this BUILDING THE MAP OF PHYSICS EDUCATION
approach as scientific constructivism.29
A critical element in building a community map for edu-
cation is the application of the two fundamental tools of
Implications of the education map for teaching science science, observation and analysis. Educational phenomena
Even when they accept the importance of acculturating permit us to carry out observations in controlled experi-
students to the community map of science, a few in the edu- ments, but experiments in physics education differ in a num-
cation community have pushed the community map of edu- ber of respects from the idealization of a traditional physics
cation to the extreme of ‘‘pure discovery learning.’’ In this experiment. Among the differences are:
model, the teacher is not supposed to get in the way of the ~1! a limited ability to identify and control all the variables,
students’ creativity by helping them. The emphasis tends to ~2! the necessity of using a strongly interacting probe, and
be on learning the process of science rather than the content. ~3! the degree of quantification that is appropriate.
Although the process of science is clearly important for stu-
dents to learn, many of us find this approach highly frustrat- Note that I have referred to our idealization of a traditional
ing and inefficient for teaching students at the college level. physics experiment. In practice, our real experiments rarely
It takes a long time to get students to construct correct sci- fit this mode. The difficulties with doing careful educational
entific ideas, even with the most carefully crafted environ- experiments all have their analog in traditional physics re-
ments. A pure discovery approach may be appropriate for search.
some students, but it cannot be considered appropriate for Classrooms, students, and teachers are all complex sys-
the teaching of scientists, engineers, or technologists, who tems. Experiments with such systems involve many vari-
must master a large body of material. ables, some of which are unknown. It is difficult to deter-
Scientific constructivism allows us to go beyond the false mine the effect of past experience and cultural environment
dichotomy ‘‘constructivism vs. content.’’ A scientific con- on students and teachers. The formal education of students
structivist might ask the question: Given the goal of under- prior to their enrollment in undergraduate courses may sig-
standing a particular set of content material, what is the best nificantly affect how they interpret what is taught. As is
way to create an environment in which the largest fraction of sometimes the case in traditional physics research, it is al-
students possible attain that goal within a specified time most impossible to identify all the relevant variables or to
frame? perform a truly controlled experiment in which only a single
Lillian McDermott, her collaborators, and her followers variable is changed—sometimes it is even impossible in
have created discovery learning approaches which include principle. For example, quantum experiments are not repeat-
rather ‘‘tight’’ guidance. These approaches combine scien- able at the level of an individual event. Although we assume
tific constructivist assumptions with the need to ‘‘cover’’ that all electrons, unlike people, are identical, it is still not
substantial blocks of material for teaching scientists and en- possible to control an experiment so that each electron be-
gineers at the college level. It gives us an example of the fact haves in exactly the same way. In the cases of electrons and
that while pure discovery learning may be of limited value people, only the behavior of populations can be predicted

565 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 67, No. 7, July 1999 Edward F. Redish 565
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 students, the investigator often must interact strongly with
them—talking to them directly and asking them many ques-
tions.
The level of quantification must be appropriate to the situ-
ation that is being studied. In traditional physics experi-
ments, the goal is to obtain quantitative results with the un-
certainty in the measurements well specified and as small as
possible. However, meaningful quantitative results cannot be
achieved unless one has a sound qualitative understanding of
the physics involved. In studies involving students, the value
of quantitative results also depends on our understanding of
qualitative issues, which usually are much less well under-
Fig. 1. Representation of the process of building the scientific map of the stood than in the case of physical systems. To be able to
physical world. determine the depth of students’ knowledge and the nature of
their difficulties, it is necessary to probe the reasoning that
lies behind their answers. The analysis of numerical data
reliably. Furthermore, we are not free to perform arbitrary alone may lead to incorrect interpretations. Detailed investi-
experiments on our students. Ethical considerations also cre- gations with a small number of students can be very useful
ate serious constraints.36 Experience demonstrates, however, for identifying conceptual or reasoning difficulties that might
that reliable and reproducible educational results can be ob- be missed in large-scale testing. On the other hand, if the
tained that are extremely useful for the development of ef- population involved is too limited, the results may be idio-
fective instruction. ~An example is given below.! syncratic and important information may be missed.
In an idealized physics experiment, an effort is made to An additional issue about educational experiments that ap-
ensure that the effect of a probe on the system that is being pears on the surface different from our experience in physics
measured is small. However, it is not always possible to find is the issue that is referred to pejoratively by some social
such a probe, especially in strongly interacting systems. If I scientists as mentalism. In our goal of understanding what is
want to probe the character of some of the excited states of a going on in education, many educational researchers ~myself
nucleus, I may have to use a probe that interacts strongly to included! attempt to infer what is happening in the mind of
excite those states ~e.g., a nucleon or meson!. These probes, the student. The objectors complain that one can never really
however, may interact more strongly with the nucleus on the know what is really happening inside someone’s mind by
way in and on the way out than when they excite the state to direct observation so one should not talk about it. I have
be studied. This strong interaction can lead to uncertainties even heard these objections from some physicists. I find this
and ambiguities in how the information about the nucleus is quite strange, since in physics we have for nearly a century
extracted. On the other hand, weak coupling is not always made immense progress by talking about objects whose ex-
even desirable in physics education research. For example, to istence we only infer from complex indirect observations.
be able to infer what is really going on in the minds of We can start with Maxwell’s inferences on the size of mol-

Fig. 2. Problem that reveals student difficulties interpreting functions of two variables.

566 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 67, No. 7, July 1999 Edward F. Redish 566
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 ecules, continued to Rutherford’s inference of the existence
of an atomic nucleus from scattering phenomena, and
reached a peak with the discovery of quarks—which many
physicists believe can never be isolated. Nonetheless, we
find it extremely useful to talk in terms of these ‘‘nonobserv-
able’’ objects and we would find it extremely difficult to do
contemporary physics without them. As we learn in physics,
inferring the existence of structures that are not directly ob-
servable is an essential element in building an understanding
that works. In order to make sense of what is happening
when a student thinks about a physics problem, we have to
hypothesize structures and processes that are dimly hinted at
in demonstration interviews37 or think-aloud protocols.38

APPLYING THE COMMUNITY MAP FOR

EDUCATION: SOME SPECIFIC EXAMPLES
The education research that is building a community map
of education can give important new insights that help in-
structors understand what is going on in a physics class. I
will give four examples that demonstrate the possibility of
learning valuable information from education experiments
and that demonstrate the value of developing curriculum
based on scientific constructivist principles.
1. The value of individual case studies: An example
from mechanical waves
My first example demonstrates that listening carefully to
one student in a detailed interview can have surprising re-
sults that can help substantially in understanding what is go-
ing on in a class.
As part of a project to develop instructional materials for
the subject of mechanical waves, Jeff Saul, Michael Witt-
mann, and I gave my engineering physics students the quiz
problem shown in Fig. 2.
We were not surprised to find that many could not write
the correct equation, but we were surprised to find that a Fig. 3. Problem that reveals student confusions about electric and magnetic
significant fraction of students drew the pulse as shrinking poles.
substantially in size. I had not discussed the damping of
waves on a string in lecture, and, although in principle the
answer is correct, it seemed a bit too sophisticated for the
gered an association that made him question his interpreta-
level at which we thought the class was functioning. The
tion. He was confused about how to read and interpret a
situation became much clearer when Saul and Wittmann car-
function39 and had particular trouble handling the difficult
ried out a few detailed interviews, asking the students to
problem of reinterpreting a one-variable function as a restric-
consider the problem and explain their reasoning. One stu-
tion of a two-variable one. Once we understood this, we were
dent ~a high achiever who eventually earned an A! responded
able to interpret the results of the quiz, document that this
as follows:
was happening to many students despite my careful efforts in
Okay. Over a long, taut spring, the friction or the lecture to be perfectly clear, and develop curricular materials
loss of energy should not be significant: so the wave ~a guided-discovery group-learning tutorial! that successfully
should be pretty much the exact same height, dealt with the issue.40 Focusing on understanding how a
distance—everything. So, it should be about the same small number of students constructed their responses to our
wave. question helped us unravel the instructional problem.
No, wait. Okay... ‘the displacement of [READING]...
is given by’...looking at the function of y ... Let’s see...I
guess it’ll be a lot smaller than the wave I drew, be- 2. Studying the distribution of responses in a class: An
cause the first time—x is zero, because e raised to the example from electro- and magneto-static forces
zero’s going to be 1... . And then as x increases, ... e A second example shows that there are surprises when one
raised to the negative... So, if x keeps on getting big- carefully probes a class’s understanding. It also illustrates the
ger, e raised to the negative of that is going to keep on difference between the impact of having outstanding and in-
getting smaller. So the—So the actual function’s going sightful teachers share their experiences, and detailed re-
to be a lot smaller. search in building a community-consensus knowledge base.
The student began with the view we expected—that the When Arnold Arons’ book on teaching physics41 first ap-
pulse would just continue without significant reduction in peared in 1990 I was absolutely delighted. Although I was
size. But the presence of the equation in the problem trig- not yet a physics education researcher, I had had a strong

567 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 67, No. 7, July 1999 Edward F. Redish 567
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 Fig. 4. Problem from Thornton and Sokoloff that reveals student difficulties with the concept of velocity.

interest in physics teaching for many years. I had read many rience with students over many decades.43 Despite my re-
of Aron’s papers and had great respect for them. I read the spect for Arons’ insights, I was skeptical about the impor-
book cover to cover and annotated it heavily. In Chap. 6 ~p. tance of a possible student confusion between electric charge
152! you will find the sentence: ‘‘...This paves the way for and magnetic poles. Indeed, I felt my personal experience
eliminating misconceptions such as repulsion between a contradicted it. The point was only convincingly brought
north magnet pole and a positive electric charge, and so home to me by the solid experimental data offered by the
on.’’ I wasn’t very worried about this. It isn’t even under- UW PEG.44
lined in my copy of Arons. ~I underlined about a fifth of the
sentences in that chapter.! 3. The reproducibility and educational experiments: An
But in January of 1994, the Physics Education Group example from kinematics
~PEG! at the University of Washington reported the results
of a study of engineering students’ responses to being taught In order for educational experiments to be useful in build-
about magnets.42 Traditionally, many teachers and textbook ing a community map, they need to generalize from the test
writers assume, just as I did, that students know little about
the subject, so a good way to introduce it is by analogy with
electric charge, the topic typically presented just before mag-
netism. The Washington PEG demonstrated that before the
lectures on magnetism, more than 80% of their engineering
students confused electric charges and magnetic poles as
measured by the simple problem shown in Fig. 3. After tra-
ditional instruction, this number remained above 50%. I was
both flabbergasted and distressed at hearing this. I had taught
the subject off and on for nearly 25 years and was teaching it
at the time of the presentation. I furthermore believed that I
listen carefully to students, and I was already sensitized to
the issue that students bring in previous knowledge. Yet I
had never imagined such a confusion was common. I probed
my class upon my return and, needless to say, found exactly
the same results as the Washington group.
Now the Arons book is still one of the best ‘‘teacher-to-
teacher’’ books available. Arons shares the insights and
tricks he has learned from his extensive and insightful expe- Fig. 5. Error rates on the problem shown in Fig. 4.

568 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 67, No. 7, July 1999 Edward F. Redish 568
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 reported from lectures at other universities. ~My results are
given as the first and second bars for each question in Fig. 5.
Note that error rate is reported rather than the success rate.!
On the other hand, I was very pleased with the robustness of
the result. I had expected to do better, but failing that, I had
at least expected some large fluctuations as a result of the
different emphasis between my lectures and those of other
faculty. This was exhilarating—just as in my freshman lab
when I measured g with a long pendulum and got the answer
in the textbook.
The next time I taught the course was two years later. I
had just completed a sabbatical with Lillian McDermott’s
group at the University of Washington, had learned her
guided-discovery model, and was trying a first implementa-
Fig. 6. Gaussian fit to histogram of FCI gains in traditional, tutorial, group tion of a set of tutorials they had developed. I decided to
problem solving ~GPS!, and workshop physics classes at eight institutions.
replace her velocity tutorial by one that drew on Thornton
and Sokoloff’s constructivist labs. So instead of 2 21 hours of
lecture and one hour of recitation, I gave my students one
population to a broader group. Our previous examples hinted hour of lecture and one hour of MBL tutorial. The result was
at the generalizability of narrow studies. In the first example a striking improvement over my best lecture efforts ~the third
I was able to extend our interview results on waves from a bar in each question! even if it wasn’t as good as four hours
small number of students to my whole class. In the second of lab ~the fourth bar!.
example, the McDermott charge/magnet results extended These results not only demonstrate the repeatability of the
from the University of Washington to my own class at Mary- Thornton and Sokoloff measurements, they demonstrate the
land. But I became firmly convinced of the robustness of effectiveness of their technique in a reasonably well-
some education research as the result of an experience I had controlled experiment.
when teaching engineering physics in the early ’90s.
In 1991 I taught the engineering physics class for the first
4. Testing the effectiveness of curricula built on the
time. ~I had frequently taught a smaller class for physics
principles of scientific constructivism
majors and the large algebra-based introductory class.! Be-
fore beginning the class, I read Thornton and Sokoloff’s pa- The first three examples ~and many others to be found in
per in which they claimed that traditional lectures failed to the research literature! demonstrate that researching students’
help students learn to interpret the concept of instantaneous real difficulties and designing learning environments to deal
velocity.45 The students of traditional lecturers in six col- with those difficulties can be quite effective in helping stu-
leges and universities with a variety of teaching styles did dents learn specific concepts. But what about more broadly?
rather poorly on a simple question that asked them to match Can the principles of scientific constructivism and the fledg-
the description of a one-dimensional motion with a velocity ling elements of our common educational map help us create
graph. The problem is given in Fig. 4. Thornton and Sokoloff effective curricula? How could we begin to tell if these cur-
also claimed that two two-hour laboratories designed using ricula improve on traditional instruction?
constructivist principles solved the difficulty for most stu- As part of his dissertation research,46 Jeff Saul compared
dents. In these labs, students used sonic rangers and micro- student learning of mechanics in traditional ~lecture
computer data acquisition to display position and velocity 1recitation! first-semester calculus-based physics with three
graphs of their own motions. Guiding questions required that constructivist curricula. In two of them, McDermott’s Tuto-
the students make predictions as to what the graphs would rials and Heller’s Group Problem Solving ~GPS!, the recita-
look like, carry out the experiments, and reflect on their own tion is replaced by a group-learning activity ~one hour per
thinking. week!. In one, Law’s Workshop Physics, lecture, lab, and
I was skeptical of this result for two reasons. First, I was recitation are combined into three two-hour guided-
sure that I could teach the subject in lecture. After all, it discovery lab sessions per week. All three of these curricula
wasn’t very difficult, and I had great confidence in my ability rely heavily on the growing community-consensus knowl-
to make things clear. Second, I felt that four extra hours of edge base in physics education.
instruction gave the students with lab too much of an advan- Saul evaluated implementations of these curricula at 14
tage. I thought I would try it myself. colleges and universities. He collected data from a total of 14
When we came to the topic of velocity, I prepared 2 21 different classes with more than 3000 students. Many kinds
hours of lecture on the subject. Although it was a large class of data were collected, including the results of open-ended
~about 175 students!, I tried to make sure most of the stu- exam questions, problem interviews, attitude surveys, and a
dents were mentally engaged. I wrote clear definitions on the conceptual survey. Due to space limitations I will only dis-
board and walked a pattern and made them graph it in their cuss the last of these here.
notebooks. I gave examples that were realistic and related to One of the tools Saul used in his evaluation of student
their experience. I used our high quality demonstration learning was the Force Concept Inventory ~FCI!.47 This is a
equipment—including the equipment Thornton and Sokoloff 29-item multiple-choice test carefully designed on the basis
used in their labs. And then I gave their problem on my of student interviews and published research to probe student
mid-semester exam. understandings of the basic concepts of Newtonian dynam-
The results were both humbling and elating. Despite my ics. The questions are qualitative, are mostly phrased in com-
best efforts in lectures, the results my students obtained were mon speech rather than as abstract physics problems, and
very close to the six-school average Thornton and Sokoloff have distractors based on the most common student errors.

569 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 67, No. 7, July 1999 Edward F. Redish 569
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 Faculty looking at this test tend to significantly overestimate partment or even another college raises the bar. Second, the
their students’ success on this test after instruction. primary benefits of physics education research, improved
Studies of many classes by Hake48 suggest that an appro- learning, increased satisfaction, and sometimes even in-
priate figure of merit for success on this test is the fraction of creased enrollments, accrue to the physics department di-
the possible gain obtained. We write this as rectly. Getting one department in the university to spend
their resources to benefit another department can be difficult.
~ posttest average! 2 ~ pretest average!
h5 . Third, there is significant competition for the limited re-
1002 ~ pretest average! sources of education schools. College level physics educa-
In Saul’s study, he confirmed Hake’s result that traditional tion is a small part of their mandate. Other issues, such as
classes average about a 20% value for h.49 The constructivist K–12 education and topics such as learning reading and
reform curricula do significantly better. The curricula that arithmetic, are just as important as university-level physics
modify only one hour of instruction ~Tutorials and GPS! education and affect much larger audiences.
averaged 37%, while the curriculum that completely replaces But there is a deeper reason for physicists to be involved
lecture with guided-discovery instruction ~Workshop Phys- in physics education research beyond the cultural and politi-
ics! averaged 43%.50 I have displayed these results in a cal. Much of what needs to be done in physics education
somewhat idealized form for easier interpretation by fitting research is very similar in spirit to activities commonly con-
the distributions for each method with a two-parameter sidered to be the purview of physicists.
~mean and width! normalized Gaussian. These are displayed
in Fig. 6. Is it physics?
Saul confirmed the FCI results by more detailed observa-
The four examples of research I described above were
tions of student responses to open-ended exam questions and
done by physicists acting as education researchers and cur-
by interviews. These results demonstrate that curricula de-
riculum developers within physics departments, studying the
veloped based on the community map in physics education
learning of university students. This kind of research effort is
can produce substantial improvements in the average stu-
growing. As of this writing, there are more than two dozen
dent’s concept learning. Most of the institutions tested were
research physics departments that have programs in physics
secondary implementers of the curricula, not developers.
education research. But shouldn’t education research only be
This demonstrates that there is significant transferability of
done in an education school rather than a physics depart-
the curricula tested.
ment? After all, it isn’t physics, is it?
In order to consider the question: ‘‘Is it physics?’’ let me
DISCIPLINE-BASED EDUCATION RESEARCH: begin with my subjective response and then analyze that re-
CULTURAL ISSUES sponse. In the 30 years since I received my Ph.D. in nuclear
physics I’ve seen and done a lot of different kinds of physics.
If we grant that physics education is beginning to use I’ve worked on phenomenology and the development of ab-
the culture of science to create a community-consensus stract mathematical theories. Though I’m a dyed-in-the-wool
knowledge base for physics education, a critical question theorist, I’ve consulted with experimentalists and discussed
still remains. If physics education research is to build a new data and the plan of experiments. I’ve served on na-
community-consensus knowledge base, what community tional committees evaluating proposed research projects and
should build it? Although there is much that is valuable that served as chair of a Department that had funded research
has been created by cognitive scientists and education programs in 14 different areas. I’ve seen the growth of space
specialists, I argue that if physics education research is to physics and biophysics and watched the decline and rebirth
make significant progress in understanding university level of university-based atomic and solid state physics. The re-
physics education it must involve physicists and physics de- search I’m now doing on physics education still feels like
partments. The community building the community map physics to me.
must include the community of those who actually teach But then why do I get so much hassle from a few col-
physics—the physicists. leagues whose first reaction is that I should move to the
Granted that physics education research is interdiscipli- College of Education? ~Most of my colleagues appear quite
nary and applied, is there a reason why it is useful to do it in happy to have me remain in the Physics Department.! I con-
a physics department? Surely it could be done equally well jecture that there are two important reasons. First, because
in an education school, relieving physicists of the need to their imagined picture of what I and my students do, con-
worry about such issues? In principle, the answer could be structed on the basis of their own experience with education
yes. In practice, there are strong reasons that physics educa- schools or newspaper reports of what has been learned from
tion research needs to be done in physics departments—at research in education, is very different from what we actually
least in part. There are three reasons for this: access, benefits, do. Second, because they orient so strongly on creating an
and competition. accurate map ~refer to Fig. 1! that they sometimes forget the
First, education researchers need good access to physics role of the mind in doing physics.
courses and physics students. Research exam questions must
appear on real examinations and new curricula must be Matching the map to the mind
tested with real physics students. This is possible if a re-
searcher in an education school has good relations with a Discovering new physics is like finding new territories to
physics department and is well aware of the many pressures, add to our map. But physicists, even those whose primary
political constraints, and psychological issues involved in the goal is to discover new territory, do other things than cover
development and delivery of every physics course. But it is new ground. Physics is really about building mental maps
often difficult enough for an insider to develop the access that allow us to make sense of the world. To do this we have
needed from his or her colleagues. Being from another de- to create map structures that match not just what happens in

570 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 67, No. 7, July 1999 Edward F. Redish 570
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 physics I am researching leads me to new and better under-
standings of physics that I have learned and taught many
times. One example of this is David Hestenes’s analysis of
the basic ideas of Newtonian mechanics in conjunction with
his study of student difficulties.52 Observation of persistent
student confusions leads to the emphasis of the importance
of what I refer to as Newton’s 0th Law of Motion:
At a time t, an object responds only to forces that
are exerted on it itself at the time t.
Fig. 7. Representation of the process of building a community map of phys- This seems almost trivial—unnecessary to fuss about, un-
ics education. til one observes students ‘‘transferring’’ forces from con-
nected chains of objects ~sometimes correctly, sometimes
not!, or insisting on including the forces the object exerts in
its free-body diagram, or describing a thrown ball as ‘‘using
the physical world but the ways we can comfortably think up the force that was given to it as it rises.’’
about it. Many great advances in physics have arisen from In order to understand what is happening in our physics
folks who rethought things they already knew in a different classes, deep rethinkings of the physics we teach are essen-
way. We’re not just creating the map—we’re optimizing it. tial, but cannot be done entirely within our own heads. As
In his recent book, How Nature Works, Per Bak states physicists, we have been educated to the point that our spon-
‘‘The laws of physics are quite simple. They are expressed in taneous reactions to a word, phrase, equation, or physical
mathematical equations that can all be written down on a situation can be substantially different from that of almost all
couple of notebook pages. However, the mathematics in- of our students—especially at the introductory level. Figur-
volved in solving these equations, even for simple situations, ing out our tacit ~and often unnoticed! assumptions requires
can be quite complicated.’’ 51 This makes the point Bak is both doing physics and understanding the cognitive psychol-
trying to make, since his book focuses on the emergence of ogy of understanding physics. These essential elements make
complex phenomena from simple equations, and it is a state- physics education research a true interdisciplinary part of
ment that I think many physicists would agree with. But we physics.
tend to forget that some of the ‘‘simple’’ equations may have
required years of training for us to be able to interpret. The Barriers to creating the consensus: Education is not just
equations of physics are not just mathematical equations. local
Their interpretation requires building a substantial collection
of spontaneous cognitive constructions ~i.e., learning!. The With the more detailed perspective provided by the above
equations discussion, let’s return to the questions posed at the begin-
ning of this article. Why do we never seem to share and pass
dF50 d * F5 j
down to succeeding generations anything we learn in physics
appear quite simple. Indeed, they only involve six symbols— education? Can we do anything to change this?
fewer than many equations seen in a freshman physics class. I believe the answer is clear. The problem is that many
But even many professional physicists will not recognize physics departments believe they have to create their own
Maxwell’s equations expressed using differential forms and solutions. Worse yet, within a single department, each indi-
may well require weeks of additional education before they vidual physics instructor often wants to have complete free-
can learn to disentangle the familiar electric and magnetic dom in constructing and delivering his or her own class.
fields and their sources from this highly condensed notation. Sharing of experiences and insights is rare even among fac-
A whole range of great advances, including Newton’s in- ulty teaching the same course in succeeding years, especially
vention of the calculus, Hamilton’s reformulation of New- at research universities. Treating education as a problem to
ton’s laws, Gibbs’s vector notation, and Feynman’s sum over be handled individually rather than scientifically by the com-
histories, could be brushed off as merely rethinking what munity at large, instead of creating a community-consensus
was already known in other forms. Yet it can convincingly knowledge base, we continue to ~in the felicitous phrase of
be argued that each of these great reformulations played ma- Arnold Arons! ‘‘reinvent the flat tire.’’
jor roles in facilitating substantial advances and the creation In Fig. 7, instead of having a tightly interacting commu-
of new physics. nity to purge wishful thinking and build an accurate and
In order to do the best physics education research, we not robust community map, we have a loose group of weakly
only have to create an understanding of how people think, interacting individuals. No consensus emerges and the series
thereby possibly creating new cognitive science, we have to fails to converge. We individually think we know some
rethink/reformulate the physics in order to understand cogni- things, but until we get into the habit of testing that knowl-
tive elements we take for granted but which our students edge, finding out and evaluating what other people know,
lack. and in general asking ‘‘How do we know this and why do we
At this point, physics education research is a highly ap- believe it?’’ we will not be able to cumulate and progress.
plied field focusing largely on our most important problem: The missing element in building a robust knowledge base
teaching introductory physics to nonphysicists. We spend a for physics education is the process and culture of science.
lot of time redesigning our map, optimizing it for students The growing community of physics education researchers,
who don’t possess our training or experience. We don’t yet both in physics departments and in education schools, who
have reformulations of our way of thinking about physics are applying the process of science to the problem and the
that lead to new physics, and it may be a long while before growing interest in physics education research are important
we get one. But I consistently find that the rethinking of the steps in remedying this situation.

571 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 67, No. 7, July 1999 Edward F. Redish 571
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 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Clement, Andrea diSessa, David Hammer, Pat Heller, Peter Hewson, and
Alan Schonfeld, among others,. For specific references to work on physics
education by both physicists and educators, see L. C. McDermott and E. F.
I am very grateful to the many colleagues and individuals
Redish, ‘‘Resource Letter on Physics Education Research,’’ Am. J. Phys.
who read and commented on this paper. I am particularly ~to be published!.
grateful to Janice Redish and David Hammer who made ex- 20
E. F. Redish, ‘‘Implications of cognitive studies for teaching physics,’’
tensive suggestions on this manuscript. The support of the Am. J. Phys. 62, 796–803 ~1994!.
National Science Foundation is gratefully acknowledged. 21
D. Halliday and R. Resnick, Physics ~Wiley, New York, 1961!.
22
Astronaut and astrophysicist George Nelson has remarked: ‘‘Education is
not rocket science—it’s much harder.’’ Shaping the Future Conference,
University System of Maryland, College Park, MD, Nov. 30, 1998.
23
Zeno’s paradox is an old proof that motion is impossible. To reach any
1
R. A. Millikan, Mechanics Molecular Physics and Heat ~Ginn, Boston,
distance you must first go halfway. To cover the second half of the re-
1903!, p. 3.
2 maining distance you must go half the remaining way, etc. To go any
P. Laws, ‘‘Millikan Lecture 1996: Promoting active learning based on
distance you must therefore cover infinitely many distances. Since this is
physics education research in introductory physics courses,’’ Am. J. Phys.
obviously ~sic!! impossible in a finite time, you cannot cover any finite
65, 14–21 ~1996!.
3 distance in a finite time, hence motion is impossible.
R. A. Millikan, The Electron, Its Isolation and Measurement and the De- 24
Except, in the case of the sine function, for a discrete set of particular
termination of Some of its Properties ~Univ. of Chicago, Chicago, 1917!.
4 angles where the result can be calculated exactly.
There is a more subtle interpretation to the Phillips quote. Even if we have 25
W. Thirring, Classical Field Theory ~Springer, New York, NY, 1979!, pp.
solved a physics education problem, because physics education depends
87–99; P. Dirac ‘‘Classical theory of radiating electrons,’’ Proc. R. Soc.
on the experiences of both students and teachers, the problems are a ~for-
London 167, 148–169 ~1938!.
tunately slowly! moving target. 26
An excellent discussion of these difficulties can be found in A. Cromer,
5
L. Carroll, Sylvie and Bruno ~Garland, New York, 1976!, p. 265.
6 Connected Knowledge ~Oxford U.P., Oxford, 1997!.
Mathematically, this is even true of a sphere, which cannot be mapped by 27
The problem occurs when a physical system we are supposed to be mea-
a single nonsingular map to a Euclidean plane. See, for example, H.
suring permits a number of different results. If we describe the system of
Flanders, Differential Forms, with Applications to the Physical Sciences
~Academic, New York, 1963!. observer1apparatus1system to be measured by a quantum wave function,
7
Though note that a more accurate map is not necessarily more useful. A the time evolution of the state will lead to a wave function in which the
map constructed from aerial photographs can be very difficult to read. A system to be observed, the apparatus, and the observer all simultaneously
map is more useful if it is constructed with an appropriate level of abstrac- coexist in states having different results. See, for example, John Gribben,
tion. Those New Yorkers ‘‘of a certain age,’’ will recall the old subway In Search of Schrödinger’s Cat ~Bantam Books, New York, 1985!.
28
maps—embedded on a realistic map of the city with correct relative dis- Some approaches that have been considered include the randomization of
tances. The current subway maps are more symbolic, emphasizing the uncontrollable phases and the coherent build up of minuscule time-
different lines and their topological relationships rather than accurately irreversible pieces of the Hamiltonian over macroscopic times leading to
represented distances. collapse of the wave packet, among others.
29
8
If you take two functions from far enough out in the sequence they will be The use of constructivism in education has bifurcated into a wide variety
as close together everywhere as you want. ~Given any «.0 there is an N of groups, with acrimonious arguments as to who are the ‘‘true’’ construc-
such that if m,n.N, i f n (x)2 f m (x) i ,« for all x.! tivists. Among this panoply of competing views there are some similar to
9
This is called completing a Hilbert space. See, for example, M. Reed and those we describe here. See, for example, D. I. Dykstra, Jr., C. F. Boyle,
B. Simon, Methods of Mathematical Physics: Functional Analysis ~Aca- and I. A. Monarch, ‘‘Studying Conceptual Change in Learning Physics,’’
demic, New York, 1980!, p. 7. Science Education 76 ~6!, 615–652 ~1992!; E. von Glasersfeld, ‘‘A Con-
10
Other goals are possible, such as helping an individual teacher understand structivist Approach to Teaching,’’ in Constructivism in Education, edited
the effectiveness of a particular educational innovation in her own class- by L. P. Steffe and J. Gale ~Erlbaun, Hillsdale, NJ, 1995!, pp. 3–16.
30
room. L. C. McDermott and the Physics Education Group at the University of
11
We try to make experiments as similar as possible, but it is not, of course, Washington, Physics by Inquiry, Vols. I and II ~Wiley, New York, 1996!.
31
possible ever to reproduce an experiment exactly—even if the identical L. C. McDermott, P. S. Shaffer, and the Physics Education Group at the
apparatus is used. These small variations help us understand what vari- University of Washington, Tutorials in Introductory Physics ~Prentice-
ables are important ~e.g., the colored stripes on the resistors! and which are Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ, 1998!.
not ~e.g., the color of the insulation on the wires!.
32
P. Laws, Workshop Physics Activity Guide ~Wiley, New York, 1997!.
12
Note from this example that wishful thinking does not necessarily imply a
33
R. Thornton and D. Sokoloff, Tools for Scientific Thinking ~Vernier Soft-
rosy view of a situation. It may be that the wishful thinking is that ‘‘the ware, Ortland, OR, 1995!; D. Sokoloff, P. Laws, and R. Thornton, Real
situation is so bad that there is nothing II can do about it and therefore I Time Physics ~Wiley, New York, 1998!.
34
don’t have to make an effort.’’ K. Wosilait, P. R. L. Heron, P. S. Shaffer, and L. C. McDermott, ‘‘Devel-
13
Plato, ‘‘Meno,’’ in The Dialogues of Plato, Volume One, translated by B. opment and assessment of a research-based tutorial on light and shadow,’’
Jowett ~Random House, New York, 1937!, pp. 349–380. Am. J. Phys. 66, 906–913 ~1998!.
35
14
H. Gardner, The Mind’s New Science: A History of the Cognitive Revolu- B. Thacker, E. Kim, K. Trefz, and S. M. Lea, ‘‘Comparing problem solv-
tion ~Basic Books, New York, 1987!. ing performance of physics students in inquiry-based and traditional intro-
15
This idea, in fact, goes back to Descartes. What Piaget added was the ductory physics courses,’’ Am. J. Phys. 62, 627–633 ~1994!.
36
empirical observations that document the result in detail. See, for example, These are similar to constraints in medical research.
37
the discussion of Descartes’ work in S. Savage-Rumbaugh et al., Apes, In a demonstration interview a student is shown a physical apparatus and
Language, and the Human Mind ~Oxford U.P., New York, 1998!, p. 90. asked to explain what they think will happen in a particular circumstance.
16 Such interviews were used by Piaget and have become a crucial element in
A wonderful example of what happens when the brain doesn’t work prop-
erly to create the idea of objects from visual images is given in the title the observations of McDermott and her colleagues.
case study in O. Sacks, The Man Who Mistook his Wife for a Hat ~Pan
38
In a think-aloud protocol a student is presented a task ~such as a physics
Books, London, 1985!. problem to solve! and asked to ‘‘think out loud.’’ See K. Ericsson and H.
17
R. Van der Veer and J. Valsiner, The Vygotsky Reader ~Blackwell, Oxford, Simon, Protocol Analysis: Verbal Reports as Data (Revised Edition)
UK, 1994!; D. W. Johnson, R. T. Johnson, and E. J. Holubec, Circles of ~MIT, Cambridge, MA, 1993!.
39
Learning: Cooperation in the Classroom ~Interaction Book, Edina, MN, This is a common problem even at the University level and is well known
1993!. to math education researchers. See, for example, S. Vinner, and T. Drey-
18
P. S. Churchland and T. J. Sejnowski, The Computational Brain ~MIT, fus, ‘‘Images and definitions for the concept of a function,’’ Journal for
Cambridge, MA, 1992!. Research in Mathematics Education 20 ~4!, 356–366 ~1989!.
19 40
In addition to the work discussed below by physicists, I have found the M. Wittmann, ‘‘Making sense of how students come to an understanding
work of many researchers in the education community to be of great value of physics: An example from mechanical waves,’’ Ph.D. dissertation, Uni-
in understanding what is happening in my classes, in particular, John versity of Maryland, 1998.

572 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 67, No. 7, July 1999 Edward F. Redish 572
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 41
A. Arons, A Guide to Introductory Physics Teaching ~Wiley, New York, Courses Through the Hidden Curriculum,’’ Ph.D. Dissertation, University
1990!. of Maryland, 1998
42 47
P. A. Krause, P. S. Shaffer, and L. C. McDermott, ‘‘Using research on D. Hestenes, M. Wells, and G. Swackhammer, ‘‘Force Concept Inven-
student understanding to guide curriculum development: An example from tory,’’ Phys. Teach. 30 ~3!, 141–158 ~1992!.
electricity and magnetism,’’ AAPT Announcer 25, 77 ~Dec., 1995!. 48
R. R. Hake, ‘‘Interactive-engagement vs traditional methods: A six-
43
Arons does include citations to education research, especially in the sec- thousand-student survey of mechanics test data for introductory physics
tions on mechanics, but the book focuses on raising issues and offering
courses,’’ Am. J. Phys. 66, 64–74 ~1998!.
solutions, not documenting them. 49
44 It was important to confirm this since Hake solicited results after the fact
Note further that this result had been known previously and even pub-
lished, but not in a journal which I looked at regularly or which was and those classes with poor results might have chosen not to report them.
50
conveniently available. D. P. Maloney, ‘‘Charged poles,’’ Physics Educa- The Workshop Physics classes tested were early secondary implementa-
tion 20, 310–316 ~1985!. tions. The well-established primary implementation at Dickinson College
45
R. K. Thornton and D. R. Sokoloff, ‘‘Learning motion concepts using consistently scores well above this level.
real-time microcomputer-based laboratory tools,’’ Am. J. Phys. 58, 858–
51
P. Bak, How Nature Works ~Springer Verlag, New York, 1996!.
52
867 ~1990!. D. Hestenes, ‘‘Modeling games in the Newtonian world,’’ Am. J. Phys.
46
J. M. Saul, ‘‘Beyond Problem Solving, Evaluating Introductory Physics 60, 732–748 ~1992!.

TOTAL DIFFERENTIALS
Levi-Civita’s course on rational mechanics was poorly attended, although the professor was
famous and the lectures were good, even if slightly verbose. Levi-Civita was very short and also
short-sighted; nevertheless, he strove to reach the top of the blackboard, putting his nose very
close to it, raising his arm, and writing blind. In this position, he was once struck on the back of
the head by a missile from the peashooter of some nasty student. Levi-Civita turned around and,
with the most innocent expression, asked: ‘‘Have I written a wrong sign?’’ His candor and good
faith were so obvious that nobody laughed, and no peashooter ever dared disturb him again. For
many months we heard the simplifications that occur in mechanics if F3d P is a total differential
without the professor ever explaining what a total differential was, and without us ever asking.

Emilio Segrè, A Mind Always in Motion—The Autobiography of Emilio Segrè ~University of California Press, Berkeley,
1993!, pp. 38–39.

573 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 67, No. 7, July 1999 Edward F. Redish 573
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