Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Mapcores 2012-2013 Assessment Report, Kristen Nairn, Pamela L. Bacon, Jim Crumley, Lynn Ziegler

MapCores Faculty Publications

This is a report showing the assessment results for the MapCores (MAthematics, Physics, COmputer science REsearch Scholars) program at the College of Saint Benedict. Started in 2009, MapCores is a cohort-based program designed to increase women's interest and achievement in mathematics, physics, computer science and engineering. The report was submitted for the National Science Foundation grant number 0965705.

A Data Generating Review That Bops, Twists And Pulls At Misconceptions, Kimberly Gardner

Faculty Articles

Statistics is an integral part of the K-12 mathematics curriculum (age 5-18). Naturally, students construct misconceptions of what they learn. This article discusses The Bop It^© Challenge, a review activity assesses student understanding and reveals their misundertandings of statistical concepts.

Iowa Academy Of Science: The New Bulletin, V09n1, Spring 2013, Iowa Academy Of Science

New Bulletin

Inside This Issue:

--Message from the Executive Director

--Seeking Project WET Facilitators

--125th Annual Meeting of the Iowa Academy of Science

--Candidates for IAS President –Elect

--Iowa Academy of Science 2013 Ballot

--Announcements, Events & Deadlines

--2012 Member Donations to the Academy

--Ag Energy Webinars

Variation Of Instructor-Student Interactions In An Introductory Interactive Physics Course, Emily West, Cassandra Paul, David Webb, Wendell Potter

Faculty Publications

The physics instruction at UC Davis for life science majors takes place in a long-standing reformed large-enrollment physics course in which the discussion or laboratory instructors (primarily graduate student teaching assistants) implement the interactive-engagement (IE) elements of the course. Because so many different instructors participate in disseminating the IE course elements, we find it essential to the instructors’ professional development to observe and document the student-instructor interactions within the classroom. Out of this effort, we have developed a computerized real-time instructor observation tool (RIOT) to take data of student-instructor interactions. We use the RIOT to observe 29 different instructors for …

Energy In Japan 日本のエネルギー, Mario Yuuji Harper

Mario Yuuji Harper

A simple explanation of energy uses and their import costs for Japan in 2010. Given more as an exercise in English than as an academic presentation.

Developing A Stem Teacher Recruitment Pipeline, Kimberly Shaw, Cindy Ticknor, Tim Howard

Interdisciplinary STEM Teaching & Learning Conference (2012-2019)

The Columbus Region Academy of Future Teachers of STEM (CRAFT-STEM), a Phase I Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program, combines internships and scholarships, an exciting summer STEM Honors Camp, a new Teaching Connections Seminar, and an impressive array of existing resources to recruit, prepare, and graduate an increasing number of STEM teachers committed to serving high need high schools.

Integrating Manipulatives To Improve Fraction Concepts, Rachel Dunn

Interdisciplinary STEM Teaching & Learning Conference (2012-2019)

The aim of this session is to demonstrate the tools used to help reinforce and recreate students’ conceptual knowledge of fractions, specifically targeting the unit of reference. These manipulatives will provide teachers with instructional support for Common Core Standards, which emphasize critical thinking skills and various representations of knowledge, specifically with fractions. Participants will become actively engaged in learning about these tools, including jumping on a number line floor mat, working with circular fraction pieces and placing fractions on a number line rope. By representing knowledge through circular and linear methods, students will use critical thinking skills and support will …

Creating A Faculty Learning Community To Support Scholarship Of Teaching And Learning Among Stem University Faculty, Cher C. Hendricks, Myrna Gantner

Interdisciplinary STEM Teaching & Learning Conference (2012-2019)

In this session, we describe the creation of a Faculty Learning Community for university faculty in science, mathematics, and computer science. These faculty, recipients of mini-grants funded by the USG STEM Initiative, are studying ways to improve their instruction and increase student learning in STEM courses. Through the FLC, they are able to collaborate and support each others’ work.

Joining & Using Google Plus Communities: Georgia Stem Teaching & Learning Conference Community, Daniel Rivera

Interdisciplinary STEM Teaching & Learning Conference (2012-2019)

The 2nd Annual Georgia STEM Teaching & Learning Conference has chosen Google Plus Communities as the designated tool for encouraging communication among university faculty, K-12 teachers & administrators, research institutions, and businesses. The purpose of this session is to show participants how to get connected and then how to use Google Plus Communities for collaboration.

Research Participants Discuss Stem Conference Participation And Impacton Thinking And Practice, Colleen Beyer, Thomas Koballa, Delena Bell Gatch, Leslie S. Jones, Sharmistha Basu-Dutt, Farooq Khan

Interdisciplinary STEM Teaching & Learning Conference (2012-2019)

Last spring, Georgia Southern University hosted its first Scholarship of STEM Teaching and Learning conference. Conference participants were asked to respond to a survey and a subset of participants was selected for an in-depth study. In this session, an overview of the research project will be presented and current research participants will discuss the impact of conference participation on their thinking and practice.

I2StemE - What, Who, Where?, Kania Greer, Bob Mayes

Interdisciplinary STEM Teaching & Learning Conference (2012-2019)

I²STEM^e is a new Institute on the campus of GSU whose focus is to increase opportunities for K-20 students, teachers, and businesses to partner together to improve STEM Education in Georgia around the tenets of place-based learning, problem based learning and teaching for understanding.

Trig-Star, James M. Anderson

Interdisciplinary STEM Teaching & Learning Conference (2012-2019)

A TRIG-STAR is a mathematics student who has demonstrated in competition that he or she is the most skilled among classmates in the practical application of trigonometry. The competition for the honor is a timed exercise which is the solving of a trigonometry problem that incorporates the use of right triangle formulas, circle formulas, the law of sines, and the law of cosines. The contest helps to promote careers in surveying and mapping to students at the High Schools across the country. The award is sponsored by the National Society of Professional Surveyors and cosponsored locally. State winners also have …

Integrating Manipulatives To Improve Fraction Concepts, Rachel Dunn

Interdisciplinary STEM Teaching & Learning Conference (2012-2019)

Many students are overwhelmed by mathematics because the language is too difficult, the teaching strategies are insufficient or they have lost motivation. With a recent emphasis on meeting the Common Core expectations, using manipulatives to eliminate misconceptions in the mathematical classroom has become even more prevalent. I explored the misconceptions that many students struggle with and provided possible methods of eliminating them at all levels for learning. During this investigation, I studied the effect of manipulatives on students’ understanding of fraction concepts and the students’ conceptions of the unit of reference when working with fraction word problems. I learned that …

Building, Refining & Defining Stem Learning Outcomes: K-16 Implications, Richard A. Duschl

Interdisciplinary STEM Teaching & Learning Conference (2012-2019)

The July 2012 release of the National Research Council Framework for K-12 Science Education: Practices, Crosscutting Concepts and Core Ideas heralds ‘a new vision of science in education.’ The Framework sets out a comprehensive agenda for the reform of science and engineering education coordinated around 3 Dimensions: Science & Engineering Practices, Crosscutting Concepts, and Core Ideas. While the Framework’s central mission is to impact K-12 education through implementation of the Next Generation Science Standards, there are important but less understood implications for higher education, informal science education and publics’ understandings of science communication efforts. In this talk, I will provide …

Session E-1: Hiding In Plain Sight, Micah Fogel

Professional Learning Day

Were the plays of William Shakespeare really written by Francis Bacon, who left a coded signature in plain sight? Can spies send messages without using codes and without getting caught? Steganography is the art of hiding messages in plain sight but in a way so that only those in on the secret can find them. We'll learn a few tricks about how to hide messages in pieces of text or sound and image files on a computer.

Introducing Computer Science In An Integrated Science Course, Barry Lawson, Doug Szajda, Lewis Barnett Iii

Department of Math & Statistics Faculty Publications

This paper describes our implementation and experience of incorporating computer science concepts into a team-taught, first-year interdisciplinary course for prospective science majors at the University of Richmond. The course integrates essential concepts from each of five STEM disciplines: biology, chemistry, computer science, mathematics, and physics. Including computer science in this course faces three primary challenges: few of the students have any CS background; the time devoted to CS instruction is reduced compared to a traditional introductory CS course; and the spirit of the course requires the CS material to be highly integrated with the other disciplines. Here we discuss our …

Application Of The Cognitive Apprenticeship Framework To A Middle School Robotics Camp, Brian Larkins, James Christopher Moore, Louis J. Rubbo, Laura Covington

Chris Moore

The International Trafficking In Arms Regulations: Precluding Innovation In Academic Spacecraft Engineering — Or Are They?, Jeremy Straub, Joe Vacek

Jeremy Straub

Government regulations and uncertainty about their enforcement can be a significant barrier to innovation. In business, it is undesirable to consume time and other resources developing a product that cannot be sold or which requires navigating significant bureaucracy for each sale. In academ-ia, where limited funding is available prior to the submission of a grant pro-posal and receipt of an award, proposal-stage compliance costs can derail a project long before it begins. This paper reviews the International Traffick-ing in Arms Regulations (ITAR) and their impact on spacecraft research in academia, private research labs and industry. It reviews the exemptions available, …

Teaching The Complex Numbers: What History And Philosophy Of Mathematics Suggest, Emily R. Grosholz

Journal of Humanistic Mathematics

The narrative about the nineteenth century favored by many philosophers of mathematics strongly influenced by either logic or algebra, is that geometric intuition led real and complex analysis astray until Cauchy and Kronecker in one sense and Dedekind in another guided mathematicians out of the labyrinth through the arithmetization of analysis. Yet the use of geometry in most cases in nineteenth century mathematics was not misleading and was often key to important developments. Thus the geometrization of complex numbers was essential to their acceptance and to the development of complex analysis; geometry provided the canonical examples that led to the …

The Lesson Of Grace In Teaching, Francis Su

All HMC Faculty Publications and Research

I want to talk about the biggest life lesson that I have learned, and that I continue to learn over and over again. It is deep and profound. It has changed the way I relate with people. It has reshaped my academic life. And it continually renovates the way I approach my students.

Horizon Content Knowledge In The Work Of Teaching: A Focus On Planning, Nick Wasserman, Julianna Connelly Stockton

Mathematics Faculty Publications

Horizon content knowledge, one component of Ball et al.’s mathematical knowledge for teaching framework (e.g., Ball, Thames, & Phelps, 2008), has yet to reach adequate clarity and consensus in the field. Recently, various scholars have worked to further conceptualize and describe the mathematical horizon (e.g., Jakobsen, Thames & Ribeiro, 2013; Figueiras et al., 2011; Zazkis & Mamolo, 2011). In this communication, we identify some limitations in the ways such knowledge has thus far been described and offer an additional form of potential impact of horizon content knowledge on the work of teaching.

Fostering Student Sense Making In Elementary Science Learning Environments: Elementary Teachers’ Use Of Science Curriculum Materials To Promote Explanation Construction, Laura Zangori, Cory Forbes, Mandy Biggers

School of Natural Resources: Faculty Publications

While research has shown that elementary (K-5) students are capable of engaging in the scientific practice of explanation construction, commonly-used elementary science curriculum materials may not always afford them opportunities to do so. As a result, elementary teachers must often adapt their science curriculum materials to better support students’ explanation construction and foster student sense making. However, little research has been conducted to explore if and, if so, how and why, elementary teachers modify science curriculum materials to engage students in explanation construction. We use an embedded mixed methods research design to explore elementary teachers’ (n = 45) curricular adaptations …

Journal Of Mathematics And Science: Collaborative Explorations

Journal of Mathematics and Science: Collaborative Explorations

No abstract provided.

Scientific Argumentation As A Foundation For The Design Of Inquiry-Based Science Instruction, A. Falk, L. Brodsky

Journal of Mathematics and Science: Collaborative Explorations

Despite the attention that inquiry has received in science education research and policy, a coherent means for implementing inquiry in the classroom has been missing [1]. In recent research, scientific argumentation has received increasing attention for its role in science and in science education [2]. In this article, we propose that organizing a unit of instruction around building a scientific argument can bring inquiry practices together in the classroom in a coherent way. We outline a framework for argumentation, focusing on arguments that are central to science—arguments for the best explanation. We then use this framework as the basis for …

Inquiry Teaching: It Is Easier Than You Think!, S. Key, D. Owens

Journal of Mathematics and Science: Collaborative Explorations

This article is a survey of the literature on inquiry teaching. Many teachers do not participate in inquiry teaching for various reasons. The following are the main reasons: it takes too much time; students do not learn what they need for the state test; and, the teachers do not know how to grade projects and presentations. These reasons sound like rhetoric from long ago, but it is very current. In this article, research is used to show that students who participate in inquiry learning or any type of problem-based education do much better than students who do not have that …

Strong Support For Mathematics Specialists In Virginia, J. Singleton, D. Blount

Journal of Mathematics and Science: Collaborative Explorations

No abstract provided.

Student Success In Subsequent Mathematics Courses After Taking Ma 004, Andrea Winchester

Summer Community of Scholars Posters (RCEU and HCR Combined Programs)

No abstract provided.

Distractions In Programming Evironments, Raina Mason, Graham Cooper

Raina Mason

No abstract provided.

Executive Summary — Teaching About Scientific Inquiry And The Nature Of Science

Journal of Mathematics and Science: Collaborative Explorations

No abstract provided.

Students Talk About Energy In Project- Based Inquiry Science, Benedikt W. Harrer, Virginia J. Flood, Michael C. Wittmann

Faculty Publications

We examine the types of emergent language eighth grade students in rural Maine middle schools use when they discuss energy in their first experiences with Project-Based Inquiry Science: Energy, a research-based curriculum that uses a specific language for talking about energy. By comparative analysis of the language used by the curriculum materials to students’ language, we find that students’ talk is at times more aligned with a Stores and Transfer model of energy than the Forms model supported by the curriculum.