Recognized as one of the most beautiful experiments of all time, the oil drop experiment performed by Robert Millikan and his graduate students (primarily Harvey Fletcher) is a standard in the repertoire of experiments performed by undergraduate physics students. However, "as a teaching lab it does not enjoy a good reputation for three…

Mobile phones are a widely used platform for educational apps, mobile health, and a variety of chemical tests. Here, we are working on a mobile phone-based physics lab (mPhysics) that uses a mobile phone's capabilities to run simple physics experiments and demonstrations. While a mobile phone can be used to analyze magnetic and optical properties…

Demonstration interviews with 27 high school students (18-19 years old) were conducted in Zagreb, Croatia, using several standard experiments on interference and diffraction of light. Students were asked for their predictions, observations, and explanations of the experiments. In this process, many student difficulties were identified, both…

We report the findings of an empirical study that investigated whether the source of data--firsthand or secondhand data gained from lab work experiments--has an influence on students' learning outcomes. Results indicate that students' choice of a correct or incorrect hypothesis for a pendulum lab experiment on the influence of the mass of the bob…

Enhancing the problem-solving skills of learners belonging to socio-economically disadvantaged groups is a great concern in general and particularly in the Indian context. Problem-solving skills are the most important skills of the 21st century for all learners to acquire necessary competencies. The main purpose of this work is to investigate the…

This study addresses the measurement of high school students' epistemic knowledge associated with scientific experimentation (EKSE) which concerns "how" scientific experimentation generates knowledge and "why" that knowledge is justified. Based on philosophical, educational standards, and literature analyses, an EKSE construct…

As soon as children can see, they observe that objects fall freely. From a young age, we spontaneously construct interpretative models to understand this everyday phenomenon. Over the last three decades, numerous experiments have been developed to help students understand physics concepts regarding free fall. Although there are many…

Several properties of Earth's magnetic field (field vectors, time dependence) are measured in various locations using a smartphone/tablet magnetic sensor. To enable a proper use of the magnetic sensor as a classroom tool, the exact location of the sensor in the device and its resolution must be identified in a first step. Then, students may…

Measuring permeability in a high school physics course has long been a hard task. However, with the advent of using smartphones in the classroom, it is not only possible but even easily done. This paper offers detailed instructions on how to measure permeability using a smartphone's magnetometer, starting with experimentally discovering the…

It is widely recognized that we need to prepare students to think with data. This study investigates student interactions with digital data graphs and seeks to identify what might prompt them to shift toward using their graphs as thinking tools in the authentic activity of doing science. Drawing from video screencast data of three small groups…

Science labs should promote reasoning that resembles the work that scientists do. However, this is often not the case. We present a lab in which students strive to find out which of two models best describes a physics experiment. The quantification of measurement uncertainties--another topic that is often neglected in high school…

This paper presents the case for how students can be helped to increase their scientific vocation by experimental work and the introduction of particle physics into pre-university studies. These two ideas are the two main lines of work of the ADMIRA initiative, which has been created by individuals belonging to different and complementary…

This study was conducted with a student who is visually impaired and questioned the force of gravity. The different stages encountered in the process were specified as steps in the study and it was shared what kind of inquiry form was needed at each step. There are different activities such as waiting for a week and thought experiment in the…

An ordinary soap bubble immersed in a pure carbon-dioxide atmosphere, created e.g. by sublimating chunks of dry ice (solid CO[subscript 2]), will expand within a few minutes to a volume exceeding the original one with a factor of almost ten. Considering that the bubble simultaneously experiences a cooling of ~30 ?C one would perhaps expect a tiny…

Novel technology has been applied to improve students' learning abilities in different disciplines. The research in this field is still finding suitable methodologies, tools, and evaluation mechanisms to devise learning frameworks with high impact on students' performance. This article describes an instructional method to perform Newtonian physics…