PHYSICS PROBLEM SOLVING

(^)
and second, aware of how these might prejudice or skew the outcomes of the study.
Throughout this dissertation, I will attempt to explain where I believe I “interacted” with
the data, the method, and the results.
I discovered some interesting aspects about doing this type of research from my
perspective as a physics teacher. Physics by its very nature is exceptionally quantitative.
Initially I tried to answer my research questions using quantitative measures. These
efforts yielded few useful insights. So first I learned to throw away my quantitative
analytical skills and concentrate on qualitative analytical skills. Second, I learned that a
physicist is uniquely qualified to undertake this kind of qualitative research.
Understanding what the students were doing in solving these problems required that I
understand the physics. That understanding came not only from graduate work in
physics, but also from having taught (at Normandale Community College) the same
algebra-based course as the University of Minnesota course used in this study.
RESEARCH CONTEXT AND SETTING
The physics courses used for this study were the two-quarter sequence Physics
1041 and 1042, taught winter and spring quarters 1991, at the University of Minnesota,
by Professor Konrad Mauersberger (now at the Max Planck Institute, Heidelberg). This
algebra-based, introductory course was taken primarily by pre-health science and pre-
architecture students, plus others needing an introductory physics course. The textbook
was Physics: A General Introduction, 2nd Edition, by Alan Van Heuvelen (1986). Each
week, students met for three 50-minute lecture periods, one double-period lab (1 hour, 50
minutes) , and one 50-minute “recitation” period. A given group of students were in the