Charles Henderson | Western Michigan University (original) (raw)

Papers by Charles Henderson

with a joint appointment between the physics department and the Mallinson Institute for Science E... more with a joint appointment between the physics department and the Mallinson Institute for Science Education. Alvin Rosenthal is an associate professor in the physics department at Western Michigan University. College science teachers know that students get the most out of class if they have completed the assigned reading. To reinforce this expectation, we ask our introductory physics students to submit a question they had about the reading. In this paper we describe the rationale and logistics of this assignment.

Physical Review Special Topics - Physics Education Research

Journal of College Science Teaching, 2010

Absorbance spectrum, Beer's law plot, and kinetics data of crystal violet reaction with NaOH. Sho... more Absorbance spectrum, Beer's law plot, and kinetics data of crystal violet reaction with NaOH. Shown on Logger Pro data acquisition software.

As part of an ongoing study of non-PER physics faculty, we developed a set of dimensions to categ... more As part of an ongoing study of non-PER physics faculty, we developed a set of dimensions to categorize and analyze practices and beliefs related to physics teaching and learning. We have used these dimensions to categorize faculty as well as PER-based curricula. This tool gives us an opportunity to be self-reflective as a discipline. In this talk, we will discuss the development of the dimensions and also identify beliefs and practices that have been advocated by educational reformers in other disciplines, but are not generally found in PER-based curricula.

2012 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), 2012

ABSTRACT Research in Engineering Education has led to the development and dissemination of a numb... more ABSTRACT Research in Engineering Education has led to the development and dissemination of a number of different instructional strategies (such as active learning, problem based learning, and concept tests) contributing to greater student learning in the classroom. However, there is little research to demonstrate how Research Based Instructional Strategies (RBIS) are being propagated from the developers to engineering faculty for use in the classroom. To examine the process of dissemination, this study uses Rogers' Diffusion of Innovation framework, which has traditionally been used to examine the dissemination of technological innovations through a population or organization. Rogers discusses five stages (knowledge, persuasion, decision, implementation, and confirmation) of the innovation-decision process to explain how adopters make a decision about an innovation. To investigate faculty members' participation in the innovation-decision process, we conducted a survey of electrical, computer, and chemical engineering faculty (n = 221) teaching engineering sciences courses. The results show that ECE and ChE faculty members are located at a variety of stages throughout the innovation-decision process. However, most respondents have progressed past the knowledge phase; they are aware of the different RBIS. It is important to account for this when presenting an innovation or trying to encourage adoption of new practices, such as RBIS. It was found that workshops and presentations can influence the trial and use of RBIS when faculty are at the persuasion and decision stages. Also, women are more likely to try and use an RBIS than men. Many of the results found here are consistent with those found in a similar study done in physics education.

Physical Review Special Topics - Physics Education Research, 2013

As part of a larger study to understand instructors' considerations regarding the learning and te... more As part of a larger study to understand instructors' considerations regarding the learning and teaching of problem solving in an introductory physics course, we investigated beliefs of first-year graduate teaching assistants (TAs) regarding the use of example solutions in introductory physics. In particular, we examine how the goal of promoting expert-like problem solving is manifested in the considerations of graduate TAs choices of example solutions. Twenty-four first-year graduate TAs were asked to discuss their goals for presenting example solutions to students. They were also provided with different example solutions and asked to discuss their preferences for prominent solution features. TAs' awareness, preferences and actual practices related to solution features were examined in light of recommendations from the literature for the modeling of expert-like problem solving approaches. The study concludes that the goal of helping students develop an expert-like problem solving approach underlies many TAs' considerations for the use of example solutions. TAs, however, do not notice and do not use many features described in the research literature as supportive of this goal. A possible explanation for this gap between their belief and practices is that these features conflict with another powerful set of values concerned with keeping students engaged, setting adequate standards, as well as pragmatic considerations such as time requirements and the assignment of grades.

Higher Education, 2014

Abstract Calls for improvement of undergraduate science education have resulted in numerous initi... more Abstract Calls for improvement of undergraduate science education have resulted in numerous initiatives that seek to improve student learning outcomes by promoting changes in faculty teaching practices. Although many of these initiatives focus on individual faculty, researchers consider the academic department to be a highly productive focus for creating change. In this paper, we argue that it is important for change agents to understand the informal social structure of the academic department and introduce social network analysis techniques to uncover this social structure. Examples are given from data collected in five academic departments. A short sociometric web survey was used to ask instructors to identify colleagues with whom they discuss teaching and the frequency of their discussions. Techniques of social network analysis are used to determine the current state of the department, target participants for a change initiative, and anticipate the spread of new teaching ideas. Results suggest that these techniques identify informal structures that would otherwise be hidden and that may be important for planning change initiatives.

Despite research documenting the potentially positive impacts of research-based instructional ref... more Despite research documenting the potentially positive impacts of research-based instructional reforms in physics, few high school physics teachers in the US enact them. One of the more successfully disseminated reforms is Modeling Instruction. To discern aspects of this reform that afforded or constrained its dissemination, we analyzed the interviews of five people involved in the development of Modeling Instruction. Our findings are framed within theoretical perspectives from the communities of practice, diffusion of innovations, and leadership.

Journal of Engineering Education, 2014

Community College Review, 2012

American Association of Physics Teachers Winter Meeting, Albuquerque, NM, 2005

Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning, Nov 1, 2012

Consider Professor Smith, who has been working in the chemistry department at Mid-Sized Research ... more Consider Professor Smith, who has been working in the chemistry department at Mid-Sized Research University (MRU) for 15 years. She has been a successful researcher, obtaining grants and publications at about an average rate for her institution. She has also been an innovative teacher who has attended several national conferences related to student-centered chemistry teaching.

Physics education research (PER) is a relatively new and rapidly growing area of Ph.D. specializa... more Physics education research (PER) is a relatively new and rapidly growing area of Ph.D. specialization. To sustain the field of PER, a steady pipeline of talented scholars needs to be developed and supported. One aspect of building this pipeline is understanding how students come to graduate and postdoctoral work in PER and what their career goals are. This paper presents the first study on the experiences and career pathways of students in PER. Data were collected through open-ended interviews with 13 graduate students and postdoctoral scholars in PER. Results show that many of these PER graduate students and postdoctoral scholars were not aware of PER as undergraduates. PER graduate students that were aware of PER as undergraduates chose to study PER as they were applying to graduate schools. The graduate school experiences of the interviewees were overwhelmingly positive, with participants reporting a positive climate that was facilitated by communicative and productive relationships with their advisors. However, some participants reported concerns about the acceptance of PER within some departments, including open hostility towards the field. The majority of participants were interested in pursuing a career as a university faculty member, with more participants preferring a position at a research-intensive university. These results suggest that a further large-scale study of graduate students in PER may be able to highlight the field as being a leader in student mentoring and community development while collecting important demographic information that could show PER to have more gender diversity than other subfields of physics.

Physics education research (PER) is a rapidly growing area of PhD specialization. In this article... more Physics education research (PER) is a rapidly growing area of PhD specialization. In this article we examine the trajectories that led respondents into a PER graduate program as well as their expected future trajectories. Data were collected in the form of an online survey sent to graduate students in PER. Our findings show a lack of visibility of PER as a field of study, a dominance of work at the undergraduate level, and a mismatch of future desires and expectations. We suggest that greater exposure is needed so PER is known as a field of inquiry for graduates, that more emphasis should be placed on research beyond the undergraduate level, and that there needs to be stronger communication to graduate students about potential careers.

It is important for a research community, such as Physics Education Research (PER), to understand... more It is important for a research community, such as Physics Education Research (PER), to understand how much funding it receives and where this funding comes from. During spring 2011, US-based members of the PER community were asked to respond to a web survey to identify funding that supports their research. Results indicate that the total funding base for PER from 2006-2010 (inclusive) is at least 262 grants worth a total of $72.5M.

We previously reported on the results of a national web survey of physics faculty about their ins... more We previously reported on the results of a national web survey of physics faculty about their instructional practices in introductory physics. A subset of 72 survey respondents were interviewed to better characterize how faculty interact with research‐based instructional strategies (RBIS), use RBIS, and perceive their institutional contexts. Drawing from 15 interviews with self‐reported users of Peer Instruction, we describe what faculty mean when they identify themselves as users of Peer Instruction.

Abstract Each year, many engineering faculty members undertake curricular innovation projects, of... more Abstract Each year, many engineering faculty members undertake curricular innovation projects, often with a long-term goal of the innovation becoming mainstream in their department, college, or institution. While the literature on curricular and pedagogical innovation is very large, the knowledge base on which engineering faculty members, who could be viewed as the essential curricular change agents, is smaller and scattered across different disciplines.