Elizabeth Whitelegg

Real-life contexts for learning physics: meanings, issues and practice

This paper examines the issue of learning physics content through real-life contexts and focuses on the context of energy. It firstly examines a variety of meanings of context-based learning and then considers two projects, one from the UK and the other from Australia, which use a context-based learning approach.

Beyond the Laboratory - Learning Physics Using Real-Life Contexts

This project is investigating ‘use of knowledge’ by students who are involved in a course where knowledge is taught, in specific contexts taken from life outside and inside school, but beyond the laboratory. In order to investigate this, the research is examining how successful students are in conventional exams where real world contexts are trivialised and laboratory/school contexts dominate, and compare this with an assessment, where context varies but is not trivialised and is real world. In particular, the research is investigating, how effectively students are able to transfer their learning of physics concepts across the differing, real-life contexts found in the Supported Learning in Physics Programme (SLIPP), and, finally, onto a non-contextual situation such as an examination question. This paper focuses on the initial study, which is part of an on-going research project. It reports on students attitudes to learning physics at post-16 level, through a real-life context approach as revealed through interviews and observation. It also considers preliminary data on the effect on student learning using context rich and context poor assessments.

The Supported Learning in Physics Project

The Supported Learning in Physics Project will provide a text-based learning programme for post-16 students, covering the common and extension cores of A-level and some GNVQ Advanced Science and Engineering programmes. It introduces self-study techniques to help students to develop into independent learners whilst being supported by their teachers and lecturers in schools and college and teaches the physics content through case studies taken from real-life contexts.

The legacy and impact of Open University women's/gender studies: 30 years on

In 1983, the UK Open University (OU) offered its first womens/gender studies (WGS) course. Although a late entrant to the area, OU WGS courses were influential nationally and internationally for many feminists and WGS teachers and scholars. Not only did OU WGS courses have the largest WGS student cohort of any UK institution with over 8000 students in a 17-year period but also because the study guides and course books were sold commercially and used by many other institutions. The courses were produced and taught by a multidisciplinary team formed by the OU employing feminist scholars on secondment from other institutions to work as members of an interdisciplinary team of academics and media professionals. This paper looks at the challenges posed by the OU WGS courses as well as their legacy within the OU and beyond. It illustrates these with the voices of students reflecting on their experience of the courses up to 30 years later. It also argues that it is important to capture the lessons learned from second-wave WGS because these have something useful to say to third-wave feminism.

Girls and Physics: Dilemmas and Tensions

This paper reports on some of the findings from a review of research commissioned by the Institute of Physics into the participation of girls in physics. The review was commissioned in response to concern about the continuing decline in the numbers of girls studying physics post-16 in England. The review includes 177 sources of national and international research literature on the participation of girls in science and in physics and is a narrative review covering 161 pages. The review findings reveal a complex picture of the reasons for girls continuing decline in participation related to their lack of meaningful access to physics which is constrained by a complex web of interactions in girls’ curriculum and assessment experience. When this is combined with perceptions of the representation of physics it results in a reduction in girls’ self-efficacy and self-concept in the subject as they progress through schooling. The review recommends that purposes for studying physics need to be made explicit for girls in particular, and that this should happen within their curriculum experience rather than outside it. Relevance of the subject to girls’ lives outside the classroom is as important as prior knowledge so curriculum interventions and teachers should take this into account. Staff development is needed to help teachers develop strategies to increase the participation of girls and this is particularly important where single sex teaching is used. Long term evaluation of different approaches, further research into the difficulty of physics and access to achievement data is needed

Barriers and constraints: women physicists' perceptions of career progress

Researchers in the area of women in science are trying to understand how the participation of women in science can be increased and also what prevents women from developing scientific careers. Past influential work supports the importance of taking the perspective of womens education and career paths as a whole, emphasizing the importance of structural and social factors in career progress. This paper reports some outcomes from an interview study with women PhD physicists working in a variety of science-related careers. Our aim is to explore and document the career experience of women scientists and to identify barriers and constraints to womens participation in science careers and to investigate ways in which educational experiences contribute to career progress.

Innovatory Educational Models for Women Returners in Science, Engineering and Technology Professions

Women returning to work after a break have been the target of programmes and initiatives within the adult and higher education sectors for many years: they have also been the focus of government concern at times of skills shortages. Often drawing on feminist principles and pedagogies , such initiatives have generally aimed to empower women and raise their awareness of gender issues at the same time as offering skills and training in preparation for employment (Coats 1996; Ellen and Herman 2005; Phipps 2008). The initiative discussed in this chapter has its roots in these traditions but, by using an online environment, the government has been able to offer a new programme to a wider and more diversely distributed target group, as well as focussing on the needs of a specific group: women already qualified in Science , Engineering or Technology (SET) subject areas.