Kathleen A. Harper

Student Problem-Solving Behaviors

Kathy Harper is director of undergraduate curriculum development in the physics department at The Ohio State University. She has been involved in local and national workshops for in-service teachers and conducts research in student problem solving.

Cultivating Problem Solving Skills via a New Problem Categorization Scheme

When one looks at STEM disciplines as a whole, the need for effective problem solving skills is a commonality. However, studies indicate that the bulk of students who graduate from problem‐solving intensive programs display little increase in their problem solving abilities. Also, there is little evidence for transfer of general skills from one subject area to another. Furthermore, the types of problems typically encountered in introductory STEM courses do not often cultivate the skills students will need when solving “real‐world” problems. Initial efforts to develop and implement an interdisciplinary problem categorization matrix as a tool for instructional design are described. The matrix, which is independent of content, shows promise as a means for promoting useful problem‐solving discussion among faculty, designing problem‐solving intensive courses, and instructing students in developing real‐world problem solving skills.

Grading without losing all your time (and your mind

One aspect of teaching that most new teachers tend to grossly underestimate is the amount of time that will be spent grading. At least that is my impression, based upon my own experience and that of my friends. Additionally, it can sometimes be difficult to develop grading schemes for particular assignments, and too often this realization happens when one sits down to grade the assignment in question.

Expert‐Novice Comparisons to Illuminate Differences in Perceptions of Problem Solutions

Comparing the performances of experts and novices on particular problem solving tasks has been a popular technique in problem solving research, uncovering differences in the ways the two groups categorize, approach, and solve problems. Applying this technique, two samples of students and one sample of experts categorized pre‐written solutions to a mechanics problem. The responses reveal differences in how the beginning college students, more experienced college students, and physics instructors view solutions. Students focus on the solutions’ surface features and presentation, while instructors look more closely at the deep structure. These differences indicate that instructors should consider modifying the way in which in‐class and handed out problem solutions are presented to students.

Using Undergraduate Students as Physics Lab Teaching Assistants

We carefully selected several undergraduates to teach mechanics laboratories of a special course for honors engineering students. We share our experiences, including efforts to assess whether students taught by undergraduates were put at any disadvantage and whether the undergraduates we employed benefited from the experience.

Grading Homework to Emphasize Problem-Solving Process Skills

This article describes a grading approach that encourages students to employ particular problem-solving skills. Some strengths of this method, called “process- based grading,” are that it is easy to implement, requires minimal time to grade, and can be used in conjunction with either an online homework delivery system or paper-based homework.

Work in progress - Comparing the use of a graphical programming language to a traditional text-based language to learn programming concepts

Programming has traditionally been taught using a text-based language where the students use an editor to type in language statements. The program is then compiled or interpreted using system commands. In these courses there are programming concepts that we want students to learn, such as declarations, math operations, loops, conditional statements, arrays, file manipulation, functions, etc. This project will attempt to determine the effectiveness of a graphical programming language (icon based) where a computer program is constructed with graphical icons. The test bed for this project will be Engineering H192 (Engineering Fundamentals and Laboratory II) at Ohio State. This course is the second course of a three-course sequence for first-year honors engineering students. The languages for this course are C/C++ and MATLAB. The course is taught to eight sections of 36 students. For a pilot section of H192, the C/C++ problems and the instructor notes will be re-written for the graphical icon development environment. The remaining sections will be the control group. A concept inventory will be completed by all students in the pilot and control sections at the beginning and at the end of the quarter. This work will begin in Winter Quarter 2007 and will be completed at the end of Winter Quarter 2008. This project is being funded by the National Instruments Foundation.

Student Categorization of Problems—An Extension

As part of gathering baseline data for a study on problem categorization, first‐year engineering honors students who had recently completed a two‐quarter sequence in physics were interviewed. The primary task in this interview was much like the problem categorization study described by Chi et al. There were, however, at least two distinct modifications: 1) in addition to the problem statements, solutions were included on the cards to be sorted 2) the problems were written such that they could also be grouped according to the nature of information presented in the problem statements and/or the number of possible solutions. The students in this baseline study, although similar in background to the novices described by Chi et al., in many ways performed more like experts. Several possibilities for this behavior are discussed.

Ohio Teacher Professional Development in the Physical Sciences

An in‐service teacher program held during the summers of 2004 and 2005 is described. This program, sponsored with state funds, drew a varied group of participants to learn Modeling Instruction in physics. The workshop leaders used the state science proficiency standards and physics education research (PER) results to guide many of the workshop’s activities. In 2004, the participants experienced the Modeling mechanics curriculum while pretending to be students; in 2005, the teachers worked in small teams to develop Modeling‐consistent units in other areas, often utilizing PER‐based materials. Indications are that the experience was valuable to the teachers and that the workshop series should be offered for a new cohort.