Leopold E. Klopfer

Factors influencing the learning of classical mechanics

The study described in this paper investigates the combined effect of certain variables on student achievement in classical mechanics. Our purposes are (1) to describe the preinstructional knowledge of mechanics, mathematical skills, and reasoning skills of a sample of college physics students, (2) to correlate these variables with the student’s success in learning classical mechanics, and (3) to develop an hypothesis about the relationships between these variables and student achievement in mechanics. We also offer some proposals for improving the teaching of classical mechanics.

A perspective on the differences between expert and novice performance in solving physics problems

AUTHOR Champagne, Audrey B.; And Others TITLE A Perspective on the Differences between Expert and Novice Performance in Solving Physics Problems. INSTITUTION Pittsburgh Univ., Pa. Learning Research and Development Center. SPONS AGENCY National Inst. of Education (ED), Washington, DC. REPORT NO LRDC-1983/20 PUB DATE 83 NOTE 15p.; Paper presented at the meeting of the Australian Science Education Research Association (Sydney, Australia, May 1982). PUB TYPE Reports Research/Technical (143) -Speeches /Conference Papers (150)

An individualized elementary school science program

Individuals or groups who embark on a major curriculum development effort do so because they believe that their product will represent some specified improvement over programs that already exist. In 1964, when efforts began at the Learning Research and Development Center of the University of Pittsburgh to develop an individualized elementary school science program, several recently completed science programs were already available. The reason for embarking on the development of yet another elementary school science program was the belief held by many at the Learning Research and Development Center that individualization of instruction would have significant positive effects on childrens learning and on the attitudes of children toward the learning process. The plan of the developers was simply to individualize one of the already existing science curriculums. The model of individualization that was to be followed was Individually Prescribed Instruction (IPI). The early efforts of the developers were hampered by the lack of reliable and easily manipulatable audiotape playing equipment, which was essential for conveying science instruction to individual first and second