Collaborative Research: Physics Inventory of Quantitative Literacy

为了改善物理教学，重要的是要有有效的和标准化的评估工具来衡量学生的物理定量素养。为了满足这一需求，本项目将开发一个有效可靠的多项选择评估工具，以衡量入门物理学生的定量素养。定量素养是一套相互关联的技能、态度和思维习惯。它们共同支持了对初等数学的复杂运用来描述和理解世界。复杂的定量素养是科学、技术、工程和数学（STEM）领域工作的基础。虽然发展定量推理是许多科学入门课程的目标，特别是物理学，但研究表明，学生经常难以使用数学推理来理解物理情况。然而，目前尚不清楚入门级的物理教学是否能帮助学生克服这一困难。该项目的目标是开发和实施一个工具，以评估学生的定量推理能力如何随时间在物理入门课程的变化。来自这种仪器的数据可以推动教学的改进，以提高学生概念化数学的能力，就像他们在物理中所做的那样。这个工具也可以评估这种教学变化的效果。此外，所得到的工具可以修改并输出到其他以数学为基础的学科。通过这种方式，它有可能提高对定量推理技能如何随着学生在大学课程中的进步而增长的理解。由于这些定量技能是学生在物理和其他STEM领域取得成功的核心，该项目可以提高学生在STEM学科的保留率，并扩大美国的STEM劳动力。一个有效的STEM员工需要具备定量素养，这是一种使用表格或图形形式的数字数据来对其含义做出适当结论的能力。发展这些技能是物理学入门的一个重要目标。然而，关于教学对学生物理定量素养发展的影响的研究却很少。提出的研究将填补这一空白，通过开发定量素养的物理清单（PIQL），一个多项选择的评估工具。项目团队将在多课程物理导论序列的背景下开发PIQL。然后，他们将开发和试点统计方法，以衡量和评估学生在PQL的三个组成部分的成长：关于比率和比例的推理，关于负数量的推理，以及关于数量之间共变的推理。将使用各种心理测量分析来确保PIQL的有效性和可靠性。(一种有效的仪器可以准确测量学生的PQL。一种可靠的工具可以在不同的学生群体中一致地测量PQL。)该项目的另一个主要目标是通过整合学生错误答案中包含的丰富信息，使用统计分析来开发一个量化成长的评分模型，而不仅仅是掌握程度。该项目将解决一个有效和可靠的工具来衡量学生的PQL在物理入门课程的关键需求，并评估其增长。该项目将促进提高复杂的定量素养，作为物理课堂的教育成果。此外，结果将为评估其他STEM学科的定量素养提供一个模型。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

To improve physics teaching and learning, it is important to have validated and standardized assessment tools to measure students' quantitative literacy in physics. To meet this need, this project will develop a valid and reliable multiple-choice assessment instrument to measure introductory physics students' quantitative literacy. Quantitative literacy is a set of interconnected skills, attitudes, and habits of mind. Together, they support the sophisticated use of elementary mathematics to describe and understand the world. Sophisticated quantitative literacy is a foundation for work in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. Although development of quantitative reasoning is a goal of many introductory science courses, particularly physics, research suggests that students often have difficulty using mathematical reasoning to make sense of physical situations. However, it is not known if instruction in introductory-level physics helps students overcome this difficulty. The goal of this project is to develop and implement an instrument to assess how students' quantitative reasoning ability changes over time in an introductory physics course. Data from such an instrument could drive improvements in instruction to increase students' ability to conceptualize the mathematics that they do in physics. This instrument could also assess the efficacy of such instructional changes. In addition, the resulting instrument could be modified and exported to other math-based disciplines. In this way, it has the potential to improve understanding of how quantitative reasoning skills grow as students progress through their college curricula. Since these quantitative skills are core to students' success in physics and other STEM fields, this project could enhance student retention in STEM disciplines and broaden our STEM workforce in the United States.An effective STEM workforce needs to possess quantitative literacy, which is the ability use numerical data in tabular or graphical form to make appropriate conclusions about its meaning. Developing these skills is an important objective of introductory physics. However, few research studies have been published about the effect of instruction on students' development of physics quantitative literacy (PQL). The proposed research will fill this gap by developing the Physics Inventory of Quantitative Literacy (PIQL), a multiple-choice assessment instrument. The project team will develop the PIQL in the context of a multi-course introductory physics sequence. They will then develop and pilot statistical methods to measure and evaluate students' growth in three components of PQL: reasoning about ratios and proportions, reasoning about negative quantities, and reasoning about co-variation between quantities. Various psychometric analyses will be used to ensure that the PIQL is both valid and reliable. (A valid instrument accurately measures students' PQL. A reliable instrument measures PQL consistently across different student populations.) Another major goal of the project is to use statistical analyses to develop a scoring model that quantifies growth, not just mastery, by incorporating the rich information contained in students' incorrect answers. This project will address the critical need for a valid and reliable instrument to measure student PQL in the introductory physics curriculum, and to assess its growth. The project will facilitate the improvement of sophisticated quantitative literacy as an educational outcome in physics classes. Furthermore, the results will provide a model for assessing quantitative literacy in other STEM disciplines.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.