C14. Commission on Physics Education

Report about the VIII Inter-American Conference on Physics Education

Dr. Eduardo Moltó Gil.
President of Arrangement Committee.

The VIII Inter-American Conference on Physics Education (VIII IACPE) was held at Havana, Cuba, from 7 to 11,July,2003. Its venues were Havana University and Havana Libre Hotel. The VIII IACPE was organizaed by an Inter-American Council for these meetings and a Cuban committee represented by the Cuban Physical Society. The general theme of the Conference was "Teaching Physics for the Future" and its goal was "to present, discuss and publish new ideas and results for improving physics teaching at all educational levels and improve the preparation of physics teachers".

The VIII IACPE was endorsed by the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT) and the American Physical Society (APS). It also had the endorsement and support of UNESCO, Latinamerican Center of Physics (CLAF) and the International Commission of Physics Education of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (ICPE/IUPAP). 167 delegates from 20 countries were present in the VIII IACPE. 62 delegates were Cubans and the rest from the others countries. The delegates from each country were the following:

1. Germany...........................3
2. Argentina...........................5
3. Australia............................2
4. Brazil...............................14
5. Canadá............................ 1
6. Colombia...........................7
7. Costa Rica........................3
8. Cuba...............................62
9. Chile..................................5
10. El Salvador........................1
11. Spain..................................4
12. United States .... ..............30
13. Irlanda.. ..............................1
14. Italy......................................4
15. Jamaica...............................1
16. México................................17
17. Norway.................................2
18. Perú ..................................2
19. Rumania............................2
20. Uruguay.............................1
Total......................................167

Dr. Daniel Codorniu, Vice-Minister of the Cuban Ministery of Science,Technoloogy and Environment made the opening words of the VIII IACPE. Dra. Myriam Chesyck, president of APS; Dr. Charles Holbrow, president of AAPT; Dr. Eduardo Moltó, president of Arrangement Committee and Vice president of Cuban Physical Society spoke in the opening sesion too. A letter send by Gunnar Tibell, president of ICPE/IUPAP was read in this opening session.

179 papers were presented in the VIII IACPE. 98 as oral communications and the rest as posters. The main themes of these papers were the following:

A: Teaching physics at non university levels.
B: Teaching physics at university level.
C: Preparation of physics teachers.
D: Informal education of physics
E: Use of technologies in physics teaching.
F: General themes on physics teaching
G: Themes of physics
H: Epistemology and history of physics in physics teaching

Six Lecturers spoke. The themes of the lectures and the lecturers were the following:

L.1 The History of the Inter-American Conferences on Physics Education through of its Recommendations.
Moreira, Marco A.. Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil

L.2 Reflections about the Methodology of the Researchs in Science Education.
de Cudmani, Leonor Colombo. University of Tucumán, Argentina.

L.3 Physics Education Research - the Key to Student Learning and to the Preparation of Teachers.
Mc Dermott, Lillian. University of Washington, United States of America. (Oersted Medal 2001).

L.4 The Role of Physics in Education.
Lederman, Leon. (Nobel Prize in Physics, 1988), United States of America.

L.5 Past and Present of the Cuban Physics Career.
de Melo, Osvaldo. Dean of Physical Faculty. Havana University, Cuba.

L.6 The development of Physics in Cuba
Fajer Victor. President of Cuban Physical Society, Cuba.

The roundtable "Role of Physical and Physics Teachers Societies in the Improvement of Physics Teaching at the Inter-American Region" was developed. It had the following speakers: Charles Holbrow (Presidet of AAPT); Fredrick Stein (Director of Education of APS); Deise Miranda (vocal for Teaching of Physics in Brazilian Physical Society); Eduardo Moltó (Vicepresident of Cuban Physical Society)

Two workshops were developed. Theirs titles and professors were the following:

W.1 Teaching with the Cosmology, Nuclear Science, Particles and Interactions, and Plasma Charts and Materials from the Contemporary Physics Education Project (CPEP).
Aubrecht, Gordon. Ohio States University, United States of America.

W.2 The Proyect SDSS in the FERMILAB.
Lara, Cristóbal. FERMILAB, United States of America:

Six working groups were developed during two sessions. Theirs themes were:

1. Physics teaching at high school.
2. Technologies use in physics teaching.
3. Physics education research and science education research.
4. The preparation of physics teachers.
5. Informal education of physics.
6. The preparation of physicists

The main recomendations of these working groups were the following:

Working Group 1: The Teaching of Physics in High School.

This group was coordinated by: Amadeo Sosa (Uruguay) and Carlos Sifredo (Cuba).

Recommendations:
1. To organize meetings (such as one on Didactics of Physics) between this and the IX IACPE, set up by the next IAF Organizer, with the support of an international team.
2. Send to all Ministries of Education, Physical Societies and Physical Teachers Societies in the hemisphere, a well-founded document indicating the importance of strengthening Physics education at the high school and secondary levels.
3. Considering the need of strengthening the experimental work at these levels, we recommend the creation of Workshops and Seminars on the subject to take place during the next IACPE, and also in the period between the present one and the next one.
4. To ask organizations such as UNESCO, OEA, OREALC, OEI, CAB, etc., for systematic support to the Ibero-American Physics Olympiad and other similar events.
5. To give this group a permanent character, in such a way that it can propose new initiatives before the next IACPE, and contribute to the propaganda of well-proven didactical ideas -which can be done through the IACPE webpage.

Working Group 2: Use of new technologies in Physics Teaching

This group was coordinated by: Rolando Blest ( Chile), Ricaardo Buzzo (Chile) and JulioVazquez (Cuba).

Recommendations:

1. Creation of a webpage with the goal of receiving and spreading contributions on different ways of using and evaluation of new technologies in Physics teaching. The people responsible for this proposal, are: Marcelo de Oliveira Souza (Brazil) (mm@venf.br); Ricardo Buzzo Garrao ( Chile) (rbuzzo@ucv.cl)

2. Creation of an InterAmerican Center for the development of multi-media software for Physics teaching. The idea is to give workshops on the creation of multi-media software and its free distribution to all members of the Physics community. The people responsible for this proposal, are: James Sullivan (United States) (James.Sullivan@uc.edu); Rolando Blest (Chile) (rblest@lauca.usach.cl)

3. Creation of a forum about the use and abuse of new technologies in Physics teaching, aimed at the evaluation the individual experiences and their impact in the learning process. The people responsible for this proposal, are: Alejandro González (Mexico) (xaghx@yahoo.com); Julio Vázquez (Cuba) (geavarona@cubasolar.cu)

Working Group 3: Physics Education and Science Education Research

The group was coordinated by: Marco A. Moreira (Brasil) and Pablo Valdés (Cuba)

Recommendations:

1. Research projects on physics education should include the participation of college teachers, secondary school teachers, and researchers from other areas of physics.
2. Educational systems -national, regional, and local- should provide opportunities -e.g., fellowships- for secondary school teachers to participate in physics education research projects as researchers.
3. Physical societies and physics departments should encourage speakers to talk about physics education research in their meetings, seminars, and workshops, and to provide a space for presenting research papers on physics education in these events.
4. Physical societies and physics teachers associations should publish research journals in physics education and provide a space for research papers on physics education in their journals. They should also publish journals for teachers in which research findings in physics education can be communicated to the target audience.
5. Research papers on physics education and instructional materials resulting from this research should aim at high quality standards as the best way of gaining full acceptance and recognition from the physics and the educational communities.
6. Research journals in physics education must be fully refereed even when they are published only electronically.
7. The physics teaching and learning process itself should be an object of study in physics education research, as well as questions regarding the nature of science, the relationships among physics, technology, and other sciences, the use of methods and procedures typical of contemporary research activities, the historical, social, and cultural aspects of science.
8. At least the equivalent to a one semester course on research in physics education should be included in the curriculum of physics teacher preparation.
9. Educational institutions, governments, and physical societies should provide support (or help to obtain support) for visits between physics education researchers in different countries.
10. Research projects in physics education should be reviewed only by experts in physics education and on research in physics education.

Working Group 4: The preparation of the Physics Teacher.

This group was coordinated by: Maite Andre (Venezuela), Deise Miranda (Brazil) and Diego Alamino ( Cuba)

Preamble:

1. In almost all countries the initial formation of the physics teacher is done at the university level, with diverse modalities and curriculum with ties within and between them.
2. Continum education of teachers is very diverse, with substantial differences in the breadth and dept attained in diferent countries.
3. There are financial resources in most of the countries but the its impact in the improvement of the teacher is quite variable.

Recommendation:

1. Create a virtual network for the formation of physics teachers, to serve as a reference for profesors, teachers, researchers and others. The network will be configured having two sections: Initial formation and Continum Formation. Each sections have specific theme and commun theme. For example:

Initial Formation	Continum Formation
Curriculum of the countries	Suggestions for teachers
Physics teaching (courses, research, materials,...)	Successful experiencies
Modalities	Events, courses,
Statistics	Associations

For this, it is neccesary to:
o Support for translation of materials into three lenguages (English, Portuguese and Spanish)
o Links with other regional websites
o Put this network on the home page of the Conferences
Continue the work of this group trough the web

Working Group 5: Informal Education in Physics

This group was coordinated by: Alicia Torres ( Estados Unidos), Hugo Jasso (Mexico and Fernando González (Cuba)

Recommendations:

1. To promote:
· Exchange meetings between researchers, science popularizers, teachers and media previous to each IACPE.
· The recognition, by all national research systems, of the importance of science popularization.
· The participation in educational scientific projects.

2. To develope:
· An information exchange network of Physics popularizers aimed at increasing the interest in Physics.
· Ad hoc strategies to measure the political and social impact of Science popularization.

Working Group 6: The Preparation of a Physicist.

This group was coordinated by: Teodoro Halpern (Estados Unidos) and Ernesto Atshuler (Cuba)

Preamble:
· You cannot have a strong local economy without a strong technical infrastructure.
· You cannot have a strong technical infrastructure without a strong scientific base.
· You cannot have a strong scientific base without strong physics and physics education.
· You cannot have strong physics and physics education without a strong physics research capability, including a trained workforce.
· Good physics instruction demands laboratory experimental skills.

Recommendations:

· Both physicists and physics teachers (to the extent they are different) must be exposed to hands-on basics and advanced experimental techniques.
· Majors must have real contact with active physics research, whether experimental or theoretical, as early as possible in the course of study.
· The use of computational tools (as in virtual experiments and simulations) must not be at the expense of true experimentation; instead, use of computer technology should complement experimental skills such as data acquisition and analysis.
· Physicists must assure ethical treatment of undergraduate and graduate students and postdocs: they should be treated as real, valuable partners; they should get proper publication credit (no padding of coauthors); and results should not be rushed to early publication without consultation with coauthors.
· Physics departments in all the Americas should emulate the REU program (Research Experiences for Undergraduates) with exchanges across national boundaries.

The VIII IACPE concluded with a plenary session where the coordinators of each working group exposed its recomendations. The recomendations were debated and approved. It was informed that Costa Rica will be the venue of IX IACPE. The delegates recognised the good quality of the VIII IACPE in this plenary session.