The State of High School Physics and Physics First

written by Paul Hickman
published by the Physics Teacher Education Coalition

The Physics First program leads to a higher proportion of students who maintain an interest in science after completing high school, presumably leading to a similarly increased number of physics majors at university. It is difficult, however, to maintain the program without an active faculty advocate, especially as it is often opposed by parents, administrators, and school boards.

http://phystec.org/presentations/071120_hickman.pdf

Physics by Inquiry: A research-based approach to preparing K-12 teachers of physics and physical sci

written by Lillian C. McDermott, Paula Heron, and Peter Shaffer

The Physics Education Group at the University of Washington (UW) has been conducting special courses for K-12 teachers for more than 30 years. They have developed a sequence of academic-year courses for prospective elementary and middle school teachers and another sequence for prospective high school teachers. They also conduct an intensive NSF-funded six-week Summer Institute for Inservice Teachers that has similar goals. The materials used in both the preservice and inservice courses are drawn from Physics by Inquiry, a self-contained, laboratory-based curriculum that has been developed for use in university courses to prepare K-12 teachers to teach physics and physical science. The emphasis in this paper is on elementary and middle school. However, most of the discussion is applicable to the preparation of high school teachers.

http://www.aps.org/units/fed/newsletters/summer2005/mcd2.html