The Conceptual Survey of Electricity and Magnetism ͑CSEM͒ was developed to assess students' knowledge about topics in electricity and magnetism. The survey is a 32-question, multiple-choice test that can be used as both a pretest and posttest. During four years of testing and refinement, the survey has been given in one form or another to more than 5000 introductory physics students at 30 different institutions. Typical pretest results are that students in calculus-based courses get 31% of the questions correct and student's in algebra/trigonometry-based courses average 25% correct. Posttest correct results only rise to 47% and 44%, respectively. From analysis of student responses, a number of student difficulties in electricity and magnetism are indicated.

Many studies in physics education indicate that our conventional instruction fails to achieve objectives we desire for our students. Students leave introductory courses unable to reason qualitatively about physical processes. They use primitive formula-centered problem-solving techniques. Their minds contain a small number of facts and equations that are accessible only by random searches. In recent years, research by scientists interested in cognition and pedagogy has shown that we can do much better. This paper reviews this research and the instructional strategies that are suggested by it. The following paper reports the preliminary results of using these strategies in introductory physics courses that emphasize problem solving.

The paper introduces a set of formative assessment tasks and rubrics that were developed for use in an introductory physics instruction to help students acquire and self-assess various scientific process abilities. We will describe the rubrics, tasks, and the student outcomes in courses where the tasks and rubrics were used.

An energy process can be represented by verbal, pictorial, bar chart, and mathematical representations. This multiple-representation method for work–energy processes has been introduced and used in the work–energy part of introductory college physics courses. Assessment indicates that the method, especially the qualitative work–energy bar charts, serves as a useful visual tool to help students understand work–energy concepts and to solve related problems. This paper reports how the method has been used to teach work–energy concepts, student attitudes toward this approach, and their performance on work–energy problems.

Overview, Case Study (OCS) Physics is an effort to integrate recent results from physics education research into instruction for introductory university physics courses that emphasize problem solving. Students actively construct a knowledge hierarchy on a foundation of qualitative understanding. They analyze physical processes and problems using methods similar to those used by experienced scientists. Students receive repeated exposure to concepts in a variety of contexts over an extended time interval. Preliminary trials of OCS Physics have produced promising gains in student qualitative understanding, in their ability to solve problems, and in their ability to form and access a knowledge hierarchy.