Embodied physics education - celebrating student research

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Let's celebrate the work of my former master's student, Pelle Bøgild, who has just published an article based on his thesis (in Danish). In his project, Pelle explored an intriguing question: Does it matter whether students' bodily movements are congruent with the physics content they are learning?

Through a study with 23 upper-secondary physics students, Pelle investigated how different types of embodied activities affect both learning outcomes and student experiences in astronomy. His research compared embodied activities with either high congruence (where body movements directly relate to the physics concepts) or low congruence (where movements are less directly connected).

Pelle’s findings reveal that while both approaches improved students’ understanding of astronomical concepts, the high-congruence activities led to greater learning gains and more positive student experiences. Perhaps most interestingly, Pelle found that students in the high-congruence group provided more nuanced descriptions of the learning activity and the physics content. This suggests that when movements align meaningfully with physics concepts, students develop a richer understanding of the content.

You can also read Pelle's full master's thesis (in Danish) to learn more about his methodology and findings. It is great to see how projects like Pelle's provide guidance for teachers and educators on how to engage physics students in meaningful ways.