Impact of a course transformation on students’ reasoning about measurement uncertainty

Physics lab courses are integral parts of an undergraduate physics education, and offer a variety of opportunities for learning. Many of these opportunities center around a common learning goal in introductory physics lab courses: measurement uncertainty. Accordingly, when the stand-alone introductory lab course at the University of Colorado Boulder (CU) was recently transformed, measurement uncertainty was the focus of a learning goal of that transformation. The Physics Measurement Questionnaire (PMQ), a research-based assessment of student understanding around statistical measurement uncertainty, was used to measure the effectiveness of that transformation. Here, we analyze student responses to the PMQ at the beginning and end of the CU course. We also compare such responses from two semesters: one before and one after the transformation. We present evidence that students in both semesters shifted their reasoning in ways aligned with the measurement uncertainty learning goal. Furthermore, we show that more students in the transformed semester shifted in ways aligned with the learning goal, and that those students tended to communicate their reasoning with greater sophistication than students in the original course. These findings provide evidence that even a traditional lab course can support valuable learning, and that transforming such a course to align with well-defined learning goals can result in even more effective learning experiences.