A Standardized Test for the Assessment of Introductory Physics Instructional Methods

The development of a broader, more inclusive assessment to be used in introductory physics courses, not just for the assessment of students' understanding, but in order to evaluate our instructional methods will be discussed. There is a need for an exam that can be used across universities to give faculty information on their students' performance on problems designed to assess not just content knowledge, but skills, such as problem solving, modeling, laboratory skills and aspects of critical thinking. We discuss the development of such an exam, which will be particularly useful for the evaluation of courses undergoing reform, the introduction of new teaching methods and other aspects of change, both in traditionally and non-traditionally taught courses.