Culturally Relevant Physics Education

Physics has long been viewed as a very intimidating course by many. While there are likely many reasons for this view, the extensive use of mathematics in physics challenges many students. Mathematics is often said to be the language of physics and many educators focus almost entirely on how to use physics equations in an attempt to prepare students for examinations. This causes students to miss out on one of the most vital components of physics, a curiosity about the world around them. The role of a physics teacher should not be to simply teach students physics equations and the mathematics to use them, it should be to get students interested in the world around them. The job of a physicist is not to apply physics equations but to learn about the workings of the physical world and make predictions about what will happen. 

There are many aspects of an educator's teaching style that can help to create a culturally relevant education. These include but are not limited to, giving students more freedom in their education, acknowledging and appreciating the culture the students come from, and designing the material to target the students' specific needs. Many of these components look identical for any course being taught, so we will focus mostly on designing the course work to be culturally relevant. To do so, the curriculum must be analyzed and educators must think about the purpose of the material they are teaching. The material should be providing the students with a deeper understanding of the world and society around them and helping to develop skills that will help them later in life rather than just improving their ability to perform well on examinations. The content should also connect to the students' lives outside of school as well as their culture. 

In order to answer this question, we must figure understand the purpose of a physics education. When learning about physics, it is important that students not only learn about the concepts of physics but also expand their critical thinking skills. To do this an educator should make sure to focus on the questions that were answered with physics and how to find and answer similar questions. This type of educational strategy will not only help students to hone their critical thinking ability, but is also more similar to what physics looks like in the real world. It is also important for teachers to link the concepts in class to experiences that students have. For physics this could look like analyzing the mechanics in sports or games the students enjoy or something similar. These strategies would help to make the course more engaging and also more beneficial to the students' overall education. 

As discussed previously, focusing just on the mathematical manipulation of formulas does not result in a culturally relevant education and just works to create drones capable of solving physics problems. However, mathematics is a vital part of physics, so how can it be incorporated in a way that benefits the students? To start, it is important for physics educators to make a distinction between the mathematical models used in physics and the physical understanding of the concepts. Too often the equations given in class are treated as being perfectly accurate despite their known short comings. Instead, physics educators should talk more in depth about how and why the models fail and about the limits of the predictions that are being made with the mathematical models. It should also be noted that the mathematical relationships are derived from the physical understanding and the methods for doing so should be also be a focus in the course.