This month, Physics Education, celebrates its 50th year of publication with a special anniversary issue.
It features a collection of commentaries on some of the most influential and noteworthy papers from the first 50 years of the journal.
Alongside an editorial from the current Editor-in-Chief, Gary Williams, the issue includes a look back at a decade of interviews in the People section. It also includes reproductions of the very first cover and an inaugural editorial from 1966.
All of the specially invited articles from the 50th anniversary issue are available free to read online at iopscience.iop.org/issue/0031-9120/51/3.
Tell us what you think about the special issue on Twitter @EducatePhysics.
Also inside the issue…
Celebration of the past—challenge for the future
Paul Black on ‘Physics Education—21 years on’ (Keohane 1987 Phys. Educ. 22 142)
On the persistence of rituals
Laurence Viennot on ‘Teaching rituals and students’ intellectual satisfaction’ (Viennot 2006 Phys. Educ. 41 400)
On the surface of it there is more to it
Gorazd Planinsic on ‘The molecular mechanism of surface tension’ (Berry 1971 Phys. Educ. 6 79)
Roller coaster loop shapes revisited
Ann-Marie Pendrill on ‘Rollercoaster loop shapes’ (Pendrill 2005 Phys. Educ. 40 517)
Random walks and Poisson sequences
Jon Ogborn on ‘Randomness at the root of all things’ (Ogborn et al 2003 Phys. Educ. 38 391) and (Ogborn et al 2003 Phys. Educ. 38 398)
Correct explanation for lift takes off
Holger Babinsky on ‘How Wings Work’ (Babinsky 2003 Phys. Educ. 38 497)
People
David Smith looks back at 10 years of interviews for Physics Education (Williams 2016 Phys. Educ. 51 3)