C739 Space, Time and Motion, catalog number PHYS 5248, is the three-CU physics course in the WGU School of Education that traces discovery from the ancient Greeks through Galileo, Newton and Einstein and then examines the properties of motion, time, space, matter and energy. It is a physics course with a historical spine, and that structure is deliberate: the history is how the physics is taught, because each stage shows a model failing and being replaced.
The history is the argument about how science works
A course that starts with Greek natural philosophy and ends with relativity could be a sequence of anecdotes. What makes PHYS 5248 a physics course is that each stage is presented as a model that explained what was known, ran into evidence it could not accommodate, and was replaced by something with wider reach. Aristotelian motion is not simply wrong; it describes everyday experience with friction rather well, which is exactly why it survived so long and why students hold it intuitively today.
That framing produces the demand the course actually assesses: explaining why a model changed, on what evidence, and what the new model covered that the old one could not. Galileo mattered because he separated the behaviour of falling bodies from the medium resisting them. Newton mattered because one framework covered both an apple and a moon. Einstein mattered because the constancy of light speed could not be reconciled with the old assumption that space and time were a fixed stage. A submission that lists who did what has missed the assessed content entirely.
The second half of the catalog scope, the properties of motion, time, space, matter and energy, is where the historical narrative turns into physics you have to be able to use. Motion described precisely requires distinguishing displacement from distance and velocity from speed. Energy requires knowing what is conserved and what is merely transformed. Time and space stop being background once the relativistic material arrives, which is the conceptual jolt the whole earlier sequence has been preparing. Candidates who read the history and skip the quantitative treatment find the last section of the course arrives without foundations.
For a teaching candidate the pedagogical payoff is direct. Students hold Aristotelian intuitions about motion and Newtonian intuitions about time, and both are the historical positions that took centuries to overturn. Knowing the history means knowing which evidence overturned each one, which is a far more powerful teaching tool than simply telling students their intuition is wrong.
Turning scored aspects into a plan
Scoring detail sits in your Course of Study rather than in the public catalog, so read it before planning. School of Education science courses may be assessed by a submitted performance assessment, by a proctored objective assessment, or by both.
Under a performance assessment, each aspect is scored on its own against a three-point scale and a 2 in every aspect passes the task, with no averaging. Head each section using the rubric's own noun, and where an aspect asks about a historical development, make sure the physics rather than the biography carries the paragraph.
The word budget, worked. With five scored aspects and directions asking for about 1,800 words, reserve 150 for framing and 120 for a close, leaving 1,530, roughly 306 words per aspect. Budget 80 words for the model as it stood, 100 for the observation it could not explain, 80 for the replacement and what it covered, and 46 for the consequence for how we understand space, time or motion. Aspects that return are the ones written as biography, with dates and names and no failing prediction anywhere in them.
Where quantitative work appears, keep units and orders of magnitude visible. This course spans scales from a rolling ball to the speed of light, and magnitude checking is what keeps relativistic and everyday cases distinct.
A structure that fits a conceptual physics history response
Task directions govern where they specify a format. Where they leave room, this arrangement keeps the physics in front and the chronology behind it.
| Section | What belongs in it | How it gets scored |
|---|---|---|
| The question | The physical question at issue: what makes things move, what is time, what is light | Frames the answer around physics rather than around people |
| The earlier model | What was believed, and what it explained successfully | Scored for treating superseded models seriously rather than dismissing them |
| The failure | The specific observation or experiment the model could not accommodate | The central scored element; without it the change looks arbitrary |
| The replacement | The new model, what it predicted, and where the old one survives as an approximation | Scored for precision about domains of validity |
| Consequence | What this changed about our understanding of space, time, matter or energy | Scored where conceptual understanding is named |
| Student intuition | The matching intuition students hold and the demonstration that challenges it | Scored where pedagogy appears in a teaching programme rubric |
Say explicitly where a superseded model is still used. Newtonian mechanics remains correct to within measurement error for almost everything a person encounters, and stating that prevents the impression that scientific change means previous work was worthless, which is a serious misunderstanding for students to carry.
Evidence craft in a physics history course
This course asks for two kinds of evidence: the experimental results that drove each change, and the historical record of what was actually claimed.
- Name the experiment and its result rather than gesturing at it. The specific observation is what makes a model change explicable.
- Be accurate about history. Popular accounts of physics contain tidy stories that did not happen, and a graduate submission repeating them undermines its own credibility.
- State domains of validity. Every model in this course has a range where it works, and precision about that range is the physics.
- Keep quantities honest. Where you give speeds, distances or times, carry units and check the order of magnitude.
- Cite both physics sources and history of science sources where you use them, in APA.
- Quote sparingly; the standard narratives here are heavily reproduced and WGU runs submissions through a similarity check.
The habit that lifts this writing is treating the superseded scientists as intelligent people reasoning from the evidence they had. Explaining why an idea was reasonable given what was known is far more scientifically respectful, and far more useful in a classroom, than treating earlier physics as a collection of errors.
What separates Competent from a return
WGU records Competent or Not Competent rather than letter grades and produces no ordinary grade point average. Because each aspect is judged alone, returns tend to name one section.
- Every scored aspect has a heading using the rubric's own wording.
- Every model change is explained by a specific observation the old model could not handle.
- Every model has its domain of validity stated.
- Every historical claim is accurate rather than drawn from popular retelling.
- Every quantitative statement carries units and a magnitude that makes sense.
Performance assessment work can be revised and resubmitted with no grade penalty, so a return costs calendar rather than standing. Terms run six months at a flat rate, and closing more courses inside a term is the only way to lower your effective cost per course.
Where a proctored objective assessment applies, the boundary does not move. Proctored assessments are yours to sit. We prepare with conceptual drills, worked problems and an honest readiness verdict, and we never ask for portal credentials.
Five mistakes students make in C739
- Writing biography instead of physics. Names and dates are the frame; the failing prediction and its replacement are the content.
- Dismissing superseded models. Each survived because it explained something, and understanding what it explained is how you understand its replacement.
- Repeating tidy popular stories. Several of the famous anecdotes in physics history are unreliable and using them costs credibility.
- Ignoring domains of validity. Newtonian mechanics is still correct for nearly everything, and saying so is part of stating the physics accurately.
- Skipping the student intuition link. The historical positions and the intuitions students hold are often the same position, which is the most useful teaching insight the course offers.
- Reading the narrative and skipping the quantitative half. The catalog scope names the properties of motion, time, space, matter and energy, and those properties have to be used rather than admired.
How support works on this course
Send your Course of Study for C739 with any rubric and task directions. What comes back is a physics-first restructure that moves each aspect from biography to failing prediction, accuracy checks against reliable history of science sources, domain-of-validity statements for each model, and an aspect-mapped draft where the connection between historical positions and student intuitions is explicit.
Where a proctored component applies, the preparation shifts to the quantitative half: motion relationships, energy transformations and the reasoning behind the relativistic results, practised as problems rather than reread as narrative.
This is a course that repays being taken seriously as physics. Done well it gives a science teacher a permanent stock of examples for how scientific knowledge actually changes, which is a standard topic in every set of science standards.
Questions students ask about C739
Is C739 the same course as PHYS 5248?
Is C739 a history course or a physics course?
Can you sit a proctored assessment for me?
Writing the history without the physics?
Send your Course of Study and any rubric. You get a physics-first restructure, accuracy checks on the historical claims, domain-of-validity statements, and aspect-mapped drafting.
Where C739 sits in WGU's programs
The July 2026 catalog places this code in 1 current WGU program. Open a program page for the complete standard path and term positions. The live Degree Plan remains authoritative after transfer credit, substitutions, and mentor planning.
The assessments, one by one
The public catalog does not publish this course's PA/OA identity or task count. WGU Tutors publishes at most one PA manual per course and only from a WGU-controlled public rubric. Until that source exists, PA help begins from the student's real Course of Study and OA support remains preparation only.