Re: physics experiments

From: Maleki (maleki_m__at_hotmail.com)
Date: 10/21/04 

Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2004 09:55:33 -0500

On Thu, 21 Oct 2004 02:00:57 GMT, Sam Wormley wrote:

> Doodedski wrote:
>> I have just started working as a supply high school teacher in
>> science. The lab part of the courses doesn't seem to interest the
>> students all that much and I don't really blame them. The
>> experiments are very basic and not that impressive. I am trying to
>> think of new experiments and I was just wondering if anybody had
>> suggestions about sources to consult (internet, books...). The
>> courses that I teach touch a broad range of subjects: mechanics,
>> optics, electromagnetism, thermodynamics, general chemistry,
>> technology, earth sciences, biology...
>> Thanks for any suggestions
>>
>>
>
> In my opinion, the labs are almost worthless, not because of
> the subject matter, but how they are structured... Students
> just want to get through them without engaging in thinking.
>
> That's just the opposite of what we want... we want them to
> have to figure out what to do to get the solution. And to
> question or check if it is a reasonable solution.
>
> A check list of step... fill in the blanks... model with a
> computer program... does't do the trick.

What made it work (but this was in first year university
physics, not high school) for my generation was a strict
demand on students for completing a "report" of the
experiment. This may also work for high school students.
Note that you have to place time limitation for it to work,
otherwise students will slack off.

It amuses me how strict they were in checking what we did in
those reports. Damn those French methods. The whole thing
had to be done in one sitting. That report was _the_ driving
force for us in understanding everything about the
experiment. We struggled, thought, repeated, frustrated,
raced against time, improvised, panicked, quarelled, spied
on others, succeeded, etc, just because we knew we had to
"report" it later in that 5 or 10 page form and turn it in
same day. You could not cheat in it because a successful
cheating would take about the same amount of time and
headache as doing it in earnest, and time was limited (lab
began 1pm and lucky ones would go home 7pm, unlucky ones
would stay till around midnight). There was one report for
each team of about 3 or 4, and it involved among many
careful statements also a superb error analysis without
which you wouldn't know if you had garbage on your hands or
you'd actually done and shown some little meaningful thing
in that experiment. The practice was modelled after French
methods of early 20th century. That's where our professors
of those days were drawing from.

I began to appreciate, for one, what it meant to get
anything pretty close to the value of 4.19 of energy/calorie
conversion. You just have to go through it to appreciate it.
Also we found out that among girls some are really smart! I
wonder if there could've been any other way or situation for
us that could've helped us to find this out. When it got to
the point of using everything that you got to get the job
done, many of them were every bit as valuable a teammate as
the guys. 

-- 
    tA bedAnjA resid dAneshe man
    ke bedAnam hami ke nAdAnam

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