The following Major Projects have been completed or are in progress.
New! Evan Richard¹s Studio Website. Please click here to view Evan's site about Studio physics. Lots of good information.
1. Honors Conceptual Physics Curriculum Redevelopment by Anthony Genova, Physics
Teacher, and James Bologna, Director of Technology, at the Windward School, Los Angeles, CA.
This project developed a complete unit for the freshman-level Honors Conceptual Physics curriculum using physlet simulations, ranking tasks, TIPER’s, (Tasks Inspired by Physics Educational Research) and assessments. The full Electricity and Magnetism unit will be piloted during the spring trimester of 2007 in both sections of Honors Conceptual Physics, with selected aspects featured in the senior-level Physics and AP Physics courses. The success of the unit will be evaluated in June leading to an eventual expansion to all units for all courses. A series of resource web pages will be built to host the simulations, questions, and practice problems.
Their website with what they developed is available at: http://physics.windwardschool.org/physics/index.html.
The complete final report can be found on the project website. As part of their final report, the authors presented their project at the 2007 AAPT Summer Meeting in Greensboro, NC, July 28-August 1, 2007. The slides from their presentation can also be found on the project website.
For a copy of the presentation click here.
For a copy of the final report click here.
2. Technology Based TIPERs for Conceptual Physics II by Paul Williams of Austin Community College, Austin, TX.
The Conceptual Physics course has significant potential to impact technology education. Strategies that promote active learning and challenge common student learning difficulties can impact student learning in a very positive way in Conceptual Physics. This project will produce a series of technology based TIPERs to be used as a daily learning activity in the second semester of Conceptual Physics. The TIPERs will make use of clickers to deliver the activity and record student responses. Additionally the TIPERs will further incorporate technology as many of them will be written to incorporate java simulations. The TIPERs will be planned prior to the Spring, 2007 semester and then written, class tested, and revised during the Spring, 2007 semester. The project will deliver both PowerPoint and pen and paper versions of the TIPERs suitable for use by other instructors, and the approach will be a valuable instructional model for incorporating clickers in the classroom.
His website with what he developed is: http://www.austincc.edu/nrgpsc/phys1407/tiperProject/curriculumIndex.htm.
The complete final report can be found on the project website.
In addition to the website, the author disseminated the activities developed for this project in several other ways. I wrote an article for the ATE Program for Physics Faculty electronic newsletter, PWEN, on using the “Using PhET Simulations to Implement DC Circuit Tipers”. This article can be found at the link: http://www.physicsworkshops.org/PWEN/PWEN1.pdf.
The author has also given several presentations on these activities at various AAPT meetings. At the Spring, 2007 Meeting of the Texas Section of AAPT, he gave a contributed talk titled “Technology Based Tipers as an In-class Small Group Activity”. At the Summer, 2007 Meeting of the AAPT, he gave an invited talk titled “Conceptually Rich Uses of Clickers” which included - in part - discussion of these activities. Additionally, he shared the ideas through a poster in the TYC idea sharing session at Greensboro titled “Incorporating Simulations into Technology Based Tipers”. At the Fall, 2007 Meeting of the Texas Section of the AAPT, the author co-presented a workshop with Tom O’Kuma and Regina Barrera titled “Using PhET Simulations in Your Physics Class”. All of these sessions were well attended with 24 attendees at the workshop, and at least 20 attendees at each of the AAPT sessions.
For a copy of Paul's final report click here.
3. Energizing Physics by Jennifer Christian Javens, Langham Creek High School, Houston, TX.
The population of on-level physics I in Texas high schools will change as IPC is phased out and the new 4 x 4 graduation requirements go into effect. There will be no math prerequisites and all students will be required to take physics as part of the Recommended High School Graduation Program. This demands a shift in our curriculum and methods of teaching high school physics. I would like to propose a project in which I explore an alternative curriculum that places energy after acceleration but precedes forces. This would allow energy concepts to be spiraled into the first semester units and decrease the emphasis of resolving forces into components using trigonometry. I would like to create pre-lab and lab activities using video analysis and TIPERS to coincide with the curriculum that is specifically designed for all high school students with varying math abilities, backgrounds, and degrees of motivation.
4. Evan Richard¹s Studio Website. Please click here to view Evan's site about Studio physics. Lots of good information.