PHYSICS 459
TEACHING LABORATORY PHYSICS SYLLABUS
Description
Physics 459 offers the student an experience in laboratory
instruction and is primarily intended for physics and astronomy
majors undertaking the Concentration in Education or considering a
career in secondary education. The course objectives are to give the
student experience in physics instruction in the laboratory context,
to enable the student to assess the effectiveness of laboratory
experiments and to develop new ones, and to acquaint the student with
the array of resources available to support laboratory instruction.
Meetings, Schedule and Requirements
The detailed course arrangements will be determined by the
responsible faculty member, i.e. instructor assigned to the Physics 102b laboratory. A typical
schedule will be as follows. The 102b laboratory meets
bi-weekly in two sections. The student taking 459 will be
expected to be present at all the laboratory sessions for one of the
two sections, which are currently offered on Tuesday and Wednesday
afternoons. The student would also meet weekly with the instructor
and possibly other members of the department for discussions relating
to the progress of the laboratory and to the following specific
assignments.
- During each laboratory session the student will interact with
students taking the lab. The student will circulate through the
lab while the experiment is in progress, responding to questions
and stopping at each group from time to time to check on progress.
The instructor will monitor this activity to ensure that the
student engages appropriately and when possible enables and
encourages the students to work out their own answers to
questions. The student will be evaluated by the students involved
in the lab using an anonymous format twice during the semester,
once near the beginning and once near the end.
- The student will prepare and deliver the pre-laboratory
lecture for one experiment (probably earlier rather than later in
the semester). The lecture will be delivered/practiced in advance
for the instructor in order to ensure that the 102b students will
be effectively taught.
- For the same experiment the student will evaluate the work of
the students under the supervision of the instructor.
- After this evaluation the student will analyze the extent to
which the laboratory accomplished its curricular objective and
then critique and suggest improvements in the existing experiment
and writeup.
- Using the Bibliography below the student will choose, design
and build a prototype of an experiment appropriate to the level
and content of Physics 102b. The choice will be discussed in
advance with the instructor and the approval of the department for
any necessary equipment purchases will be sought. (The Department
expects to be able to support purchases up to about $500 for this
purpose. The student will first consult with the Physics
Instructional Laboratory Associate to determine whether the needed
equipment is currently available in the department inventory.
Machine shop facilities can be used if needed) The student will
also prepare the accompanying writeup for the guidance of students
performing the experiment. The writeup is expected to include
pre-lab questions and to conform in other ways to the format used
in the course.
- The student will carry out the experiment as designed, and
should arrange for other students to perform it as well (not on a
for-credit basis). He or she will then analyze and critique the
laboratory on bases similar to those in requirement (4). The
analysis will be included in the final paper for the course.
- The student will write a paper including the analysis of the
experiment he or she designed and an analysis of the entire
Physics 102 laboratory addressing the issues of: coherence of the
laboratory experience; coverage of basic laboratory skills;
communication of the important idea of obtaining knowledge via
experimentation; and whether the course syllabus is adequately
addressed by the selected experiments; etc. This analysis should
be informed by a broad perspective on laboratory instruction as
revealed through library research.
Grading
The individual elements of the students work will be graded and a
final course grade will be assigned according the following
weightings:
|
Interaction with laboratory students (with special
attention given to improvement in response to suggestions
from the instructor and the first evaluation by students
enrolled in the lab)
|
20%
|
|
Pre-lab lecture
|
10%
|
|
Evaluation and analysis of existing experiment
|
20%
|
|
New experiment developed by student (factors to be
considered in evaluation include the soundness of the
curricular objectives; level of attention to pedagogy;
clarity and effectiveness of writeup; and whether the
experiment works)
|
30%
|
|
Final paper (includes student's assessment of the new
experiment)
|
20%
|
Bibliography
The monthly journals American Journal of Physics and Physics
Teacher regularly include articles relating to laboratory pedagogy
and descriptions newly developed instructional experiments for
introductory level physics.
This website maintained by Suzanne
Amador Kane.