- [All] Good morning.
- Today we are going to be sharing
different teacher approaches on how best
to have students learn from classroom physics labs.
Mrs. Zeller, why don't you get us started, please?
- Sure, Mr. P.
In my physics classes, we have two main types of labs.
We have inquiry, pre-learning labs
that occur at the beginning of the unit,
and are used to build knowledge
and make connections to throughout the unit.
The other type are application, or confirmation labs,
where students have already learned the material,
and now are applying their knowledge
to figure out a challenge,
or confirm something they know.
One example of an inquiry lab that we do is
using bowling balls and brooms
to investigate forces for the first time.
Students are given various motions
that they need to create using the bristles of a broom
against the sides of a ball.
At the end, we focus on inertia allowing
a rolling bowling ball to continue,
the relationship between force and acceleration,
and interaction force pairs based on
observing the bristles of a broom bend
when it pushes on a bowling ball.
Students have not learned about forces in any detail
before we do this lab,
but then after the lab, we can connect to
all three of Newton's laws.
This gives students a common experience
that they can all relate the material to.
We also have inquiry labs, creating motion graphs
by walking in front of a motion sensor,
torque and equilibrium labs
with balancing masses on a meter stick,
and exploring free fall by dropping various objects.
In advanced placement physics,
we often start a unit by just giving students a phenomenon
and having them investigate a relationship.
These labs have much less provided structure,
and are designed to teach experimental design
as much as the content the students are investigating.
An example of an application confirmation lab
is our hit the tape lab.
We do this lab to wrap up horizontal projectiles.
The students set up a ramp to flat track setup,
and without allowing the marble to shoot off the table,
they collect data and figure out where on the floor
the marble will hit when it's allowed to.
We focus the lab on students applying
their linear and projectile motion knowledge,
and using their problem-solving skills
to determine what they need to measure
to make necessary calculations.
Students enjoy this type of lab
because they actually get to test the answer
to their problem and physically see if they are correct.
The amount of instruction and scaffolding
is based on the students in the class.
I am constantly revisiting my labs,
and trying to make them more meaningful for students.
My goal is to make them more inquiry-based
and student created.
I want my students to investigate
and learn their knowledge through doing science.
Okay, Mr. P, now it's your turn.
- Thanks, Mrs. Zeller.
Labs in my physics classes slowly move
from what I call cookbook labs,
where they are given step-by-step instructions
on how specifically to do the lab,
to labs where they are given almost no instructions at all.
For example, in the first lab,
I tell them exactly what the procedure is,
what to measure, and walk them through the entire process.
By the end of the school year,
I provide them with the lab materials,
and tell them what they are trying to prove.
They determine their own procedure,
what to measure, and why.
We use labs as a way to prove the laws of physics.
This shows that these aren't just
random equations we are manipulating,
but rather equations which describe
the physical world around them.
Also, I consider the basic understanding
of how to use a spreadsheet program
very important for physics,
so in most of our labs, we harness the power of Excel.
Mr. Thomas, now it is your turn.
- Thanks, Mr. P.
Besides developing students'
procedural skills with experimentation,
I believe it's just as important
to also be able to develop their questioning skills.
In order to do this, I first try to get the students
to overcome their fear of asking questions.
Just ask anything.
Next, I believe it's important to build
some sort of a structure for those questions.
Number one, what is actually happening?
Number two, so what does this mean?
Let's dissect that motion,
let's figure out what its foundation is.
Number three, now what can we do with that understanding?
What implications does it have?
How does this relate to other observations we've made?
For more of a procedural understanding of my labs,
I've typically taught in smaller schools
with limited physical resources and measuring devices,
so I'll use sometimes more digital resources
or technology already available to the students,
such as their phones.
I'll get the students to pair up
and take a video of some projectile motion,
and we'll use a 10 by 10 grid as a background.
Using the video, students will be able to
determine approximate displacements,
and the frame rate of their cameras
helps them with the change of time.
For things such as oscillatory motion,
we'll use simulations through the Internet
that help us study maybe a pendulum swinging,
or a mass on the end of a spring.
And we can use what they provide
to help us with understanding conservation of energy.
Tying this together, we can develop a
pretty good understanding of what's going on.
Mr. Segal, camera is yours.
- Thank you, Mr. Thomas.
I don't always use inquiry labs,
but when I do, I like to use a structure that I learned
in 2013 in a modeling physics workshop.
It was taught at Arizona State University, Tempe
by Jeff Steinert.
I present a preselected set of lab materials,
and I demonstrate something they can do.
For example, the materials might include
a fan unit cart, a track, and a motion detector.
I ask the students, "What do you observe?"
and I write responses on the board.
Then, in another column I write,
"What can we measure or quantify here?"
and I record the quantities that they name.
And then in a third column I write,
"What experiment or experiments can we do?"
And I provide the sentence stem
that the purpose of our experiment is
to determine the graphical and mathematical
relationship between two variables.
In effect, that sentence stem is a request
for an independent and a dependent variable,
and a reminder that we're hoping to make
a data table, and a graph, and an equation
that describes the graphical relationship.
There may be multiple relationships that are doable
with the given set of materials,
and I let the lab groups choose
whichever experiment they want to do.
Well, Mrs. Morey, I believe it is your turn.
- In my AP physics 1 class,
my physics lab approach is to have students design
as many of the labs as possible,
and then receive feedback from their peers.
I still do a lot of cookbook labs
in my AP physics 1 class,
so they can learn lab skills.
But when they're designing their own procedure,
they design it, do some initial testing,
present methods to the class,
and then we have a class discussion
about similarities and differences
between the lab procedures.
We talk about whether these differences
are likely to affect results.
Groups are then able to make changes to the procedure,
if they desire, before they collect their data.
Now I'll move on to Mr. Sourvelis.
- Typically, I incorporate an inquiry approach to labs.
Often, a lab will stem from
a common student misconception or discrepant event.
So, a typical lesson would begin with elicitation
or descrepant event, followed by classroom discussion,
in which the students would design a lab with my guidance.
Concluding the lab, you would have
a little bit of content or a miniature lecture
with students practice, and finish each lesson with a test.
Common student misconceptions about physics
are a great opportunity to get your students
discussing their ideas.
With the guidance of the teacher,
they can be led through designing their own experiments,
so that they can actually test those ideas.
When they execute the experiment,
what we're most interested in is
their ability to collect data,
and then analyze that data
to derive some physical significance from their experiment,
ultimately coming back into the classroom
so that they can present their ideas to their classmates.
All right, Mr. P, wrap it up.
- As you can see, we all have different approaches
to physics labs in the classroom,
and no one approach can be considered to be
the correct approach.
However, I will say, there does seem to be
a common theme of pushing students
to design their own experiments.
Hopefully this video is a helpful tool
to help you, as the teacher,
determine what is best for your students.
And I'd like to thank all of you
for sharing your insights with us today.
- [All] You're welcome.
- And thank you for learning with us today.
I enjoyed learning with you.
- In my AP physics one class, my labs,
okay, hold on, hold on, hold on.
- Good morning.
- It doesn't take a bunch of takes
for me to sit here in this booth all day
and say the truth, okay?
Now look, you're drooling, you have tooth decay.
(laughing)
- I forgot to count.