High School Roundtable

As part of our support for high school Physics teachers we held a High School round table in the afternoon at our Fall meeting. The topics of (1) discipline, (2) level of curriculum, (3) grading/ paperwork and (4) making policy changes were discussed. Some material is available on each topic under Roundtable Resources. You can also download the High School Roundtable Notes from our discussion; if I left anything out please let me know by emailing BreeBarnett@hotmail.com.

Fall 2011 Pictures posted!

Pictures from the NCNAAPT Fall Meeting and Conference are available on Flickr or on our Facebook fan page. Some pictures and relevant diagrams are available within the notes for the day. Be sure to email Secretary Bree Barnett Dreyfuss with additional information, corrections, etc.

Group photo Fall 2011

Group photo with title

Fall Business Meeting

Dennis Buckley gave the Treasurer’s report, including $1,300 over budget last fiscal year. Using color postcards to advertise meetings and to send programs. We currently have $4,700 in the checking account.

Don’t forget about the Spring Meeting, April 20th & 21st in Lake Tahoe hosted by the Tahoe Community College. More information to come.

Keynote Speaker: Richard Muller

Richard Muller is a UC Berkeley professor of the popular “Physics for Future Presidents” class at UC Berkeley and author of a popular book of the same name. Muller discussed his development of his “Physics for Future Presidents” non-Physics major Physics course at University of California, Berkeley. The class has become a course that does not include as many calculations as a Physics course for Physics majors but rather fewer calculations that demonstrate more content. Throughout his development of the course Muller has discovered much about how students, both Physics majors and non-Physics majors, think and comprehend knowledge. His goal for every course is to teach students so that they can randomly recall relevant Physics knowledge when challenged. Muller shared many anecdotes about his students over the years demonstrating Physics knowledge they gained from his class. He also advocates using units and examples that are relevant and measurable for students. Muller uses the food calorie for energy and often has students compare large amount of energy, including the amount of energy released during the September 11^th attacks, to the amount of energy in calories in a chocolate cookie.

Richard Muller, keynote speaker

Several publications by Muller were previewed including his college level textbook “Physics and Technology for Future Presidents:
An Introduction to the Essential Physics Every World Leader Needs to Know” and a smaller non-textbook book called “The Instant Physicist.” Educators should write to the Princeton University Press to request a copy of the book, free of charge.

Muller did briefly discussed his work with climate change by showing a brief animation of the changes in surface changes over time. More information is available on the Berkeley Earth website and the video is available on YouTube.

Fall Meeting: Show & Tell Notes

[pictures taken today will be posted soon]

David with rubber bat

A detail shot using Fox's Infared camera

David Kagan, CSU Chico

David shared a rubber bat that he can use to find the “sweet spot.” Contact David for the information of the company that made it for him for $50. It was a movie prop but you have to tell them that you don’t want a dowel in it.

David shared video of a baseball hit at the batter’s footer with a regular video and then with the Fox News Infared camera. The

transfer of energy to the ball from the bat makes the ball hot enough to be bright white. The place where the baseball hit his foot also glows white; amazingly the ball is now only half white. More information is available on his website: www.phys.csuchico.edu/baseball

Frank Cascarano, Foothill College

Joulies coffee accessory

Frank with a Joulie

Frank shared a small object called a “Joulie” that has a material in it that melts at 140 degrees. When dropped in hot coffee it absorbed energy to cool your coffee but when your coffee cools below that same temperature it releases energy to the cup of coffee.

Bernard Cleyet, retired

Bernard Cleyet shares video

Bernard showed a video of a different glass materials heated and used as a conductor in a simple electrical circuit with a light bulb. The experiment used Sodium glass, pure silica, and Pyrex and plugged into an outlet. Bernard also offered lots of capacitors for anyone who needed some.

Don demos his micrometer

Don Rathjen, Exploratorium Teacher Institute

Don demonstrated a home-made micrometer that will measure one millimeter per rotation.  With 24 threads per inch, one turn is ~1mm, but it will measure within 10% error. Can use to measure the width of a hair, different wire gauges, etc. Don will be posting the instructions with photos on his website soon.

Shel Randall, Sierra College

POV Ray is a scripting tool that lets you make images with simple commands. Shel shared a short animation about thin film interference that he has made in the last year. He encouraged everyone to experiment with the animation program for use in their classroom.

A diagram of the iFly tunnel

John Boyce, iFly

John is the educational director for iFly in Union City, CA. John gave us a brief introduction of the facility and the science behind it. Field Trips with the program can be organized via John and previewed on the education portionof their website. If you book a field trip by Thanksgiving, you might win a free visit! Be sure to email John directly for more information: johnb@iflysfbay.com

Michael Walks

Michael Boykin, GVHS

Michael demonstrated a way of showing a real simple action explained in terms of Physics. He demonstrated how even walking is a complex set of procedural steps. He leads students to the idea that muscles are on the back of the body and the secret is pushing back against the floor in order to be propelled forward which can be related to Newton’s Third Law. Michael reminded us that getting up on the table or doing something silly is always going to get and keep your students’ attention.

Dean Baird, Rio Americano High School

Dean shared his “Scientists Valentines and “Back Masking” which involves playing a song backwards and hearing “secret messages.” Upon first listening, no one can discern any words but when the “secret message” lyrics are shown suddenly everyone can hear it. For more information can be found at www.JeffMilner.com/backmasking.

Bree Barnett Dreyfuss, Amador Valley High School

Bree suggested reading “The Pluto Files” by Neil de Grasse Tyson and using it with an astronomy unit to discuss the scientific process and classification of objects in the solar system. There was a NOVA Special and supporting material online as well.

Bree also previewed her work with Jon Brix on using laboratory notebooks from bound composition books in their Conceptual Physics course. If the experiment is successful this year she plans on offering a workshop at the Spring meeting, April 20 & 21, at Lake Tahoe.

Be sure to like NCNAAPT on Facebook as well!

Gunjan (aka Dr. G)

Dr. G demonstrated her programs that teach Physics to younger students using a volunteer child.

Leanna Felardo, Oroville High School

Leanna asked everyone to bring mystery equipment to the Spring meeting in Tahoe. She will be leading a workshop meant to  help identify unknown material and its use. You can also email Leanne with a photo of your mystery equipment at LFelardo@ouhsd.org.

Brian demos Torque

Brian Bellis, Hoover High School

Brian shared how he uses with a large wood spool to demonstrate torque. Brian also demonstrated an optical illusion of a little Red Dragon that he found online and folded up. The eyes of the little red dragon follow you as it moves.

Joel Rosenberg, Lawrence Hall of Science

Joel explained the process behind the CELL (Clean Energy Learning and Leadership) program. There is a visual representation of Power as the area of a box with the voltage representing the width and the current representing the height of a rectangle.

Peng Yav, Sebrante, IISME

Peng shared the details of the IISME summer program. Teachers have the opportunity to work in the industry during the summer to gain experience and money. The applications for the summer program are due this month! To learn more about Industry Initiatives for Science and Math Education (IISME) contact:

Shari Liss, Education Director at sliss@iisme.org  and (408)553-3179

Christina O’Guinn, Education Manager at coguinn@iisme.org and (408)553-2266

Fall Conference 2011 Invited Speaker

We are pleased to announce that the invited speaker for our Fall 2011 Conference will be UC Berkeley’s own Richard Muller. Muller is a professor of the popular “Physics for Future Presidents” class at UC Berkeley and author of a popular book of the same name. Muller is also a Faculty Senior Scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory and associated with the Institute for Nuclear and Particle Astrophysics. Read more about Muller’s career, interests and most recent book, “The Instant Physicist,” on his website.

Save the Date for the UC Berkeley Physics Department Demo Show Friday Nov. 4th and the section Conference on Nov. 5th!

Exploratorium Educator Social

An amazing opportunity for Educators from our friends at the Exploratorium:

Spring 2011 Conference Notes

Notes from the Spring Conference on April 23rd, 2011 are posted with links that are currently available. If you need anything corrected or would like to add anything to a post, please email Bree at Secretary@NCNAAPT.org.

If you were at the conference and would like to print out a certificate for your Professional Development records, you can download it here as a Document or a pdf.

Dennis and Bree register everyone

A note from our Program Chair, Paul Robinson, about our meeting:

“AAPT’ers,

Contributed Papers & Presentations – Sp2011

“Teaching Strategies for Conceptual Physics for Freshman”
Bree Barnett Dreyfuss and Jon Brix
Amador Valley High School, Pleasanton, CA

Jon and Bree discussed several strategies for teaching freshmen Physics:

• Use hands on learning & projects
• Enforce vocabulary
• Use the GUESS (Givens, Unknown, Equation, Substitute and Solve) calculation method
• Encourage partner work

Jon and Bree discussed difficulties in teaching the class due to low math skills, special needs students, varying grade levels, etc. The class requires a variety of strategies and resources in order to keep them engaged. Additional resources will be available on Bree’s website.

“Developing Some of the Skills and Values Needed for Success in Introductory Physics”
Jeff Phillips, President of SCAAPT
Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, CA

Jeff discussed data that suggests that students that develop their own understanding of concepts through exploration and discussion increases their understanding. Data was collected throughout the college and analyzed to show this improvement; some data was taken from the  Lawson Test. Interesting trends include students believing that they are either “smart” or “dumb” and that the method will not change that. Much of the class time has been replaced with teaching metacognitive skills and problem solving skills. Some activities involve the students determining the variables in the problems. For example, students are handed several different objects with different radii, mass, shapes, etc. to determine what affects the moment of inertia.

“The Law of Refraction in the Tenth Century”
Duygu Demirlioglu, Holy Names University, Oakland, CA

Consider a standard problem: given a light ray, incident in some direction on the flat interface between two transparent media, find the direction of the refracted ray. A straightforward and quite trivial application of Snell’s Law yields the solution. Suppose, however, that you are living a thousand years ago. All you have is a ruler—no protractor, no calculator, and no table of sines. A geometric law of refraction—found in the tenth century but largely unknown in the West—will be presented. This approach suffices to solve all the refraction problems (such as critical angle, apparent depth, and lensmaker’s formula) encountered in any physics textbook. It requires hands-on drawing, but no knowledge of trigonometry, or even much geometry; it allows students to understand the physics with very little mathematics.

“Chasing Shadows: NASA’s Kepler Mission”
Edna DeVore, SETI Institute, Mountain View, CA

An updated version of “Transit Tracks” activity where students interpret light curves to determine the period and the size of the transiting planet will be presented.

Exploratorium Tour – Sp2011

Paul Doherty & Don Rathjen

Paul D explains the Resonance column

Paul gave us a brief history of the Exploratorium and its growth over the years. Participants were then split into two groups to explore the Exploratorium’s favorite exhibits. Don and Paul gave tours of the museum and met back together for one big demonstration. Highlights include exploring the reflective properties of the dome at the Palace of Fine Arts and the hidden resonance tube inside one of its pillars. Paul demonstrated the “whirly” sound resonance tube in a larger-than-normal format. A video will be available once its edited.