Adaptation of Workshop Physics for an Integrated Lecture/Laboratory Course

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The physics teaching community is focused on redesigning course content and pedagogy so that students leave their physics course with good conceptual understanding, problem solving skills, comfort with technology and an awareness of how physics is relevant to issues in their own lives. These objectives have not always been met with traditional physics curricula and teaching strategies. The physics department at Muhlenberg College shares these goals and is engaged in reforming the entire physics curriculum, beginning with the introductory courses.The physics department is adopting the Workshop Physics curriculum, developed at Dickinson College, and adapting it to the existing traditional large-lecture/lab format. Students meet twice a week in two-hour lab periods to do real-time microcomputer based experiments, spreadsheet modeling and kinesthetic experiments from the Workshop Physics curriculum. Using the new technologies in the science lecture hall at Muhlenberg College, computer-based tools used in the laboratory are used to do the other Workshop Physics activities as interactive lecture demonstrations or cooperative-group student activities. By using the same tools and curriculum in both lecture and lab, obstacles to learning in the lecture are removed. Students, having already developed an understanding of the tools used in lab, focus on the physical principles under discussion. The same technology is fully integrated into all aspects of the course (lecture and lab) as well as the inquiry-driven approach. We envision these two parts of the course working together, avoiding the synchronization problems and redundancy that so often limit the effectiveness of more traditional courses.