The Physics of Everyday Life: Java Applets and Interactive Lecture Demonstrations for Non-science Students

日常生活中的物理：面向非理科学生的 Java 小程序和交互式讲座演示

• 批准号: 0123561
• 负责人: Carl Wieman
• 金额: $ 30.5万
• 依托单位: University of Colorado at Boulder
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2001
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2001-09-01 至 2005-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0123561&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Physics; Everyday; Life; Java; Applets

The project aims to address the problem that physics, or more specifically physics courses, are widely held to be difficult, unpleasant, and irrelevant, even though physics provides the foundation of much of modern technology. The objective of this work is to change the curriculum and method of presentation of undergraduate physics courses to make them popular, engaging, and more effective at providing widespread understanding of physics concepts as they apply to the world around us. The approach that is being taken to achieve this goal is to first develop a novel introductory course for non-science students that will build on the unique curriculum put forth in the new textbook "How things work; the physics of everyday life". Interactive Java applets and interactive lecture demonstrations (ILDs) are being developed that cover the topics in this text, and thereby provide novel presentation formats to go with this novel curriculum. Applets and ILDs are two of the innovations that science education research has shown contribute substantially to student conceptual learning. Through the use of readily available technology these can also be easily and inexpensively implemented in the standard large lecture course format. The physics for nonscientists course is specifically targeted because it has the capability of reaching large numbers of students, but the institutional and disciplinary barriers to introducing such radical changes in it are uniquely low compared to other physics courses. However, demonstrated success in this course is likely to result in similar changes being adopted in the rest of the undergraduate physics curriculum, and the applets and ILDs being developed can be used equally well in a variety of courses. The development of these applets and ILDs heavily utilize the same skills that have made the PI a highly successful experimental physicist, and their effectiveness is being assessed using standard techniques of education research. The Wiley publishing company will vigorously pursue the implementation and distribution of these innovations.

该项目旨在解决这样一个问题，即物理课程，更具体地说，物理课程，被广泛认为是困难、令人不快和无关的，尽管物理提供了许多现代技术的基础。这项工作的目标是改变本科物理课程的课程和呈现方法，使它们变得受欢迎、吸引人，并更有效地提供对应用于我们周围世界的物理概念的广泛理解。为了实现这一目标，正在采取的办法是首先为非理科学生开发一门新颖的入门课程，该课程将以新教科书《事物如何运作；日常生活的物理》中提出的独特课程为基础。交互式Java小应用程序和交互式讲座演示(ILDS)正在开发中，它们涵盖了本文中的主题，从而提供了与此新课程相匹配的新颖演示格式。Applet和ILDS是科学教育研究表明对学生概念学习做出重大贡献的两项创新。通过使用现成的技术，这些也可以以标准的大型讲座形式轻松和廉价地实施。这门面向非科学家的物理课程之所以特别有针对性，是因为它有能力接触到大量学生，但与其他物理课程相比，在该课程中引入这种根本性变化的制度和纪律障碍非常低。然而，这门课程被证明是成功的，很可能导致类似的变化被应用于本科物理课程的其余部分，正在开发的小应用程序和ILDS可以在各种课程中同样好地使用。这些小应用程序和ILD的开发大量使用了使PI成为一名非常成功的实验物理学家的相同技能，它们的有效性正在使用教育研究的标准技术进行评估。威利出版公司将积极推动这些创新的实施和分销。