Creating a Modern Physics Course: Visualization and Computation for Undergraduate Physics Majors

科学和工程专业的学生在第三学期第一次接触到20世纪世纪物理学的严肃研究，通常被称为现代物理学。现代物理课程在未来科学家和工程师的教育中具有独特的作用。物理学专业的学生开始他们感兴趣的当代物理学家的主题的研究;工程和其他科学专业的学生有他们唯一的机会学习物理学相关的微观和纳米技术领域，这将是他们的职业生涯的重要性。然而，目前的课程几乎没有改变，以反映有关学生学习，计算技术或基础量子物理学的最新研究进展的知识。 我们正在现有的工作（主要是可视化量子力学）的基础上创建一个新的现代物理课程。这门现代物理课程将利用当代的教学方法，这些方法基于对学生如何学习物理，计算和可视化技术以及最近的基础研究成果的研究。包括在要开发的材料是工具，这将有助于学生可视化的量子物理概念，简单的动手活动，和计算工具的模板。这些材料中的许多将是可视化量子力学材料的扩展。通过从这些现有的量子教学材料开始，该项目将能够以相对较低的成本完成这项工作。 该项目将接受咨询委员会的建议和指导，该委员会的成员是根据他们的知识和以前在现代物理教学方面的工作而选出的。 在这些材料用于商业销售之前，将由现场测试人员完成广泛的测试，他们将在全国各地的课堂上使用这些材料。 其结果将是一套现代学习材料，为科学和工程专业的学生提供了解当代物理学的机会。

Science and engineering majors first encounter a serious study of Twentieth Century physics, frequently called Modern Physics, in their third semester. The Modern Physics course has a unique role in the education of future scientists and engineers. Physics students begin their study of topics of interest to contemporary physicists; engineering and other science majors have their only opportunity to study physics related to micro-and nano-technology - areas which will be of importance to their careers. Yet, the present course has changed little to reflect knowledge about student learning, computational technology, or recent research advances in fundamental quantum physics. We are building on existing work (primarily Visual Quantum Mechanics) to create a new Modern Physics course. This modern Modern Physics course will utilize contemporary teaching-learning methods which are based on research into how students learn physics, computational and visualization techniques, and recent fundamental research results. Included in the materials to be developed are tools which will help students visualize the concepts of quantum physics, simple hands-on activities, and templates for computational tools. Many of these materials will be expansions of Visual Quantum Mechanics materials. By beginning with these existing quantum teaching-learning materials the project will be able to complete this effort at a relatively low cost. The project will receive advice and direction from an advisory committee whose members have been selected for their knowledge and previous work in teaching modern physics. Before the materials are released for commercial distribution extensive testing will be completed by field testers who will use the materials in classes throughout the country. The result will be a set of modern learning materials which provide the opportunity for science and engineering students to learn about contemporary physics.