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Technology Outside of the Physics Classroom Presented By Zak Knott Riverside – Brookfield H.S. Joint AAPT October 29, 2005 Rationale A traditional school day limits contact time with students to only 45-55 minutes per day. By utilizing the internet to allow students to communicate we can expand the school day while more deeply integrating technology into our curriculum. Overview My experience with physicsmonkey.com Class message boards Class “wiki” Student & parent feedback Background As a new teacher I found catching up students who had missed class one of the most tedious parts of my job. Originally wanted to create a place for students to download missing or lost worksheets from. www.physicsmonkey.com was born! PhysicsMonkey.com Established an online presence for the class As the site went “live” the interactivity of the bulletin boards increased and the site evolved into its current role Message Boards Gave students a place to communicate with each other about homework, notes, and lab assignments. To encourage students to use them I added a “Question of the Week” to answer on the board. A Research Type Question Well, I've opened the door. I guess we may as well run through it. . . In class last week I mentioned that there are a group of people known as the "Flat Earth Society" who truly believe that we live on a flat earth. Now, before you immediatly laugh it off lets look at their arguments. Visit their webpage at: http://www.alaska.net/~clund/e_djublonskopf/Flatearthsociety.htm and read about the evidence they offer for a flat earth. Also, I wanted to point out that the site http://www.flat-earth.org/ is a joke intended to mock the flat earthers (for example, it claims that Australia does not exist, but the author is from Australia). So please do not comment here on that site. You will find other information by performing a Google search, just be careful that you've chosen a reputable source. What I'd like to see in your post this week is an argument for or against a round earth. The flat earthers provide some pretty convincing arguments so please use what you know about physics to support one side or the other. Sample Responses Honestly, I went to the website with as clear a mind as possible, but I found the arguments less than convincing. First of all, even before I looked at the arguments I noticed that the use of language was far from sophisticated . . . That was very, um, creative I guess. I don't completely buy it, however. I think the whole water argument was pretty well thought out, and that if the earth was round, we'd be falling off of it from the north pole. I don't know. I'm sure I would believe it if I didn't really know any better, but the whole geocentric thing really doesn't make sence, and we really shouldn't think the universe revolves around us. . . Creative Type Question For the question of the week this week you have two options: 1) Compose a poem that could be used to explain energy to a third grader. 2) Create an experiment about energy that could be completed by a third grade class. Student Responses It can do work, and it can play. It lights your room, as bright as day. It cooks your food, and heats your tea, It comes from the sun, and beneath the sea, and all it could be, is energy. Problem Type Question Other Topics Create a mnemonic device to help remember the resistor color code Write an email to the president explaining your position on a mission to refurbish the Hubble Telescope Use an interactive web site to predict the likelihood of life existing on other planets Discuss the U.S. energy policy after conduction some independent research Free Group Discussions www.network54.com groups.yahoo.com Search for “free bulletin boards” PhysicsMonkey Wiki Added because of backlash from implementing modeling Students wanted me to put each days notes on the internet Since that sounded like a lot of work I put the responsibility on them Wikipedia An online encyclopedia Content is created, edited, and maintained by anyone who cares to do so Freely available & surprisingly complete Often criticized as unreliable PhysicsMonkey Wiki The good: http://www.physicsmonkey.com/wiki/index. php?title=Kinematics_formulas The bad: http://www.physicsmonkey.com/wiki/index. php?title=Definition_of_force Other Tools Present and Future Although I can’t see any usage statistics, anecdotal data suggests that the chat room is used. “Blogging” could be used to have students create their own webpage about some topic. FAQ’s could be created for each unit All of these tools and more are freely available! Conclusion Message boards, class wikis, and other tools present students with a way to continue communicating about physics outside of the classroom Overall the response from students has been very positive Do You Want to Try This? Visit www.PhysicsMonkey.com to have a look around E-mail me [email protected] and I will help you get started