American Association of Physics Teachers
Chesapeake Section

The Universe on a Desktop: Observational Astronomy Simulations in the Instructional Laboratory
Dick Cooper, Gettysburg College, dcooper@gettysburg.edu

Though the value of hands-on learning has long been recognized by educators, it is difficult to design laboratories in astronomy classes that present realistic astrophysical techniques to undergraduate students. Unlike most other sciences, astronomy is largely observational, not experimental, and making useful observations involves expensive equipment over time scales incovenient for pedagogy. In recent years, however, astronomy has gone almost completely digital, and the advent of large on-line data bases and fast personal computers has made it possible to realistically simulate the experience of research astrophysics in the laboratory.

Since 1992, Project CLEA (Contemporary Laboratory Experiences in Astronomy) has been developing such computer-based exercises aimed primarily at the introductory astronomy laboratory. These exercises simulate important techniques of astronomical research using digital data and Windows-based software. Each of the 9 exercises developed to date consists of software, technical guides for teachers, and student manuals for the exercises. CLEA software is used at many institutions in all the United States and over 60 countries world-wide, in a variety of settings from middle school to upperclass astronomy classes. We will describe and demonstrate some of the CLEA materials and talk about our design philosophy. Plans for future development will be presented. Project CLEA is supported by grants from Gettysburg College and the National Science Foundation.

http://www.gettysburg.edu/academics/physics/clea/CLEAhome.html

Saturday, April 15
starting at 8:30am

Data Acquisition and Analysis: A New Course to Prepare Students for "Discovery-Based" Science
Hollis Williams and Laura P. Eisen, Trinity College, williamsh@trinitydc.edu

Many colleges are promoting active learning and discovery techniques in the introductory physical science courses. The goal of a discovery based course is to allow the students to use their experimental data to determine scientific principles. The students MUST be able to acquire the data, mathematically manipulate the numbers, and use graphical analysis to see the relationship for the desired concept. To accomplish this the students must have specific mathematical, analytical and critical thinking skills. If these skills are absent, the students are unable to discover the underlying relationships and have difficulty understanding the relevant concepts. To assist the students, we devised a pre-science course designed to address the difficulties experienced by the students in the introductory Chemistry and Physics courses taught at Trinity College. This course aims to help students develop the required skills using familiar problems, so they are not trying to learn difficult concepts while learning new skills. Each exercise engages students to help them achieve the skills that will be useful in the physical science courses. The initial activities emphasize numbers, measurement, and data reliability. Other activities in the course focus on the use of graphs to look for mathematical relationships between variables. Different techniques of data acquisition and analysis are used in the course. A final project by the student integrates the various skills used in the previous activities.
Supported in part by NSF DUE Grant 98-51321

Magnetic Torsion Pendulum
James O'Connell, Frederick Community College, jsoconnell@aol.com

The fiber torsion balance was one of the most sensitive pre-electronic scientific instruments used in physics. Cavendish and Coulomb used these balances to measure the fundamental forces of gravity and electric charge. In this talk I describe how to construct a simple, inexpensive magnetic-dipole torsion pendulum using modern materials and how to use the instrument to measure the horizontal component of the Earth's magnetic field.

It's Just Physics, uh-Meteorologically Speaking
Sherman Frye, Northern Virginia Community College, nvfryes@nv.cc.va.us

Non-science majors in college traditionally do not take physics to fulfill their one-year science requirement, thus missing much of the knowledge and information concerning their physical world that all citizens should have in this age of information and technology. For the past two years I have been teaching a semester of Astronomy and a semester of Meteorology for non-science majors which fulfills their one year science requirement. As the word gets around, the courses are becoming increasingly popular and allows an "ole physics prof" to slip in quite a bit of physics concepts and principles to these student citizens. I will present what we do at NOVA to maybe give other physics instructors some ideas about such offerings at their institutions. It sure helps in the student/faculty ratios.

Challenges to Faraday's "Flux rule"
Frank Munley, Roanoke College, munley@roanoke.edu

Faraday's flux rule states that the emf in a closed circuit equals the rate of change of magnetic flux through the circuit. The flux rule can also be used for moving circuits, but an alternative is to integrate the motional force (the cross product of v and B) around the circuit. A number of texts, including Feynman's famous "Lectures," have claimed that the flux rule fails for certain "anomalous" cases of moving circuits, while the motional force approach always works. It will be shown how the flux rule, properly understood, can work for the anomalous cases.

Interactive, Web-Delivered Simulations in Support of Science Education
Pascal Renault, John Tyler Community College, prenault@jt.cc.va.us

The purpose of this presentation is to share with fellow teachers of science the availability of web-delivered, interactive simulations. These simulations provide free, easily accessible, fun, interactive and lively visualizations of inherently dynamic concepts. Specifically, this presentation will include a brief overview of the technology used for developing these simulations, a presentation of nine simulations developed by the author - covering dynamics, optics, waves, and thermodynamics, and will point out web links to other similar resources. The simulations developed by the author are available at <http://users.erols.com/renau/>.

Geometric Lorentz Solutions for Bodies Undergoing Constant Acceleration Using Brehme Diagrams
Lewis F. McIntyre, GRD Inc., McIntyreL@grd.com

This paper presents a geometric solution using Brehme diagrams to determine the hyperbolic trajectories of bodies undergoing constant acceleration to relativistic velocities, as observed by an unaccelerated observer. The solution shows the proper trajectory of uniform linear acceleration to be circular motion in the x-t plane. Classical acceleration trajectories are derived from the hyperbolic trajectory as small angle approximations, while relativistic solutions are asymptotic to a constant velocity of c.

The "Stretching" of a Coil Spring: There's a Twist
William H. Ingham, James Madison University, inghamwh@jmu.edu

When a coil spring "stretches," most of the length increase is actually due to torsion in the wire. Studying this has apparently long been part of the education of mechanical engineers, but the details of spring deformation are not studied by most physics students. My presentation will examine how a coil spring's size, shape and composition determine the familiar spring constant of Hooke's law. Measurements on several different coil springs will be reported.

Undergraduate Physics Research
George King III, Mary Washington College, gking@mwc.edu

In this presentation I will describe the role of research, as it relates to the education and career choices of Mary Washington College physics majors. Over the past 13 years of my affiliation with MWC, about 75 students have undertaken research projects, covering a broad range of topics. I will briefly describe a few of these projects, thus providing a flavor of what research is in a liberal arts setting for physics majors at MWC.

Our Home Still the Best Lab for Teaching Physics
Ahmad Halim, Wilson High School, Portsmouth, VA, rec_ah@landau4.phys.virginia.edu

Progress in Science Hardware and Software made a tremendous progress in developing many Labs for teaching Physics to both High School and College students. Many vendors like Vernier and Sarrgent Welch are taking advantage of the technology and offering a line of Technology oriented devices such as CBL for building Labs. Thousands of dollars are needed to purchase these technology oriented devices. The obvious question, what will happen if a school locality or a college does not have the required funds for setting up these Labs? In many cases, some School districts and Colleges do not have a budget for buying equipment due to many factors such as loss of funds from proprty taxes, or simply a cut in the budget for polytical and non-polytical reasons. This paper will outline home ready Labs for teaching Physics. A Lab on electricity unit can be constructed at home by simply using a cup, salted water, zinc bolts, copper bolts and electric wires, these itemms are readily available in the Kitchen and the Garage. You can build a series circuit and a parallel circuit and explain Ohm's law. It also will provide a Lab on building batteries and using chemical energy to generate electricity. A Lab on measuring the granity can be constructed at home by simply using a measure, a tennis ball and a watch. The driveway of our home is the best Lab to explain the expansion of solids. THe driveway is composed of several sections to allow for expansion of concrete during summer. More demos from home will explain pressure, force, centriptical acceleration and theory of flight. All these Labs will be at display at the meeting.

"http://www.physics.udel.edu/csaapt/Spring2000/abstracts.html"
Last updated April 20, 2000.