Physics Tutorials and Laboratories

This page contains links to documents discussing ideas for the physics undergraduate labs, tutorials and related issues. Unless noted otherwise, proposals discussed should be treated as (highly) preliminary, and intended to promote/provoke discussion. All documents are in pdf format.

Proposal to the Student Experience Fund (January 2007)

Final Proposal

Here are links to the proposal that was submitted on January 31, 2007

• Final Proposal (pdf format)
• Draft Budget (Word format)

Drafts

Here are links to the drafts that were used in the process of putting together the final proposal. The documents are all in Word format.

• Cover Page
• Executive Summary So far this is just an empty stub
• Introduction
• Physics Education Research A discussion of the pedagogical foundation of the proposed Practicals
• The Physics Practicals What we want to do and why
• Costs and Other Resources A very rough beginning at costing out the proposal
• Appendix A Figures of how the rooms can be re-arranged for seminars and lectures
• Appendix B A "proof of concept" Introduction to the Practicals for the TAs.
• Appendix C Some details of the hardware and software that we intend to use.
• Appendix D A floor plan for the pilot room
• Appendix E A floor plan of the final layout
• Appendix F Audio-visual and network requirements

Design Documents

• Overview and Issues
  • Revision on Sunday March 13: a new issue of the TA union.
  • Revision on Friday March 11: each Practical group must be for a single course.
  • Revisions made on Tuesday March 8 include: a "best case" timeline; a calculation of TA hours and a brief discussion of the implications of having 2 TA's per group; a new "issue" about the optimal number of students who will work together in a small group.
• Pedagogical Design
  • Revision on Monday March 21. New section at the end on the need to de-mystify computerised data acquisition. Also refer to the new Lab Equipment document and the draft Formal Report Module.
  • Revisions made on Wednesday March 9 include: changing the small-group size from 5 to 4 students; changing the group size from 20 students with one TA to 32 students with two TA's; a new section exploring an idea about Formal Reports.
• Best Practices A PowerPoint presentation of what others are doing, plus more. Compiled by David Bailey.
• Lab Equipment A first cut at how much it will cost for equipment.
  • Revision of Thursday April 7: each room will require a balance.
• Physical Plant for the Architects. The next item in this list is the design document, which contains various iterations and thoughts. This document is a short-form hopefully suitable for architects.
• Physical Plant Design
  • Revision on Tuesday March 29: yet another furniture design to increase flexibility; rough in the space requirements of the technologists.
  • Revision on Friday March 25: discuss implementing on the 2nd floor; reduce the furniture size; add a 3D visualisation of a room.
  • Revision on Sunday March 20: added a "dumb" whiteboard at each pod. This requires removing some tables around the walls so the students can easily get to and write on it.
  • Revision on Tuesday March 8: a new "Plan B" floor plan where we will have 6 identical rooms. Each room will accomodate up to 32 students, who will work in small groups of 4 students each.
• Giant Restaurant Model This is yet another plan, put together by Jason Harlow. The dark-blue circles are supposed to be tables, and the coloured rectangles are supposed to represent carpet colour.  The only wall is the one down the middle, currently separating MP125 and 126.
• Mixed Layout This is a design by Larry Avramidis. It keeps both the small rooms around the edge and a large central area.
• Here is a plan by Ruxandra. It is in 2 parts:
  • Description
  • Figure (the figure will open in a separate window so both can be seen at the same time.)

Other Material

• Introduction Sections of the TA Manual This is sort of a "proof of concept" by seeing if the plan makes sense when trying to introduce it to the TA's.
• A Module on Formal Reports Another "proof of concept" by putting together a module on Formal Reports. It is shorter than the typical module, and is still in a very rough state.
• Racing Cylinders. Another draft Guide. Preparing this one taught me how hard it is to predict what equipment we will need until we actually put a guide together.
  • Student Guide
  • Instructor Notes
  • Test Ideas
• A Module on Radioactive Half-Life. Another "proof of concept" based on a module used at Sydney University
  • Student Guide
  • Instructor Notes
  • Test Ideas
• An article on innovative teaching techniques (by David M. Harrison and Stephen W. Morris, submitted to Physics in Canada, Jan. 2005.)
• Workshop Physics This is Priscilla Laws' project at Dickinson College, Much of the "Physical Plant Design" linked above is stolen from her.
• Sydney University Physics Education Research Group Contains Workshop Tutorials which may be useful for us
• Univ. of Maryland This is Joe Redish's PER site. It includes a Per on the Web section which has a massive list of other Physics Departments involved in this sort of thing.
• Teaching Biological Physics This paper is from the March 2005 issue of Physics Today. The first author, Raymond Goldstein, is on the short list for our new Chair.
• UC Berkeley 1st Year Physics courses are doing combined tutorial/labs similar to what we have been considering.
  • A description of their method.
  • Student handbook
• A report by Howard Okada on an ActivePhysics workshop he attended.

To get your 2 cents worth into the design documents, you may email me at: harrison@physics.utoronto.ca

Last modified: $Date: 2007/02/09 16:45:00 $ (y/m/d UTC)