Physics 152 Virtual Labs
John Yeazell, Physics
The project goal was to create interactive virtual physics labs to teach the fundamental concepts of simple harmonic motion.
Instructional goals
- Provide actual physics lab experiences online, to allow students to learn when they choose
- Expand the number of physics experiments available to students
- Provide more students with hands-on learning
Project Rationale
With the high demand for hands-on activities and a limited amount of space and equipment, it is often difficult to give all students an adequate hands-on experience during the traditional two-hour physics lab. Physics Professor John Yeazell encountered just that situation. With large classes and not enough equipment to go around, he was eager to discover a tool that would allow more students to have a successful hands-on lab experience.To that end, Professor Yeazell developed the idea of virtual or online labs. In these labs, students watch experiments take place, record data, analyze information for experiments, and submit their findings for assessment. Professor Yeazell and the IDC team created one lab as a pilot. In addition to providing activities and experiments to simulate the lab experience, the pilot project will evaluate how the students view their experience with the virtual lab.
Implementation
Professor Yeazell provided the IDC team with videos of lab set-ups that demonstrate the concepts of simple harmonic motion, and the assignments and questions to go along with each video. The IDC team used Adobe Premiere to compress the videos, built a Flash interface that randomly generated video clips along with an Excel spreadsheet that provided the accompanying data for each clip.Technologies Used
The Web site was created using Adobe Premiere, Microsoft Excel, and Macromedia Flash.Impact on Student Learning
With about 2000 students taking Physics for Engineers every year at Purdue, the virtual labs provide an accessible way for all of them to engage in a wide array of experiments that require specialized instruments. Dr. Yeazell’s surveys have shown that the remote labs can be a very effective teaching tool. He notes, “The remote labs allow students to interact with more experiments than they can in the limited time available in the laboratory session. Their response has been overwhelming enthusiastic with 90% liking it better than the in-class lab. They also believe it teaches them as well or better than a typical in-class lab and our assessment indicates that it does as least as well in teaching the physics. It’s a great supplement to an existing laboratory.” In the future, Dr. Yeazell plans to develop more remote labs, including “Measure Gravitational Constant” and “Rocket Impulse,” and to distribute virtual labs to colleges and K-12.Web link: http://testweb.test.ics.purdue.edu:8080/yeazell_project/remote_lab/main.html
IDC Staff Contact: David Eisert