Pasco Probeware Works
FINALLY!
The initial reason I started this blog was to share some of my methods with other teachers, especially science teachers. This is only my third year teaching high school, but I have been teaching at various other levels for almost a decade now, so I am getting a little confidence and feeling like I might have some things to share.
The number one thing that I wanted to share was the use of Pasco Probeware in my high school physics classroom. Our school invested a few thousand dollars on Pasco Probeware last year, in hopes of making our science labs better learning experiences. I have modeled the use of them on some of the labs I performed as a student (and later taught as a TA) at VCU. Last year was a transition year, as I took old labs and altered them for the new equipment - replacing spring scales with force probes, and thermometers with temperature probes.
But the motion sensors had the biggest impact, because students were able to see a real-time graphic display of x-vs-t for one dimensional motion. This makes it much more intuitive for them to learn the relationships of position, velocity, and acceleration.
I was so excited about this year being even better. But then disaster struck. From my point of view, having our school switch from Mac to PC was a nightmare. None of the Pasco software was installed on the PCs, and the probeware was useless... until this week. I could have dealt with this just fine, if at the beginning of the year I had been told "no Pasco till February". But instead I have been hearing "next week" the whole time, so I haven't had the best attitude. I don't blame anyone for the delay in installation, but it has been very unfortunate for my classes.
Anyway, they work now. The software is installed and we got started this past Thursday and Friday with an introduction to motion lab, which was a little ridiculous for the students, considering that they had this material back in September. But it was nice to give them something easy, so they could concentrate on using the software more than learning the concept. The lab consists of graphing motion relative to the sensor, and matching some pre-made graphs of position vs time. We discussed how the sensor is able to determine your distance (x = v/t, and it knows the speed of sound in air), and played around with them a little bit. If anybody reading this would like to see the lab instructions, I would be more than happy to email them to you (they are in powerpoint format). Contact me at Wulf@atlasblogged.com. You are welcome to alter the document or use it as is, free of charge.
Starting this coming week, I expect to be using the force sensors to investigate Archimedes Principle. I am trying to come up with a good and useful way to use our few pressure sensors to do a good lab on Bernoulli, but I might have to settle for a demonstration. I will keep you all updated.
The initial reason I started this blog was to share some of my methods with other teachers, especially science teachers. This is only my third year teaching high school, but I have been teaching at various other levels for almost a decade now, so I am getting a little confidence and feeling like I might have some things to share.
The number one thing that I wanted to share was the use of Pasco Probeware in my high school physics classroom. Our school invested a few thousand dollars on Pasco Probeware last year, in hopes of making our science labs better learning experiences. I have modeled the use of them on some of the labs I performed as a student (and later taught as a TA) at VCU. Last year was a transition year, as I took old labs and altered them for the new equipment - replacing spring scales with force probes, and thermometers with temperature probes.
But the motion sensors had the biggest impact, because students were able to see a real-time graphic display of x-vs-t for one dimensional motion. This makes it much more intuitive for them to learn the relationships of position, velocity, and acceleration.I was so excited about this year being even better. But then disaster struck. From my point of view, having our school switch from Mac to PC was a nightmare. None of the Pasco software was installed on the PCs, and the probeware was useless... until this week. I could have dealt with this just fine, if at the beginning of the year I had been told "no Pasco till February". But instead I have been hearing "next week" the whole time, so I haven't had the best attitude. I don't blame anyone for the delay in installation, but it has been very unfortunate for my classes.
Anyway, they work now. The software is installed and we got started this past Thursday and Friday with an introduction to motion lab, which was a little ridiculous for the students, considering that they had this material back in September. But it was nice to give them something easy, so they could concentrate on using the software more than learning the concept. The lab consists of graphing motion relative to the sensor, and matching some pre-made graphs of position vs time. We discussed how the sensor is able to determine your distance (x = v/t, and it knows the speed of sound in air), and played around with them a little bit. If anybody reading this would like to see the lab instructions, I would be more than happy to email them to you (they are in powerpoint format). Contact me at Wulf@atlasblogged.com. You are welcome to alter the document or use it as is, free of charge.
Starting this coming week, I expect to be using the force sensors to investigate Archimedes Principle. I am trying to come up with a good and useful way to use our few pressure sensors to do a good lab on Bernoulli, but I might have to settle for a demonstration. I will keep you all updated.
posted by Wulf at
10:05 PM
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