Activity-Based Tutorials

Home | Volume 1: Intro | Volume 2: Modern
Understanding How Students Learn | Teacher's Guide

M.C. Wittmann, R.N. Steinberg, E.F. Redish and the University of Maryland Physics Education Research Group

Volume 2: Moden Physics

Overview
Classroom Materials
Software
Videos
Exam Questions
Essay Questions

Volume 2: Software

In the New Model Course in Applied Quantum Physics, computer programs are used in lecture demonstrations, tutorial activities, and in homework that students must complete. The software is either commercially available, downloadable from the web, or included in this package of materials. For more information on each set of programs, follow the links listed below. Those including "(WWW)" link to locations outside the CD-ROM.

For suggestions on how to install the software on classroom workstations, click here.

Photoelectric Tutor

A program developed by Graham Oberem and Richard Steinberg. The program interacts with students by interpreting written comments and sketched graphs and responding according to research into common student reasoning about the photoelectric effect. The software is available for purchase from Physics Academic Software (WWW).

Visual Quantum Mechanics

A set of curriculum materials and programs developed by the Dean Zollman and the Physics Education Group at Kansas State University.

Clicking on the links below will run the programs used in the tutorials within your browser
(The programs have been tested in Netscape and Internet Explorer and may run in other browsers; you will need the Macromedia Shockwave (WWW) browser plugin to run these programs):

• Spectroscopy Lab Suite
• Quantum Tunneling
• Energy Band Creator

Other programs have been used in classroom lecture demonstrations. More information on these programs can be found at the VQM web site (WWW). 

Physlets

Physics applets, written in java, have been developed by Wolfgang Christian at Davidson College. They have been written so that parameters of the system can be changed simply by editing the javascript in the html files. We have created a set of activities which allow students to study the energy levels of different quantum wells. For more information, follow the link to physlets.

Spreadsheet physics

By working spreadsheets that allow manipulation of data, students can gain insight into numerical analysis of information. We use two specially designed spreadsheets in our tutorials, both of which are included on this CD-ROM.

(Clicking on the links may open the files or download them to your hard drive depending on your browser settings.)

• Square waves
• Gaussian
• Zip version of both files (provided for those with difficulties in downloading the Excel spreadsheet files)

CUPS Utilities

A set of programs for all levels of physics.  In tutorial, we make use of one program, "1-D lattice." It is available on this CD (with approval pending for distribution), by browsing on the CD to "NewModel" --> "software" --> "cups." The full software package is available for purchase from Wiley (WWW).

MBL materials

A set of programs that allow computers to interface with Universal Lab Interface hardware. These materials are commercially available from Vernier Software (WWW). In tutorial, we use modified force probes to gather data. Specifications on the modifications carried out at UMd will be included in the final version of this CD.

MUPPET

We have used a variety of additional programs in tutorial and in the classroom. For example, the M.U.P.P.E.T utilities are a set of MS-DOS programs developed at the University of Maryland. The full package contains programs for all levels of physics. These programs are included on this CD. For more information on these programs, follow the link to MUPPET.