Fall 2009: Homework Week 6

Navigation Links

Fall 2009-Day 12
Instructional Strategy of Homework

Design your own experiment!

Design your own experiment about thermal phenomena and try it with at least one other friend or family member.

Post a summary of your experience on Blackboard. Include a description of your experiment and reflect on the process you went through.

Questions to think about: What did you plan? What did you say? How did your friend/family respond? Did it go exactly as you planned?
Submit here and also post on BlackBoard Discussion Forum

Attached Files: 2009FPh111Robertson.doc (35 KB)

1. Where and when would be a good time to look for the moon for the next few days, assuming the good weather continues and we can see the moon? Why would these be a good time and area of the sky to look?

2. Write the next section of your moon paper in which you develop an explanatory model for the phases of the moon:

First review briefly the pattern of the phases of the moon that you have just presented in detail in the previous section. These are what need to be explained.

Next describe a way to explore here on earth the relationships we have been seeing in the sky among the sun and moon by using a lamp to represent the sun, a ball to represent the moon, and yourself to represent the earth. Describe how you moved the ball to replicate the pattern of phases that you and colleagues have observed in the sky. What did you infer from this about the cause of the phases of the moon?

Then discuss why we think the moon is close and the sun is far away. Include a description of the demonstration we did in class that utilized the observation that an angle of about ninety degrees is observed when pointing one arm at the sun and the other arm at a first or third quarter moon. Also discuss why we infer that the moon is small and the sun very big.

Sketch two perspectives for each phase: what do you see here on earth? What would you see if you were to look down upon the sun, earth, and moon from way above the solar system?

3. Summarize your experiences exploring thermal phenomena: a. Compare temperature of metal, wood, Styrofoam, sponge that have been sitting in the room for a long time . What were your initial ideas? what are your ideas now? b. When putting hot water in cups made of different material, what did we learn about thermal phenomena? What did we learn about designing experiments? c. State the powerful ideas we developed from these observations d. Use these powerful ideas to explain why the metal legs of a chair feel cold compared to the plastic seat. Be careful to consider in what direction heat flows e. Sketch temperature versus time graphs that represent your findings about heat and temperature when: (draw what makes sense to you) i. Mixing two equal amounts of water at the same temperature ii.. Mixing two unequal amounts of water at the same temperature iii. Mixing two equal amounts of water at different temperatures iv. Mixing two unequal amounts of water at different temperatures v. Heating ice/water mixture until all ice melts, heating liquid water, boiling water f. What is something you explored either in the classroom or at home with your friends and family activities and what did you learn from it?

4. Read: Robertson, S. (2007). Inquiring into temperature. Unpublished manuscript. Giancoli, D.G. (1980). Physics. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, Inc. p. 233

a. What Pre, During, and Post reading strategies did you utilize while reading these pieces? b. What was something interesting you learned from reading these articles? Submit as part of Homework 6 here and post on BlackBoard discussion forum.

Click on the submit link below to see the file for Sage's paper.

5. From what you experienced in this class, and from reading this article, how would you teach a unit on thermal phenomena in your own classroom?

Submit as part of Homework 6 here and post on BlackBoard discussion forum.

Example Student Responses