Fall 2017 Joint Meeting of the Illinois and Wisconsin Sections of the AAPT
"Contemporary Physics Instruction"
Oct. 20-21, 2017
Rockford, Illinois 61108
We are pleased to invite you to attend the Fall 2017 joint meeting of the ISAAPT and the WAPT. Come to learn more about physics, discover new tools and techniques for teaching physics, share your experiences via contributed presentations and Take Fives, and meet old and new friends.
Friday, October 20
2:30 |
Registration |
3:00 |
Workshop W1. "Exploration of Integrating Computation into the Curriculum", Todd Zimmermann |
3:00 |
Session A and B - Contributed Presentations |
4:30 |
"Las Campanas Remote Observatory: Remote Challenges and Solutions; Real Science Within Reach", Howard Hedlund |
5:15 |
Welcome - Dr. D. Breiter, Dean of Science, Math and Nursing, Rockford University |
5:30 |
"The State of 'Beyond the First Year' Physics Labs and the Resources to Support Them", Lowell McCann |
6:15 |
Socialize |
6:15 |
Book signing, "Deep Learning in Introductory Physics: Exploratory Studies of Model Based Reasoning",
Mark Lattery, University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh |
6:45 |
Banquet, Presentation of High School Teacher Award to Michael McHale |
7:45 |
"Building Instruments of Discovery", Sarah Tuttle |
Saturday, October 21
7:00 |
ISAAPT Council meeting |
8:00 |
Registration |
8:15 |
"Is the pipeline leaking? White women and other minoritized scientists in Astronomy", Sarah Tuttle |
9:00 |
Workshop W2. "Women and Minorities in the History of Physics, Role Models for Today", Gregory Good |
9:00 |
Session C - Contributed Presentations |
10:30 |
Break |
11:00 |
Workshop W3. "More Modern Modern Physics for the High School Classroom", James Madsen |
11:00 |
Session D and E - Contributed Presentations |
12:30 |
Lunch, Business meetings for each section |
1:15 |
"Science and Social Media: One Physicist's Experience", Robert McNees |
2:00 |
Workshop W4. "IOLab - a multi-sensor device", Morten Lundsgaard |
Take Fives. Anyone who registers for the meeting may take 5 minutes or less to share a favorite item related to teaching physics - a demonstration, a new website or app, announcement of an upcoming event, ... Please use the registration form to tell us the title of your Take Five. There may be time for a few unannounced Take Fives after those that are scheduled in the program.
2016-2017 Illinois Outstanding High School Physics Teacher Award. This will be given during the banquet on Friday evening. Congratulations to Michael McHale, Byron High School, Byron, IL.
Meetings. The ISAAPT Council will meet on Saturday morning. The Illinois and Wisconsin sections will each have
a business meeting during lunch on Saturday.
Registration
• The registration fee for faculty is $40.
It is free for students, guests, invited guests, first-time ISAAPT attendees from Illinois (first 10),
and first-time WAPT attendees from Wisconsin (first 10).
After Oct. 13, the registration fee for faculty will be increased by $5.
• ISAAPT section dues: $20 (faculty), $10 (K-12)
• Workshops (see below)
W1. "Exploration of Integrating Computation into the Curriculum", Friday, 3:00 - 4:30 pm, free
W2. "Women and Minorities in the History of Physics, Role Models for Today", Saturday, 9:00 - 10:30 am, free
W3. "More Modern Physics for the High School Classroom", Saturday, 11:00 am - 12:30 pm, free
W4. "IOLab - a multi-sensor device", 2:00 - 3:30 pm, free
• Friday evening banquet: $20
• Saturday lunch: free
• The deadline for banquet reservations is Friday, Oct. 13.
When you arrive at the meeting you may pay the total fees at the registration table by using cash, a personal check, a school or company check, or a credit card.
Invited Speakers
Las Campanas Remote Observatory: Remote Challenges and Solutions; Real Science Within Reach, Friday 4:30pm
Howard Hedlund, Astro-Physics Inc., Rockford, IL
Operating a remote observatory presents many challenges and problems. Doing so in another hemisphere compounds these immensely. I will discuss how we found solutions to these challenges and provide some guidance for establishing a remote observatory. I will also briefly describe the equipment that we are using. I will then discuss how real, meaningful science is being done with our system. You don’t need meter-plus class telescopes or multi-million dollar budgets to produce publishable results.
The State of ‘Beyond the First Year’ Physics Labs and the Resources to Support Them, Friday, 5:15 pm
Lowell McCann, Ph. D., University of Wisconsin – River Falls
Undergraduate physics laboratory experiences after the introductory sequence are not as common nor as uniform as faculty may believe. I will discuss what the Advanced Laboratory Physics Association (ALPhA) has learned about the state of these courses around the nation and the resources that exist to support faculty and staff who teach them.
Building Instruments of Discovery, Friday, 7:45 pm
Sarah Tuttle, Ph. D., University of Washington, Seattle, WA
Astronomical instrumentation creates the tools that we use to push at the edges of our knowledge of the universe. I will talk about several projects I’ve been involved with building, including HETDEX - a replicated spectrograph to measure dark energy, and FIREBall - a balloon experiment hunting for the intergalactic medium. I will also talk about how we can involve students in this experimental work from high school students through graduate students.
Is the pipeline leaking? White women and other minoritized scientists in Astronomy, Saturday, 8:15 am
Sarah Tuttle, Ph. D., University of Washington, Seattle, WA
Inclusion and diversity are now decades conversations in the sciences. As an organizer of the recent “Women in Astronomy IV” meeting, I’ll give a review of the meeting, talk about some of our actions moving forward, and tie in ways we can ground our teaching to support minoritized students. I will discuss briefly how our framing around “STEM” and “filling the pipeline” might be having the opposite effect of our intentions.
Science and Social Media: One Physicist’s Experience, Saturday, 1:15 pm
Robert McNees, Ph. D., Loyola University, Chicago
Social media presents new opportunities for scientists to communicate their work to the public, but like any new form of media it comes with a unique set of risks and challenges. In this talk I will discuss my (occasionally rocky) attempts at using Twitter as a platform for sharing science with a diverse audience. I will analyze some of my successes, post-mortem a few of my failures, and share lessons that I learned the hard way. If time permits, I will give a brief introduction to some of my research on quantum gravity and discuss how I tell (hopefully) interesting stories about that work in 140 character bursts.
Workshops
All of these workshops are free.
W1. Friday, 3:00 - 4:30 pm
Exploration of Integrating Computation into the Curriculum
Todd Zimmermann, Ph. D., University of Wisconsin, Stout
We will discuss the benefits of integrating computation into the high school and undergraduate physics curriculum and will explore a computational activity you can incorporate into your classroom. We will also look at the PICUP collection of activities that are available. We will discuss opportunities for you to develop and integrate computation into your classes. PLEASE BRING A LAPTOP COMPUTER.
W2. Saturday, 9:00 - 10:30 am
Women and Minorities in the History of Physics, Role Models for Today
Teachers will be introduced to the teaching materials on the AIP website related to the history of women and minorities in the physical sciences. The purpose of these materials is to help students appreciate that not only white males have contributed to the development of physics, astronomy, and other physical sciences. On the flip side, there have been many more women than Marie Curie and many more African Americans than Benjamin Banneker and Jim Gates who have had successful careers in the physical sciences. We will explore several of the lesson plans in each group and explore games and other activities to bring these lessons to life.
W3. Saturday, 11:00 am - 12:30 pm
More Modern Modern Physics for the High School Classroom
This workshop will show you how to bring current science from the IceCube Neutrino Observatory, the biggest and strangest telescope in the world, into your physics classes. We will start with a quick overview of the construction and operation of the IceCube Neutrino Observatory, a multi-purpose facility located at the South Pole. Then we learn about the standard model of particle physics. In this activity, you will star as one of nature’s fundamental particle, and learn that there’s more to matter than mass and charge. Finally, we use on-line tools to analyze IceCube data, and see how one goes from observations to understanding some of those energetic and puzzling phenomenon in the universe.
W4. Saturday, 2:00 - 3:30 pm
IOLab – a multi-sensor device
Developed by Mats Selen and the PER group at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, the IOLab is a wireless data acquisition system which interfaces with a PC/Mac using a USB dongle from up to 100 ft away. It is small (3 cm x 7.5 cm x 13 cm) and light (less than 200 g), which makes it highly portable.
The IOLab contains more than twenty sensors or inputs, including a 3D accelerometer, a 3D magnetometer, a 3D gyroscope, wheels which record position, velocity, and acceleration, a force probe, and both analog and digital inputs. Data can be analyzed in the IOLab program itself, or can be output to a spreadsheet or other software.
Some of the many applications of the IOLab are measuring force, acceleration, velocity, and displacement in mechanics labs, measuring voltage drop, current, magnetic field in EM labs, and measuring light and sound in wave labs.
In the first half of the workshop, participants will work in groups checking out activities in mechanics, EM, and light. In the second half, participants will get a chance to follow their curiosity and explore the many possibilities that the IOLab offers. Participants should bring a computer so they can work with the IOLab on their own computer.
For more information see the IOLab channel on YouTube and the IOLab website.
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