Traditional introductory laboratory science courses taught in U.S. colleges and universities tend to be unrelated to the creative, reasoning and experiment design processes actually involved in scientific research. Absent from the generally tedious, cookbook traditional laboratory courses is the freedom for students to explore and to be creative, when in fact science education research has demonstrated that the most effective way to learn science is by doing it in ways very much akin to the way scientific research is done.
This text concerns learning the fundamentals of physical science by doing science as science is done. Learning science is a process of synthesizing new experiences into what one already knows and understands. In doing science there are no right or wrong answers, only defendable answers constructed from experiments and from what a person already knows.
The Personal Labs in this manual are designed to accompany an introductory physical science course. These labs are intended to complement, not to replace, formal laboratory experiments and other course work. The aim of the Personal Labs is to extend the laboratory experiences of students, to better familiarize them with observational and experimental techniques, as well as to enhance their understanding of the basics laws of physics. The materials in the labs have been carefully selected to minimize costs and to optimize "hands-on" learning. Hands-on exploration of the activities in this book will enable students to learn science by doing scientific experiments in an informal atmosphere. Hopefully students will find the activities a fun and an engaging way to learn the fundamentals of physical science, and to acquire, first-hand, the basic skills needed to do science research.This manual was developed to accompany a one semester introductory physical science course, Fundamentals of Physical Science (PHS 110), at Arizona State University. The manual was first used during the fall semester 1996. Constructive comments from students enrolled in the fall 1996 course have influenced this revised version. Assistance from Steven Beeson in various aspects of the development of the course has been indispensable and is gratefully acknowledged. Graduate Assistants who helped critique and test the lab materials include Seth Cohen and Quinton Hurst, and their input has been valuable in the development of the course materials. Undergraduate Teaching Assistants, Mark Castagna, Amy Johnson and Kathryn Kavern also contributed to the improvement of the course materials, and their help is appreciated. Finally, the reforms implemented in PHS 110 could not have been accomplished without the support and encouragement from Howard Voss, Chair, Department of Physics and Astronomy at Arizona State University.
Efforts to reform PHS 110 is part of a larger project, the Arizona Collaborative for Excellence in the Preparation of Teachers, to improve the teaching of science and mathematics. Funding from the National Science Foundation is gratefully acknowledged.
Susan Wyckoff
Department of Physics and Astronomy
Arizona State University
Tempe, AZ 85287
wyckoff@asu.edu
January 1997
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