21st-Century Topics and Tools

The physics topic that I chose to explore was Galileo’s principal “showing that (ignoring air resistance) heavy and light objects accelerate at the same constant rate as they fell” (Stern, 2006).   I found a very simple yet amazing website that allows the students to explore this principal with and without air resistance.  This website can be found at http://www.planetseed.com/node/20129.   Even though this website seems very juvenile I think it is very effective. 

This website helps the students to become 21^st-century scientifically literate students because they will be able to fully understand how objects accelerate at the same rate.  In class we are limited to the things that we can show our students and no matter how well we explain it the visual learners will not grasp the concept.  With the advances in technology we are able to show the students things that cannot be easily demonstrated. 

After introducing this concept with an interactive PowerPoint, we would do an activity that was similar to the one we performed the first week of this class.  The following day I would have the students explore the interactive websites.   The students will keep notes of what objects they chose to drop and the result for normal mode.  They will also have to keep notes on vacuum mode.  After they are done with the activity they will have to summarize their findings. 

The challenges that I might face that are very typical when I work with technology are, old computers, low batteries, and the internet going down.  That is why it is a must for me to always have a back-up plan. 

References:

SEED (2012).  Galileo drops the ball.  Retrieved from http://www.planetseed.com/node/20129

Stern, David P. (2006) The way things fall. Retrieved from: http://www-spof.gsfc.nasa.gov/stargaze/Sfall.htm