Describes a program designed to make physics more accessible to students. Entails extracting articles from newspapers (compiled to form a journal named "Exaktueel") and using them as a source of ideas for classroom activities. (ZWH)

Discusses how laboratory skills or experiences learned in a chemistry course can be used to help students to better understand physics. (ZWH)

Presents a procedure that students can use to determine the center of mass of a thin (two-dimensional), homogenous object experimentally, analytically, and numerically. Requires students to use three distinctly different approaches to a single problem and necessitates a combination of laboratory skills, a knowledge of fundamental calculus, and…

Tests on diffusion and osmosis given to (n=116) secondary biology students, (n=123) nonbiology majors, and (n=117) biology majors found that, even after instruction, students continue to have misconceptions about these ideas. Appendix includes diffusion and osmosis test. (MKR)

Investigation of (n=101) 17- to 18-year-old students' responses to a task relating to Boyle's Law for gases found that 34% to 38% of students did not understand the concepts of volume and mass, respectively, of a gas under the given circumstances. (Author/MKR)

Describes a method of measuring the speed of sound that can be done in front of a class on a lab table in 15 minutes, be understood by junior high school students, and be engaging and instructive for students at high school and college levels as well. Provides schematic for sound trigger. (MVL)

A simple experiment concerning the elasticity of wood is described that can easily be performed at home. The forces needed to produce a stress in wood are measured and compared. Provides a mathematical discussion of the elasticity and stress of wood. (MVL)

Presents pendulum lab results as an example for students on the write-up of experiments. (PR)

Describes a program where high school students developed a science presentation consisting of 10 demonstrations on wave motion. It is noted that the presentation was highly sought after by other schools. (MVL)

Discusses the probability of seeing a tire explode or disintegrate while traveling down the highway. Suggests that a person observing 10 hours a day would see a failure on the average of once every 300 years. (MVL)

Leeuwenhoek's demonstration proving the Earth's rotation, which leads to some significant errors in reasoning, can be reproduced from this article and used to provide an interesting discussion in undergraduate astronomy and physics courses or clubs. (LZ)

Describes two simple demonstrations of an object moving in a straight line tangent to the circle if centripetal force is removed. Demonstrations use a pie plate and petri dish with ball bearings to illustrate the phenomena on an overhead projector. (LZ)

High school physics students (n=41) were exposed to both massed and distributed practice on two different physics topics. Results suggest that using distributed practice in high school physics classrooms can lead to higher student achievement. (11 references) (Author/MKR)

Explores the effects of the square-cube law that predicts the physical consequences of increasing or decreasing an object's size. Uses examples to discuss the economy of scales, common misconceptions, and applications of scaling laws. (JRH)

Forty-six students enrolled in a high school physics course participated in a study designed to portray student views on, and understanding of, collaborative concept mapping. Students demonstrated a good understanding of concept maps and emphasized their usefulness as a learning tool. (56 references) (ZWH)