------- Initial information on upcoming SLAPT Workshop Events for 2018-2019 School Year are listed below and further details will be posted as soon as possible -----
Past events are on the archive page linked above and HERE--------
Thanks to Elegan Kramer for her leadership the last year as President and continuing into 2018-2019.
To sign up for periodic email announcements about our workshops and other events please fill out THIS ONLINE FORM.
------- When announced the incoming SLAPT President's message will be below -- or click HERE. -------
August 25, 2018: "Free" Resources
Date: Saturday, August 25, 2018
Time: 7:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
Location: Parkway North High School 12860 Fee Fee Road St. Louis, MO 63146
Presenter/Host: Val Michael/Elegan Kramer
Every year for all my years of teaching I tried to add something new or fresh, a different approach, a new lab, a new topic, a recent event application, a new way of understanding. This was as for myself as much as it was for my students. Back in my early years it was not so easy to find these materials (pre- internet, pre -physics educational research). As the years progressed, some of the resources I found profoundly changed my teaching because of the way they profoundly changed the way students thought, acted and understood. Please join Elegan Kramer and myself as we investigate several of these free resources. Bring a flash drive so that you can download some of the materials (many are very large files). You will most surely find something that will intrigue you as you think of the coming year.
You also may have found these types of resources that refresh and stimulate. Please consider sharing. Contact me at vlfmich@gmail.com or call 636-751-5081 to let me know what you would like to share and about how long it will take. Finally, we will do a small make and take just for the fun of it. Hope to see you Saturday the 25th.
October 6, 2018: Six Flags for Teachers
Date: Saturday, October 6, 2018
Time: 8:00 a.m. - 12 p.m.
Where: Six Flags St. Louis, Eureka, MO
Host: Rex Rice, Jen Meyer, Gabe DelaPaz and Six Flags Personnel
Six Flags has supported SLAPT’s development of a comprehensive educational component for Physics Day. This year Physics Day will be combined with STEM day and will include additional learning opportunities for students. Circus Harmony will be performing and students will be able to learn about the science behind the circus. In addition, Six Flags is hosting a speaker series of local STEM professionals who will share about opportunities in the STEM field.
To learn more about how to include amusement park physics into your classroom, join us (and bring a guest) for a free workshop at Six Flags on October 6 at 8am. We'll begin with a behind-the-scenes tour of the engineering that makes the rides work. Next, we'll provide an overview of the resources available to use with students in preparation for Physics Day and to use at Physics Day. Finally, we'll strap on our wireless data collection devices and ride, ride, ride! RSVP to Casey Chamberlain at cchamberlain@sftp.com , with "Physics Workshop" in the subject line and you and your guest's name in the body of the note.
Additional Six Flags Physics Day curriculum materials and information can be obtained at: http://www.slapt.org/resources/sixflags/index.html
October 13, 2018 - Energy Make N Take +
Date: October 13, 2018
Time: 8:00 a.m. - 12:00 noon
Location: Clayton High School
Hosts: Bob Brazzle, David Schuster, and Gabe DelaPaz
Sign up here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfuugo2_yEW7v0OKBxbRThlGAF364gL8jCis5BVmm40FyvY3g/viewform
Bring a ramp, a photogate, and a cart that is used at your school. We will help you build a hoop spring that can attach to your track and a flag. Then we'll perform a series of experiments to characterize several different energy accounts quantitatively, and with minimal teacher-guidance.
Also, we will be showing participants how to use a "ternary diagram" to track the evolution of energy within a 3-component system (e.g. KE, Grav. Pot. E. and Thermal in a roller coaster). We have a blank Excel file we'll be giving everyone and we'll show them how to use it. It is intended for people to use with computational models, and we have a few ready-made to show. But students can also create them by hand and have conceptual discussions about energy evolution of a system.
Hope to see you there.
Bob, Gabe, and David
November 10, 2018: Particle Quarknet
This workshop had to be canceled
Date: November 10, 2018
Time: 8:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
Location: Chaminade College Preparatory School
Host: Marteen Nolan
An overview of the QuarkNet MasterClass in Particle Physics using data from the Large Hadron Collider in Cern will be given, we will explore the CMS (Compact Muon Solenoid) data specifically. We will highlight the information and resources available on the QuarkNet website and do some data analysis ourselves. You will need to bring a laptop computer for the best level of participation.
Chaminade, 425 S. Lindbergh Blvd, St. Louis, MO. Room 301-- enter main older brick building through front steps ...stairs or elevator to third floor https://goo.gl/maps/3Joqiwd2fp82
December 13, 2018: Joint SLAPT and ACS St. Louis --- Thermodynamics Sharing
Date: Thursday, December 13, 2018
Time: 7-9 pm
Location: John Burroughs School; Science, Technology and Research Building
Presenters: Wayne Winters (SLAPT) and Eric Knispel (ACS)
This is a joint meeting between SLAPT and ACS and will be a share-a-thon format on the broad topic of thermodynamics. Please feel free to bring any ideas concerning demos, labs, problems, or questions to share with the group and facilitate a discussion. During a break in the middle of the meeting, there will be an opportunity for a guided tour of the new science facilities at JBS. This meeting will be held in the Science, Technology and Research (STAR) building on the Burroughs campus. A map of the campus with the STAR building location and parking lot information is linked HERE.
February 2, 2019 - Neural Networks Modeling Make 'N' Take
Date: Saturday, February 2, 2019
Time: 9:00 a.m.
Location: Room 2017, Liberty High 2275 Sommers Rd, Lake St. Louis, MO 63367 -- Google Map LINK
Presenters: Narelle Deatherage and Lydia Spoor
Please RSVP: HERE
Simple circuits are taught as a part of many physics courses, and also forms part of the curriculum for both AP Physics 1 and AP Physics 2. As part of this workshop, we will look at modeling neural networks as equivalent electrical circuits. Plastic tubes filled with gelatin can be used to study resistivity and ohm's law, in addition to providing students with connections to biology. This workshop will be a MAKE'n'TAKE, so you will be able to make your own set of neuron resistors. We will also explore other activities and labs for circuits that you can complete with your students in order to enhance their understanding. In order for us to acquire the needed materials PLEASE RSVP at THIS ONLINE FORM. If you have questions about the workshop contact Narelle at: narelledeatherage@wsdr4.org
April 6, 2019 - Geometric Optics and Using Google Drive
Date: Saturday, April 6, 2019
Time: 9:00 - 12:00 pm
Location: Parkway Central High School, 369 N. Woods Mill Road
Presenter: Jen Meyer
We will start the workshop by turning the classroom into a camera obscura! We will discuss how we use it as the foundation for building a model for light's behavior in geometric optics. If you have never experienced a camera obscura before you won't want to miss it! Next we will do our favorite labs and activities that pertain to geometric optics and share the unit sequence used at Parkway Central for our general physics class and our AP Physics 2 class.
In this workshop you will also learn how to set up and use Google Drive to collect student work. This is especially useful for partner or group labs. Multiple students can work on one document and you will be able to see what each student contributed and when they edited the document. We will show you how to easily access and manage the documents.
Parkway Central is located at 369 N. Woods Mill Rd, Chesterfield, MO 63017. Park in the main parking lot in the front of the school and enter using the front door. Signs will guide you to room 803. You will walk straight into the building and through the upper commons. Keep walking West until the hallway comes to a dead end. Turn right and room 803 will be on your left.
Feel free to email Jen if you have any questions at jmeyer3@parkwayschools.net.
April 26, 2019- Six Flags Physics Day
Date: Friday, April 26, 2018
Time: 9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Location: Six Flags St. Louis
Again this year, Physics Day is exclusive to high school physics -- giving your students even better access to the rides. SLAPT highly recommends the picnic combo package that includes buffet lunch in the catering grove - it's much better than waiting in lines at the food vendor stations. If you choose to buy park admission tickets without the lunch, you can save several dollars per ticket if you order in advance. You also get one free chaperone ticket for every 15 paid tickets. Bus and car parking is $20 per vehicle. Processing fee is $10 and is indicated on the order form. Click HERE for the 2019 order form -- or call Six Flags at 636-938-5300 ext 6288 for further information. Also again, this year, there will be data collection opportunities at Mr. Freeze with Vernier accelerometers. Students can wear a vest with the equipment attached and then download data following the ride. Teacher volunteers are needed throughout the day to staff the data collection equipment. If you are available, email Jen Meyer at jenmeyer82@gmail.com or sign up on the online form HERE to volunteer for as little as a couple of hours or as much as the whole day. Further information and curriculum materials can be downloaded HERE on this web site.
April 27, 2019 - 34th Annual SLAPT High School Physics Contest
The Physics Department of Washington University in St. Louis will host a competition to be held on its campus Saturday, April 27, 2019. The contest is open to all high school students and will have two different exams. Students can only take one of the exams.
The first exam will be only mechanics and consist of 50-ish multiple-choice questions. The cash prizes for this exam will be: First Prize of $100, Second Prize of $50, and Third Prize of $25. We will present Certificates of Honorable Mention to the next highest scoring twenty percent of the contestants. We encourage first-year physics students to take this test.
The second exam will also consist of 50-ish multiple choice questions. The approximate numbers of questions covering the various topics will be: mechanics (18), waves (5), sound (3), fluids (1), thermodynamics (4), electricity and magnetism (11), optics (5), and modern physics (3). The cash prizes for this exam will be: First Prize of $100, Second Prize of $50, and Third Prize of $25. We will present Certificates of Honorable Mention to the next highest scoring twenty percent of the contestants.
To enable smaller schools to compete more fairly, we will have a large and a small division for all team awards this year. The team score from a large school (>500 students) will be the total of the highest four scores from that school. The team score from a small school will be the total of the highest three scores from that school. The top three highest-scoring schools in each division will receive certificates marking their excellence.
As an incentive, you might want to consider allowing those students who place on their physics contest exam to become excused from their final exam in your course. The test is also an excellent practice opportunity for students who will be taking an AP Physics exam in the following weeks.
For both exams we will allow calculators of all types. It is the responsibility of the teacher to ensure that all calculator memories are cleared or put into press-to-test mode. We will supply the values of physical constants, but no equations. The students are not allowed to bring a formula sheet. Each contestant may keep a copy of the test, but we will not return the graded answer sheets. We will send a list of all winners to teachers with students participating in the competition along with statistics on the test results. Individual scores below the top three in each division will be kept confidential, except that we will report the score of each contestant to his or her teacher.
Students should arrive at 8:40 am. The tests will run from 9:00 am until 11:00 am followed by a 1.75-hour lunch break (featuring WUSTL-provided free pizza!!!) and an award ceremony lasting from
12:45 until 1:15 pm. During lunch, we may be treated to a physics talk or two by the professionals at WUSTL. The test and awards ceremony will take place in Crow Hall in the northeast section of Washington University's Danforth Campus. Maps can be found HERE.
Due to the tremendous support of SLAPT and WUSTL, there will be no fee for entering the competition. To register your students, please use THIS online form. You'll need your contact information, the enrollment count of your school, and a list of student names with Mechanics or Senior test designation. Kindly register by Monday, April 22, 2019. We will be able to accommodate 200 students, and probably at least an occasional student who did not register in time. You do NOT need to attend to send your students, but you are encouraged to do so.
This link hosts some old exams and some statistics about the contest. If I get a break from my spring grading-induced haze, I may even update it from the past couple years. Directing your students HERE can help them prepare.
Please pass this onto to a local teacher-friend. We have been steadily increasing participation, and we'd love to have more schools involved. Bring all your favorite rivals!
Thanks,
David Schuster, PhD
Clayton Physics
April 2018 Contest Results - Click HERE
May 11, 2019 - SLAPT Planning Meeting for 2019-2020 - (wow - 2020) School Year
Date: May 11, 2019
Time: 9-11
Location: Parkway North High School Room 2213
🙁 If you can't come to the meeting tomorrow please fill out the SLAPT Workshop Survey form. We will use the responses to plan workshops in 2019-2020.
The SLAPT 2019-2020 planning meeting is tomorrow (Saturday, May 11) from 9-11am at Parkway North High School (Room 2213). In addition to planning future meetings, we will give out an award, elect a new president, and we need a new webmaster. We need a new president and webmaster so please consider volunteering!! If not, at least consider leading or hosting a workshop.
Thanks everyone! Good luck to the end of the school year and have a great summer!
Please attend the planning meeting. The more input we get from our members, the better our workshops will meet your needs. There are many ways to help make next year successful and rewarding for our community. You could volunteer to present (or co-present) a workshop, or volunteer to host a workshop at your school. If you have a topic you’d like to present, but feel it is not enough material for a full workshop, we’d still love to hear about it, because we typically have a workshop composed of several short presentations by multiple teachers. If you have a connection to a regional business or governmental agency which does work related to physics or engineering, you could suggest a field trip to the site.
We have an online survey that will stay active throughout this school year through which you can tell us the topics of greatest interest to you for next year. We would like everyone’s input on this, so please take 5-10 minutes to make your voice heard. You can also e-mail Elegan Kramer at ekramer@parkwayschools.net if you have ideas or any other input. Additionally, we would like to hear your suggestions about how the SLAPT website and other communications tools we have used the last several years can be updated and improved.
Thank you in advance for your participation and for helping make a successful workshop series for the 2019-2020 school year.
---------- TO HELP US PLAN FOR FUTURE WORKSHOPS, PLEASE FILL OUT OUR OPINION SURVEY HERE
2018-2019 SLAPT President's Welcome
xxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxx – Saint Louis Area Physics Teachers Association
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua. At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua. At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua. At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.
Thank you for all that you do and I hope to see you soon!
xxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxx, email, President, SLAPT
2019 Workshops - Here is the start of a list of 2019 Workshops and other events hosted and sponsored by other organizations.
American Modeling Teachers Association: Modeling™ Instruction, under development since 1990 under the leadership of David Hestenes (Emeritus Professor of Physics, Arizona State University), corrects many weaknesses of the traditional lecture-demonstration method, including fragmentation of knowledge, student passivity, and persistence of naive beliefs about the physical world. Unlike the traditional approach, in which students wade through an endless stream of seemingly unrelated topics, Modeling ™Instruction organizes the course around a small number of scientific models, thus making the course coherent. It applies structured inquiry techniques to the teaching of basic skills and practices in mathematical modeling, proportional reasoning, quantitative estimation and technology-enabled data collection and analysis. Each summer, Modeling™ workshops are held all over the country. In 2014, almost 1200 teachers took one of the 75+ workshops in 20 states. The content areas of the workshops (depending on location) are mechanics (physics I), E&M, CASTLE, waves, light (physics II), chemistry I and II, biology, physical science, and we are proud to now offer workshops especially geared to middle school science teachers! On the website of the American Modeling Teachers Association (AMTA) we have a list of workshops that will be offered this coming summer, --- the information is subject to change so check the site every so often to see if now your state offers a Modeling™ workshop:
2019 Summer Modeling Workshops: http://modelinginstruction.org/workshops-2019
Workshop descriptions, dates, details: http://www.phystec.org/pd/?set=Modeling
June 10-14, 2019 - Nuclear Science & Engineering for Secondary Science Teachers A Three Credit Hour Faculty Development Course on the University of Missouri- Columbia Campus
Date: June 10-14, 2019
Time: Daily 8a.m. - various
Location: Various on campus sites at University of Missouri, Columbia - including visits to area energy sites.
This will be the 37th year Mizzou has offered this course and related energy events. Several SLAPT members have attended in the past and have many a postive comment about it. Seats are limited, so inquire soon. Please visit the website linked here for details, application, and points of contact. http://www.murr.missouri.edu/et_secondaryst.php
Join the American Association of Physics Teachers
Why should you become a member? It's easy, and there are nice tangible benefits: you will receive both Physics Today and either the Physics Teacher or the American Journal of Physics (your choice) in addition to online access to the magazines. AAPT sponsors contests, awards, pre-college and college teacher training programs, programs for physics students, two national meetings each year, facilitates collaborations between all sorts of physics teachers, and provides grants to sections.
Perhaps more importantly, though less tangibly, is that AAPT is our professional organization, and that membership is a professional responsibility. AAPT supports what we do, recruits and trains new teachers, voices our concerns to legislators, and boosts the prestige of our profession.
Additionally, our new AAPT section status gives SLAPT greater visibility and recognition in the national physics teacher community. Our involvement in AAPT through membership and participation in national meetings will further boost the strength and quality of service SLAPT provides to our members.
Click HERE to go to AAPT's online registration site.
.........
St. Louis Area Physics Teachers - SLAPT Constitution