Sports, Cars, and Classroom Physics
Sports, Cars, and Classroom Teaching
Teaching Physics with Phones: A Game Changer?
The journal of the American Institute of Physics, Physics Today, recently featured Physics Toolbox on a spread in its January edition.
“What came as a surprise to me as a designer was that we created this for high school, yet our tools have been picked up so much at the university level and are used for non-teaching-related research...”
Lesson Ideas
Climate Change Teaching-Learning Sequence
Climate change presents a highly-relevant thematic approach to teaching about energy. This detailed sequence, using simple activities, includes the use of the smartphone light meter.
Measuring Friction with a Smartphone
Pulling a smartphone along a flat surface can reveal some beautiful acceleration-time graphs, helping students to understand both Newton's 2nd law as well as kinetic friction on different surfaces.
Impulse-Momentum Graphs with a Smartphone
A smartphone-mounted toy car can be used to create acceleration-time graphs to quantitatively study the impulse-momentum theorem. A bit of modification on a spreadsheet can help students to convert to a force-time graph and calculate the area under the curve during the collision.
Magnetic Braking and Thermal Visualization
This article breaks down the physics of thermal heating on amusement park rides, making connections between infrared camera data and acceleration, magnetic field strength, etc.
Smartphones for Education: An Innovation Hub
In this Spanish-language paper, the authors provide a literature review on the use of smartphones for physics teaching, and propose an innovation hub among institutions in Spain, Cuba, and Colombia.
In the News
Basketball Player Shot Classification
This thesis report made use of smartphones (accelerometer and gyroscope data) to classify the type of shots taken by players.
Road Pavement Monitoring
While there are standard processes for measuring road quality using a road surface profiler, "from an operational point of view, the smartphone was more cost and time effective, and also an easy-to-use approach for the purpose."
Movement Detection when Changing Forms of Transport
Smartphones have been used for many biomechanics studies, distinguishing users' postures and movement. This article uses Physics Toolbox to determine users' multimodal forms of transportation.
Longboard Classification Using Machine Learning
Multiple individuals at DePauw University showcase how accelerometer data can identify different performance techniques.
Robot Airbags to Minimize the Danger of Falls
Check out this article for some really interesting visuals about a robotic walker that includes airbags that can deploy in multiple direction, depending on how the fall happens. Physics Toolbox was used to measure impact forces.
Car Talk: German Style
Numerous car owners have reported problems with brake light dimness. This nextnews program showcases data collected with Physics Toolbox to document the issue. See the video.
In the News
Come say hello at these upcoming events! Drop us a note at support@vieyrasoftware.net or on X @physicstoolbox.
National Science Teaching Association (NSTA)
Denver, CO | March 22, 9:20 AM
Building Embodied Intuition for Science Graphs with Smartphone Motion Gams
American Educational Research Association (AERA)
Philadelphia, PA | Date/Time TBD
Measuring the Impact of Extended Reality in Education: Challenges and Opportunities
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