Zhang, Y., & Probst, D. K. (2016, June), Introducing Physics Concepts with Illustrative Stories  Paper presented at 2016 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, New Orleans, Louisiana. 10.18260/p.25455

\bibitem{asee_peer_25455}
  Zhang, Y., \& Probst, D. K. (2016, June), \emph{Introducing Physics Concepts with Illustrative Stories}
  Paper presented at 2016 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, New Orleans, Louisiana.
  10.18260/p.25455

Yumin Zhang and David K. Probst P.E..  "Introducing Physics Concepts with Illustrative Stories".  2016 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, New Orleans, Louisiana, 2016, June.  ASEE Conferences, 2016.  https://peer.asee.org/25455 Internet.  13 Apr, 2024

\bibitem{asee_peer_25455}
  Yumin Zhang and David K. Probst P.E..
  "Introducing Physics Concepts with Illustrative Stories".
  \emph{2016 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, New Orleans, Louisiana, 2016, June}.
  ASEE Conferences, 2016.
  https://peer.asee.org/25455 Internet.  13 Apr, 2024

@INPROCEEDINGS{asee_peer_25455
author = "Yumin Zhang and David K. Probst P.E."
title = "Introducing Physics Concepts with Illustrative Stories"
booktitle = "2016 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition"
year = "2016"
month = "June"
address = "New Orleans, Louisiana"
publisher = "ASEE Conferences"
note = {https://peer.asee.org/25455}
number = {10.18260/p.25455}
}

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - Introducing Physics Concepts with Illustrative Stories

The algebra based Introductory Physics course is offered to all students majoring in Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, and Polytechnic Studies in our college. One of the challenges for these students in learning this course is grasping the physics concepts.  They have the tendency to reduce learning to memorizing, and fail to concentrate their effort on understanding the theoretical structure and the connections between concepts and reality. 

Fortunately, most concepts in this course are closely related to everyday life experience, so they can be introduced with illustrative stories. Specifically, the automobile is an excellent example for many concepts in Newtonian mechanics. Besides, some theories and concepts can also be introduced by experimental demonstrations and simulations. For example, energy conservation can be illustrated by the motion of a pendulum. The interactive simulation in PhET1 is very helpful, where the kinetic and potential energy levels are demonstrated clearly. In addition, one can slow down the time so that students can see more clearly the transition between these two forms of energy. Furthermore, air friction can be activated and its magnitude is adjustable, in this way the dissipation of energy can be illustrated.  

The effectiveness of this approach in teaching Introductory Physics I was assessed with Force Concept Inventory (FCI). At the beginning of the semester, a subset of FCI was tested. At the end of the semester, the complete set of FCI was used in testing, and the gain measured is statistically significant.  Following Richard Hake’s formula of knowledge gain, the result is G=0.43, far higher than the national average of 0.23 with traditional instruction. On the other hand, a deeper analysis also shows the limitation of the everyday life examples, as air friction makes a big difference at high speed. 

AU  - Yumin Zhang
AU  - David K. Probst P.E.
CY  - New Orleans, Louisiana
DA  - 2016/06/26
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Introducing Physics Concepts with Illustrative Stories
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/25455
DO  - 10.18260/p.25455
ER  -