I have always told my students that experimentation is the backbone of
Physics and measuerment is the backbone of experimentation. On the
highschool level it would be appropriate, and considerably less expensive,
to use fewer black boxes and more common devices. All too often a student
will use an expensive device to make an extremely precise measurement only
to use another device which introduces an error of 20% or more.
I believe the role of labs on the highschool level should be to teach
students HOW to measure and HOW to estimate the error in their measurement,
and HOW to estimate the overall validity of their lab exercise.
One example of this sort of occurrence is when students do a specific
heat lab. They measure the mass of water to + or - .1% then measure a delta
T of 2.5 degrees + or - .5 degrees.
I do not believe in cookbook labs. I instruct students to redesign
their lab if they make a measurement that introduces a possible error of
more than 2 or 3 percent.
Fred Bucheit
Nothing has meaning except in relation to something else.