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Action Research - Use of Video in the Physics Classroom



I've quietly followed this Listserv for over a year -- and have reveled in
the level and breadth of it's participants.
Now, I'm stepping in with a request:

So you know, I teach physics in a large urban high school in Michigan.
I'm currently working on a research proposal involving the use of video in
enhancing physics education.
I have informally experimented with the use of video vignettes in my
classroom: from qualitative demonstrations ("cool stuff!", PSSC (Cinema
Classics) demos, Tacoma Narrows (Fuller & Zollman), etc.) and minimal
quantitative uses (e.g. from this clip of "The Fugitive" falling, let's
calculate the distance and velocity on impact)
My ratio of resources vs. class sizes has inhibited the exploration of much
student-generated video for analysis -- although I think there is a lot
potential there.
I've authored DVD's of collections of video clips I use but . . . .
What I'm getting to is simply this: I want to pick the brains of this
listserv:

In what ways have you, personally, used short video clips in physics
education? Specific examples?
What, in your mind, is the power of video in teaching/learning physics?
How would you assess or measure the efficacy of particular uses of video
clips in the physics classroom?

For perspective, I'm framing my research under 3 categories:
I want to experiment with the use of short digital, interactive video clips
(interactive meaning non-linear, freezable, able to manipulate time and
direction, etc.) to attempt to assess their efficacy for the following
target uses:
to elicit and / or confront possible misconceptions
to qualitatively support and / or demonstrate phenomena in real
contexts
to quantitatively analyze and problem solve

Any examples, insight, suggestions, literature, or wisdom on this would be
respfully appreciated.


thanks,
mfoster