[Phys-L] Re: First Day Activities or Demos

[bblais at BRYANT.EDU (Brian Blais)]

A. Marie Pool wrote:
> I need something to catch my students attention the first day of school.
> Suggestions?

I have a fun assignment for the first day that I have used to get
discussion going, and to introduce scientific thinking.  After I go
through the syllabus, I ask if there are any questions (which there
never is), and so I say, "Well, I have a question.  I would like to know
how those automatic flushing toilets work.  You know, the ones that you
go to the bathroom, get up, and *flush*!  It somehow 'knows' when to
flush.  How do they work?"

I then write down all of the ways that the students think they *can*
work (light, motion, sound, weight, IR beam blocking or reflecting,
etc.)  Some students are adamant that it works in a particular way, and
I ask how they know.  I refuse to take "authorities", like the company
website ("they'll tell you *anything* to sell you the product"), or any
hear-say.  I will only take direct observation.  Their assignment for
the next class it to then, by direct observation, determine which of
they possible ways are correct, or not, bearing in mind that all of the
methods may have some randomness and some time delays.

It's a fun way to get them to understand falsification, consistent data,
not accepting authorities, and logical reasoning.  I would love to come
up with another test system other than the automatically flushing
toilets, just for variety.  I think it is important that the student is
able to make tests, and there is a decent amount of possible options and
events to make it non-trivial.

Any ideas?



                                bb

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             bblais@bryant.edu
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