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Re: Virtual and Real Images

Is the problem that the
students cannot remember this? Yes, real images are those where light
converges. Is the problem that the students cannot remember this
definition?<<<

I am not sure what the exact problem is, whether they don't get the definition or whether the students can't remember the definition. Now I have asked a student or two and they can parrot back the definition but they can't tell me what it means.

In lab on Monday, a lens lab based on the activities in Physics by Inquiry, the students had a convex lens. light source, object and screen. They were to move the lens so that it was the specified distance from the object and then look and see if it was a real or virtual image.

They had a great deal of trouble with this. They insised that even when they were supposed to get a virtual image that there was indeed a real image on the screen. The image they saw was just a circle of light, not the object. I tried to explain that they were supposed to see an image of the object on the screen. If they looked in the lens and saw the image object than that was a virtual image.

I dunno

tina


Tina Fanetti
Physics Instructor
Western Iowa Technical Community College
4647 Stone Ave
Sioux City IA 51102
712-274-8733 ext 1429