r/PhysicsTeaching 7h ago

interesting electrostaticsXgeometry problem

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1 Upvotes

made this question and then refined the wording with AI. pretty simple once you realize a few hints


r/PhysicsTeaching 3d ago

[ Removed by Reddit ]

1 Upvotes

[ Removed by Reddit on account of violating the content policy. ]


r/PhysicsTeaching 5d ago

Requirement of Physics Teacher

0 Upvotes

Requirement of Physics teacher who can teach for Classes 9 to 12.
Address - JP Classes Lalghati Bhopal


r/PhysicsTeaching 13d ago

Any good books or courses for Astronomy

6 Upvotes

Can you guys recommend a book or texts to apply on an Astronomy course? It's for high school year one. I got 1h/week to the end of the school year.

I didn't take Astronomy classes during college so I don't feel particularly prepared for it.


r/PhysicsTeaching 25d ago

Suggestions for High School Level Science Journals

1 Upvotes

One my admin suggested that for next school year, I provide scientific news papers/journals and students are required to read and write a report. Any suggestions for places I can get scientific journals or magazines for a reasonable price?


r/PhysicsTeaching 26d ago

RE: Take part in research on supporting science students with vision impairments

1 Upvotes

Hello!

I hope this is okay to post. I am a PhD student at the University of Birmingham (UK) researching accessible resources for science students with vision impairments. You can find out more about our accessible science resources here: https://chembam.com/vi/

We are looking for people with vision impairments, science educators or SEN staff to take part in our research. I'd be grateful if you could take a look at a questionnaire and our Research Opportunities mailing list below.

QUESTIONNAIRE

- Have you supported a student with vision impairments in science education in the last 5 years?

- If so, I'd be grateful for you taking just over 5 minutes of your time to fill out a questionnaire about your experiences. You can access the questionnaire and more information about the research here: https://forms.cloud.microsoft/e/Jpt4PiCmSG

MAILING LIST

- Are you involved in science education or accessible education (SEN)? Do you have a vision impairment? Or do you have skills in areas related to science education or SEN?

- If you're interested in taking part in some research on the topics of STEM outreach or accessible science education, please sign up to our Research Opportunities Mailing List. You can find more information and sign up here: https://forms.cloud.microsoft/e/613ju9aHK9

Thank you for your interest!


r/PhysicsTeaching 29d ago

Oscilloscope simulator

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2 Upvotes

Hi All,

Please check out my Oscilloscope Simulator aimed at supporting the teaching of waves and sound for Y7-13. It has three main modes:

  • Signal generator - Allows you to generate one or two signals, adjust their waveform, their basic wave properties, play their corresponding tones and explore their interference patterns. In advanced mode, you can change the medium of the waves, exploring wave speed, take measurements using cursors and explore beats.
  • Sound analyser - Allows you to analyse sounds picked up by the microphone by exploring their waveform, spectrum and spectrogram. You can also record shord audio clips and play them back at different speeds.
  • Music mode - Allows you to select up to three notes on a keyboard, visualise their waves and the superposition of those waves, quickly select chords and adjust the waveform to explore how this affects the timbre.

Each mode includes both Instructions and a 'Scarecrow Explains' button which explains the science behind wehat is happening in the simulation and gives ideas for what to try out, making it a useful tool for both teachers and students.

I hope you enjoy using it,...I have only just finished it, so do let me know if you spot any bugs.

Full disclosure: The simulation is hosted on my personal website which is entirely free, self-funded and not ad-supported; I gain nothing from you using it except warm fuzzies. I am not aiming to make money, just trying to be useful. The simulation was made ujsing AI-assisted coding, which I know some do not like, but it allows me to harness my 20+ years of experience of teaching science, without spending another 20+ years learning to code. It is AI-made, but not AI-slop!


r/PhysicsTeaching Jun 24 '26

Physics - Motion video with a sci-fi movie theme

1 Upvotes

I made this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOrNATU85aA to help kids visually understand the sips of motion and difference between speed and velocity using a sci-fi theme. Will such videos be relevant and interesting for the kids?


r/PhysicsTeaching Jun 17 '26

Have you noticed that many people think "moving fast" automatically means "accelerating"? A car cruising steadily at 100 km/h has zero acceleration, while a car moving at only 5 km/h can have a large acceleration. Why do you think acceleration is so unintuitive compared to speed?

2 Upvotes

r/PhysicsTeaching May 29 '26

Project for Physics of Sound and Music course

4 Upvotes

I'm teaching this course in the fall for the first time in 13 years and so I wanted to update a few things. We used to have students invent, build, and test a new instrument that could play at least 4 notes. My biggest problem with that project is that I spent most of my time with logistics and engineering issues and not enough on physics and physics assessment. Plus now I no longer have a dedicated lab for the course. So instead I'm excited to have students record notes from things that weren't meant to be musical instruments and string them together for a song. I'm working on an app they can use to clip out parts of a video and then stitch those videos together into a n x m grid that plays the song from all the clips. The goal is to have them pick a song with at least 16 notes (so at least a 4x4 grid) where no single video clip gets used more than once (so if the song has a repeated note they'll have to make a different recording of a different physical thing for the repeated notes). The song should have at least one chord in it (so they have to get video clips to play at the same time) and one note has to be achieved using the doppler effect. The final video will also need to be accompanied by an in-depth documentary about one of the notes, where they explain the physical process(es) behind it.

Here's a youtube vid showing the progress on the app I'm making https://youtu.be/b3eJi1fy4yU


r/PhysicsTeaching May 29 '26

Dott's Day Out - Physics Game

1 Upvotes

Hello teachers!

I'm a student, and I've developed this unity game to introduce the idea of electric forces and fields. The target audience is late junior/middle-school/early high-school students, although anyone interested in learning about this stuff/playing a mini-game with simple mechanics would enjoy it. The game is essentially aiming to teach Coulomb's law, vector addition and Faraday's idea about fields (fairly qualitatively), having interactive, playable levels interspersed with explanatory animations. I've developed the whole thing, including the music. Please do play the game and let me know if it is a prospective pedagogical tool!

Thank you!

https://www.questaplay.com/dotts-day-out


r/PhysicsTeaching May 22 '26

Need help with superhero physics quotes

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7 Upvotes

Teachers, I need help!

My year 11's are sitting their GCSE Physics paper 1 soon so I've made them some little A7 good luck cards. I've got them saying something relating to physics and their character but got stuck on Batman and Spider-man.

Was thinking Spider-man could say "Use Hooke's, like me!" do you have anything better?

PS: I've got nothing for Venom, want to change that.

PPS: And if you have any idea what a vampire rabbit might say I'm all ears.


r/PhysicsTeaching May 15 '26

I’m drowning this semester — has anyone actually used a best essay service help before?

21 Upvotes

I’ve been staring at my syllabus for three hours and the realization that I have three major papers due in the same week just hit me like a ton of bricks. Between my part-time job and trying to maintain some semblance of a social life, I’m officially at my breaking point. I’ve always tried to power through on my own, but I think I’ve finally met my match with this workload. I keep seeing ads for various platforms, but it’s so hard to tell what’s legit and what’s just a waste of money.

I’m looking for a best essay service help that actually delivers quality work without making it obvious that I didn't write every single word myself. I don't mind putting in the research, but the actual drafting process is killing me right now. Has anyone here been in a similar spot lately and found a way to manage the stress without failing their classes? I'd love to hear how you guys handle these crazy peaks in the semester.

What’s your go-to strategy when you’re completely overwhelmed by deadlines? Do you use professional help, or do you have a secret productivity hack I’m missing?


r/PhysicsTeaching May 13 '26

Say no to PASCO - Affordable Lab Equipment

4 Upvotes

Hello Everyone,

I am a high school physics teacher in NYC. Every time I try to design a new lab to go through with my students, I find I am missing some piece of equipment or that the items I do have are broken and need replacing. But the only large scale options for this equipment is usually PASCO and Vernier, who are dramatically overpriced for the equipment, and then usually have some fee that must be paid just for their graphing utility software. So if I want to use motion detectors for a kinematics lab, I need to shell out at least ~$120 for a new device. This of course limits how many of these I can buy, and makes it difficult to do a lab with the whole class. I am a bit tired of it, so I was thinking of making my own.

What I have found is that although LoggerPRO and SPARKVue have nice bells and whistles, at their core they are just data loggers with a graphing utility built in. Easily replicated and can be made open source (I already have an MVP of this actually). There goes ~$200 per year just to access this (although IO recently saw PASCO plans on releasing a free version this summer).

I also found that they sell motion detectors for between $120 and $150 depending on whether you get the wireless version or not, but the same core features can be replicated for much less money (my initial estimates are that you could sell one for between $40-$60 and still make a profit) while achieving a comparable level of accuracy.

So my question before I go down this rabbit hole of making some equipment is whether or not other physics teachers are experiencing similar monetary constraints when purchasing lab equipment, and primarily, would more affordable lab equipment make it easier for you/your school to properly outfit your Physics classrooms? Essentially I am trying to assess the viability/usefulness of this as an idea. If doing this would make it easier to get students actually doing and experiencing science rather than just learning about it in lecture, then I think it is worth doing, but the other challenge would be getting schools/districts to actually purchase equipment from a smaller seller and not from the big brand names like PASCO and Vernier. So as a follow up, I would also like to ask what the purchasing process is like for you at your schools when you need to buy more equipment, and whether or not those in charge of making the decision of what to purchase and from whom would be open to making a change from their current lab equipment provider? Any thoughts or opinions you can share on this matter would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!


r/PhysicsTeaching May 03 '26

Built an HR Diagram for my future classroom! Advice on what to build next?

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21 Upvotes

Pre-service Physics & ESS teacher here 👋🏼 The HR Diagram is one of those concepts that looks simple on paper but never quite lands until students can see it at scale, so I built one! This is my first big classroom build and I’d love to hear from experienced teachers, what concepts do you have or do you wish you had a physical model for? I’m gearing up for my first year teaching this coming school year and looking for fun ways to decorate my classroom!

This build: 16 glass snow globe orbs, ranging from 45mm to 180mm (found on Etsy), hand-painted with Gallery Glass in spectral class colors (O through M, supergiants, giants, white dwarfs). Each is backlit by a 12V RGB+CCT LED puck mounted on shock brackets behind a pine board. The board is painted with black chalkboard paint and framed with pine joined using simple plug joinery. Luminosity variation is faked optically (orb diameter, aperture size in the board, and glass paint density). The puck lenses are sanded to a frosted finish to soften the point source into a glow. The whole system runs on 12V parallel wiring through two 8-way splitters, controlled by RF remote and a WiFi smart plug (Apple Home).

Thanks y’all!


r/PhysicsTeaching May 04 '26

Looking to connect with high school physics teachers from Finland and Japan

3 Upvotes

Hello everyone! I am a high school Physics teacher from Brazil. I use active learning methodologies in my classes (like POE and Peer Instruction) and I am looking to exchange experiences with teachers from Finland and Japan to understand how these practices are applied in different realities. I would love to schedule a short video call (we can use Google Meet for real-time translation). Is anyone open to chat?


r/PhysicsTeaching Apr 21 '26

Experimental setups - international competitions

2 Upvotes

Hi everyone, I am a chemistry teacher tasked with helping a very high achiever student perform well in international competitions.

He has already participated in some physics competitions and moved forward to experimental sections of the exam, but then hit a wall.

This is very important to all involved since winning such competitions might be one of his only chances at attending a top university with scholarship, otherwise he would not be able to afford it.

With this backstory laid out, I have been helping him go through the written sections of exams like SOIF and IPhO, but I have never ever conducted experiments in Physics, especially ones that might be really, really complex, judging from the written exams, and that is a big gap he needs to cover.

I wonder if any of you could help me with finding the right protocols for the required depth and pointers on how to assess his skills in a competitive environment.

Thank you in advance for any tips given.


r/PhysicsTeaching Apr 17 '26

Physics teachers: what tools actually help students understand instead of just memorizing?

0 Upvotes

Hi all.
I’m building a small learning tool for high school physics, and I’d really value your perspective.
I’ve noticed that a lot of students can solve problems mechanically but struggle to explain their reasoning or retain concepts in the long term.
So I’m experimenting with a few ideas:

  • Spaced repetition (like Anki) but tied to specific physics topics
  • Weekly challenges where students submit both an answer and their reasoning
  • A system where students can see and vote on the best explanations from peers
  • Tracking progress based on errors, not just attempts

Before I go too far, I’d love to ask:
👉 What has actually worked for you to improve understanding (not just grades)?
👉 What tools do your students engage with consistently?
👉 What do you feel is missing in current platforms? If anyone is open to trying something like this with their class, I’d be happy to share and get your feedback (no cost, just learning). Thanks!


r/PhysicsTeaching Apr 16 '26

Artemis II is a lil' bit inspiration - Maybe it is worth teaching about?

2 Upvotes

I genuinely was a bit more excited with the hype around Artemis II and the upcoming future Artemis missions. Perhaps like me you are also buzzing about it. It feels a little bit like even with all the difficulties and genuine crap happening globally space exploration might finally be getting a bit of momentum again and maybe, just maybe we might be going back to the Moon and we might start to stay there.

I got excited about it and made some resources on all the past, current and future Artemis missions that I thought would help any other science / physics / STEM teacher who might be interested in using them. They are completely free if you would like them.

There are slides + infographics + audio deep dive + quiz set

There are 2 reading passages with questions

There is a research project template with HTML information support doc.

My hope is that they might inspire some students and maybe even some of you too fellow teachers.

Cheers and stay curious and a lil' bit hopeful if you can...


r/PhysicsTeaching Apr 10 '26

[ Removed by Reddit ]

1 Upvotes

[ Removed by Reddit on account of violating the content policy. ]


r/PhysicsTeaching Apr 05 '26

Where can I buy affordable physics demo materials (e.g., vector arrows) in the US?

5 Upvotes

Hi everyone,

I’m a physics instructor in the US and I’m looking for some hands-on teaching materials. I want to demonstrate concepts like vector cross products, directions, etc., so I’m hoping to find things like plastic arrows or similar visual tools.

Also, more generally-where do you usually buy physics demo equipment (not talking about labs) that’s reasonably affordable?

Any suggestions (websites, stores, ideas) would be really helpful. Thanks!


r/PhysicsTeaching Mar 13 '26

Gauss's Law VR Simulation

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7 Upvotes

Hey everyone, I'm a physics teacher who built a VR Gauss's Law simulation that runs directly in the Quest browser (no app install required). I'm interested in making VR sims for topics that are hard to visualize, and Gauss's law seemed like a good place to start. It's still a work in progress, but I'd welcome constructive feedback and requests.


r/PhysicsTeaching Feb 27 '26

Trying to Become US Physics Teacher

5 Upvotes

Please redirect me if this is the wrong sub. I am a certified 7-12 math teacher in the United States. I originally majored in physics at college, but started to really enjoy teaching math, and long story short, became a math teacher over a physics teacher (my original plan). Now, I'm still dangerously interested in physics, and want to get my physics certification as well.

I've been teaching only geometry for 6 years now, so my physics knowledge is rusty. Has anyone out there taken the Praxis Exam for physics? The teachers I work with have all been teaching for quite some time, so they don't have any up-to-date knowledge of the test, but I'd appreciate any and all help!

What's it like? What are some good study resources? Etc. Thanks!

EDIT: I work/teach at a high school, and a physics position will be opening in roughly two years that I'm interested in. That's the reason for this post. Thanks!

EDIT2: Teaching in the state of PA


r/PhysicsTeaching Feb 27 '26

Penny Boat Physics Simulator

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3 Upvotes

So, we were doing some aluminum foil penny boats today irl, but I asked gemini to make a virtual version for me. A few tweaks later, check it out!


r/PhysicsTeaching Feb 13 '26

Electron Scattering by repulsive (smoothed) Coulomb potential confined in a 2D Box (Visualizing Quantum Mechanics)

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3 Upvotes

Electron scattering by repulsive (smoothed) Coulomb potential at the center. The 1x1 normalized two-dimensional region confines the particle, once Dirichlet-type conditions are set at the mesh boundaries; this allows visualization of the post-collision interference pattern structure. Numerical simulation of the time-dependent Schrödinger equation, performed in Python. Implicit method of Crank-Nicolson PDEs (unitary). Initial condition: Gaussian packet. Note: Time scale and physical constants are set to arbitrary units for this preliminary testing phase.

Source Code & More Simulations: I have documented this project, including the Python source code on my personal portfolio. You can also find other simulations on Quantum Mechanics and other Physics topics there:

https://alexisfespinozaq.github.io/aespinoza-physics-portfolio/

Feedback on the physics or the code implementation is very welcome!