Unit Context

Since my practicum is at Leo Hayes High school I have tried to model my classed based
on this. I tried to stay true to the school. For example, since Leo Hayes has two floors and
there is a balcony on the 2
nd
floor where you can throw something down to first floor I
actually wanted to tae advantage of this fact. So two of my physics labs involve throwing
ob!ects over the railings. In this way we are maing functional use of the schools layout
while also adding a "cool# factor that grabs the student$s attention without having to go
on a field trip. %he first class starts in an exercise room which Leo Hayes has as well.
I am teaching &&
th
grade physics and though I didn$t have the chance to spea with
the 'hysics teacher at Leo Hayes I did get to spea with the &&
th
grade (hemistry teacher.
I ased him whether since he was teaching a difficult elective if the students essentially
self streamed themselves. He said that they did but there was a greater gap in the
student$s levels than one might thin. In his opinion, he felt that out of a class of )*
students, there were about ) or + who couldn$t do the math and were not prepared for
the class. He claimed in those cases the student was not interested in the class but their
parents had intervened and forced them to tae it.
I am predicting that I won$t have that many behaviour problems in my classes. ,ost
of my students will probably go on to college but I will still have a hard time getting their
attention as a lot of them tend to be very "cool# and aloof.
%he classes at Leo Hayes are always either -- or .- minutes. /0hy they didn$t go with
!ust .* for each one lie at other nearby high schools is beyond me but I am sure there
was some rationale.1 %his does mae it very hard for me to get out of the classroom so I
decided to mae good use of the school$s layout and facilities itself.
Rationale
In my opinion, the most important tae away of this unit is understanding that energy
is neither created or destroyed but it is simply converted from one form to another. 2long
with this I wanted students to reali3e that the energy in a closed system is always
constant. If &- years down the road if my students have forgotten everything else
including how to derive e4uations of Force that act on an incline I could forgive myself.
5ut I want the essentials to stic with them. 2s a result, I I didn$t start out discussing wor
immediately in the very first days but focused on some in4uiry based lessons where they
had to try to construct the laws of energy.
Since 6nergy has become a very precious resource that all of the ma!or countries are
vying for I felt that I should have a significant S%S6 component to this unit. I couldn$t
include as much as I wanted due to the difficulty and rigour of the sub!ect matter /not to
mention the trigonometry and math sills1 I did give a full day to discuss 'ea 7il, and
how different energies each have their own 6876I /6nergy 8eturn on 6nergy Investment1
I also tried to add some activities that would appeal to the person interested in history
and the arts. %hat is why the first lab I chose was to investigate 9oule$s apparatus he
invented in the &:+*$s to heat up water via mechanical energy. 0hen I saw a youtube
video of this device myself it was presented with such artistry and beauty that I felt a little
teary eyed. I would hope that maybe one of my students in the class felt the same way. It
is good to try to humani3e the material since it can easily be turned into something dry
and cold.
I opted to have both a midterm and a final with each being an hour. %his was done so
I would avoid having a & hour test for the whole unit. 5efore each test, I decided the
students should create their own ban of 4uestions to help them actively review.