Developing the QuickQuest

Creative Process:

The starting point of the creative process was thinking about a topic that could be taught in another way. A topic that needed a change in the teaching strategy is how basic optics applies to three common atmosphere phenomena. To upgrade the teaching strategy for this topic I began perusing the many strategies discussed in this course and selecting those that seemed most applicable. I tried to visualize how I could combine several strategies into a single effective learning experience for the students. I started with an obvious strategy for me, problem based learning. I than did a little brainstorming to develop a selection of different types of problems and I selected a problem that had the best chance of incorporating several teaching strategies. After working on a general outline of the problem I discovered the teaching strategies that could be incorporated are problem based learning, the Big6, a real world application, an internet search that requires several sources including an assessment of the validity of the sources, and an end product that is ill defined and requires creativity. Once I had this ambitious set of strategies, I began putting together the general structure in Mod 5. In Mod 7 I recognized this was a good problem to adapt to a QuickQuest. Frankly some of the QuickQuests I reviewed looked a little to cook bookish to me.

I decided to approach the writing of the QuickQuest as though I were writing a story as a way to try and capture the interest of the students. I had a general outline of the first section in mind and starting writing. As I was writing the first section I discovered I could incorporate important pieces of information as part of the story similar to a detective story. Some of the information is extraneous and the students must pick between what is and is not important. The darkened glasses, the time of day and the cold weather are all important pieces of information. At this stage I discovered I could construct the problem to include a mystery: Why did only one person see the green flash? The second part of the QuickQuest is basically an outline of the expectations and requirements to solve the problem. Nothing fancy here but it did take some work to make it fit with the overall story line.

I plan to use the problem after all the necessary background basic optical properties are covered. The QuickQuest will be assigned as a group project and time will be given in class for the students to get started. I am opposed to the concept of a group grade for a group project, thus each student will turn in their own work, but they are free to collaborate as needed.

I have several outcomes in mind:

1. The students recognize that a good foundation of basic properties can be used to understand everyday physical phenomena.
2. Real world scenarios as related by lay people are messy and require careful sifting and winnowing of information.
3. The Internet can be reliably used to gain new information and knowledge in physics.
4. The information on the Internet must be assessed for relevance and accuracy.
5. The students can explain sundogs, sun columns, and the green flash using ordinary optical properties.