Day 58: Sketching Potential and Field Graphs

Continuing with the theme of having students demonstrate their understanding in multiple representations, today during peer instruction, I had a couple of questions focused on two positive point charges of equal charge, on the horizontal axis, centered on the origin. Students sketched a graph of potential vs. horizontal position and sketched a graph of electric field magnitude vs. horizontal position. Yesterday, when whiteboarding, students really struggled with this particular representation; they did much better today. My favorite feature of InfuseLearning, which we use for peer instruction, is their DrawResponse feature where students can easily sketch a graph or diagram and I can view all of them on one screen. Here is a sample:

graph

  ##electrostatics ##representations ##peerinstruction ##tech  

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