Sunday, February 1, 1998
By Renate Robey,
Denver Post Staff Writer

In the name of science, Dave Ulmer was wearing only one of his shoes Saturday morning. The other shoe, a size 10 1/2 black Reebok, was on a lab table being carefully examined by a team of physics teachers.

Nearby another teacher watched small toy cars fly around a blue plastic racetrack. Yet another jumped as high as he could. A fourth balanced a paper cutout on a pencil. It was all part of Active Physics, a new method of teaching physics that uses real-life situations to teach students about the subject.

"This is the way we need to go if we want to keep kids in science," said Ulmer, who teaches at Coronado High School in Colorado Springs. About 50 teachers from around the state attended a seminar on Active Physics on Saturday at Horizon High School in Thornton.

Ulmer's sneaker actually was part of an exercise to teach students about the coefficient of sliding friction as they dragged the shoe across different surfaces. The paper being balanced was part of a lesson on finding the center of mass, and the jump was part of a gravity exercise.

And while there still are the obligatory physics equations and symbols, the emphasis is on learning how things work and not just on complicated math. So, students might study a tape of basketball star Michael Jordan and explain hang time.

"What drives students away from physics is they're not strong math students," said Ulmer, who has taught physics for 28 years. Nationally, only 20% of students take physics classes.

"In the last five years, it's become a concern all over America that we're losing kids in all science (classes)," said George Carlson, a teacher at Fruita-Monument High School in Grand Junction."We're trying to excite the kids ; eliminate some of that math and still get the concepts through," Carlson said.

About five years ago, the National Science Foundation awarded a $1.5 million grant to work on a curriculum for the Active Physics concept. The curriculum was developed by the American Association of Physics Teachers, the American Institute of Physics and others. So far, it's been given a test run at schools in several cities, including Horizon High School. Other districts in the metro area are considering it.

"The reason you're capturing students is you're giving them a reason to learn the information," said Mary Gromko, science consultant for the State Department of Education.

Some academics have balked at the method preferring a more traditional approach, heavy on math equations. But Gromko said there's room for both approaches. "Students headed to engineering colleges might want to take a more traditional physics class but Active Physics will appeal to some of the other 80 percent who shy from the subject", she said. The seminar was hosted by the State Department of Education.

The Active Physics lessons are based around six themes: sports, medicine, home, transportation, predictions and communications. For example, the students might be given the same exercise the teachers were given Saturday: There's a space colony on the Moon; find a fun way for the colonists to exercise.

A group of teachers from Evergreen High School came up with "Human Hoops," a sort of low gravity version of basketball. The difference is that both the players and the ball go through the hoop. Players get extra points for hitting the ceiling or doing back flips in the air before going through the hoop.