| Product Name: |
SToMP |
| Level: |
First Year Tertiary |
| Platform: |
PC - Windows® |
| Supplied Information: |
The SToMP Project (Software Teaching of Modular Physics) is funded by the UK Higher Education Funding Councils under the Teaching & Learning Technology Programme. SToMP aims to provide a complete and open learning environment in which students can work with no need of other resources. All the required materials (including teaching scripts, audi-visual material, interactive simulations and background material) are available on the computer. A new multimedia data base known as Micorcosm is used to present and cross-reference this wealth of information and to provide navigational tools. The SToMP material has been written to take advantage of this hypermedia environment. The teaching scripts, with their interactive activities, provide access to other related materials which are presented to the user via multiple windows. Data-handling tools, a graphing tool and a word-processor are also available, providing students with the ability to create notes or write assignments from laboratory simulations, with the academic material at their fingetips. The recommended usage of SToMP is a replacement for some lectures. |
| Possible Use: |
This product is suitable for First Year Tertiary courses for use by students without supervision. This product could be used for extensively - about 30 hours. |
| Developer/s: |
TLTP SToMP consortium |
| Review: |
SToMP is designed to transform the traditional methods by offering a 'complete' first year course, either supplementing or supplanting traditional methods.SToMP is a hyperlinked multimedia environment. It is designed to replace some lectures with private study, accompanied by introductory lectures. It has: text editor; spreadsheet; graph plotter; digital video; simulations; etc. It is a hyperlinked textbook which leads students through the material, accompanied by questions embedded in the text and at the end of each unit. SToMP, v3.04 covers measurement uncertainty, and waves and vibrations. Optics and thermodynamics sections are being developed. SToMP considers simple harmonic motion in five units, with text and simulations (mass and spring, simple pendulum and LC circuit). Pre-requisites and learning goals are clearly stated. The student is introduced to the basic terminology, and then guided through a simulation of the simple pendulum, so that they 'discover' the correct relationship. There is no particular encouragement for students to use the tools provided (spreadsheet, plotting tools, etc). SToMP shows the relation of uniform circular motion to simple harmonic motion mathematically and with many illustrations, including an effective animation showing uniform circular motion viewed at different viewing angles. SToMP encourages the student to interact with the systems under consideration, and divine the underlying relationships and the general principles of simple harmonic motion. Depth of material covered is good. Sections of SToMP are screenfuls of equations, which are tedious to read on screen, but SToMP supports them with animations and pictures. SToMP crashed on occasions, but performs much better than earlier versions. SToMP could be used in teaching first year physics, but it calls for a rethink of the way physics is taught at that level. It could be used for revision or as a remedial tool, but if a good lab exists, it should be used to relace some lectures, QUTs experience with this is quite successful.
(Published UniServe News Vol 4, July 96) |
|
Mick Pope, UniServe Science, July 96 |
Other references
to this product: |
Computers in Physics Education, 2, pp 5-7 (1994); 4, p 6
Computers in Physics Education, 13, pp 7-8 (1997) |
| |
| Supplier: |
SToMP Project,
Department of Physics,
Universirty of Surrey,
GUILDFORD, Surrey,
GU2 5XH, England UK |
|
stomp@surrey.ac.uk |
|
http://www.ph.surrey.ac.uk/stomp/ |
|
phone: +44 1483 259414 |
|
fax: +44 1483 259501 |
| Date Record Last Modified: |
18/8/98 |
