Classroom demonstrations

Classroom demonstrations have two important purposes: to increase student understanding of the concepts demonstrated, and to increase student enjoyment of class. Previous studies have cast doubt on whether traditional demonstrations accomplish the first, finding that passive observation of demonstrations does not significantly improve student understanding of the associated concepts. Indeed, many students alter their memory of demonstrations to match their ideas about the underlying physics. Data show that having students predict the outcome of a demonstration and discuss their predictions with one another before the demonstration signficantly increases the effectiveness of classroom demonstrations.