Active Learning Activities

Finding Catharsis in Film and Media

Students analyze a film or piece of media watched in the course using two concepts: climax and catharsis.

Dragon’s Den – Brain Exploration Techniques

Students engage in a gamified activity mimicking the popular tv show the Dragon's Den.

Learning in Everyday Life

In this integrative assignment, students analyze their everyday activities through the lens of various learning theories.

Running on Water: Activating Prior Knowledge of Static Equilibrium

Students watch, discuss, then analyze the veracity of a video in which hydrophobic shoes allow people to run on water.

Sensation and Perception Lab

The lab explores the senses of taste, smell, touch, proprioception and vision.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs in the Workplace

In groups, students explore Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs in its application to workplace scenarios

Card Sorting Activities for Mechanics

Physics Worksheet Based Activity

The aim of the activity is the application of concepts and math to solve complex problems.

How to Write Reading Annotations

This activity helps students improve their quality of reading annotations using platforms like Perusall.

Categorizing for Review

5 Senses Lab

Group Problem Solving with Show and Tell

Students learn to build a conceptual model describing a Mechanics-based situation and practice mathematical problem-solving.

Live Demonstrations of Beats and Interference of Sound

In this activity, students learn to apply the principal of superposition to two new sound contexts.

Model Building

Students learn to build a conceptual model describing a situation involving an accelerating charged particle.

Solving World Issues: One Smartphone at a Time

The purpose of this activity is to familiarize students with the potential of online tools for problem-solving.

Gender and Job Inequality

Action-Learning Sets

Forget the Math! Draw Pictures to Learn the Wave Theory of Light

Who am I: (Mis)conceptions of Self

Defining a Definition

In this single-class activity, students practice problem-solving related to definitions.

Talk to Your Neighbour

The aim of this activity is to grab student attention and have them work on problems related to material just presented.

Kinematics Concept Mapping

Mass of A Car

Students measure the mass of a car using diagrams to find equations of motion describing stages - acceleration & deceleration

Bottle Rocket Tracker

Using video and Tracker software, students learn to analyze and fit equations of motion to raw data.