– Texts with activity explanations or instructions.
– Pictures illustrating experiments, equipment, and/or context situations.
– Video clips or digital images to illustrate phenomena or to use for measurement.
– Measurement data presented as graphs, tables, meters, or digital values.
– Models (textual, equations based, or graphical) to describe and simulate
phenomena.
– Programmes to control devices and to make mathematical computations links to
Internet sites and other external resources for students.
Coach activities are presented below, but please note that all kinds of activities are
supported in a single computer environment and not in a suite of separate
programmes. Having a single environment instead of a bunch of special purpose
software packages brings many benefits. First, students and teachers only need to
familiarise themselves with one environment, in which components are geared with
each other. They can grow into their roles of skilled users of the system during their
learning and teaching. A learn-once-use-often philosophy of educational tools is
realisable. Additionally, students may experience the connections between different
school subjects using a single environment instead of a grab bag of disconnected
tools. Another advantage of a single environment compared to a software suite is the
possibility to easily combine different tools in one activity.
12.3.2 Coach Tool for Data Logging with Sensors
12.3.2.1 Characteristics
The Coach tool for data logging with sensors enables students’ experimentation
activities in which the sensor, connected to an interface, measures a quantity
(e.g. temperature, voltage, pH) in the physical world and transforms this quantity
into a voltage or other signal(s), which is then read by the interface. The interface
converts the signal into digital data that are transferred to, then interpreted and
processed by the connected computer or other devices with dedicated software
(Fig. 12.1). A computer equipped with an interface and ample sensors becomes a
universal measuring instrument, which has a wide range of sampling frequencies
from very low to very high (e.g. 10,000 samples per second). This computer-based
instrument certainly can take the place of instruments such as thermometers, voltmeters and pH meters, used in conventional practical work. It enables automatic,
accurate, conditional measurements and includes ample ways of storing, displaying
and analysing data. During the measurement, real-time data can be represented in
graphs, tables or displayed as digital values.
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T. Ellermeijer and T.-B. Tran
– Pictures illustrating experiments, equipment, and/or context situations.
– Video clips or digital images to illustrate phenomena or to use for measurement.
– Measurement data presented as graphs, tables, meters, or digital values.
– Models (textual, equations based, or graphical) to describe and simulate
phenomena.
– Programmes to control devices and to make mathematical computations links to
Internet sites and other external resources for students.
Coach activities are presented below, but please note that all kinds of activities are
supported in a single computer environment and not in a suite of separate
programmes. Having a single environment instead of a bunch of special purpose
software packages brings many benefits. First, students and teachers only need to
familiarise themselves with one environment, in which components are geared with
each other. They can grow into their roles of skilled users of the system during their
learning and teaching. A learn-once-use-often philosophy of educational tools is
realisable. Additionally, students may experience the connections between different
school subjects using a single environment instead of a grab bag of disconnected
tools. Another advantage of a single environment compared to a software suite is the
possibility to easily combine different tools in one activity.
12.3.2 Coach Tool for Data Logging with Sensors
12.3.2.1 Characteristics
The Coach tool for data logging with sensors enables students’ experimentation
activities in which the sensor, connected to an interface, measures a quantity
(e.g. temperature, voltage, pH) in the physical world and transforms this quantity
into a voltage or other signal(s), which is then read by the interface. The interface
converts the signal into digital data that are transferred to, then interpreted and
processed by the connected computer or other devices with dedicated software
(Fig. 12.1). A computer equipped with an interface and ample sensors becomes a
universal measuring instrument, which has a wide range of sampling frequencies
from very low to very high (e.g. 10,000 samples per second). This computer-based
instrument certainly can take the place of instruments such as thermometers, voltmeters and pH meters, used in conventional practical work. It enables automatic,
accurate, conditional measurements and includes ample ways of storing, displaying
and analysing data. During the measurement, real-time data can be represented in
graphs, tables or displayed as digital values.
132
T. Ellermeijer and T.-B. Tran