Teaching Strategies

Topic Strategy Title Description
Group work - Strong Students Help Weaker Students

Do a lot of group work in lectures where students help each other. Randomly allocate them, so the students are in groups which are a mixture of strong people and weak people. The strong people can help the weaker people. The students are actually very good at doing that, it gives you another set...

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Everyday Life Examples

Use things from everyday life. Things that they’re going to be interested in - solar energy, or designer drugs. So it’s mixing up a bit of everyday life with things that make up the interests of the majority of the students and that they are going to find fits with their future studies.

Real Life Applications

Relate material to real-world applications, for example, the ‘Particle in a box’ model for cyanine dyes.

Link to Particle in a Box PDF

Qualitative Introduction

Introduce quantum mechanics in a very qualitative way, so they don’t get worried about it in a big way or worry about the mathematical treatments. Introduce just the big thing that it can tell us, but not be too concerned about the details. The ideas that flow from the qualitative concept are...

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Leave Maths Until Later

Introduce the concepts without being too mathematical at the second year level.

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