Educational problem
High school students have very little knowledge about particle physics and modern physics in
general. Most of the school curriculum is focused on basic physics concepts that have been
known for centuries. There is very little information about the current state and direction of physics and state-of-the-art research. Also nuclear and particle physics is very rarely mentioned in class. This leaves students with a very stale and antiquated perception of physics and fails to ignite their interest in the subject.
Educational scenario objectives
The scenario’s goal is to allow high school students to visualize the complexity of the hadron - hadron interactions through the graphical representation of ATLAS event data and interact with them in order to study different aspects of the fundamental building blocks of nature. They also learn about the fundamentals of particle detector operation and explain the way particles interact with them and leave a characteristic signature according to their different types.
The students who most likely have never came in contact with particle physics are shown what a real researcher does, and how new particles are discovered. This gives students a realistic and exciting look at the research being done at CERN and stimulates an enthusiastic interest in it. It also inspires teachers to talk to their students about particle physics and shows them a way to integrate it into their class at a level that is suitable to their students.
Using HYPATIA, students can experience how a researcher works and appreciate the difficulty
and complexity of the work being done. They see how scientific inquiry works in real life. This has the objective of igniting the student’s interest in particle physics, and physics in general. Our aim is to drive the students to learn more on their own and investigate further (and even pursue a career in physics).
Download the PDF complete version by clicking on the following link » educational_content_hypatia_higgs.pdf
» Please access the following website for obtaining more information about the programme HYPATIA » http://hypatia.phys.uoa.gr/applet/
Educational content developed by The Institute of Accelerating Systems and Applications - IASA (GR)
Validated by Discover the Cosmos
Last update | 20/06/2013