This is how I solved the driving question for the Laser Laws project. The driving question for this project is: How can you test Pythagorean theorem and the law of reflection. I will write the answer to this at the bottom of my post. For this project we had to make a display using lasers and mirrors.
Here is the measurements of part of the display
Here is the measurements for the other part of the display
This is my review and process of creating this display.
I think that if I were to do it again then I would focus more on spreading the work out evenly between all the group members in project, and also not getting distracted.
I think that the display looks pretty cool, and I am somewhat proud of the final result.
The Curricular Competencies for this project are:
- Questioning and predicting: Demonstrate a sustained intellectual curiosity about a scientific topic or problem of personal interest.
This means that all class time is used efficiently for learning and project work without distractions.
I got distracted sometimes during this project, so I was not very good with this part of the curricular competencies. For example, sometimes I got distracted by the ipad or something else. I am fixing this by putting restrictions on apps for my ipad that are not essential for school.
2) Communicating and Representing: Represent mathematical ideas in concrete, pictorial, and symbolic forms.
This means that a scientific experimental procedure is developed and implemented with all required steps of the scientific method. A conclusion about the law of reflection and the pythagorean theorem is formulated and supported by precise measurements.
I did reasonably well with this part of the curricular competencies, as shown in the picture of the sheet there is a section about the law of reflection and how I proved it true, along with a area where the Pythagorean theorem is used to calculate if a triangle is a right angle triangle.
3) Applying and innovating: Co-operatively design projects.
This means that the laser triangle is accurately planned, built, labeled and measured. All group members contribute equally.
I think I did okay with the planning of the laser triangle, as each mirror had a label underneath showing the angle that it was at and the distance it was from the other mirror in front of it. These things were not added until the end of the project, so in the picture of the measurements they are not there but they are in the picture of the final project under milestone 5 later in this post. I did not do amazing in the part where all group members contribute equally, as not all members of the group had the same amount of work. To fix this next time I am in a group for a group project I will spend more time evenly distributing the work, and paying more attention to how much work everyone has.
The steps that I took to make this game were:
Milestone 1: For this milestone we made a project start mind map using MindNode with light as the piece. We added thoughts, questions, and examples, and we had to put at least one question from each QFT board. We also answered the questions that we knew the answer to
Here is the mind map for this project
Milestone 2: For this milestone we watched videos and did a quiz on Pythagorean theorem.
We had to score 80% or better on the test, or we had to do it again.
Milestone 3: For this milestone we used the scientific method to create a lab experiment to test the law of reflection, and then write a lab report on it which had to include the question, a hypothesis, a procedure, the data analysis, and a conclusion.
Milestone 4: For this milestone we made a laser display with a right angle triangle that was created by a laser bouncing off of mirrors in a online ray optics simulation, and we had to create a lab report to go along with it. It had to contain the same sections as the lab report in milestone 3 contained.
Milestone 5: For this milestone we made the real, fully functional (hopefully) laser display using the design we made in milestone 4. The display was supposed to include at least one right angle triangle. We were also supposed to add measurements to the mirrors for the angles, and distance between them. After we finished everything for milestone 5 we turned on our lasers, but they were not visible in the air so we had to use a smoke machine. I put a picture of what it looked like at the bottom.
Milestone 6: For this milestone we made the blog post which I am doing right now.
As the answer to the driving question, you have to go through a very long process to 100% say it is true, with lots tests using different types of triangles and angles, and objects of with different surfaces, but if you just want to test it for yourself and have fun doing it, it is a lot less complicated. If you do what my classmates and I did in this project, (it doesn’t have to include the mind map or the blog post to still be testing it) then you will be testing the Pythagorean theorem and the law of reflection while also getting a laser display to look at, or you could make it digitally.
I learned a lot about the Law of reflection and the Pythagorean theorem in this project, like how light bounces of a object symmetrical to the normal, but not the object itself, or how the Pythagorean theorem does not work on any triangle besides a right triangle. I really liked doing this project and I found it quite cool to see working with the smoke and everything.
Here is a picture of the finished project.
Thank you for taking the time to read my blog.