Although the issue of potential energy disabiguation came to a head Thursday afternoon and Friday Mornign while the teachers worked to negotiate a shared meaning of potential energy, threads of this confersation occured earlier in the week. The teachers in this video are practicing their first round of Energy Theatre. Their task is to represent the energy in a pushed cart. At this point, they decide that they should use potential enrergy.
This video begins with Lane (the instructor) suggesting that they need a gesture (he says "symbol") for potential energy. Almost immediately, Val rests her head in her hands in as sleeping motion. Peter then suggests that they could sit. Lane comments that those gestures are not very energetic (interesting synonym to use for "active") Eventually Vicky and Kelly decide upon the "ready-set-go" pose that runners take immediately prior to a race.
It is interesting that they choose symbols of inactivity (e.g. sleeping and sitting) to represent potential energy. This could be an artifact of a misreading of the unfortunate term "potential." When you're sleeping or sitting, for example, you have the potential to be active. These poses could also be taken to indicate the metaphor of stored energy waiting to be released, especially the "ready-set-go" pose.
Interestingly, these teachers are continuing to enact the substance model of energy through their participation in Energy Theare. Even though they would take the "ready-set-go" pose, the teachers still moved between the rope objects (occurs after this clip). At this point in the course, the teachers still have a tentative model of what energy is and what its different forms represent. It is interesting that these poses seem to blend two models.
One other comment: What is that gesture that Visala makes? it looks like she is miming brushing her teeth, but I can't imagine any connection between that action and potential energy. Oppinions?
Okay - that is a weird gesture. It is hard to make out on the small screen - and blurry on the bigger one. It looks like she *might* be repeatedly pointing down as she shrinks - I don't know though. Interesting find!
ReplyDeleteOkay - Lindsay and I think it might be chemical potential energy - and it might be eating food. ? Maybe?
ReplyDeleteOh, that's an interesting interpretation, especially considering that in our model, the arm is converting chemical energy into kinetic energy. If that is the case, it is interesting that that gesture was not adopted by the group but the "ready set go" pose was. I can't recall if my clip goes that far (I can't see the video on my iPad) but after Vicky and Kelly start using the gesture, the other teachers begin to mimic it.
ReplyDelete