Experiences from Teaching Physics with iPython Notebook¶
By Anders Lehmann
Associate Professor, AARHUS UNIVERSITY
Denmark
- Winner of EuroVision
- Birthplace of Søren Kierkegaard
Intro¶
- ipython is an awesome tool for teaching
- But could do things better
Teaching Physics¶
Physics is considered hard by students
- What is the use?
- ElectroMagnetics is abstract
- What is a field?
- How do semiconductors work?
What’s good about ipython notebook?¶
- Great tool
- Feels lightweight
- Like MatLab in a browser that starts counting at zero!
Physics extension¶
- Adds physical quantities
- Adds physical constants
- Enables check if Units match
- Started by:
%load_ext physics
How do you make physics interesting?¶
- Use real life examples demonstrated in ipython notebook
- Be exciting and fun
Experiment¶
- Introduce ipython as an online calculator
- Show that it can use units
- Extend by adding small functions
- Introduce plotting