Using custom interactive video prelab activities in a large introductory lab course

Abstract

The large introductory physics lab course at the University of Colorado Boulder, which serves primarily engineering and physical science majors, was recently completely redesigned to align with new explicit learning goals. One of the learning goals of the new course was to have students enjoy working on physics experiments and to see value in experimental physics as a discipline. Additionally, we wanted to make the student workload consistent with a one credit course. To help achieve these goals, we created custom interactive videos that were viewed by the students before the lab to help them prepare for the lab activities. We present design principles for creating these videos, as well as data regarding student engagement and perceptions of this part of the course.