Teacher Resources
The Physics Classroom has been devoted to helping students, teachers, and classrooms since the 1990s. We are as passionate about that mission now as we have ever been. If you are a teacher of Physics or Physical Science, we encourage you to use our Video Tutorial with your students. And we also encourage you to consider the use of other resources on our website that coordinate with the video. We have listed a few below to help you get started.
Curriculum Corner: Wave Motion
Try our Curriculum Corner for a Think Sheet or a whole unit of Think Sheets and get your students thinking about waves. You will find a Think Sheet here on the topic of standing waves. If the video is homework; then these are awesome next day starters. This is free curriculum for the taking. And for a few extra bucks, you can obtain the source documents and purchase a license to place them and any deriviative from them on your course management pages; see
the Solutions Guide.
Physics Interactives: Standing Wave Maker
Our interactive simulations allow a student to playfully alter a variable and observe the result in the form of an animation. This one on standing waves challenges students to find "just the right frequency" to cause a rope to vibrate as a standing wave. Using our student activity sheet, they will record data and look for patterns in the data, leading to an equation that relates the frequency of a harmonic to the harmonic number and the frequency of the fundamental. Don't miss
the classroom-ready student activity sheet and the accompanying
Concept Checker. When put together - simulation, student activity sheet, and Concept Checker - you have the skeleton of a highly engaging lesson plan.
Minds On Physics, Wave Motion Module, Mission WM7
This mission from our Minds On Physics program may be our most effective follow-up to the video. It's a great challenge for students and worth the class time to do.
Concept Builders, Waves and Sound Chapter: Name That Harmonic (Strings)
This Concept Builder is also a great fit to the video. Students will be challenged to detemine the harmonic number based on a standing wave pattern, to relate the frequency of one harmonic to that of another, and tp determine the wavelength of a wave from the pattern and the length of the string (or rope).
Physics Classroom Tutorial, Vibrations and Waves Chapter, Lesson 4 - Nodes and Antinodes
When students need to quickly review, brush up, and revisit the ideas in the video, point them towards the Physics Classroom Tutorial page that accompanies the video.. This page discusses how to recognize a harmonic number from the pattern of nodes and antinodes in a standing wave diagram.
Physics Classroom Tutorial, Vibrations and Waves Chapter, Lesson 4 - Standing Waves and Harmonics
This Tutorial pages discusses the standing wave diagrams and the mathematical relationships for the various harmonics of a vibrating rope (or string or wire).