Online Check-in Results
In November 2024, students were asked to complete an online evaluation form for this course. In this form they indicated how strongly they agreed or disagreed with twenty-three statements, and had the opportunity to submit written comments on six additional questions. Evaluations were performed in-class and submitted anonymously via a web-based evaluation form.
Many thanks to my students for their honest feedback on these forms.
The results of the "multiple-choice" responses are summarized here. Values in parentheses, where presented, indicate averages from the previous year.
| STATEMENT: | AVERAGE RESPONSE (n=14) 5-Strongly Agree 4-Agree 3-Neutral 2-Disagree 1-Strongly Disagree |
| 4. I enjoy taking this class. | 4.29 (4.54, 4.33, 4.63, 4.33, 4.27) |
| 5. I learn a lot in this class. | 4.79 (4.85, 4.83, 4.38, 4.87, 4.80) |
| 6. The information in this class will be useful in the future. | 3.79 (4.38, 4.06, 3.88, 3.79, 3.87) |
| 7. This class is difficult for me. | 4.43 (4.23, 4.12, 3.88, 4.00, 4.07) |
| 8. This class has a lot of homework. | 3.54 (3.77, 3.18, 3.38, 3.40, 3.40) |
| 9. I complete homework assignments regularly. | 4.57 (4.31, 4.71, 4.38, 4.67, 4.93) |
| 10. The textbook in this class is useful to me. | 3.38 (3.77, 3.17, 3.38, 3.60, 4.07, 4.00, 3.44, 3.63) |
| 11. The teacher in this class is useful to me. | 4.85 (4.77, 4.72, 4.63, 4.87, 4.67) |
| 12. The teacher demonstrates enthusiasm for the subject. | 4.79 (4.92, 5.00, 4.75, 5.00, 4.80, 5.00, 4.78, 4.97) |
| 13. The teacher is respectful of students. | 4.64 (4.46, 4.44, 4.63, 4.93, 4.53, 4.94, 4.56, 4.63) |
| 14. The teacher wants me to succeed. | 4.43 (4.54, 4.72, 4.88, 4.80, 4.60) |
| 15. The teacher presents course material in a clear, straightforward manner. | 4.15 (4.54, 4.59, 4.38, 4.60, 4.40) |
| 16. The teacher presents course material using variety of techniques. | 4.00 (4.38, 4.41, 4.13, 3.53, 4.00) |
| 17. The teacher checks to ensure that students understand the material. | 3.85 (4.31, 4.18, 4.13, 4.00, 4.40) |
| 18. The teacher is available outside of class for individual help. | 4.46 (4.69, 4.47, 4.38, 4.71, 4.53) |
| 19. Class time is used effectively. | 4.08 (4.62, 4.18, 4.00, 4.33, 4.27) |
| 20. Course objectives are clearly stated. | 4.25 (4.23, 4.29, 4.38, 4.43, 4.40) |
| 21. Grading criteria are clearly communicated. | 4.00 (4.46, 4.22, 4.14, 4.47, 4.00) |
| 22. Assignments are meaningful and reflect the course objectives. | 4.25 (4.38, 4.50, 4.29, 4.47, 4.40) |
| 23. The presentations (either PowerPoint-based or website-based) are useful to me outside of class. | 4.38 (5.00, 4.28, 4.43, 4.87, 4.53, 3.69, 4.22, 4.00) |
| 24. The presentations (either PowerPoint-based or website-based) improve the quality of the teacher's lectures. | 4.38 (4.69, 4.24, 4.13, 4.53, 4.67, 4.41, 4.22, 4.33) |
| 25. The presentations (either PowerPoint-based or website-based) are effective in helping me understand the material. | 4.38 (4.67, 4.29, 4.00, 4.80, 4.60) |
| 27. For assistance in coursework, students who ask other students for help: | 11/14 |
| 27. For assistance, students who use office hours | 10/14 |
| 27. For assistance in coursework, students who search online for help: | 8/14 |
| 27. For assistance, students who refer to textbook | 5/14 |
| 27. For assistance, students who email instructor | 6/14 |
| 27. For assistance, students who ask a family member | 1/14 |
| 27. For assistance, students who ask a tutor | 0/14 |
Results from the "free response" questions are given here. Not all written comments have been listed, but the comments that are given are representative of what was received.
| 28. List a few of your favorite things about this class. |
I really enjoy the classroom atmosphere classroom atmosphere is good! I love the dynamic of the class! I also greatly enjoy the online presentations; it's easy for me me to go back and review what I had initially missed in class. I enjoy the class atmosphere in this class because, though we move at a very fast pace and learn a lot in one class, it never feels like we're compromising also having the occasional good laugh. My favorite thing about this class is the classroom atmosphere, I think because some of the stuff we are doing is challenging work it brings us together as a class to work through things together inside and outside of class time. I also really like the website so that I can go back to the exact same presentation outside of class to review for assessments or if I was a little confused in class. My favorite thing about this class is the labs. I enjoy hands-on activities, so labs are fun for me. My favorite thing about the class is the flow of it--there's never something that comes up that we don't expect, I feel that Mr. White clearly maps out the schedule on his website what we are going to do, and how we do it. The lab examples are extremely helpful, and the website is the most helpful resource I have used in a Poly class. I also love the labs because I am a very hands-on learner and I overall appreciate the organization in it. I really enjoy the labs, Mr. White's enthusiasm for physics, and the people in the class. I enjoy the labs. The material we cover in this class can sometimes be difficult to comprehend. The labs are a good way of seeing real applications of what we are learning in class. Additionally, I enjoy the speed tests because the test us on how quick we can solve a certain et of problems. The labs are very fun, and the material can be very interesting, although usually too rushed to be meaningfully interesting. The classroom atmosphere is really great, and I feel like the material is well communicated in class. - The class atmosphere is fun and conducive to learning // - Homework is always interesting and never busywork I love the side quests that we do, squeaking the whiteboard, dropping bowling balls, and practical demonstrations that make the class entertaining! I think the atmosphere is super laid back, and we cover content at an alarmingly fast rate. ( a good thing!) |
| 29. Which achievements in here are you most proud of for the year-to-date? |
Catching the ball in the cup at the beginning of the year! Good lab reports. I am most proud of my achievement on the Unit 3 test. That is my highest grade so far and is evident of my hard work studying for that unit! The test before I hadn't done so well, but I was able to redeem it by doing well on this one. I'm most proud of how I have done on my labs and most of my assessments so far. They were especially rewarding because I have put a lot of time into studying and doing my assignments well. I'm most proud of learning to ask for help in this class. I've been meeting more with Mr. White and have been working on building better study habits which I'm proud of. I think it will benefit me in this class but also in the future. I am most proud of my extra credit assignment since I got full credit on it. I am most proud of my extra credit assignment because I feel that I spent a decent portion of my time making sure my work was being put out to the best of my abilities, and I think doing that assignment and specifically writing out each step really helped me understand what I was doing better. I was very proud of Charlie and my performance on the Halloween speed test, as we were both practically asleep to begin the test, but had a generational comeback to take first place. I am most proud of my effort in each lab report. I enjoy working with the data that my group and I came up with and seeing how accurate/inaccurate they can be. Honestly, getting an A first quarter/getting an aon the third test of the year. The class is super challenging, in many ways overly challenging in an unhelpful way, but it was nice to be able to succeed there. I think I'm very happy in my understanding of the subjects, even if it sometimes doesn't really show too much on the tests. I think I understand the material that is taught in class and I am able to keep up pretty well. I'm proud of our experimental setups which involve pulleys, I love pulleys! So Fun! I think what was rewarding was that it reminded me of those [surface ski lifts](https://youtu.be/x4Av3jGKee8?t=229) that turn. |
| 30. List a few of your least favorite things about this class. |
I often find that the homework does reflect what we learned in class because it contains material we haven't learned yet. Tests, sometimes the classes can seem to go on for too long (especially during classes after lunch) I just think the class is a bit fast-paced, and we skip over some difficult things sometimes. I think because many of us are advanced, it seems easy, but it takes a while for me to truly grasp the material. I don't particularly like how quickly we jump from topic to topic. I understand that this is supposed to be a difficult and fast-paced class, but sometimes I think even doing more than one example problem of a topic could help me a lot. My least favorite things about this class is sometimes the homework takes me a long time. I also sometimes get frustrated with myself because I don't understand things the first time and then I have to go back multiple times to grasp onto more challenging topics. My least favorite part of class is the test. I think it's super challenging, and we don't have enough time in class to go over it after we take it. Additionally, the lectures are not the most engaging. I think obviously AP Physics is going to run very fast as it's a fast-paced course..sometimes I need a little extra time outside of school to catch-up on what we talked about in class but that's normal! So it's not a least favorite thing, it's just a challenge for me. I'm not the biggest fan of lectures, especially those without any interactive examples, but I do understand that these are needed for us to learn the material. The difficulty of the material. The tests are quite ridiculous. I don't understand what benefit is provided by putting extremely hard questions on the test that we have never seen the likes of beforehand. No amount of studying or notes or hard work can help you prepare for these questions where we "extend the material" which essentially ask us to intuitively know the answer to a question we've never been asked in any way before. I'm not a huge fan of how material is thrown at us on the test that we haven't really seen or gone over before the test. Before each test, I really study the material for a few days and get a great understanding, yet I feel as though the test bring in new material that makes it so all my studying doesn't fully pay off. - The course website is not always super helpful at home, but I can use the textbook I think the multiple choice section on the tests is difficult only because of the grade weighting. I understand the point of it being an analog to the real AP test weighting, but the real test is curved to where a ~70 is an A. To be clear, I'm not objecting to the scoring/weighting of the tests; it's just my least favorite thing because I spend more time triple-checking my multiple-choice answers and then rushing through the FRQs. :) |
| 31. What has been most difficult or challenging for you up to this point? What strategies have you considered for meeting those challenges? |
Tests - practicing more and practicing efficiently. I think Unit 7 and 8 were the most challenging. I didn't do very well on the test, but I went to meet with Mr. White afterwards, so that I could understand where I went wrong! Understanding the calculus portion of this course with concepts like dx and others has been the most difficult and challenging for me. I am trying to meet with my teacher more on these concepts as well as trying to understand those basic math concepts in math class. Tests have been the most difficult part of this class for me. I don't think it's necessarily because I don't understand the content but because I haven't built up great study habits yet that fit the course for me. I talked with Mr. White in a meeting about what other students do to study so I'm going to try to do that for the next test. I think the most challenging thing is the test. I've gone to every chipotle session to combat this challenge, but it does not seem to help. My tests have definitely shown that a challenge of mine is knowing the exact set up for the problems that I'm given. Sometimes I mix up different formulas I should be using, and that's frustrating because outside a testing environment, I feel that I know what to do. Time management is also a difficulty for me, and the way I have strategized to overcome this is to schedule and meet with Mr. White as much as I can outside of the classroom. So far, I think the most challenging thing for me has been time management on my tests, and finding the time to prepare for them outside of class. Often, I find myself having to cram for the tests at the last minute because of college apps and my other work, and during the tests I spend too much time on the multiple choice because of how heavily it is weighted and then have to rush through the FRQs. Tests. I meet with Mr. White before and/or after tests to review the material. See the previous question, also the homework seems to often be a day early, such that we have to do the homework the day before we learn the material. This doesn't make sense, as the homework is usually challenging and very much depends on the information learned in class, so it makes no sense that we would have to address this challenge by basically teaching ourselves the material for the class. I think adjusting and figuring out new problems that are put on the test. I really have to try and bring old knowledge and put it with my new knowledge, all while solving problems that I haven't seen some parts of. For example, on the last test, the graph analysis was difficult for me because I was never taught how to take the average of the graph, and it took me time to figure out a way to do it, making me run out of time on other sections. The most difficult topic for me up to this point has been center of mass. Its sometimes just the calculus acrobatics that we do to for certian derivations that twist my head but still super interesting nonetheless! |
| 32. Suggest some improvements to make the class better. |
none so far, thank you! I think just reminding students to come visit you during office hours if they don't understand! I think those are the moments where I can ask personal questions and truly take the time to understand concepts. In the future maybe spending some more time on the previous night's homework and explaining those could be beneficial, and also teaching more of the calculus part because a lot of people have forgotten how to use that. I can't really think of anything. The things I get frustrated with are good frustrations if that makes sense because I'm being challenged in a good way. Some improvement that might make this class better for students who take it in the future is more test prep in class. Dedicating an entire class to reviewing material would greatly help my understanding of it. Maybe since the tests are AP style, adopt the grading scale for the actual AP test so we are familiar with the way we feel after we take it, and the accurate score we would be receiving on the actual AP test. (curving on the AP scale) I think I understand concepts much better after we do a lab on them, so maybe more labs could be helpful to the class. That said, I understand AP Physics C has a very dense curriculum that requires lots of classtime/lecture time to go over, so more labs might not be feasible. no imprvements Make the tests about material that we actually learn, instead of incorrectly assuming we can just intuitively figure out random new questions based on completely new material. Maybe giving us a better idea of some things that might be on the test that we haven't really seen, so we can try to adjust and prep better. I think what would really be helpful is access to more "tricky" problems earlier on, like those found on AP classroom and tests. What I mean is not more practice problems with potentially difficult steps, but problems that test your knowledge by asking something in a convoluted way. This is a very specific type of problem on a test such as the Conservative Force MC problem on the Newton laws tests. Perhaps would it be possible to open up some of the AP progress check MC questions? |
| 33. Other comments? |
Nothing! I am having so much fun learning and taking this course has inspired me to go past my main Humanities focus in college and try to pursue a minor in calculus or physics even! I'm really happy I'm taking AP Physics! Thanks for making it a great class :) This class has the potential to be great, but is severely held back by a confusing desire to almost artificially make it more "challenging" or "advanced," which does not benefit us in any way. |