Important Developments in Physics Expected in 2019

Many students take up Physics tuition Singapore in order to get help with the subject for their school work. But there are many students who want to take up a good tuition because they wish to go deeper into the subject and take it up later as a career. For such students, it is not just enough to go through their school syllabus and text books. They need to keep abreast of the latest developments in Physics. As we are about to complete the first quarter of 2019, it would be good to take a step back and look at what we think are going to be the things to look forward to in the world of Physics this year.

Physicists across the world are waiting in eager anticipation for the announcement by Japan whether it will be the host location for the international Linear Collider. It is expected to be one of the most impressive linear particle accelerator in the world. The ILC would be almost 50 kms long, and it would have electrons collide with positrons. At present the longest linear particle accelerator is just about 5 kms long and is stationed at Stanford, USA. Professional physicists as well as students taking up IP Physics tuition are looking forward to the ILC with great interest.

Another area which is expected to see big developments this year is commercial space travel. In March, a crew demonstration mission from SpaceX will be launched from Florida, USA. This test flight will not have any crew on board. It is expected to demonstrate their capabilities to actually fly astronauts to and from the International Space Station. The first manned mission is expected in June.

After Asia and USA, another area which physicists are looking at keenly is Europe. There is a bit of political upheaval happening because of Brexit, and physicists are following those developments keenly to understand what impact they will have on their field of study and research. The seven year European framework program, called Horizon Europe, or the Galileo satellite constellation are just two examples of pan-European initiatives in Physics that could be impacted by Brexit this year. Students who have enrolled with Physics tutor Singapore and are planning to take up higher studies in Physics would also be keenly awaiting those developments, to understand what impact it would have on the country they wish to pursue their studies in.

About A Good Physics Teacher

All over Singapore, you will find a large number of physics tuition Singapore centres which aim to provide a solid grounding in the basics of Physics, so that students who take up those courses can feel confident about taking up Physics as a viable career option. But the syllabi and teaching methodologies of all these centres are not optimized for best results. We feel there are four important aspects that every physics tutor in Singapore should be knowledgeable about and aware of. Let us discuss these four aspects briefly.

The first thing is that teachers should know the academic level of the students they are taking in. Most students would be normal, a few would be fast in grasping, and the very rare student would be gifted. Depending on how many students of each of these three categories a class has, the correct teaching methodology would have to be adopted. Teachers should be made aware of non-traditional teaching techniques like creativity, show-and-tell, out-of-the-box thinking etc.

The teachers of IP physics tuition must have the ability to make a useful and exhaustive lesson plan, and also execute the lessons as per plans. The lesson plan creation will need to be an iterative process involving planning, implementing, and reflecting. According to the lesson plan made, the tutor would need to set up the learning objectives, and parallelly create resources for use in the classes.

The next important thing that needs to be done is to ascertain the system of assessment that would be used. This would include not only formative assessment but alternative assessments as well. Since Physics is a subject that leans equally on theoretical aspects and laboratory work, the assessment methodologies would need to include ways and means to test both.

Outside of all the above aspects, tutors also need to spend time on constructive teacher-student interaction. The classroom interactions need not be limited to the tutor delivering the content and students bringing up their questions. The tutor needs to set aside some time every week for freewheeling discussions on different aspects of Physics which could be outside the curriculum as well, or even about latest developments in the world of Physics.