Georgia Public Broadcasting’s ‘Physics in Motion’ donates to Westover High School

ALBANY — In August 2018, Georgia Public Broadcasting launched a new series, “Physics in Motion,” that covers middle and high school physics concepts.

The series was produced by GPB in partnership with Georgia Power and the Governor’s Office of Student Achievement. After the series wrapped, GPB decided to donate the equipment used to produce the series to a Georgia physics teacher.

That teacher is Subha Roy Vidyadharan, also known as “Mrs. Roy,” a science teacher at Westover Comprehensive High School who uses the GPB resource often.

“GPB’s new series ‘Physics in Motion’ is one example of how we work with Georgia teachers to create high-quality digital learning resources,” GPB Education Director Laura Evans said. “We are thrilled that Mrs. Roy is using the series in her classroom, and we hope this equipment will help inspire her students to get excited about science.”

Vidyadharan said she considers the donation a strong recognition from GPB.

“We are very happy and excited to get the physics lab equipment, which was donated from Georgia Public Broadcasting,” she said. “My students, when they helped unloading and getting the materials to our classroom from the parking lot, were really excited to see the GPB personnel in our classroom.

“We watch the GPB ‘Physics in Motion’ videos for most of the topics in our classroom. My students are familiar with each one in the videos. We are thrilled to have the support from GPB, and we will continue using the ‘Physics in Motion’ series throughout the year.”

The science teacher added that the videos are a good resource to support teaching and learning physics with more curiosity and interest.

“My students love to watch these videos and do the labs along with each segment,” Vidyadharan said. “The lab equipment we got from GPB will be a great help for me to do more activities in our classroom, which will help my students to love physics.

“Most of the equipment can be used for my physical science classes, too.”

GPB said Vidyadharan was selected as the recipient because she was using the new physics series on a regular basis to support her instruction and expressed a need for the additional equipment to help her students understand the concepts.

“Physics in Motion” is aligned to the latest Georgia science standards and divided into seven units of study. All seven units are divided into video segments, 66 segments total.

Each segment has learning objectives, vocabulary, a note-taking guide, questions to consider, practice problems and a lab or performance task. Some segments have closer look videos that offer in-depth, guided practice on concepts.

The series was developed by Georgia physics teachers who served as consultants throughout the production process. A teacher toolkit is available at no cost to Georgia educators and can be purchased by out-of-state educators.

The series is available on all platforms at gpb.org/physics.

Special Photo: GPB