Physical Science Study Committee

The Physical Science Study Committee was inaugurated at MIT in 1956 to review introductory physics education and to design, implement and monitor improvements. It produced major new physics textbooks, instructional movies, and classroom laboratory materials, which were used by high schools around the world during the 1960s and 1970s.

Original members

• Professor Jerrold Zacharias, chairman
• Professor Eric Rogers
• Professor Francis L. Friedman
• Professor George Gamow
• Professor Sanford C. Brown
• Professor Victor Weisskopf

Development

In 1956, MIT professors Jerrold Zacharias and Francis Friedman organized a group of university and high school physics educators to reform the teaching of this fundamental science at the secondary level. There was concern that traditional teaching failed to convey a sense of excitement and inquiry, and a way of thinking about physics beyond rote memorization of equations. After the launch of Sputnik by the Russians in 1957, the US National Science Foundation greatly increased funding, to radically improve the teaching of science in the country's response to Cold War rivalries.

Photographer Berenice Abbott and filmmaker Richard Leacock were recruited to make visual aids to understanding complex phenomena such as wave propagation, kinetics, and electrical charge. They brought an esthetic sense of visual beauty to illustrations of elegant physical concepts.

In 1960, the textbook and course materials were first published by D.C. Heath, and a series of coordinating laboratory equipment and an experimental handbook was also released. The otherwise-unrelated Heathkit company marketed a series of its standard electronic instruments (e.g. oscilloscopes and signal generators), specially modified in some cases, to coordinate with the laboratory handbook. Another company marketed a small table-top water-filled tray which could project an image of wave phenomena, which became an influential educational aid used at both the high school and college levels. A related series of small paperback books on related scientific subjects at a high school level was published, covering topics such as crystal growing, waves and beaches, nuclear particles, the universe, and biographies of notable scientists.

Books

• PSSC. Physics. 1st Edition 1960. D.C. Heath
• Judson B. Cross, John H. Dodge, James A. Walter, Uri Haber-Schaim. PSSC Physics. 3rd edition 1971. D.C. Heath

Films

• Richard Leacock, director & producer, Eric M. Rogers, lecturer, "Coulomb's Law"
• Abraham Morochnik, Donald Ivey and Patterson Hume, "Frames of Reference"
• Elbert Little, "Random Events"
• John N. Shive, "Simple Waves"

See also

• Harvard Project Physics – a contemporaneous alternative approach to teaching physics at the high school level

External links

• AAPT Celebrates PSSC's 50th Birthday Links to more than twenty articles written by instructors of physics.
• Physical Science Study Committee, 1956, MIT Institute Archives & Special Collections, summary of fonds.
• 1959 film Coulomb's Law by Richard Leacock on the Internet Archive.
• 1959 film Time and Clocks by John G. King on the Internet Archive.
• 1959 film Simple Waves by John Shive on the Internet Archive.
• 1959 film Introduction to Optics by Norton Bloom on the Internet Archive.
• 1959 film Mechanical Energy and Thermal Energy by Norton Bloom on the Internet Archive.
• 1960 film Frames of Reference produced by Richard Leacock on the Internet Archive.
• 1961 film Speed of Light in Water by William M. Siebert on the Internet Archive.
• 1961 film Elastic Collision and Stored Energy produced by Norton Bloom on the Internet Archive.
• 1961 film Sound Waves in Air by Richard H. Bolt on the Internet Archive.
• 1961 film Random Events by John Friedman on the Internet Archive.
• 1961 film Rutherford Atom by Robert I. Hulsizer on the Internet Archive.