Teaching Resources

SCHOOL FOR SCIENTIFIC THOUGHT

While at UCSB, I helped initiate and design a program in which graduate students design and teach special topics courses for local high school students. The School for Scientific Thought is now externally funded and is in its 7th year running. You can check out the current course offerings here.

I was among the first cohort of instructors for the program, for which I designed and taught a course on Quantum Mechanics. The course was spread over five weekly sessions. Below, I've collected the lecture notes, handouts, and resources that I put together for the course.

SURFING THE WAVES OF LIGHT AND MATTER: THE FUNDAMENTALS OF QUANTUM MECHANICS

+ COURSE TEASER

+ BUILDING INTUITION: CLASSICAL MECHANICS

• notes on demonstrations: [notes]
• standing waves in 1D: wave on a string: [notes]
• standing waves in 2D: vibrating plate: [notes]
• traveling waves in 1D/2D: ripple tank: [notes]

+ DEVELOPING FORMALISM: MATH AND PHYSICS PRIMER

• differential equations: [notes]
• multivariable calculus: [notes]
• energy landscapes: [notes]
• simple harmonic oscillator: [notes]
• momentum and energy spaces: [notes]

+ EXTENDING INTUITION: QUANTUM MECHANICS

• overview: [notes]
• notes on demonstrations: [notes]
• light as a particle: photoelectric effect: [notes] [handout]
• light as a wave/particle: single and double-slit diffraction: [notes]
• matter as a wave/particle: crystal diffraction: [handout]
• event probabilities: path integrals: [notes]
• wave-particle duality: [notes]
• meaning of wave description: [notes]
• wavefunctions: [notes] [worksheet]
• Schrodinger's equation in free space: [notes]
• Schrodinger's equation in confined space: [notes]
• quantum tunneling: [notes]
• uncertainty: [notes] [handout]
• Fourier transforms: [notes] [mathematica notebook]
• special topics (spectroscopy, Bose-Einstein condensation, entanglement): [notes]

+ HANDOUTS

• terminology: [session 1] [session 2] [session 3] [session 4] [session 5]
• summary of diffraction/interference: [handout]
• summary of uncertainty principle: [handout]
• basics of wavefunctions: [worksheet]
• Fourier Transforms: [mathematica notebook]
• summary of parallels between classical wave mechanics and quantum mechanics: [handout]

+ EVALUATION

• QM course: [survey]
• SST program: [survey]