Schools Why don't they teach Quantum Physics in high school?

[Sophie35]

Why don't they teach Quantum Physics in high school?

Like I can't learn quantum physics in my high school and it really interests me but I have to learn all the stuff online :(

 

[WannabeNewton]

So self study it...

 

[StevieTNZ]

I didn't even know QM existed until 2008, and I took compulsory Science until Year 11 (2001-2003). Not once was QM mentioned in those three years.

 

[Jorriss]

Even a superficial look at quantum mechanics requires calculus and either linear algebra or differential equations depending on the approach. Have you completed calculus?

 

[QuantumCurt]

Because it requires several years of physics, and a solid knowledge of calculus based physics, plus differential equations and linear algebra to really be able to understand quantum mechanics in any kind of formal sense.

 

[bhobba]

Some do. But only at HS's with a curriculum advanced enough for you to know the required math which usually is only the case first or even second year university.

Thanks
Bill

 

[wukunlin]

I knew about QM in high school through self study. I only really understood the hand wavy concepts. It gets too dangerously close to crackpottery imo without rigorous mathematical understanding.

 

[WannabeNewton]

I don't see the issue with self-studying the prerequisite mathematics and then self-studying the subject proper, considering you're in HS. I didn't do that for QM but I did do that for GR and I had a lot of fun with it (and still do of course!).

 

[robphy]

I think a high-school class can be developed around Feynman's approach, as presented in his QED.

A few years ago, I taught aspects of QM and SR to non-science majors at a liberal arts college.
I wanted to develop graphical methods that yielded simple quantitative results that displayed those aspects.
For the QM part, I used Feynman's QED... and designed activities that had students obtain the law of reflection and of refraction using the imaginary "quantum stopwatch" (See, e.g., http://www.aip.org/cip/pdf/vol_12/iss_2/190_1.pdf and http://www.eftaylor.com/quantum.html )... with the eventual goal of using computer software to handle the tedious details. (The grand scheme for followup courses would be continue this line of thinking to get to the fancier "standard" stuff requiring linear algebra and differential equations.)

 

[ZapperZ]

Like I can't learn quantum physics in my high school and it really interests me but I have to learn all the stuff online :(

You can learn ABOUT quantum mechanics in high school, but you won't be able to learn it until you have mastered the mathematics required.

Zz.

 

[mfb]

You can learn ABOUT quantum mechanics in high school, but you won't be able to learn it until you have mastered the mathematics required.

Zz.

Even if it stays a bit hand-wavy, I think it is very useful to get some idea about QM.

Here in Germany, it is a usually taught in physics in the "Oberstufe" (at the age of ~17-19). At that point, derivatives are known, but differential equations are solved like "let's see if that is a solution. Oh, surprise, it is!". Potential wells and interference can be studied, energy levels of the hydrogen atom are looked at (without deriving them), and similar things.

 

[HayleySarg]

I think part of it, from another viewpoint, is that there simply isn't the funding. It's hard enough for schools to offer physics at all (Many do it every other year). The idea of offering yet another science course, that very few students would be able to handle, is probably just out of reach.

The sad reality of an "okay" system, is that it's not without it's flaws.

 

[bhobba]

The sad reality of an "okay" system, is that it's not without it's flaws.

Sigh - true.

When I did HS here in Australia virtually everyone did:

English
Math A
Math B (combined together about the equivalent of US Calculus BC)
Physics (a litte bit of handwavey QM was done)
Chemistry
Biology or Technical Drawing depending if you wanted to do Engineering or the biological sciences at university. Nearly everyone did Medicine, Science, Math or Engineering - Arts etc were not as popular.

Now it's all changed - hardly anyone wants to do the hard stuff like Math, Science and Engineering. Sad. Of course Medicine has vastly more takers than places.

Thanks
Bill

 

[Turion]

Even if it stays a bit hand-wavy, I think it is very useful to get some idea about QM.

Here in Germany, it is a usually taught in physics in the "Oberstufe" (at the age of ~17-19). At that point, derivatives are known, but differential equations are solved like "let's see if that is a solution. Oh, surprise, it is!". Potential wells and interference can be studied, energy levels of the hydrogen atom are looked at (without deriving them), and similar things.

Why is it useful to get some idea about QM?

 

[bhobba]

Why is it useful to get some idea about QM?

It builds intuition for when you encounter it at a deeper level. Its like the hand-wavey presentation of calculus you get at the start - you build intuition for when you do it properly in your epsilonics. Even if you never do more advanced calculus knowledge of it is good background - same with QM.

Thanks
Bill

 

[QuantumCurt]

I really like the term "hand wavy quantum mechanics." That just brings to mind some crazy scientists with long hair flying all over the place, waving his hands around and ranting about how crazy quantum mechanics is.

 

[HayleySarg]

They tried to make us watch "What the bleep do we know?" and I *accidentally* kicked the cord out from the projector. The sub was HOPELESS to figure it out. I convince her the light blew in the projector.

For science. If I ever have to endure any of that crackpottery again, I'll rampage.

 

[Vanadium 50]

To squeeze in more than hand-wavy quantum mechanics takes time out of other topics in the syllabus, and those other topics provide the foundation for QM. Even colleges don't try and squeeze in serious QM into a year-long intro course.

 

[WannabeNewton]

See if there are colleges around you that offer summer programs or year long weekend programs for high school students which include QM. MIT's MITES program has physics 1-3 and calc 1-3 although I don't think it has a dedicated QM course; needless to say MITES has a competitive application process. IIRC Columbia has physics and math classes for high school students as well. Regardless, if you have enough interest in the subject then self-studying it in HS won't hurt you. The bare minimum mathematics for QM is easy mathematics (calc 1-3, ODES, LA). You don't have to go all out.

 

[bhobba]

They tried to make us watch "What the bleep do we know?"

Watched a bit of that on you-tube - will watch it all later but the bit I saw was this QM is magic rubbish. I cringe at anyone forced to endure crap like that.

At HS you need to learn it in a way similar to what Feynman did:


Beyond that you really don't have the required math at HS - unfortunately - unless you go to a very advanced HS.

Thanks
Bill

 

[WannabeNewton]

I don't think my HS was particularly advanced but it offered math up to calc 3, ODEs, and LA. We also had a rival HS which did the same. I don't know how common it is but it isn't too sparse it would seem as I met quite a number of kids during science olympiad meets, robotics meets, and Intel science fairs whose HS's offered math courses beyond Calc BC.

 

[bhobba]

I don't think my HS was particularly advanced but it offered math up to calc 3, ODEs, and LA. We also had a rival HS which did the same. I don't know how common it is but it isn't too sparse it would seem as I met quite a number of kids during science olympiad meets, robotics meets, and Intel science fairs whose HS's offered math courses beyond Calc BC.

That's advanced for Australia mate. The most advanced we have is an IB program. If you went to a school like that then - yes - you can start QM beyond the very basic stuff at Feynmans Lectures on QED level.

Thanks
Bill

 

[WannabeNewton]

Ah I see. Well I still think self-studying is a nice option in HS. I remember there's a cute little anecdote in Zee's QFT book about a student who self-studied QM in HS and started to use his QFT text during his freshman year of uni.

 

[thegreenlaser]

I did a little bit of super-simple algebra-based quantum in high school. It focused mostly on the historical development, experiments, and some important results. Of course, I didn't really understand quantum theory at all after that, but I still think seeing it was important because it really made me interested in physics. I had always been mildly interested in physics, but getting that taste of modern physics made me really interested to learn more. I'm almost certain that seeing QM in high school had an effect on the degree path I've chosen, even if I didn't learn any "real" QM.

For that reason I think it may be good to give a taste of modern physics in high school. If nothing else, it might convince some kids that physics isn't so boring after all.

 

[bhobba]

They tried to make us watch "What the bleep do we know?

Watching it now. I like watching philosophical hand-wavey mumbo jumbo like I enjoy watching sci fi and compare it to views I have formed over many years. But to force anyone to watch stuff like this is torture and should be outlawed.

Added Later:
Oh dear, oh dear. If this load of rubbish is what the average person on the street is learning about QM - god help us. For example they get caught in the semantic stupidity of an observation requires an observer - in QM an observation is when something makes its appearance here in the macro world - not when its registered in someones consciousness. One person, only one person, recognized the stupidity of that but said even if it appeared in the macro world it must be observed by someone - which is an absolute load of poppycock. Yet its full of this rubbish stated as if its a fact beyond question.

Thank heaven others have already debunked it:
http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2005/06/30/2839498.htm

Its amazing however the silly ideas people have about this stuff and how they hold onto it regardless of the reason and logic you bring to it. On another forum about audio of all things there was this guy that believed because the property of red is reflected light and not produced by the object, red is not a property an object has but something created by us. I carefully explained that's silly. But no - he was wedded to it - and came up with junk like where does the property of red reside - in the properties of electrons in the outer shells of the objects constituent atoms/molecules. That was too much for the guy who simply, basically, said its what he chooses to believe. Unfortunately I see far to much of this sort of junk in society.

Check out:
http://www.phys.ufl.edu/~det/phy2060/heavyboots.html

Getting back to this thread. Basically the reason its not taught in HS is to do it in any proper way you need math most HS's don't teach. Unfortunately when they do teach it sometimes they do it by junk like this movie. At a minimum it should be done correctly - like Feynman does.

Thanks
Bill

 

[jasonRF]

I don't think my HS was particularly advanced but it offered math up to calc 3, ODEs, and LA. We also had a rival HS which did the same. I don't know how common it is but it isn't too sparse it would seem as I met quite a number of kids during science olympiad meets, robotics meets, and Intel science fairs whose HS's offered math courses beyond Calc BC.

Your high school was particularly advanced. Mine did offer a calculus class, which was better than some of the neighboring towns, but no advanced placement courses of any kind. And we never even heard of science fairs, etc. Our one year of physics we could take was algebra based, and the teacher spent the first half of the year reviewing trig so that most of the students could understand inclined planes. I realize that my high school was particularly poor, but even in college I knew very few people who had the sorts of classes in high school that your school offered. And those that did came from magnet schools in large cities. Perhaps it is a generational thing - I graduated from HS 20+ years ago...

Anyway, back to the OP, even a modest Chemistry class provides some of the qualitative quantum mechanics that folks are talking about. At least mine did, and my chemistry teacher was just hired because he was a good track coach (the schoolboard made him take a "chemistry for nurses" course the summer before he started teaching).

jason

 

[Infrared]

WannabeNewton mentioned a science program at Columbia for high school students. Since I am in it (Columbia Science Honors Program http://www.columbia.edu/cu/shp/) and coincidentally just took the quantum class, I thought I would chime in. It is possible for a high school student to learn some quantum mechanics. However, there are certainly mathematical prerequisites. Much of the first half of the course was devoted to teaching the necessary linear algebra. Still, we got through some good material. We used Schrodinger's equation, derived the Heisenberg (and general) uncertainty relation, solved the quantum mechanical harmonic oscillator, and did lots of stuff with spin/angular momentum including Bell's Theorem.

To the OP: Do check if there are similar programs where you live. If not, there is nothing stopping you from self-studying a topic if it really interests you.

 

[atyy]

I agree: self-study if you're interested. Make sure you know the basics first, say the stuff in Halliday and Resnick or Young and Freedman. There's more advanced classical mechanics than that, but at which time it's no harm to look at Beiser's "Concepts of Modern Physics", French's "Introduction to Quantum Physics", Gasiorowicz's "Quantum Physics", Rae's "Quantum Mechanics", Grffith's "Introduction to Quantum Mechanics" or the 3rd volume of the Feynman Lectures on Physics. It's useful to examine a few books, since there may be mistakes in a particular book, or an explanation that doesn't work so well for you.

These are just suggestions. It's helpful to borrow books from a library, since buying lots of books is expensive. There are notes online like David Tong's http://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/tong/concepts.html and Binney and Skinner's http://www-thphys.physics.ox.ac.uk/people/JamesBinney/QBhome.htm, which has accompanying videos or podcasts.

There's also a very good quantum mechanics course by Balakrishnan on Youtube , but it's more advanced.

I think the important things when self-studying are to ask how the mathematics is related to things that are observable, and experimentally verifiable, and to do lots of the problems. I'm not sure if Schaum's has notes on quantum mechanics, but I've found them helpful for other stuff, since they have lots of worked examples.

 

[Choppy]

There's a coulpe reasons that I would add.

First, as Vanadium suggested, in high school you have to factor in the goals of the curriculum. HIgh school physics is meant to be taught to the general population and serve as an introduction to the physical sciences. Only a few students who take it will go on to be physicists, and those who do will get QM as undergraduates. Others will go on to be engineers of all disciplines, other scientists, professionals, technicians, etc. And there is a lot of ground to cover and not a lot of time. I hesitate to suggest the QM is irrelevant, but it just is not a high enough priority compared to the other subjects the have more broad applications.

Second, anyone who has ever suffered through a class taught by an unqualified teacher will know that making more advanced subjects part of a standard curriculum is problematic. Unfortunately not all physics teachers have a degree in physics. Depending on local requirements, you could have a teacher who him or herself has only taken a single university physics course. This is one of my reasons for not trusting programs that claim to teach university- level curricula at the high school level. I am sure in many cases the students are getting a great education, possibly better than at somoe universities. But what about the poor kids who try to get ahead and end up being taught by a gym teacher who took on the class over the summer to supplement his income? That would be almost as bad as biology teachers who don't "believe in" evolution.

 

[QuantumKangaroo]

In some places they do. Here in Ontario, Quantum Mechanics is one of the units of Grade 12 Physics. Just thought i'd put that out there.

 

[ZapperZ]

In some places they do. Here in Ontario, Quantum Mechanics is one of the units of Grade 12 Physics. Just thought i'd put that out there.

This is really an old thread. But still, you should read the entire thread, because you need to define, at this level, what you mean by "teach" and what you mean by "quantum mechanics". I seriously doubt that the kids are being taught how to solve the Schrodinger Equation, which, to most people, is "quantum mechanics".

Just showing how you get milk from a cow does not make one a dairy farmer.

Zz.

 

[QuantumCurt]

In some places they do. Here in Ontario, Quantum Mechanics is one of the units of Grade 12 Physics. Just thought i'd put that out there.

As ZapperZ pointed out, actually learning Quantum Mechanics is pretty distinct from discussing a few aspects of quantum mechanics. An introductory general physics course will cover some of the qualitative ideas of QM and cover things like determining the quantum numbers of a particle by simple inspection. However, this course isn't going to discuss QM in any quantitative depth. It's a ~2 week unit within a much broader

This earlier exposure is of course a very good thing, but I'm not sure that this is what's really being suggested by 'teaching QM in high school.' It's not unusual for high school physics courses to have a full semester of classical mechanics and a full semester of electromagnetism. However, it is very unusual for a high school to have a full semester of QM. The level of mathematical knowledge required to actually do QM is well beyond the scope of the majority of high schools, and rarely does a high school have a teacher that is genuinely qualified to teach such a class.

 

[Dishsoap]

I did a little bit of super-simple algebra-based quantum in high school. It focused mostly on the historical development, experiments, and some important results. Of course, I didn't really understand quantum theory at all after that, but I still think seeing it was important because it really made me interested in physics. I had always been mildly interested in physics, but getting that taste of modern physics made me really interested to learn more. I'm almost certain that seeing QM in high school had an effect on the degree path I've chosen, even if I didn't learn any "real" QM.

For that reason I think it may be good to give a taste of modern physics in high school. If nothing else, it might convince some kids that physics isn't so boring after all.

Same. The physics class I took wasn't even algebra-based, since pre-algebra wasn't a pre-req for the class. My teacher was amazing though, and after class he would talk to us about all the neat things that physics has to offer outside of F=ma. He minored in physics in undergrad, but had still taken a quantum class, so he told us the gist behind the uncertainty principle, and other cool stuff.

That... that was why I chose to study physics.

 

[DEvens]

High school is oriented towards putting most of the students into the workforce at the end of grade 12 (or whatever the equivalent is for those who finish). So it is mostly putting out auto mechanics and house electricians and secretaries and various other occupations like that. Perfectly honorable occupations, and required by society, but not strongly in need of quantum mechanics.

 

[thegreenlaser]

High school is oriented towards putting most of the students into the workforce at the end of grade 12 (or whatever the equivalent is for those who finish). So it is mostly putting out auto mechanics and house electricians and secretaries and various other occupations like that. Perfectly honorable occupations, and required by society, but not strongly in need of quantum mechanics.

I would actually disagree. Most of what students learn in high school is not really useful in most workplaces. Most people get by just fine without ever needing to solve quadratic equations or look for symbolism in classic literature. I feel like high school is more oriented towards giving people a base from which to pursue university degrees. For all the kids going straight to work or going to trade schools, I think it tends to be justified by the "well-rounded person" argument. And maybe that's even the right way to do it---truly practical skills are tough to teach in a classroom setting. Regardless, for better or for worse, I think high schools have a much different focus than giving kids an education that will be immediately applicable after they graduate.