Advantages of using computer simulations in Physics learning

Abstract

Physics is commonly considered among students to be a difficult subject. Given the declining interest expressed by students in this field and to the failure level found in examination results in last year’s, it becomes urgent to find strategies to invert this situation. This study aims to contribute to the definition of the best strategy to be adopted by teachers in delivering the free fall and horizontal launch subjects. The goal is improve the teaching quality and to minimize the failure rates existing in this discipline by using different strategies. Analysis of the surveys before and after teaching the involved subjects shows that the use of computer simulations lead to a high success rate than when they are not used.