Computational notebooks for instructional physics laboratory: Practical insights

Laboratory is a standard part of future scientists' and engineers' curriculum. The curriculum of today demands that instruction in physics be equipped with computational activities. In a large-enrollment, calculus-based, one-semester, introductory mechanics course, we designed a relatively novel laboratory curriculum that integrates computation with experiment. This was accomplished by implementing a web-based, interactive computing software Jupyter Notebook. Labs written in the Jupyter Notebook format seamlessly integrate text and code. The traditional, text-based part of the labs provides lab instructions, content information, and even special formatting for symbols and expressions (LaTeX). The computational part of the labs is contained in code "cells" where students work with simple programs (in Python) for analyzing and visualizing experimental data. The entire notebook document consists of a sequence of text cells and code cells, exhibiting well-ordered structure as a whole. In this presentation, we will share the benefits, challenges, and drawbacks presented by this curriculum.