Audio Transcript

Published: March 16, 2026
APA 7 Citation: Newsome, B. (Host). (2026, March 16). Matt Dodds – Using hands-on teaching to improve Physics understanding [Audio podcast transcript]. Fizzics Education.
https://www.fizzicseducation.com.au/podcast/fizzicsed/using-hands-on-teaching-to-improve-physics-understanding/

Ben Newsome CF is the recipient of the 2023 UTS Chancellor’s Award for Excellence and a Churchill Fellow. He is a global leader in science communication and the founder of Fizzics Education.

[00:00:00]
Announcer: You’re listening to the Fizzics Ed Podcast. For hundreds of ideas, free experiments and more, go to fizzicseducation.com.au. And now, here’s your host, Ben Newsome.

[00:00:17]
Ben Newsome: Welcome again for another Fizzics Ed Podcast. Glad to have you no matter where around this world of ours you are. I hope you’re doing well as this season we kick off with an amazing science teacher, Mr. Matt Dodds. Now, Matt is an amazing teacher, that’s for sure. So much so that in 2025, he got the Prime Minister’s Prize for Excellence in Science Teaching in secondary schools.

[00:00:37]
Ben Newsome: I’ve been hanging out with Matt at a variety of conferences for many, many years, and I thought, let’s kick off this season with an amazing teacher. He’s been bringing kids to Siding Spring Observatory in Coonabarabran, which is in New South Wales. Think real observatory for depth studies, all the way through to helping students understand what gravitational wave detectors actually are. He built one out of LEGO!

[00:00:59]
Ben Newsome: It’s worked so well that people around the world are using that same design in LIGO sites. This is really cool. By the way, Matt teaches in all sorts of different areas, but the very core message that he’s saying is make it hands-on and interesting for kids. Let’s get into it.

[00:01:15]
Announcer: This is the Fizzics Ed Podcast. We’re all about science, ed tech and more. To see 100 fun free experiments you can do with your class, go to fizzicseducation.com.au. That’s physics spelled F I Z Z I C S and click 100 free experiments.

[00:01:31]
Matt Dodds: So, I am a high school physics and biology teacher. I’ve been teaching for over 15 years now, predominantly in regional New South Wales. I started my teaching career in my last year of uni, and they took us to Tamworth. Imagine a coachload of soon-to-be teachers jumping on a coach at Central Station, going all the way to Tamworth, and we all got assigned a different school.

[00:01:52]
Matt Dodds: The school I was randomly assigned is called Farrer. It’s a very unique school, it’s an all-boys boarding school. The premise of the excursion was you don’t have to do any teaching, but you can walk in and out of the classroom or the classes they had there for three days. I thought to myself, it’s a long way to go to not do any teaching.

[00:02:13]
Matt Dodds: I was in the classroom with a physics teacher and he said, “Do you want to team teach this lesson?” I said, “Yes, that sounds great.” So, we’re jumping on the board, helping the kids with equations, and he must have had a word to the principal because at the end of three days, I got a pseudo job offer. They basically said if you want to live on-site and work at the school, potentially you could put yourself in a position to apply for a science job that was coming up.

[00:02:38]
Matt Dodds: So, I guess that’s how I moved from the Blue Mountains and from UNSW in Sydney all the way to Tamworth. Then recently, a couple of years ago, I moved from Tamworth to Glen Innes, which is two hours further north. The reason for the move was my wife’s from here, all her family’s here, and I was ready for a new challenge, a bit of a change.

[00:02:59]
Matt Dodds: I went from an all-boys boarding school to a co-ed school, and I’m really enjoying it. As I said, I teach physics and biology and obviously junior science as well. I enjoy the challenge of teaching at a new school and reinventing yourself, building your reputation again and building rapport with the students, then seeing them go off to where they go.

[00:03:33]
Ben Newsome: Quite the trip. Quite the trip.

[00:03:36]
Matt Dodds: Yes, it’s been a long trip. It reminds me of the song, “a little further north each year,” but I don’t think I’m moving any further north just for the moment.

[00:03:43]
Ben Newsome: True. Mind you, I am aware that you got quite further north at one point, heading over to CERN at one point.

[00:03:52]
Matt Dodds: Yes, look, I think there’s some amazing opportunities for science teachers and I’ll mention a few of them. One of them is the physics teachers’ PD at CERN in Switzerland. Now, if it sounds too good to be true, this is the truth. It’s a two-week trip to Switzerland to listen to lectures, do site visits, do hands-on physics experiments at CERN.

[00:04:13]
Matt Dodds: You apply through ANSTO, so the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, and it’s a fully funded trip. It was amazing. It was a lot of learning. I thought to myself at the end of the first week, you know that classic Far Side gallery comic, “Excuse me, Miss, my brain is full.” There were two weeks of it, but I absolutely loved it.

[00:04:38]
Matt Dodds: Then recently, I went to the Perimeter Institute in Canada to do some physics over there for one week, and the week immediately after that, I flew from Canada to America to go to the gravitational wave detector and did a one-week PD there. Some of these things I didn’t know about until I went to CERN. They said to me, “Have you been to the PD in Canada?” I’m like, “Tell me more.”

[00:05:07]
Matt Dodds: I will say that the PD in Canada at the Perimeter Institute was really powerful. It was PD delivered by both physics researchers as well as really professional high school physics teachers sharing their craft. It’s a programme that’s been really honed, and I highly recommend people to attend that as well.

[00:05:32]
Ben Newsome: That’s fantastic. By the way, it would be a struggle to find a physics teacher who doesn’t know about the LHC, we know about this thing. But less known is Beamline for Schools. Just a little heads up, years ago I got to speak with Sarah, I think she might still be there around Beamline for Schools. If you’re listening on in, just type in “Beamline” and your students have an opportunity to genuinely participate in a competition that’s global, and you just might get that ticket that Matt got with your students to get over there too, which is kind of cool.

[00:06:04]
Ben Newsome: Hey, gravitational wave observatory, I’ve never been to LIGO, I’ve never been to those places, but my gosh, it’s pretty wild. Now you made one out of LEGO, right?

[00:06:13]
Matt Dodds: This is true, yes it is. I’ve always been fascinated by an interferometer and the idea of it and how it works. I’ve seen some professional ones, desktop versions on optics benches. I ordered two educational models from Denmark from a university there, and they were really good. I went to order more and they said to me, “You know, you can build your own one.”

[00:06:38]
Matt Dodds: I initially was trying to get some more for outreach, then I thought, you know what, that’s a great challenge. So I went to bed thinking about it and before midnight, I just had this idea. Instead of building it out of optics bench sort of components, building it out of LEGO. I couldn’t sleep, so I got up and I built it out of LEGO and it worked, which was fantastic.

[00:07:03]
Matt Dodds: I didn’t wake up anyone else in the house, which was good. I thought about waking my wife up. She also did assist me the next day with some troubleshooting with the device, but since then, I collaborated with a close friend in Melbourne, his name’s Frank, and we got the LEGO interferometer to a point where it’s now a product that’s used for outreach.

[00:07:29]
Matt Dodds: So, I delivered ten of these to Swinburne University in Melbourne, and then I went to Brisbane actually to deliver some workshops for their outreach team on how these devices work. The cool thing about it is you literally do build it out of LEGO, some optics components so a laser, a diverging lens, a beam splitter, so a 50-50 mirror, and some 3D printed components.

[00:07:59]
Matt Dodds: From when I first built it to when it was delivered to Swinburne was a couple of years actually. But the cool thing was when Swinburne said that they were very interested in it to use for OzGrav for outreach, that’s when I said, “Alright, I need to take this from something that the mirrors were held by Blue Tack to something where the mirrors are held by a 3D printed component that holds the mirror in a stable position.”

[00:08:26]
Matt Dodds: Yes, look, I’m very proud of that, and I should let you know, Ben, this is pretty cool. They now exist in the LIGOs around the world. So there’s one, there’s two in America, there’s one in Japan. I don’t know if there’s one in Italy yet, but I do know that the lady from Swinburne, Jackie Bondell, she took one to Japan and gifted it to them.

[00:08:50]
Ben Newsome: And you built it in the middle of night, I love this. Of course, I get what you mean by the Blue Tack. I mean, the modulation of heat in the day, now your Blue Tack starts dripping and the lenses move. That’s kind of hard when you’re trying to pick up gravitational waves. But the idea is kind of wild. Actually, a little while ago there was a guest who came on who went to the New York Maker Faire and built a pancake bot out of LEGO and a George Foreman grill.

[00:09:13]
Ben Newsome: Very cool. So you can do a lot of stuff with LEGO. It’s not just about following the bouncy ball of the things they give you to build, you can do whatever you want with it, it’s all about creativity, right?

[00:09:24]
Matt Dodds: Yes, and look, funny enough, Ben, that leads on to a thing that I wanted to mention, which is one of my favourite assessment tasks. I’m a big fan of Sir Ken Robinson with the TED talk he does called “Schools Kill Creativity,” and I’m very mindful of the way that I treat my students and the opportunities that I give them. So, one that I try and do in Year 12 is one in which they can build a teaching tool for physics.

[00:09:53]
Matt Dodds: I say to them, look, you’ve learnt the syllabus for electromagnetism, reflect upon it and then build something to teach part of it. Last year, one of my students, Jada, built a replica of the Michael Faraday motor, which is very cool. Instead of using liquid mercury, because we discussed that that’s not really applicable, she used gallium, liquid gallium.

[00:10:21]
Matt Dodds: Another student, Jacob, built a 3D printed three-phase AC induction motor. There’s a bit of a workshop process where they come to me with an idea, we sort of storyboard it out on how it’s going to work and they do some draft designs. It’s such an amazing task that lets them become a maker, become a creator. I tell them, look, it’s okay if it doesn’t work. If it’s just a model, that’s fine. It doesn’t have to be a working model, but if it is a working model, that’s even cooler.

[00:10:52]
Ben Newsome: That’s so cool because I do know that participation in physics is increasing at Glen Innes High School, which is fantastic, which is an awesome thing to say. Here’s an actual measured result, but let’s be honest, the kids are going to be loving this. How scared are they with, “Hey, righto, I’m hanging out with a guy who’s got… I don’t know, do the kids even know about your awards and bits and pieces?” Or they just know that you get to do cool stuff in your class. But what do they feel like when they’ve got to design something to teach students when they’re literally a student themselves?

[00:11:21]
Matt Dodds: Yes, some of them just know me as Mr. Dodds, others know a bit more about what I do outside the classroom. They mostly approach it with a lot of enthusiasm, especially when I tell them that it will potentially become a passion project. It will become something that they adopt and they get really into it. The hours they put into it, they won’t even notice how many hours they put into potentially building something and testing it.

[00:11:51]
Matt Dodds: I run a few holiday workshops where they can come in and bring what they’re working on and I can assist them in developing it. It’s really good and I tell them, look, I’m not a pro at every single field of physics, but I can assist them in their projects as long as we work together. They do love it. As you said, they go from being a student to being a teacher of students, and then we sit back and we watch their videos.

[00:12:19]
Matt Dodds: It’s cool when you see a student teach the class a topic that you’ve taught them, but to such a good level. I’m like, “Yes! That’s the success.”

[00:12:29]
Ben Newsome: That’s fantastic. I mean, let’s be honest, there’s nothing like a deadline saying on October I’m presenting this thing, I guess I better be good at it. And the kids are going to step up every time. It’s amazing what happens when you give them enough rope, right?

[00:12:41]
Matt Dodds: Yes, 100%. I tell them, I give them the assessment task notification really well in advance, like six or eight weeks in advance. They say, “Look, we only normally get an assessment task notification two weeks in advance.” I’m like, “I know, but if you want to think about this beforehand, here you go, you can look at it.” I’ve got one girl this year that wants to build a rail gun.

[00:13:01]
Matt Dodds: Yes, and I said to her, that’s achievable. I sent her some YouTube links to CSIRO, actually, which does a YouTube video on a rail gun, which is a very simple design. I said to her, look, start simple, build something that demonstrates the concept, then we can work together on building something a little bit more advanced.

[00:13:22]
Ben Newsome: I suppose you could also twist it into why don’t you do it with the beginnings of the roller coaster catapult in some ways.

[00:13:29]
Matt Dodds: Exactly. Whatever you’d like to do with it.

[00:13:32]
Ben Newsome: This is fun. I know that I’m mentioning some people remembering when they went through school, the physics thing could seem to be potentially scary because there’s calculations and all these things. I’ve been lucky enough to do a few different science subjects as a kid before I started doing this stuff, but I must say it’s the most hands-on. Sorry biology teachers, I know, chemistry teachers, you can yell at me, I know, but it is very hands-on if you link the equations with the phenomena that you’re actually talking about.

[00:14:03]
Matt Dodds: 100%. And that’s actually part of the marking criteria, linking the equations to it and then potentially picking a variable and changing it. One of my students, I said to him, his name is Carter, I said it would be really cool if you measured the magnetic permeability constant mu nought (μ₀), using a different method than what we’d done in class.

[00:14:27]
Matt Dodds: So he did it with two copper conductors and electronic scales and collected his data. I checked his data and I was like, “Dude, this is awesome, well done.”

[00:14:34]
Ben Newsome: But the thing is, we’ve been lately working a lot on plants and space and there is a lot of physics concepts in it. One thing I’m aware of, I’ve been up to the Glen Innes Show, I’ve seen your photos that you’ve submitted there, I know you’re right into astronomy which is awesome.

[00:14:54]
Ben Newsome: It makes me think about getting kids to understand how pixels can be picked apart to know a given concept, whether it’s bits of low Earth observation data or whatever it is. You can bring physics concepts into the other subjects, right?

[00:15:03]
Matt Dodds: Yes, definitely. It’s quite funny when I pitch physics to the Year 10 crowd. I don’t think you should ever push students into your subject, but you should definitely advertise your subject in such a way that the students that should gravitate towards it have the opportunity to think about it.

[00:15:27]
Matt Dodds: So I present to Year 10 and I tell them what physics is, all the different things that it touches, which is basically everything. It’s the universe, it’s how motors work, it’s atoms. I say to them, “Please do not pick physics if you don’t love mathematics.” But if you love maths and you love problem solving and you love learning about how things work, physics is an amazing subject.

[00:15:47]
Ben Newsome: I’ve got a bubble in the back of my head, I’m trying to remember—and please correct me because I don’t mind being wrong. I can’t remember if it was Faraday or if it was his student or if he was one or the other. At that time there was one dude who loved their maths, maybe it was Boltzmann, and then maybe there was one guy that couldn’t do it whatsoever but either way they were both geniuses with the craft itself. I guess I wonder like if you’re a student sitting in Year 10 and they go, “You know what sir, I actually don’t like maths but I really like knowing how stuff works.” How do we support those students?

[00:16:18]
Matt Dodds: Yes, look, I do know that some schools require students to do advanced maths or extension maths for them to do physics. And after teaching physics for 15 years and knowing the maths that’s required, I actually tell them general mathematics is fine. You don’t need… obviously calculus is fantastic because sometimes in my classroom students raise their hand and go, “Do you mind if I solve this a different way?” Like, particularly projectile motion questions.

[00:16:51]
Matt Dodds: You can solve this any way you want, but I’m going to teach you the way that’s in the syllabus. But I’d like to say that physics is actually very accessible, high school physics. General mathematics I think is adequate. If students are capable of doing advanced, that’s fantastic and they should, but I do think it’s quite an accessible course and it’s a great course.

[00:17:15]
Ben Newsome: It’s good fun. So I guess as we wind this forward, you’ve been able to do a lot of trips overseas, been able to inspire a lot of students of course. Getting to work with OzGrav is rather fun. What was it like meeting the Prime Minister? It must have felt a bit odd.

[00:17:27]
Matt Dodds: Well, yes, look, it was odd. It was surreal. It had been sort of on my vision board for quite some time with regards to the work that I do outside my classroom. And so just to give a bit of background to that, I organise an excursion to Siding Spring Observatory. And I always try and think about the students in my classroom, you know, what’s the learning experience for them?

[00:17:55]
Matt Dodds: And I think about the fact that you know if you’re learning about the universe from a textbook when you can just walk outside at night and look up, you know that’s… the universe is quite accessible. And so I organised this excursion to take my class to Siding Spring Observatory for a two-day excursion where they do stargazing at night, they have lectures from astronomers, they see million-dollar spectroscopes.

[00:18:21]
Matt Dodds: And as I was planning this excursion, I realised that planning it for my school takes a certain amount of effort, but inviting other schools doesn’t cost me that much more time. And so I sent emails and phone calls and text messages out to other teachers from the region. Country schools, you know the other teachers at the other schools.

[00:18:46]
Matt Dodds: And so since I think 2017, or could be earlier than that but it could be around 2017, at least between 50 and 70 Year 12 students annually go to Siding Spring Observatory. And if you do get the chance and you’re listening to this podcast, add it to your map, Coonabarabran, and it’s an amazing place to see Australia’s biggest optical telescope.

[00:19:13]
Matt Dodds: And so yes, that was one of the things that helped me I guess achieve the Prime Minister’s Prize for Science in secondary schools. But yes, no, look, it was a phenomenal experience and I use it actually to motivate myself to keep doing great science teaching. You know, I thought it’s like that saying, “you’re only as good as your last game you played” or your last win or whatever it was.

[00:19:38]
Matt Dodds: And so I’ve got a big week coming up with experiments for students and I’m looking forward to it. I know it’s going to take a bit of fair bit of effort. But you know it’s great to give students these experiences and then share those experiences I guess through the school newsletter with the school community and then share them on Facebook pages so that other teachers can look at what I do with my students and go, “You know what? I’ll try and attempt that.”

[00:20:04]
Ben Newsome: In a lot of ways it’s about capacity building, right? I mean, you could have just did it with your school only, right? Like you could have just gone, “No, I’ve got enough effort, I’m not going to do any single little bit more.” But also there is advantage in that too because I mean if your numbers had dropped, you’ve effectively been supported by the other schools so it’s still going to be able to come off no matter what each year.

[00:20:29]
Matt Dodds: Yes, exactly. And it’s very nice that every year as soon as I… like I get text messages on the first day of the term from other teachers at other schools that say, “Matt, what’s the dates for the excursion? I want to book it in the school calendar.” And I actually caught myself out once. I released the dates for the excursion and then I went to book accommodation for my school and then the accommodation was already booked out by other schools and I was like, “Dammit!”

[00:20:56]
Ben Newsome: Oh gosh! Actually, I didn’t get to go but one of our staff members was at the Coonabarabran show this weekend that just went past. I’m trying to remember, is that the road where you go from Coonabarabran out to Parks where it’s like the longest solar system orrery sort of because they’ve got these different models of the planets and you just drive and drive and drive until you finally get from Uranus to Neptune? That’s the one, right?

[00:21:18]
Matt Dodds: Yes, correct. And it goes a few different ways. And so when we go from up here in Glen Innes, I tell the kids, “Alright, I’ve got a surprise for you,” and the first one we hit is Pluto just outside Tamworth near the airport. And everyone out of the bus and we read the caption, we take a photo with the sign, then we drive to the next planet.

[00:21:43]
Matt Dodds: You know we’re making our pilgrimage through the solar system until we get to the observatory. And the observatory is actually the Sun. So the size of the dome represents the Sun in the solar system.

[00:21:52]
Ben Newsome: Oh, so those models are actually modelled to the size… nice. I haven’t actually been there, been in Narrabri and Parks, I haven’t been there yet. Nice. So if you’re listening on in, here’s a challenge. I mean I don’t want you to break the Australian record, but you probably could if you’ve got a large country, you could actually do this with an observatory of your own in your own country if you wanted to. Put some together and off you go.

[00:22:15]
Matt Dodds: Exactly. Yes, it’s pretty cool.

[00:22:18]
Ben Newsome: Nice, it’s good fun. Righto, so just curious out of all the different lessons that you’ve run over the years, it’s been a long career, what’s your favourite go-to? Like if you had to do one tomorrow which didn’t involve too much prep, but you know it’s a absolute gimme of a lesson. Kids are going to love it no matter what, it’s great fun, it’s a go-to. What’s your favourite?

[00:22:38]
Matt Dodds: I think recently, for how elegant it is, using Hot Wheels cars to teach projectile motion. I ran two workshops in Melbourne about a month ago, less than a month, at the Vicphysics conference. I ran one on detecting muons with a muon detector and using it to teach special relativity.

[00:23:02]
Matt Dodds: And then I ran another one on using Hot Wheels cars to teach projectile motion. And the one with Hot Wheels cars was full. It was full, there was not a spare chair in the room. And I didn’t just hand out lesson plans and do a presentation, I actually took Hot Wheels cars and Hot Wheels track and we did it together.

[00:23:24]
Matt Dodds: And it’s really cool because it is something that is a little bit difficult, mainly because physics teachers make the misconception that we’re calculating kinetic energy, horizontal kinetic energy based off the difference in height the car falls down. But that doesn’t work too well because the car is not 100% efficient.

[00:23:51]
Matt Dodds: But you basically work out the horizontal velocity of the car based on where it hits the ground, and then I tell my students, given any distance back, calculate where to place a cup to catch the car. And when I did this a couple of years ago, one of my students, Charlotte, who ended up coming first in physics, she just yelled out, “Physics works!” when she caught the car in the cup. And I’m like, “Yes, yes it does!”

[00:24:16]
Ben Newsome: That’s so fun. I actually remember… gosh, I’m going back. So this would be 1996, I’m showing my age. I know I did that lesson, probably nowhere near as good as your one. We definitely did, I was the student by the way, it was like first year undergrad student. We were doing a similar thing and we had to work out the angles, we had to weigh the car out.

[00:24:34]
Ben Newsome: And actually funny enough I was at the Cooma Show this weekend doing the things, I was watching these guys who were ex-Crusty Demons of Dirt motocross riders and watching them doing their flips and everything else going, “You know what, there is no way you would do this in front of several hundred people without knowing exactly to a T where you’re going to be.”

[00:24:54]
Matt Dodds: 100%. And to teach it, I actually show them the videos from YouTube of Hot Wheels America when they do this with actual cars, very similar to what you’ve just said where cars get launched off ramps and very big ramps and loop-the-loops as well. It’s a great experiment.

[00:25:17]
Matt Dodds: It actually to me was inspired by when I was at uni. We were given a ball bearing and a ramp, and we had to assume nearly 100% energy conversion between height and kinetic energy. And we were given a cup to place or a container to place on the ground. We had to do all the calculations and then we could release the ball.

[00:25:39]
Matt Dodds: If the ball bearing went in the container first go, we got full marks for the lab. Our second go, they would give us a different height so we’d have to redo all our equations again. And I thought that was really cool. So thank you to UNSW, I really appreciated that first year physics lab.

[00:25:57]
Ben Newsome: It’s absolute gold. So there you go, if you’re even if you’re not teaching physics, just go find how to do it and give it a go because it is actually a fun one. If you can have a student saying “Physics rocks” or “Physics is cool” or “Physics works”, that’s a win in my books. That’s awesome.

[00:26:12]
Ben Newsome: So righto, so knowing this, what would be your advice to any form of teacher teaching science in any capacity to make it engaging and fun?

[00:26:26]
Matt Dodds: That is a really, really good question, Ben, because I tell teachers in some workshops that I run, whenever I’m presenting, that if I could, I’d call up all the students that I’d taught in my first three years of teaching and apologise to them. Mainly because I did a lot of theory and my repertoire for my pracs really wasn’t there yet.

[00:26:51]
Matt Dodds: But I did challenge myself to try and incorporate more pracs each year and actually really get the pracs dialled in. So, making the worksheets, testing the experiment, changing certain things. When I was doing teaching thermodynamics, I spent a long time at home changing the volume of water in a cup and seeing which volume works the best to give the greatest results.

[00:27:18]
Matt Dodds: And so I guess my advice for teachers out there is connect with the other teachers at your school, or if you’re the only physics teacher or whatever teacher, typically it’s physics or chemistry at a school, reach out to other teachers in other schools. I think, believe it or not, Facebook is amazing. Physics Teachers Australia and there’s chemistry pages where people ask questions.

[00:27:44]
Matt Dodds: I normally jump on there straight away if someone posts a picture of an induction coil and puts the comment, “How does this work?” I always jump on, “Please ask a physics teacher in your region to show it to you because it’s pretty hard to describe over Facebook.” But I think collaboration and seeing other physics teachers present.

[00:28:04]
Matt Dodds: Ben, I’ve been very lucky to be in your audience and see how you connect with students in the work that you do. And so that I guess builds capacity and confidence. But getting out there, attending conferences either in person or via Zoom I think’s really important to developing your repertoire.

[00:28:24]
Ben Newsome: That makes sense. I mean eventually, why keep on recreating these wheels over and over and over again? Might as well find out. And I do like the idea of making it hands-on and what a really good idea with the apologising. I mean that would take some bravery, but you’re right. I mean I think about my early lessons, they were rather stunted at best. I mean I tried to deal with the classroom management.

[00:28:44]
Ben Newsome: Actually, funny enough I was doing a PD recently and I said, “I promise you if you get your lesson engagement right, your behaviour problems drop anyway.”

[00:28:51]
Matt Dodds: 100%. There’s classes that I’ve taught in the past where the moment the students walk in, I have an iPad that’s connected to the board like it’s screen mirroring, and I’m writing up a prac. And the fact that they just go, “We know what’s expected,” they sit down and they write up the prac and then we discuss it and then we do it.

[00:29:15]
Matt Dodds: It gets them interested. Or another interesting one is when they come in and I say to them, “Come and have a look at this,” and I’ve already got the equipment set up and getting them to predict the outcome, observe it, explain it. So I think as much as you can, doing experiments, having a clear goal for the experiment, practicing them in your own time.

[00:29:38]
Matt Dodds: One that I did a couple of years ago, which isn’t in the syllabus but I’m going to keep it, is building a cloud chamber.

[00:29:46]
Ben Newsome: Oh yes. Well if you’re going to do subatomic, that’s one way to do it, right?

[00:29:51]
Matt Dodds: Exactly right. And I said to the students, I gave them a Google Form survey at the end of Year 12, sort of like “rate your teacher and his teaching,” what was your least favourite experiment, what was your top experiment? And one of my best students, one of my top students, said that his favourite experiment of all was building the cloud chamber and seeing the tracks.

[00:30:09]
Ben Newsome: Off the top of my head, is it dry ice, isopropyl alcohol and throw it in some sort of clear box, right?

[00:30:14]
Matt Dodds: Yes, that’s exactly right. I get my clear box from Petbarn, isopropanol from Bunnings and dry ice is a little bit harder to get, but if you’re in a big city you can generally find a supplier, but yes it was pretty cool.

[00:30:28]
Ben Newsome: Oh, it’s good fun. I haven’t done that in ages. Our guys were trying to work out how do we give it on tap using nitrogen because we don’t always want to have to get dry ice and we didn’t want to keep bending and breaking the boxes. But that’s a whole other side thing.

[00:30:44]
Ben Newsome: Matt, it’s been really awesome hanging out with you, especially I know you’re a rather busy person in Term 1, but I reckon your kids are having a ball, which is the biggest thing.

[00:30:55]
Matt Dodds: No, thank you Ben. Thanks for having me on. And thanks for the work you do. As I said, I draw energy from other people that have a lot of energy as well and you’re definitely one of them. Seeing you at the lab assistant conference with your passion and seeing you at Glen Innes at the Glen Innes Show presenting as well, the science show, I love it. Congratulations, Ben.

[00:31:17]
Ben Newsome: Thanks mate. Love what you’re doing so you’re still doing Science with Mat?

[00:31:21]
Matt Dodds: I am indeed, yes. So it’s basically workshops to empower physics and biology teachers. Sometimes we take them on the road, we did from Cairns to Brisbane, I believe it was last year. And it’s one of those things where I’ll just briefly describe this moment, we were teaching viewing stomata in plants under microscopes.

[00:31:49]
Matt Dodds: We actually took a plant with us the whole way, my wife and I, and this teacher, this lab technician was like, “Oh my goodness, I didn’t realise it was this easy.” You know, if you get the right plant with the right stomata, you can literally just take a leaf off the plant and do a wet mount. And she’s like, “For so many parts of my career, I was using sticky tape or nail polish and doing that sort of stuff.” And just sharing techniques with other teachers, it’s really cool. I love when I get a random Facebook message on my phone from a teacher in Western Australia or somewhere else in Australia and they’ve replicated my Hot Wheels prac. “Thanks mate, check this out!” So that’s the cool part.

[00:32:28]
Ben Newsome: That’s a funny thing hanging out with teachers who’ve been doing it for a while, they’ve always got these things in the back of their head. You just triggered another memory, I think it was another uni one. It was the glue on the back underneath of the leaves situation and we were being asked to look at valley versus ridge top for a given eucalypt. And it was like, “Oh, the standard deviation was rather hard to pick on this,” but we did it. But there are so many pracs out there, aren’t there really?

[00:32:54]
Matt Dodds: Yeah, 100%.

[00:32:56]
Ben Newsome: Matt, much appreciate for your time. Thank you very much and undoubtedly we’ll catch you soon enough. And by the way, before you run away, how might people get in touch with you?

[00:33:04]
Matt Dodds: Yeah, sure thing. On the website sciencewithmatt.com.au there is a contact form and I check that daily. My phone number’s not on there for good reason because it’s the internet. But if people fill out that contact form they can shoot me a message and I can reply to them. I’m very happy to always share assessment tasks. I just actually just sent out an email with an assessment task to 30 teachers.

[00:33:30]
Matt Dodds: If I’ve spent time making it and I can share it and someone can benefit, then that’s obviously the thing about teaching and sharing. But yeah, just check out sciencewithmatt.com.au and fill out the contact me form.

[00:33:41]
Ben Newsome: Easy as, and I’ll normally put these links in the show notes so you can click away to your heart’s content and go nicely harass Matt. But look, much appreciate, have an awesome time and I’ll probably catch you at the next whatever we’re doing.

[00:33:53]
Matt Dodds: Sounds good Ben, thank you very much.

[00:33:58]
Announcer: We hope you’ve been enjoying the Fizzics Ed Podcast. We love making science make sense. Why don’t you book us for a science show or workshop in your school? If you’re outside of Australia, you can connect with us via a virtual excursion. See our website for more.

[00:34:13]
Ben Newsome: Well I hope you enjoyed that chat with Matt Dodds. I certainly did, especially when it comes to thinking about how to make things engaging. I mean let’s be honest, who wouldn’t want to play with matchbox cars and make them shoot across the room and make sure the mathematics matches what you see in reality? I mean isn’t that what physics sort of really is? Love it.

[00:34:34]
Ben Newsome: And what an amazing and deep connection to students that he has that he would go back to his earliest students to just say sorry. I mean how many people would have the guts to do that? I know Matt would and perhaps all of us could take a very good strong leaf out of his book. So hope you enjoyed this. There are more and more episodes coming up through this season of the Fizzics Ed Podcast.

[00:34:52]
Ben Newsome: So you’ve been listening to me, Ben Newsome from Fizzics Education. This is the Fizzics Ed Podcast and I hope to catch you another time.

[00:34:57]
Announcer: You’ve been listening to another Fizzics Ed Podcast. We’re excited about science. Subscribe to us on iTunes to download the next episode as soon as it’s released. And don’t forget, for hundreds of ideas, free experiments, our new Be Amazing book and more, go to fizzicseducation.com.au. That’s physics spelled F I Z Z I C S.

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Frequently Asked Questions

How can Australian science teachers access international professional development opportunities at facilities like CERN?
Matt Dodds highlights that organisations such as the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) facilitate fully funded programmes for teachers. These programmes, like the physics teachers’ professional development at CERN in Switzerland, often include lectures, site visits, and hands-on experiments. Matt suggests that attending one international programme often leads to discovering others, such as those held at the Perimeter Institute in Canada or gravitational wave detectors in the United States.

What is a LEGO interferometer and how is it used in science outreach?
The LEGO interferometer is a functional model of a gravitational wave detector that Matt designed using LEGO bricks, a laser, a beam splitter, and 3D-printed mirror mounts. It allows students to observe the phenomena of interference and understand how facilities like LIGO detect ripples in space-time. The design has proven so effective for science communication that it is now utilised for outreach by OzGrav in Australia and at LIGO sites in Japan and the United States.

How does using toys like Hot Wheels improve physics understanding?
Using Hot Wheels cars to teach projectile motion makes the mathematics “real” for students. By launching cars off tracks and calculating their horizontal velocity, students can predict the exact placement of a cup to catch the vehicle. This hands-on approach demonstrates that physics equations accurately describe the physical world, leading to high engagement and “lightbulb moments” where students see the practical application of their calculations.

Can students succeed in Physics without taking advanced or extension mathematics?
While some schools mandate advanced maths, Matt argues that high school physics is quite accessible for students taking general mathematics. While calculus can provide alternative ways to solve problems (such as those involving projectile motion), it is not a strict necessity for the syllabus. He encourages any student who loves problem-solving and understanding how the universe works to consider the subject.

What is the “build a teaching tool” assessment task?
In this Year 12 assessment, students are challenged to build a physical model or device that can be used to teach a specific concept from the electromagnetism syllabus. Examples include 3D-printed induction motors or replicas of the Faraday motor using liquid gallium. This task shifts the student from a passive learner to a “maker” and teacher, fostering deep creativity and a thorough understanding of the scientific principles involved.

Extra thought ideas to consider

The “Apology” Reflection for Professional Growth
Matt mentions the idea of wanting to apologise to his earliest students for relying too heavily on theory before he had developed a robust repertoire of practical experiments. This highlights a critical stage in a teacher’s career: moving from surviving the curriculum to mastering the “craft” of engagement. Educators might consider how they currently balance theory and practice, and what specific “pracs” they could dial in this year to reduce their reliance on textbook-heavy lessons.

Capacity Building through Regional Collaboration
The success of the Siding Spring Observatory excursion stems from Matt’s decision to invite other regional schools rather than keeping the event exclusive to his own students. This collaborative model ensures that even if one school has low enrolment numbers in a given year, the event remains viable and the costs for accommodation and experts are shared. This “open-door” policy for excursions could serve as a blueprint for other regional educators looking to provide high-level science experiences that would be impossible to facilitate in isolation.

Engagement as a Classroom Management Tool
A recurring theme in the conversation is that when students are immediately met with an interesting experiment or a challenge to “predict, observe, and explain,” behaviour problems significantly decrease. By prioritising a “hands-on first” environment—where the equipment is set up and the goal is clear the moment students walk in—teachers can create a self-managing classroom where curiosity and the “physics works” moment become the primary drivers of student focus.