CULTIVATION OF INNOVATIVE POTENTIAL IN BASIC DISCIPLINE FIELDS: RESEARCH ON THE PROGRESSIVE CONNECTION BETWEEN MIDDLE SCHOOL AND UNIVERSITY PHYSICS EXPERIMENTS AND THE PATH OF INNOVATION CAPABILITY

Physics laboratory instruction plays an important role in education in the basic disciplines by connecting theoretical knowledge with real-world phenomena and developing students' scientific literacy and capacity for innovation. The transition from secondary school to university presents students with substantial discontinuities in knowledge and a sharp increase in experimental complexity. Drawing on the College Physics Laboratory at Northwestern Polytechnical University, this study proposes a progressive instructional framework of “engaging introduction, coherent progression, and innovation-oriented learning.” It develops a university physics laboratory teaching scheme that moves from activating prior secondary-school knowledge, through developing university-level understanding, to extending learning through innovative practice. Using electricity, optics, mechanics, and thermal physics as four implementation modules, the scheme establishes a three-stage progression from consolidating foundational knowledge to developing experimental competence and undertaking innovative inquiry. The framework is designed to help students adapt smoothly to the pace and demands of university physics, systematically strengthen their capacity for innovation, and provide a practical approach to cultivating high-caliber innovators for contemporary society.