RESEARCH ON AN IMPROVEMENT OF FRANK-HERTZ EXPERIMENT TEACHING

The Franck-Hertz experiment, a landmark experiment in the history of modern physics, plays a significant role in undergraduate laboratory courses for elucidating atomic structure models. This paper presents an improved design for the Franck-Hertz experiment, encompassing six aspects: integration of historical context, automated data acquisition, design of experiments targeting high-excitation states, fostering of team collaboration, training in scientific software usage, and progressive formulation of thought-provoking questions. With these enhancements, students are relieved from the burden of tedious manual data recording, thereby freeing up time to substantially expand and deepen the experimental content. In addition to maintaining a balance between theoretical instruction and hands-on training, the revised approach further cultivates scientific inquiry skills and reinforces basic competencies in scientific literacy. This reform aligns with the general-education philosophy underlying experimental physics teaching at Tsinghua University.