(1390) USING THE WHEATSTONE BRIDGE AS A TOOL FOR ACTIVE LEARNING

摘要

The so called Wheatstone bridge is an electrical circuit used to measure an unknown electricalresistance by balancing two legs of a bridge circuit, one leg of which includes the unknowncomponent. Its operation is similar to the original potentiometer. It was invented by Samuel H. Christiein 1833 and improved and popularized by Sir Charles Wheatstone in 1843. One of the Wheatstonebridge's initial uses was for the purpose of soils analysis and comparison.If we add a voltage source in each of the four branches of the circuit (we will call this generalizedbridge as CWB-4G) and we use the well-known method of meshes for to draw interesting conclusionson how students in a first course in Science or Engineering can develop their mental processes tohave a meaningful learning, about concepts like voltages and currents in a circuit. The circuitpresented here is a generalization of the famous Wheatstone passive circuit. We can convert it inactive by adding four voltage generators, one in each branch, and that the underlying physics is muchmore dynamic and attractive. Also check by Cramer's method of solving systems of equations willallow us to discuss possible solutions to this circuit.