A sound-generating polarity detector for visually impaired students

Abstract

This study aims to develop a polarity detector that generates sounds in two different patterns for positive and negative polarity, which enables visually impaired students to detect the polarity of electrically charged objects in static electricity experiments. The traditional electroscopes used in physics laboratories are not practical enough to determine the polarity of electrically charged objects. For visually impaired students to perform static electricity experiments on their own, there is a need for an electroscope that informs them about the polarity of electrically charged objects, for example, by generating sounds or vibrations in different patterns. With this motivation, we developed a sound-generating polarity detector with a small budget for two polarities. Visually impaired students and others can easily use such a digital educational tool in the physics laboratories. Physics teachers can use this laboratory tool as an educational material that reduces their workload, and it would be beneficial to bring it into the existing literature.