Re: devil's advocate (? one wonders...)

[palmer@sfu.ca (Leigh Palmer)]

Dewey says:

> If the fact that the overwhelming end result of physics instruction for 95%
> of the students who receive it is dislike, belief that they cannot
> understand it, and no evidence of understanding of it (FCI and other tests)
> isn't data ("The plural of anecdote is not data!"), then where's the "data"
> that says "that rigorous work in problem solving has... sharpened their
> critical thinking skills, that they ... have a better understanding of the
> physical world than before instruction, that they ... have a better feel
> for the methods of science is hardly objective."?
>
> Finally, for now, I'm wondering where the fact that I am pointing to the
> failure with the 95% says automatically that I am _also_ referring or
> specifically saying failure with the 5%.  (I have suggested that the 5%
> might be better for a different kind of initial instruction, but have I
> specifically said that the 5% are failed too?  I don't think so.)
>
> So it's okay then to ignore our effect on the 95%?

If I accepted your initial hypothesis I'd quit teaching. I'm convinced
my results are much better than that. The FCI wouldn't show that, and
I concede that if the FCI is your arbiter of the value of my efforts
then you will judge them to have been futile. That's not what my
students are telling me in plain English, however. Am I to discount
the importance and value of their personal perception and assessment
of what they've learned just because FCI says otherwise?

Leigh