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Re: ??? ??? ???



John Cooper opines:

On Fri, 5 Sep 1997, LUDWIK KOWALSKI wrote:

Yes, "thinking's fun", as you wrote, Leigh, and as confirmed by Margaret
on the other side of the globe. I wish my students would agree.
Perhaps a non-physicist's perspective will enlighten.
1. Most of your students are not physicists, have no hope of, or interest
in, becoming so. It is a truism that those who teach a subject are
disproportionately under-represented in their clientele, at least up to
the junior in college. Communication consists in addressing audience, not
whom you wish it were.

My inference is that you believe one should aim lower when addressing an
introductory course. If my inference is correct, I believe you are wrong.
When teaching an introductory course I will always give my students the
very best I know. Of course that does not mean that I will immediately
start analysis by performing a Fourier transform on every function in
sight, but it does mean that I will be introspective about what I am
doing, and I will share those thoughts with my students as I go. I want
them to see how I think. Perhaps it is conceited of me to believe that
they will profit from my exposing myself, but it has been my experience
that this approach works. I give virtuoso performances whenever I think
a few students will be moved by such things. I don't think it is a good
idea to "dumb down" an introductory course just because it is biologists
I am teaching instead of physicists, for example. Rarely do those students
convert to physics, but many of them remain on friendly terms with me
after the course ends, and they still talk to me about science.

There is ample evidence that a steady diet of virtuoso performance will
not work. Richard Feynman's sole attempt at teaching an introductory
course was an acknowledged pedagogical failure, but the learning that
has resulted from its dissemination in the diaspora has been orders of
magnitude greater than he could have hoped for in his class. I am sure
his undergrads were not cheated either, and perhaps a few were moved as
I like to think I would have been had I had that opportunity. I did have
such a teacher, Luis Alvarez, for a two semester nuclear physics course.

I'm very glad that I was exposed to a variety of teachers. I can better
appreciate my favorites, and a variety of tastes for style among my peers
is satisfied by that variety. I don't believe there is *a* best way to
teach.

Leigh