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textbook order

Thoughts on text order, since the topic has come up:

I've heard that PSSC originally started with optics, and then went to
mechanics. They rearranged it to standard order due to market pressure,
not publisher pressure.

An acquaintance of mine teaches waves really early in the course. He finds
that in a beginning course, boys and girls are on equal footing in dealing
with waves, but not in mechanics.

I find that standard textbook order is a nuisance for the order that I
prefer. The order that makes sense to me is static forces followed by
kinematics, then dynamics (I think that's standard order for an engineering
curriculum). I teach momentum before Newton's laws, which is also a
nuisance with the way most texts are ordered.

Digby Willard

Responding to the message of Sat, 04 Dec 1999 10:13:44 -0500
from Ludwik Kowalski <KowalskiL@MAIL.MONTCLAIR.EDU>:

The message form Roger Freedman prompted me to ask this
question. How many authors of widely used introductory
physics textbooks belong to phys-L? I would very much like
to hear their side of the story of "perpetual misconceptions".
Are they sufficiently free to discuss this in public? Are they
allowed (by publishers) to start presenting material differently,
for example, "energy before work", or "equilibrated charges
on capacitors in series can be unequal", or "no need for
Bernoulli", etc.

For those who may not know let my add that earlier editions
of UNIVERSITY PHYSICS of Young and Freedman were
authored by Sears and Zemansky. In other words the new
textbook (10th edition, 2000) has glorious history.