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Re: Controversial Exam Questions - Not Ohm's Law



At 15.22 11/05/00 -0800, John Mallinckrodt wrote:
On Thu, 11 May 2000, Michael Edmiston wrote:

<deletions>


> I believe weight is defined as the gravitational force the earth exerts
on a
> body, and if that is true, the question is okay and B is the correct
answer.
>
> Now, the question is this... is that what the exam writers wanted to find
> out? Were they trying to see if the students could make this distinction?
> It appears to me thy might indeed be after exactly that.

I think you might be right. If they really wanted to know if the students
understand the *third law*, they could have written a far less ambiguous
question.

That's exactly the problem. They *were* testing understanding of the third
law. I'd be happy if they'd just used "force of gravity" in place of
"weight". The context would make the rest clear and cumbersome wording
would be unnecessary.

Mark



_____________________________________
Mark Sylvester
United World College of the Adriatic,
34013 Duino TS, Italy.
_____________________________________