Greetings everyone. I hope everyone has had an enjoyable and
relaxing holiday. I was wondering if anyone could help me out? I'm in
the process of reviewing texts for both my general chemistry and general
physics classes for the upcoming school years. I'm not sure what route
to take here, but before I start making final decisions for the new
texts, I wanted to get all of your opinions.
One thing I am considering is trying to find a text that has topics
that are relevant to my students. In your opinion, what chemistry and
physics topics do today's students find most relevant? Just out of
curiosity, when you were in high school, what topics were seen as being
relevant in chemistry and/or physics?
I'm also wondering if my classes may be a bit too structured. After
looking over my current texts, which are about 10 years old, they seem
to be quite structured but I try to incorporate what is being taught
into other subject areas and how it impacts upon them. On the other
hand, my new course of study, they seem to want the topics to be more of
a personal experience where the students are analyzing issues, studing
the environment, technology, social problems, integration of science
into other disciplines, etc. Is anyone else experiencing where the
setup of their text does not mesh with their course of study? What do
you do about it? If you can, can you please tell me what text you are
using, the author(s), and is the text primarily setup as being primarily
"structured" or "personal experience"?