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Re: Borrowing bandwith?



Everybody and his dog seems to have a "unique" approach to the teaching of
physics. Yet the textbooks end up looking like clones


On Tue, 16 Jul 2002, Robert J. Beichner wrote:

I was wondering if I could impose on the collective wisdom of you fol=
ks on
the Phys-L and PhysLrnr lists. I just signed a contract with Addison-=
Wesley
to write a new physics textbook. (I wasn=B9t invited back to work on =
the next
edition of Serway/Beichner. It=B9s a long story=8A) I=B9m still tryin=
g to walk the
line between a fully reformed approach and a traditional text. My goa=
l is to
write a book that looks =B3normal=B2 but ends up supporting PER-based=
ideas.

Anyway, having been a long-time lurker and occasional participant on =
these
two lists I know that there are lots of great ideas. I'm sure that yo=
u have
favorite problems, examples, applications, and even pedagogies. If yo=
u are
interested, I=B9d like to put some of them into this book. Obviously,=
I can=B9t
use them all. I=B9d have to put my own spin on them or the text would=
end up
reading like a committee wrote it. But I=B9d be very happy to acknowl=
edge your
contributions in the preface.

As a concrete example, John Mallinckrodt has commented several times =
in
these lists on his approach to teaching kinematics using just a few
definitions rather than focusing on a special set of equations. I lik=
ed that
idea and have modified my own classes along those lines. I tried to
incorporate some of the approach in Serway/Beichner, but faced some
constraints. (You=B9ll notice that was allowed to cut the number of s=
pecial
kinematics equations down from 8 to 4, but that was it.) In the new t=
ext I
will only include the constant acceleration equations as a special ca=
se and
put them in an example. (In fact, a lot of the =B3teaching=B2 will be=
done in
examples since that is all many students read.)

There are two ways to do this sort of =B3community book building=B2 t=
ask. The
first would be for me to set up my own listserv and handle everything
privately. But it seems to me that this could provide fodder for lots=
of
interesting discussions over the existing lists. (Perhaps the PhysLrn=
r folks
would rather not participate in the discussion since it is not resear=
ch,
although I would hope that the book will clearly be seen as research-=
based.)
So what do you think, is this better done privately or publicly? Keep=
in
mind that this is a 3 year project, so the discussions would be part =
of the
lists for a long time.

Bob Beichner
NC State Physics


--
"But as much as I love and respect you, I will beat you and I will kill
you, because that is what I must do. Tonight it is only you and me, fish.
It is your strength against my intelligence. It is a veritable potpourri
of metaphor, every nuance of which is fraught with meaning."
Greg Nagan from "The Old Man and the Sea" in
<The 5-MINUTE ILIAD and Other Classics>