In a post of 15 November 2004 titled "Re: Will NCLB Promote Direct
Instruction of Science?" [Hake (2004a)], I wrote:
"In response to Michael [Horton's] request for lists of
research-based teaching methods, Larry Woolf, in a Physhare post of 4
Nov 2004 21:28:10-0800, wrote . . . . . . . . For more references to
teaching methods that research has shown to be effective see Hake
(2004b). . . . "
In response Herb Gottlieb (2004a,b) wrote:
"Having gone through a great deal of the 'educational literature'
during the past 60 years I am convinced that every new (or
rediscovered) teaching method goes through a similar 15 year cycle. .
. . During the third five years
less and less articles acclaiming the new method are published. In
fact, there are almost no articles at all are found during the last
year or two of this interval. "MEANWHILE ANOTHER NEW OR REDISCOVERED
TEACHING METHOD IS INTRODUCED AND IT STARTS ITS OWN 15 YEAR CYCLE TO
OBLIVION."
John Denker (2004) agrees, writing [bracketed by lines "DDDDDDD. . . ."]:
DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD
Just to remark that "meanwhile" is more descriptive than "next 15
year cycle", because the cycles overlap:
___xxXXXXXxx___
______xxXXXXXxx___
_________xxXXXXXxx___
et cetera.
So on average there's only about 5 years between 'miracles'.
I WONDER IF THE PEOPLE INVOLVED HAVE LEARNED ANYTHING FROM THE
IMPERMANENCE OF THEIR IDEAS? [My CAPS.}
DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD
EVIDENTLY NOT! In fact Crouch & Mazur (2001) at Harvard and Dori &
Belcher (2004) at MIT, not blest with the prescience of Gottlieb and
Denker, are wasting their times going along with yet another of those
cyclic short-lived fads (Interactive Engagement) that bedevil physics
education.
One might excuse Harvard and MIT as being Massachusetts ultra-liberal
wackos, but there are yet others lacking the Gottlieb/Denker wisdom,
such as [see Hake (2002) for the references]: Redish et al. (1997);
Saul (1998); Francis et al. (1998); Redish & Steinberg (1999); Redish
(1999); Beichner et al. (1999); Cummings et al. (1999); Novak et al.
(1999); Beichner et al. (2000); Bernhard (2000); Johnson (2001);
Meltzer (2002a,b,c); Meltzer & Manivannan (2002); Savinainen & Scott
(2002a,b); Steinberg and Donnelly (2002); Fagen et al. (2002); and
Van Domelen & Van Heuvelen (2002).
Planck's Principle" is:
"An important scientific innovation. . .[or unorthodox teaching
method] . . . rarely makes its way by gradually winning over and
converting its opponents: it rarely happens that Saul becomes Paul.
What does happen is that its opponents gradually die out and that the
growing generation is familiarized with the idea from the beginning:
another instance of the fact that the future lies with the young."
-- Max Planck, The Philosophy of Physics [1936]
REFERENCES
Crouch, C.H. & E. Mazur. 2001. "Peer Instruction: Ten years of
experience and results," Am. J. Phys. 69: 970-977; online at
<http://mazur-www.harvard.edu/publications.php>.
Dori, Y.J. & J. Belcher, J. 2004. "How Does Technology-Enabled Active
Learning Affect Undergraduate Students' Understanding of
Electromagnetism Concepts?" To appear in The Journal of the Learning
Sciences 14(2), online at
<http://web.mit.edu/jbelcher/www/TEALref/TEAL_Dori&Belcher_JLS_10_01_2004.pdf>
(1 MB).
Gottlieb, H. 2004b. "Effective" teaching methods," Phys-L post of 15
Nov 2004 22:00:29-0500; online at
<http://lists.nau.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0411&L=phys-l&O=A&P=21075>.
The same post at Gottlieb (2004a) but with a different title that
stimulated a 38 post Phys-L thread (as of 17 Nov 2004 20:20:08-0800).
Hake, R.R. 2004a. "Re: Will NCLB Promote Direct Instruction of Science?"
online at
<http://lists.nau.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0411&L=phys-l&O=A&P=20811>.
Post of 15 Nov 2004 16:34:59-0800 to AP-Physics, EvalTalk,
Math-Learn, Math-Teach, Phys-L, PhysLrnR, & Physhare.