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[Phys-L] Re: On Bulbs Batteries and Engineers

Thanks again for your clear explanation. I'm sure that others on this
list-serve, as well as myself, would like to learn some of the techniques
that your students have been using to understand complicated electric
circuits that stump experienced electronic engineers.

Is there any way that you could share some of these techniques with us?
(Perhaps in an e-mail attachment?)

Thanks in advance.

Herb Gottlieb


On Tue, 22 Feb 2005 21:31:06 -0600 Joseph Bellina
<jbellina@SAINTMARYS.EDU> writes:
The problem for the electrical engineers was not a simple bulb, wire,
and battery. I don't know how they would do with that. Rather is
was a complicated set of series and parallel networks of bulbs. They
were asked to rank order the brightness of the bulbs, and then predict
what would happen if a wire was connected between certain points in the
circuit.
What happened was that the engineers that I heard about...and of
course I didn't hear about all of them, was that they confused by the
complication of the circuit and set about writing down lots of
circuit equations, when my students knew the ranking could be
determined by
simply looking at the circuit and understanding a few simple rules
about current flow.
Of course part of this is the culture. The electrical engineers
were acculturated to think one way, my students to think another.
Perhaps
the engineer's way will work best for them in their profession, and
ours will work best for the pre-service teachers.

joe

Herbert H Gottlieb wrote:

My comments, shown in bold type and preceded with three stars ***
and n
bold type, are interspersed in the paragraph below.


Joseph Bellina <jbellina@SAINTMARYS.EDU> writes:


I would guess that your grandchildren would be lucky since these
students now understand what guided inquiry is and how it works.



*** I certainly agree that Knowing and Understanding how "guided
inquiry works" is a valuable tool for college students who hope
to become science teachers.



They (the girls) can also explain how a circuit works in ways
that


their boyfriend electrical engineers cannot.

*** It is difficult to believe that boys who have been graduated
from
colleges with Electrrical Engineering Degrees have so much
difficulty
with a simple series circuit containing only a bulb, a battery, and
a
length of connecting wire.

Anyone would certainly be surprised to learn that graduate
electrical
engineers were unable set up such a simple electric circuit. Is it
really possible that not even one, in a whole group graduate
electrical
engineers, was able make a flashlight bulb light with the aid of a
battery and connecting wires.



They (the girls) are surprised when they hear their boyfriends
saying
things that they know are obviously wrong.



*** Is it possible that the boys are only joking with the girls to
get
their reactins? If so, the boys should mend their ways?




I don't think its fair, Herb, to criticize until you know more of
what is happening. If you were aware of the curriculum and had
read my





note carefully you would have realized that this experience is
the
beginning of their learning not the end.



*** I certainly did not intend to criticize anyone. It was just
that I have worked many years with graduate electrical engineers
and greatly respect them. Electrical engineering is very rigorous
and those who are graduaterd from colleges with earned degrees
in electrical engineering are among the most capable and
intelligent
people that I know. I have never met even one of them who could not
connect a bulb and battery in a simple circuit..

... and cheers 2U2.

Herb
------

--
Joseph J. Bellina, Jr. Ph.D.
574-284-4662, 4968
Saint Mary's College
Dept. of Chemistry and Physics
Notre Dame, IN, 46556




Herb Gottlieb from New York City
A friendly place to live and visit