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Re: [Phys-l] Unit Conversions (was Mass and Energy)



"Essentially private schools are now often just concerned
with the bottom line financially and have lost sight of education."


An exception is my alma mater (HS). I recently attended my 50th reunion during which the Head (a woman!) gave a lecture on the changes since ... I didn't catch much because of my very poor hearing, but I did note her emphasis on incorporating the results of learning research; in particular the difference in the sexes. As a result during the first years (two?) classes are segregated when possible. I later had a long talk w/ the Physics teacher *, who is a grad. of NAU (M.Ed.), therefore, quite familiar w/ per and incorporates it in his teaching. So there!

* He's a member of the AAPT Cmte on Physics in High Schools, and a peer modeler.

bc



John Clement wrote:

No, it is not psycho-babble. If you don't understand the terminology, then
it will seem like babble. This same thing happens when students encounter
physics terminology. They think they understand, but they don't.

Let us take the term "formal operational". Piaget applied this to students
who pass certain tests and thought that they were capable of formal
reasoning. Actually it just indicates a general level of achievement in
reasoning and corresponds to what Arons would call the necessary precursors
to being able to understand physics. I use it in the latter sense because
even when students test at this level, they still use incorrect reasoning
upon occasion. One needs a term to describe this "state" of learning.


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have difficulty with them. But also the evidence is very firm and
convincing to any scientist.

Now as to the NCLB, what does it do? It puts sole responsibility on the
teachers and administrators. In reality of course, students and parents are
also responsible. I am currently under the gun because enough of my
students have said that they learned nothing in my class that the admin. Is
upset. I have evaluations that show the opposite, but who cares about that
sort of thing. Essentially private schools are now often just concerned
with the bottom line financially and have lost sight of education. So the
blame game goes on. I hit the students hard in certain ways, and they rebel
and complain to the administration. They look at the top student's
complaints, but ignore the fact that she scored 98% on the FMCE. She didn't
like the learning, but it worked extremely well. This is like having a
patient complain that they didn't like the fact that the injections hurt,
despite the fact that the cancer was cured. At present the implementation
of NCLB in TX is driving competent experienced teachers out of the schools.
So one does not need lawyers or NCLB to implement stupid policies.
Capitalism and the ENRON philosophy of keeping up appearances has done the
job quite nicely.

John M. Clement
Houston, TX

)

Jack,

It is all the psycho-babble that seems to scream 'stupidity'. I am much
more comfortable with 'ignorance', but an ignorance that comes partly from
poor preparation, but also from lack of intellectual curiosity and more
importantly, a lack of intellectual honesty on the part of students.

IMO, we can largely thank the lawyers (sorry) and the psychologists of the
past few decades for removing the responsibility of the individual from
the
social equation. In our cases, there IS a responsibility on the students


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