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Re: [Phys-l] Students' READING abilities



Perhaps a clud to an answer should come from someone (if there be such) who teaches in a school where most of the physics students are enthusiastic about learning physics.
Regards,
Jack


On Tue, 24 Feb 2009, Rick Tarara wrote:

But what ARE they interested in, in High School? In math? In English? In
History?

If we only teach what interests students (maybe pop culture?) in our
schools, where does that leave us?

Lack of interest is NOT a viable argument against science in school, at any
level! It is defeatist at best.

Rick


----- Original Message -----
From: "John Clement" <clement@hal-pc.org>
To: "'Forum for Physics Educators'" <phys-l@carnot.physics.buffalo.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 11:24 AM
Subject: Re: [Phys-l] Students' READING abilities



In most cases, the traditional high school physics course is an
elective. It is therefore self-selective. Student enrolling in the
course generally have some interest in the subject or else they wouldn't
take it. I know this is not 100% true because some take it because they
know they want to be engineers; some take it because they know they want
to major in science in college; and so forth.


Actually, it is not just self-selective. A lot of students take it
because
they think it will help them get into a "good" school. The vast majority
of
these students either will not, or can not pursue a career in math or
science. TX is requiring 4 years of HS science next year in the belief
that
this will improve student learning. This will probably just put more
unwilling students into science classes, and swell lower level science
classes. Only a very few are actually interested in it or seriously plan
to
pursue science or engineering. Some private schools require physics for
all. So actually most students are really not interested in it in HS.

John M. Clement
Houston, TX


_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@carnot.physics.buffalo.edu
https://carnot.physics.buffalo.edu/mailman/listinfo/phys-l


_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@carnot.physics.buffalo.edu
https://carnot.physics.buffalo.edu/mailman/listinfo/phys-l


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