Re: [Phys-l] Students' READING abilities

[Jack Uretsky <jlu@hep.anl.gov>]

Hi all-
	I think that there is much truth to be learned from Bob's 
experience.
	Further evidence in support - leeading physicists are 
astonishingly erudite on many subjects outside of physics.
			Regards,
				Jack

On Tue, 24 Feb 2009, LaMontagne, Bob wrote:

> If students today have such difficulty reading, shouldn't our efforts be
> directed at improving this important life skill rather than something
> like physics which they probably won't use more than a couple of times
> throughout their life?
>
> I am not being flip here. My grammar school education was in a small 4
> room Catholic parochial school. Throughout the entire 8 years we never
> had a lesson on science of any kind - never mind physics. But we did get
> mind numbing hours of drill in reading, diagramming sentences,
> arithmetic, elementary algebra, music, and (of course) Catechism. Some
> of us ,like me, went on to public high school. Science and math there
> came incredibly easy for us. Our group ran the science club, the ham
> radio club, and two of us were Westinghouse Science Talent search state
> winners. Our advantage was our strong reading and math skills. We
> learned science - we weren't taught it.
>
> Bob at PC
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: phys-l-bounces@carnot.physics.buffalo.edu
> [mailto:phys-l-bounces@carnot.physics.buffalo.edu] On Behalf Of Anthony
> Lapinski
> Sent: Monday, February 23, 2009 4:24 PM
> To: Forum for Physics Educators
> Subject: Re: [Phys-l] Students' READING abilities
>
> Interesting and important thread!
>
> Reading in class is a good idea, but it takes MUCH (too much?) time.
> Many
> students are distracted/impatient these days, making it even more
> difficult for them to learn physics. Still, they should ultimately be
> responsible for their learning. Straight lecturing simply does not work.
>
> ttps://carnot.physics.buffalo.edu/mailman/listinfo/phys-l
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