Are other people seeing problems with this--students ability to sketch
graphs of algebraic expressions? This year is the worst I've seen. The
context is primarily in doing Gauss' Law for spheres and cylinders and
wanting a field versus distance graph. I'm getting a lot of nonesense even
after we've done numerous examples (and pure gibberish the first time this
is asked). [We're talking about Chemistry and Engineering students with
pretty solid calculus backgrounds.] I'm wondering if this might not be
partly due to graphing calculators--they've graphed many functions but never
internalized what shapes go with what functions. Again--is this an
isolated observance or are others seeing this too?
Rick
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Richard W. Tarara
Professor of Physics
Saint Mary's College
Notre Dame, IN
rtarara@saintmarys.edu
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Free Physics Software
New multi-input energy simulator--plays similar to the Montana State analog
computer.
www.saintmarys.edu/~rtarara/software.html
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