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Re: [Phys-L] [SPAM] Re: critical thinking exercise : DC circuits



I do the same thing for the same reason. My department head arranged for the school to have my class notes copied and distributed in lieu of a textbook, so the students have the same notes in front of them as I project on the SMART board. I'm sure my notes have as many problems, errors, and misconceptions as any textbook, but I do listen and try to fix the problems when people point them out.

When I surveyed my students, the vast majority prefer the class notes to a traditional textbook. For the one or two students each year who want a traditional textbook, I sign one out to the student and collect it back at the end of the year.

Jeff Bigler
Lynn English HS; Lynn, MA, USA

On 12/9/2013 4:15 PM, Anthony Lapinski wrote:
Very interesting. I don't use books any more in my (high school) classes.
They are not written for students to understand and are way too
encyclopedic (and expensive).
And students have no time to read them with all the other (home)work they
have to do.
I use my own notes to teach the ten topics I get to each year.
Nothing beats an engaging physics teacher in class to make physics come
alive.



Phys-L@Phys-L.org writes:
Well Feynman couldn't get textbooks to be accurate, so how can you? He
was
on the California textbook committee and even with a Nobel and the
committee
authority he couldn't get publisers to change the texts. One publiser
even
submitted a textbook with a nice cover but blank pages inside as a sample
of
the new edition. But textbooks may be preferable to the web as the web
contains more wrong information that right. The Wikipedia is actually
very
accurate, as are most university sites.

There was the school web site that had some outrageous misconceptions
being
promulgated, so I wrote them, and the reply was that the text was for
students, not experts. I think the same attitude is taken by publishers.
Fortunately the whole website is gone, and is replaced by one with no
science info. But it happened due to reorganization and not my efforts.

Then I was a mentor to another teacher. When I pointed out that the book
had some very bad errors, he didn't listen, and continued to use the bad
info. So teachers are just as guilty as publishers. They have very rigid
paradigms that are difficult to challenge and change.

Also errors not only propagate to later editions, the publishers are cheap
so they lift erroneous pictures and graphs from one textbook and put them
in
others. So the error propagate to other texts supposedly by other
authors.

John M. Clement
Houston, TX


What fascinates me is how so many bugs can persist for so long.
How can there be a thousand errors in a thousand pages ...
in the THIRD
EDITION?
Only the third? I started using the 7th edition of a
first-year chemistry textbook. There is a picture of a simple
electric-sector mass spectrometer with + and - flipped.
Actually, a student brought it to my attention. I informed
the publisher and one of the authors.
Tenth edition: still wrong.

A colleague and I picked apart a first-edition "Engineering
for Chemists" textbook much like you did a few years ago. We
had about one notable error every two pages. One major error
I remember is that the author occasionally used Co as the
symbol for copper. (Co is cobalt; Cu is copper.) Sent all the
errors to the author and publisher. The publisher responded,
"stylistic preferences." I just looked up the book. Still in
the first edition. 580 pages. 20 cm × 25 cm (8 in × 10 in).
Sells for 200 $.

And you wonder why I avoid publishers.


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_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@phys-l.org
http://www.phys-l.org/mailman/listinfo/phys-l