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Re: [Phys-L] Instructional resources (Was: Indicators of quality teaching)



Safety is an important facet of teaching in the sciences. Here in the province of Ontario WHIMS/MSDS are required for students in high school by ministry mandated curriculum.

The only proviso I give my teacher candidates is: any lab activity, demo, or experiment that may be repeated more than once a semester up to 35 years of your teaching career - remember the accumulated effects and the natural tendency to be cavalier in your approaches.

Example: breaking a stick on two stemmed wine glasses - I've seen this go wrong with a cavalier attitude.

John Caranci
OISE Physics Teaching Instructor

On 2013-07-04, at 3:57 PM, rjensen@ualberta.ca wrote:

I concur with Marty's improvements to points 2, 3, and 4.

Regarding point 5: I submit that most (all) on Phys-L are good career
teachers, but compare the number of teachers in all of North America
to the number that attend education conferences to the number that
participate in forums such as Phys-L. True story: I was attending a
large chemical education conference (BCCE; 2000+ participants). Dozens
had signed up for a workshop on giving demo's. I was shocked and
saddened by the number of college and university instructors *freaking
out* (figuratively and literally) when anything involved fire. A few
hypochondriacs refused to touch any of the chemicals. And these people
*teach* chemistry.

I presume physics is better, but I suspect there are a few instructors
that shy away from high voltage, etc.

Dr. Roy Jensen
(==========)-----------------------------------------¤
Faculty Lecturer, Chemistry
E5-33A, University of Alberta
780.248.1808



On Thu, 4 Jul 2013 08:10:05 -0400, you wrote:

I have to agree and disagree somewhat with Dr. J.'s points. The discussion will be between the points involved for clarity.

On Jul 4, 2013, at 2:30 AM, rjensen@ualberta.ca wrote:

On 06/21/2013 12:59 PM, Anthony Lapinski wrote:

Books are terrible. Who writes these things?

I offer a few observations on this:

1. Science books typically start when a proto-author writes something
for their students. The work is tailored to the authors students: the
background they have and want information the author wants to convey.

2. Authors often write because they have a novel way of presenting
information. They often don't like the existing method of presenting
information.

They 'Think" they have come upon a new way, but the more things change the more they remain the same. see below.

3. When new author(s) join a book (like a first-year textbook), #2 is
compounded because the new author(s) tweak here and there, which
affects the continuity of the overall book. Over time without a
supervising author or editor, the book becomes fragmented conceptually
and in presentation style.

Each author thinks they have a better way of presenting information in a new sequence, but too often it is just a rehash of the preexisting format. I was searching for a new mid-level Biology book last year and discovered that all of them are basically the same. In fact many devote too little space to actually explaining something and more to useless pictures of scientists for the sake of diversity. Topics are split up according to where the author thinks further information should be presented. So, for example, cell metabolism is often split among three or four chapters. Invariably, almost without exception, the questions are extremely poorly conceived and often follow the same format as every other author.

4. Teachers have a preconceived 'best-way' to present something. Often
these methods are how they learned when they themselves were a
student.
Actually, I have found that good teachers can pick apart the good and the bad in the instruction they had in university or even go back to high school, and as for me, I have tried to present the work as I would have liked my instruction to be.

5. Teachers may not understand what knowledge the students have, and
what they do not have.

I have to disagree here... as a career teacher I always take into account the previous knowledge base of my students and try to fill in the gaps through all the available teaching methods I can come up with, plus a lot of new ideas on ,y own.

6. Getting feedback from practicing teachers to improve an developing
instructional resource is like reanimating the dead! [**Hint!**]
Often we never have the time... TESTING! and "coverig tghe curriculum" Teaching 70 or80 kids a day is no easy chore and leaves little time for anything else.

Take care,
Dr. Roy Jensen
(==========)-----------------------------------------¤
Faculty Lecturer, Chemistry
E5-33A, University of Alberta
780.248.1808

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

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