I should just shut up here..as I said I would, but one last note, and
then I think it's time to fade into the background.
I have been concerned about the tone of this list for some time. I get
the impression, maybe wrong, that some 'debate team' tactics are too
often used to dismiss or ignore some of the points made by others. I do
know (have been contacted by them) that people have left this list
because (just like the hypothetical student who wouldn't question
errors) they feel their ideas were being demeaned and were personally
being belittled or at least these people felt that was happening. To be
sure, this has become more subtle (not straight from the school of Hake)
but maybe still there. It does seem to me personally that focusing on a
post's hyperbole or sarcasm isn't entirely kosher...especially when
we're pretty much all smart enough to recognize such.
Anyway, to my point in all of this:
While physics education can be improved especially at the lower levels,
it would seem that what PER has taught us is that students come with a
whole raft of pre/mis-conceptions that are rooted in their everyday
experience (concrete experience) with the world around them. To deal
with this, it would seem that confronting these head-on with concrete
everyday counter examples and straight forward 'conceptual' arguments
works better than jumping too quickly into the abstractions and
mathematics of the science (hyperbole warning)--Newton before QED.
I've always thought Physics did this pretty well with the spiral
approach common for physics majors--three level of mechanics, three of
E&M, two or three for thermo, etc. My only suggestion has been that
this spiral starts one level too high. Having taught those 3.5 decades,
teaching both liberal arts 'conceptual' physics and science/engineering
major intro calculus level physics, I see great value in starting even
future physics majors with an almost purely conceptual course--one
without the mechanical problem solving (another whole discussion to deal
with that) so prevalent, now even at the High School level. [Yes, there
are some, maybe many who feel that without the math and problem solving
it 'ain't' physics, but there I disagree.] Consequently, within _my_
problem solving courses, there has been a large dose of the same kind of
conceptual instruction and assessment that I use in the general
education classes. The engineering/science students have the same kinds
of problems with the concepts as the gen-ed students even though they
actually can calculate 10% of a 100 correctly (all the time). So--the
spiral approach can start out grounded in everyday, concrete examples,
with forces as 'real' and primary, with energy divided into artificial
categories, doing calorimetry (just like it was the 19th century), maybe
even with moving clocks running slow ;-) , etc. but then moving on to
the more abstract notions, the more mathematical approaches, and for the
theoretical PhDs, ending up 'at the right place.'
OK...is it really better to start out 'black' to end up 'white' or to
start out dark grey and end up light grey? I don't know, and not sure
how to try it or assess it. One of my problems with many PER techniques
(besides whether or not they interfere with individual/life-long
learning) is that without full curricula based on such, we don't know if
we produce a better 'product' in the end, but without knowing, it is
difficult to get whole programs to change the pedagogy.
In the end, I'm not sure there really is that much disagreement
here...it is more about tone and presentation for which I am probably as
responsible as some others.
Now I AM done,
rwt (fading into retirement at the end of the semester)
--
Richard Tarara
Professor of Physics
Saint Mary's College
free Physics educational software
www.saintmarys.edu/~rtarara/software.html
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