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Re: What to teach (was: American students do poorly)



About time this topic was reconsidered. I have just come back from
doing some work in Thailand, where they have exactly the same
problem that Australian Universities have, and now it is explicitly
suggested that American Universities have: We all seem to be teaching
too much and the students are not coping. However, everyone just
looks around at what other universities are doing, and what other
countries are doing, and says "we are no different, so it is not our
problem".

The really disturbing thing is that Faculties that have relied on
Physics departments and Physicists to teach service courses are
starting to think about teaching the necessary Physics themselves -
in the context of their own needs, using people with SOME knowledge,
but not detailed overview. It is seen as "more efficient" and more
easily controlled - and how much call will there be for Physicists if
we only teach majors?


And they "teach to much" in two different meanings. 1) The courses are
"an inch deep and a mile wide". The students have fat text books
(2 to 3 times the size of other countries) and they cover an amazing
amount without being able to spend time on any one topic. 2) The
American teachers "teach" by puting the answers on the board and
expecting the students to basically accept the result and memorize it.
In other countries students were required to struggle BEFORE they were
introduced to the "standard" answer.


School teaching has taken massive strides (at least in Australia) in
trying to break this down - and we have lot to learn from THEM.
Unfortunately the curriculum is still being manipulated by university
academics with a vested interest in defending first year curriculum -
and the pressure of content still causes the sort of superficial
teaching described. Sad really. It is so self defeating.


Anyway, here is the point for this group.

Before we go to the high schools to enlighten them, aren't we
(collectively) guilty of the same thing? I think we are doing a
disservice to our students by covering as much as we do in the
first year. I would like your opinions on what it is we SHOULD be
teaching in the first year of physics. Perhaps a good place would be
to answer the following questions:

What is "physics"?

What "facts" should every student know after a year of physics?

The ultimate question here is "what do they NEED TO KNOW?" If a
content component cannot be justified by a need (best tested by
finding a case example, in the real world of a student, when it will
actually be used) it should not be there. I say that because the
evidence is strong that _students_ make the test of "Need to know"
and if they do not see a positive response they don't learn it. They
have so much thrown at them in first year they HAVE to make critical
decisions to select the work they will learn, and the "need to know"
test is a simple and obvious one (and commonly used)

IF the students go on to higher study and need to know things now
commonly taught in first year they are remarkably efficient at
learning it THEN. Anyway as things are now they learn it when they
need it - 'cause they sure didn't learn it in first year anyway!


What "skills" should every student have after a year of physics?

How do we best accomplish this in 3-4 hr a week?

Do the answers depend on whether the students are physicists,
chemists, engineers ...?

We must take this into account, or at least in some universities we
will lose the trade.

What is the feeling out there????

Ian



Dr Ian Macdonald
Education Development
School of Engineering and Science
School of Biophysical Sciences and Electrical Engineering
Swinburne University of Technology
PO Box 218 Hawthorn 3122
Australia
Phone: +61 3 9214 8003
Fax: +61 3 9819 6443
email: imacdonald@swin.edu.au