Re: What to do now

["Dewey Dykstra, Jr." <dykstrad@EMAIL.BOISESTATE.EDU>]

> Another way to get conversation going is to ask a question of the Mazur
> type, have the students discuss what they think the answer is and then
> have a vote.  To encourage risk taking, have the students close their
> eyes when then vote.  With the results on the board, you have a sense of
> the distribution of ideas in the class and can work off of
> that.  Generally if the response is mixed, I ask for someone to defend
> each of the views and get into a discussion.  If only a few miss the
> question, I generally ask for an explanation of the majority view.
>
> Good luck
>  >
>
> Joseph J. Bellina, Jr.               219-284-4662
> Associate Professor of Physics
> Saint Mary's College
> Notre Dame, IN 46556

Tina:
One more thing occurs to me at the moment beyond what I have already
written to you on the side.  Joe's note here reminds me of it.  It is
often very hard to get students in the calc course to talk to the
class about their own ideas.  My theory is that this is due to the
ego issue I mentioned in my other note.  At any rate, one way to
break this cycle is to ask questions in multiple choice form and have
people anonymously vote for their choice.  If you do not have some
fancy classroom voting system you can have them hold up cards facing
you with their choices and you can count or you can even have them
cover their eyes and vote.  It turns out that usually when they
realize that more than one person voted for a choice then they feel
comfortable talking about it without having to take responsibility
for having chosen that choice.  I believe Mazur talks about the
cards.  You could use sets of 5 x 8 cards with the choice letters
drawn on them so you can see them to count from the front of the
room.  This is essentially what Joe is suggesting above.  The
students it seems can hear the rustling of each other's clothes when
they vote so they know that "somebody" voted for a choice.

You can also present the choices as things other people have said and
solicit commments from the class on their opinions and justifications
for their opinions on each of these ideas.

It was very surprising to me when I first encountered it to realize
the calc level students are less willing to talk about the ideas than
the conceptual physics students.  So far I have found that the ego
notion, that the calc level students have a lot of ego invested in
knowing science and the conceptual level students do not, explains
the situation effectively.

Dewey
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Dewey I. Dykstra, Jr.                 Phone: (208)426-3105
Professor of Physics                  Dept:  (208)426-3775
Department of Physics/MCF421/418      Fax: (208)426-4330
Boise State University            dykstrad@email.boisestate.edu
1910 University Drive                 Boise Highlanders
Boise, ID 83725-1570                  novice piper: GHB, Uilleann

"As a result of modern research in physics, the ambition and hope,
still cherished by most authorities of the last century, that physical
science could offer a photographic picture and true image of reality
had to be abandoned."  --M. Jammer in Concepts of Force, 1957.

"If what we regard as real depends on our theory, how can we make
reality the basis of our philosophy? ...But we cannot distinguish
what is real about the universe without a theory...it makes no sense
to ask if it corresponds to reality, because we do not know what
reality is independent of a theory."--S. Hawking in Black Holes
and Baby Universes, 1993.

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