If we lived in a perfect world, students would come to
HS motivated, well-prepared, wanting to learn for its
own sake, and free of the grade-grubbing virus. But
that's simply not the case. Parents and students BOTH
believe that GPA is extremely important. Furthermore,
both are typically addicted to extra credit from years
of abuse. So, I see basically two choices for HS
physics teachers. Present a "here's the formula, go
crunch the numbers" course where little thinking and
real understanding of intro physics is required; such
an approach will easily produce enough A's & B's so as
not to cause admin or parent problems. Or, OTOH,
require students to think and explain how they know
what they know and to REALLY understand the concepts
behind the "formulas" (How I hate that word). For
most, this will be their first such experience in
school and can be very intimidating. If this
intellectually-challenging approach does not provide
"life preservers" to produce the expected number of
A's & B's, parents and administrators howl and
students get extremely discouraged. I try to follow
the second path. I view the use of some "fluff" extra
credit as the price I have to pay for really
challenging students. I assume most college
instructors would prefer these students to those
coming out of the first approach. True?
If there's another realistic alternative for HS, I'd
love to hear it. John Barrere Apex HS Apex, NC
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