Mike (Monce) and others... don't despair in the belief you are alone. I
see the very same thing.
In my year-long calculus-based general physics (mostly sophomores) I
begin the year with very explicit lab handouts and even provide the
skeleton of an Excel spreadsheet to help them analyze the data. With
each lab assignment throughout the year I provide fewer details in the
handout. By the end of the first semester I don't provide any portion
of an Excel spreadsheet, but still expect them to e-mail their data
analysis as an Excel or QuattroPro attachment. (They also submit a
hardcopy report.)
I never used to get complaints about the gradual weaning process I
perform. Now I do. Even though I tell students what I am doing, I get
some who don't believe me. I have had students write things like the
following on their course evaluations:
"Edmiston started out great and gave us all the information we needed
to succeed with the labs. Then he quit doing this. He says he quit on
purpose, but I think he is just lazy. I think for the money I am paying
he should be required to provide the same quality of teaching all term
long that he started with."
I teach modern physics to juniors and seniors and try to provide minimal
direction for the labs. I am especially dismayed that the seniors have
gone through their junior year without taking a course from me, then
they take modern physics and seem to have forgotten everything I tried
to teach them about labs and lab reports when they were sophomores.
Two weeks ago I had some seniors trying to take lab data in pencil on
loose sheets of paper. They were half-way through the experiment when I
caught them. I made them go get their notebooks and start the lab over.
They sure were angry.
Earlier in the term I had some PChem seniors using a platinum-resistance
temperature sensor following a cooling curve. The resistor was hooked
to a Keithley meter that reads temperature directly. I looked at the
data they had taken for the last hour and the temperature readings were
all over the place (consecutive readings taken a minute apart that were
bouncing over a 20-degree range). The wire had come loose at the
binding post on the meter. The students couldn't believe they had to
start over again (because they shouldn't be blamed for equipment
malfunctions). I told them that recording data that are bouncing all
over the place, for an hour, indicates a mental malfunction in addition
to an equipment malfunction. They accused me of calling them stupid. I
wanted to say, "Yes, that's exactly what I am calling you." But I
refrained. I told them I was sorry the wire came lose; I fixed it; then
I told them to start over.
I want to be sure to report that I have many excellent students who
clearly benefit from my approach. They realize what I am doing and they
appreciate it. They meet my expectations and more. But I am seeing a
growing number of students who think their tuition dollars purchased the
right to have everything spoon-fed to them, and they complain if that is
not what they get. I am hoping this is something that will pass, but I
am worried.
Michael D. Edmiston, Ph.D.
Professor of Physics and Chemistry
Chair of Sciences
Bluffton College
Bluffton, OH 45817
(419)-358-3270
edmiston@bluffton.edu