Re: Setting up problems

[Robert Cohen <Robert.Cohen@PO-BOX.ESU.EDU>]

On Wednesday, October 08, 2003 1:23 PM, Promod Pratap wrote:
> I teach Physics to undergraduates (Physics majors and others) 
> at UNCG, and I have reached the conclusion that students have 
> problems with Physics because they do not know how to set up 
> problems to the point where they can do the math to solve the 
> problem.  Observations to support this conclusions include:  
> a) students who do well in the Calculus course (upto and 
> including ODE) do poorly in Physics coursed;
> b) students remark -- "I could NEVER have take the problem 
> given and arrived at that equation";  c) the inordinate 
> desire of students to "find the magic formula", so that they 
> can then plug and chug.
>
> Is there some way to teach students how to read a word 
> problem and then set it up so that they can then apply the 
> math to it?  I don't remember how I learned this, but I (and 
> all my colleagues) seem to be rather good at this.

Last year, I first taught my students a 6-step general method for
solving word problems.  Then I taught the physics concepts.

This year, I taught my students the physics concepts and never gave them
a method for solving word problems.

This year's students are doing much better at setting up problems.

I think the main difference is that last year I was actually encouraging
students to forego "thinking" because "the method" would supposedly give
them the answer regardless of their understanding.  This year, I've
focused on "understanding" the concepts and students have come up with
the best "method" for themselves.

Unfortunately, students from both years are very poor at math.  For
example, as I mentioned in another post, I've found that at least half
my students cannot measure angle, e.g., be able to give the exterior
angle of _/ if given the interior angle of 120 degrees.  As Dave Barry
likes to say, I am NOT making this stuff up.  Giving them "a method" for
solving problems allows them to avoid the "real" problem of
understanding angles.  Apparently, this is how they've survived geometry
and trigonometry.  I'd like to know if my campus is "special" in this
regard.

At least this year's students are more aware of the math deficiencies
because they can distinguish between the "setting up" (which is the
physics and which they can all do for the most part) and the "doing the
math" (which many cannot do).

____________________________________________________
Robert Cohen; 570-422-3428; www.esu.edu/~bbq
East Stroudsburg University; E. Stroudsburg, PA 18301