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Re: Pedagogy



Fernanda Foertter [Advanced Physics Forums] wrote:

I have a question to ask. I'm currently at a university with a small
Physics Dept. It has around 25 faculty. I've struggled tremendously with
the teaching style, which to say the least, is eclectic. There is really no
departmental minimum. Each professor is left to do whatever he/she pleases
and there is no one to check.

It sounds like you are going to the university I got my undergraduate
degree from. They boasted that they had no curriculum committees --
apparently an indication of the great academic freedom at that
university. There were good courses and some that were not so good --
not so good in the sense that they did not provide enough of what was
needed for further study or for graduate school.


So my question is this: Is this something common? Is this what also
happens at other schools all the way up to Ivy League? Are there schools
that really seem interested in making Physicist out of Joe Shmoe off the
street? Or like where I attend "if you can't learn on your own, tough."

I feel like my department wreaks of elitism. Basically, if you can't
learn on your own, you shouldn't be here.

The university I went to had the superior attitude that two hours per
week of their intermediate level courses (for upper level undergraduate
credit or lower level graduate credit) was worth three hours at other
schools -- or that students could make up the difference by extra study.
In reality, this seldom happened. So a three credit per term E&M course
met only twice a week, and only about two thirds of the normal amount of
work was covered for a given number of credits. We had a great E&M
teacher, who later wrote an interesting text on the subject, except that
it had very little material on electromagnetic waves. I think we spent
only about two weeks on the subject beyond the section
on Maxwell's equations. The teacher said he needed three hours per week.
Courses like Modern Physics that had to be three hours per week gave
4 1/2 credits per term. In the early 1950's, they had a one term course
in mechanics based on _Mechanics_ by Slater and Frank. There was an
elective course in Vibration and Sound based on the text by Morse. There
were separate courses in Thermodynamics (using the text by Zemansky) and
in Statistical Mechanics. There was a one year course in Optics taught
by a distinguished experimental physicist.

I started as an electrical engineering major, hoping to learn about
electronics. However, the school emphasized power engineering, and there
was no electronics until the senior year. I decided to switch to
physics, but it was not easy to do so, because I had a half State
engineering scholarship. I sat in on some of the physics courses
mentioned above. Our general physics course was non-calculus based,
using the text, _College Physics, 2nd ed._ by Sears and Zemansky.
Apparently, it was too much trouble to offer a separate calculus-based
course, probably because the pre-med students didn't have to take
calculus in those days. The best prepared students came from an advanced
program in a local high school, where they had calculus and
calculus-based physics. The general physics course met eight hours per
week including three hours lab and four hours recitation, both taught by
a TA. There was one lecture demonstration per week, taught in alternate
weeks by two professors -- one a distinguished experimental physicist
and the other taught by a very easy-going philosophical physicist. At
the first demonstration lecture, the former said, "Physics is supposed
to be a dull subject, but I will do everything possible to make it
interesting." Almost the only demonstration I remember was the monkey
and the hunter projectile motion demonstration. After a few weeks, the
TA asked us if it would be OK if he didn't collect the homework. There
were three tests per term, each 80% multiple choice -- no final exam. It
was easy, but sophomore engineers were taking a difficult course in
Applied Mechanics based on the text by Synge and Griffith, so it was
difficult to take general physics seriously. One Applied Mechanics
instructor failed about 18 out of 50 students. I got through because my
instructor only failed the two students that stopped attending class.
But I learned little mechanics from either course.

In one Classical Mechanics
course, the prof offered no more than the notes off of Marion's book. No
examples on how to solve problems.

I left school for a few years, working as an electronics technician. Whe
I returned, the philosophical professor was teaching the junior level
courses in physics. He combined the mechanics and vibration and sound
into a single six credit course meeting four times a week. There was no
required text, but about 65 pages of mimeographed notes. The suggested
reference was _Theoretical Mechanics_ by Becker, but it was never
referred to. The professor was a fairly good teacher on his own terms,
but he had no idea of what students going to graduate school elsewhere
needed or wasn't concerned about such needs. The level was only a little
above that of calculus-based general physics. He did teach us to solve
problems at that level. There were no tests or exams in the course, but
there was a weekly quiz with one (maybe two) problem(s) selected at
random from the homework. There were only a few pages in the notes about
vibrating strings. The professor similarly combined thermodynamics and
statistical mechanics in a single six credit course meeting four hours
per week, based on about seventy pages of notes, only listing a few
texts as references. None of these texts were actually used. The notes
had a few pages on kinetic theory. For statistical mechanics, we were
assigned reading the first chapter of the professor's own monograph on
non-equilibrium statistical mechanics, but no problems were assigned,
and we were not tested on it. The professor was apparently very
brilliant, but he once told me, being my advisor, that he liked to
concentrate on a small area of physics. He did not like schools that
pressured students.

My QM course was laid out with theory alone... no applications or how to
attack problems.

There was no undergraduate QM course in those days. The official Modern
Physics text was _Introduction to Modern Physics_ by Richtmeyer and
Kennard (before other authors like Cooper and Lauritsen were added), but
the main text was an old book from about 1934 on atomic spectra by
Harvey E. White, the department then specializing in spectroscopy. QM
was mentioned, but not worked out in detail. The teacher was quite good.

>
My Stat Mech course's final exam was on a chapter of a book that the
>professor never covered. I've yet to be shown how to attack
Thermo problems.
I also find my department lacks the overlap I hear my friends at other
universities speak of. That is, there is a certain expectation that "you
should have learned this in Modern Physics...or your math course."
Hopefully your teacher didn't skip that part or you'd be out of luck
learning on your own.

This was inevitable at our school -- with three credits per term for two
hours per week.

And then there is my all time favorite: When asking a prof about a
problem the answer begins with " this is easy."

I had a differential equations and infinite series professor who didn't
speak English very well. Among the few words that were easy to
understand were "Extremely simple." However, he was very well organized
and somehow presented the material clearly, outlining in advance what he
intended to do. It was a good course.

The worst part is that since one is coming from such a small dept, the
general idea is that they should have a perfect GPA since it's so easy, when
in fact, teaching is mediocre. It also troubles me that there is a general
departmental feeling that if you have been taught the theory, you should
know how to solve problems. This is akin to teaching a surgeon body parts
and expecting him to perform surgery...

Sounds familiar. When I went to graduate school at FSU, I think they
wanted to show me how advanced their courses were, putting me in the
most difficult ones my first term there.

Or is it? Or am I describing Physics departments across America? I'm
so frustrated that I couldn't afford to leave town...

This too, sounds familiar. I had a $200 per year scholarship to MIT,
where I wanted to study electronics, but it cost at least $2000 to go to
MIT in those days. So I didn't go there.

I have been around a little bit. I attended Cornell Summer School four
times. All the courses there were at a reasonable level, and the
homework was graded. They left students to work alone in the
intermediate and advanced labs, but the equipment was good and of
considerable variety. Usually, questions were answered with questions,
but what I learned turned out to be useful later on.

I went to graduate school at FSU. I think state universities are a lot
different from private universities. When I went to FSU, we were
presented with a list of undergraduate texts, the contents of which we
were supposed to know in order to pass the qualifying exam. For
mechanics, they used the text by Becker. Most entering graduate took the
second half of that course. It seemed so difficult that I had to start
with the first half of the course. They covered the entire book,
assigning many problems. I thought a state university would be easier,
but I received the shock of my life when I started out in a course in
mathematical physics based on the text by Morse and Feschbach
and some notes from the University of Chicago by Dr. Kester. The
professor, Dr. Mael Melvin, specialized in general relativity. Kip
Thorne writes in his book, _Black Holes and Time Warps_, that his first
research project given to him by Dr. Wheeler was based on some work done
by Dr. Melvin. Another teacher, my first term, Gerald Speisman, - for QM
- had co-authored a paper on perturbation theory with Richard Feynman,
under whom he obtained his Ph.D. I believe the highest grade in the
class on his mid-term exam was 49% and the passing grade was 17%. I
passed with a grade of C, but with only a few points to spare, about
21%. One big difference between FSU and the private university I went to
is that FSU had a curriculum committee. Starting my second term, I took
some intermediate level graduate courses. Except for the second half of
the mechanics course, taught by a graduate student, they were excellent.
The graduate student only worked problems, and I never learned much just
watching someone work problems. I had to struggle with them myself. Dr.
Heydenburg, a noted experimental nuclear physicist, taught a Modern
Physics course based on quantum mechanics. The official text was by
Eisberg, but the quantum mechanics was based on the text by David Saxon,
and Pauling and Wilson was used for the hydrogen atom. The first term
ended with the QM treatment of the helium atom. Dr. Heydenburg taught in
an understandable way. I regret that I couldn't take the second half of
the course. Instead, I took a 600 level course in Atomic Physics, the
official text being by Leighton. We only used it for special relativity
and the introduction to QM. The rest of the course was from Condon and
Shortley. The teacher, although reputed to be good in optics, had never
taught this before. It was somewhat of a disaster. The thermodynamics,
kinetic theory, and statistical mechanics courses were good, the teacher
having written his own texts with a pedagogical purpose in mind. The E&M
course, from Corsin and Lorraine was good, but not as original as the
one at my undergraduate school. At FSU, I taught general physics labs
and graded homework as a TA, but usually only a real professor taught
the recitation sections. By and large, I think I would have gotten a
better preparation for graduate school at a good state university,
although there were a few memorable teachers at the private university.
I went to a private high school (on a scholarship.) There I was led to
believe that private universities were better than state universities
with a few exceptions like U. of California/Berkeley, U. of NC, U. of
Michigan, and U. of Wisconsin. With a few exceptions, the teachers at
the private university treated students more like individuals, but the
overall content at FSU was more inclusive. Dirac, who spent his last
years there, said that the Physics Dept. there was of about the same
quality as that of Cambridge University.

I once worked in electronics at the Princeton-Pennsylvania Accelerator,
allowing me to audit a course at Princeton. In 1966, I sat in on
Dr. Goldenberg's course in Modern Physics. The official text was by
Leighton, but he picked the best text for each topic, so many texts were
used. It was a very demanding course. He couldn't present enough
material in a lecture. He often looked at the clock on the back wall of
the classroom. One day, the students fixed the clock so it was running
backwards. He didn't look until near the end of the period, when he was
momentarily puzzled. The credit students took their tests in the evening
so that time was not lost from the lectures. Dr. Goldenberg's class was
followed by a course in Thermodynamics taught by Dr. Peebles, known for
his work in cosmology. I did not know him, but I saw that he related
well to his students, whom I saw talking with him before his class
began. I went to public lectures by other Princeton professors including
Robert Dicke and Martin Schwarzschild, some at a lecture series on
cosmology at a Princeton high school. I could tell that Dr. Dicke
enjoyed teaching -- from his lecture mainly to a student group
(astronomy club) and from his reaction, as a member of the audience,
when someone asked a good question at the cosmology series. I also met
Dr. Eric Rogers, who taught general physics. There were also in-house
lectures at the Accelerator given by Princeton professors like Drs.
Lemonick, Schumacher, Fitch and/or Cronin, and Bazin. All were good. I
think the undergraduate program at Princeton was ideal for students that
were capable.
>
I feel like this was a waste of my time. I feel like throwing away 6 years
of school cause is just feels hopeless...

After I left the Princeton-Pennsylvania Accelerator, I taught at the
high school level for about ten years. I felt like I didn't remember
much physics above the high school level. In 1977, I got up the nerve to
enroll at a Harvard Summer School course in QM taught by Ramamurti
Shankar, one of the really great physics teachers. There were only about
eight students in the class, six for credit, myself included. I did
quite well, understanding Dirac notation for the first time. I am in the
second group of students he refers to in the first edition of his text,
_Principles of Quantum Mechanics_. I was lucky to take the course then,
because Dr. Shankar left for Yale, where he is now Chairman of the
Physics Dept. I recall that he was attentive to a student having
difficulty, offering to find him a tutor. Dr. Shankar paced his course
at a reasonable rate, but it was a grind for me, because I was taking
another course on wave motion that was going at breakneck speed,
probably the only student to take two physics courses that summer. But
Dr. Shankar put students at ease with his sense of humor. Harvard never
had advanced summer courses in physics after that year (other than
electronics), probably because the emphasis seemed to turn to computer
science, and Dr. Shankar was gone. Maybe I should give up, but I always
come back for more.

Hugh Logan
Retired physics teacher