[Physltest] [Phys-L] Re: "Effective" teaching methods

[John Denker <jsd@AV8N.COM>]

Joseph Bellina wrote:
> Good point. That might also explain why higher grad teachers are more
> difficult to convince.

I assume that means "higher grade" -- not "grad" as in graduate
school.

Still, thinking about grad school sheds some side-light on
this already-interesting point.  If we consider only certain
higher-grade classes, namely physics majors and grad students,
then arguably in some sense there is nothing the teachers
ought/need to be convinced of, since they are using traditional
methods on a selected subset of students, namely students for
which traditional methods work OK.  Proof by construction.

My side-light leaves wide open the question of what methods
to use for non-selective classes (including HS and intro-level
college).  Different problems generally call for different
solutions.

>  The elementary teachers have for the most part
> not been successful, or don't think of themselves as successful in
> learning science.  So when they see they can learn by guided inquiry it
> makes a bigger impression than if they had been successful with the
> traditional method.
> Perhaps it would help to focus more on their misslearning...ie what flawed
> models persisted inspite of their apparent, to them, success.

That's an interesting idea, and I will need to think about
it some more ... but my initial reaction is that it isn't
really the optimal line of attack.

It is easy to say that whatever type of instruction works
on the teachers will work on the students, but I don't
think it's true.  Not all teachers are alike, and not all
students are alike.  Even more importantly, people don't
have to be the same to get along!

Here's a very short parable:
   My five-year-old nephew gave his mother a box of
   lollipops for her birthday.

He was using his infantile interpretation of the Golden
Rule:  he gave her something _he_ wanted.  It was of
course not even remotely what _she_ wanted, but he wasn't
sophisticated to understand the distinction.

In this spirit, I think the sophisticated approach would
be for us to focus primarily and explicitly on what works
for the various types of students.  (We _also_ need to
consider what works for the teachers, keeping in mind
that that's not necessarily the same question.)
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