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

[John Denker <jsd@AV8N.COM>]

Frohne, Vickie wrote:
> many
> elementary education majors, and indeed many elementary education
> *teachers* are far below the level of scientific and mathematical
> understanding that they are required (by virtue of state and national
> standards) to teach. It is impractical to think that the physics
> community will be able to "cure" this situation by teaching
> one-semester courses for pre-teachers, or working with in-service
> teachers for a couple of weeks every summer in small groups. While
> these efforts are useful, we just can't put enough usable information
> in the hands of enough people that way. Teachers need *daily* support
> with their "content." This is why having a good curriculum with
> excellent ancillary teacher resources is essential.

When I think about where that thought is going, I come up
with the following scenario, which is probably part farce
and part fact ... but I honestly don't know which part is
which, so please bear with me.  A Modest Proposal (tm):

   The aforementioned teachers could be replaced by (or
   recertified as) CARPs i.e. Classroom Administrators /
   Readers / Projectionists.  Each day the CARP walks into
   class and takes attendance, then reads a few pages from
   the excellent text, then shows a few excellent video clips.
   Every so often the CARP administers a quiz.  The CARP
   spends several hours per day filling out federally-mandated
   paperwork.

   The CARP doesn't have enough subject-matter expertise to
   answer nontrivial questions from students, nor enough
   to perform demonstrations that work.

   Why do we need more than a handful of real teachers when
   we have plenty of CARPs?

This proposal is not entirely fanciful.  There are already
ways you can get college credit via the Mechanical Universe
videos.
http://www.google.com/search?q=mechanical-universe+credit+site%3A.edu
http://www.google.com/search?q=mechanical-universe+telecourse+site%3A.edu

And there are more than a few courses on other topics, just from
PBS alone (and there are other sources).
   http://www.pbs.org/als/courses/courselistings/courses_discipline.htm

And having looked at my share (thousands and thousands) of
transcripts, I can say that when looking at a transcript from
East Podunk Community College, I would have *more* respect for
a line item that said "Mechanical Universe" than one that said
simply "physics".  It's not the solution to all the world's
problems, but it's a respectable serious thing.

Will this ever catch on in a big way?  I don't know.
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