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[Phys-L] Re: What students will do. (was: Physics Solutions Manual)



Hi all-
I think that Antthony is on the right tracck. I think that,
historically, high school and freshman college physics, were much more
qualitative and less mathematically demanding "in the old days". There
was more gee-whiz stuff, which was fine for getting people interested in
the subject. Reasonably rigorous mechanics, except at places like MIT and
CalTech, was postponed until about the junior year. I think the reason
that MIT was pushing the envelope back in the '30's was because there was
a substantial undergraduate influx from New England's prestigious prep
schools coupled with an influx of physics faculty (stolen from Princeton)
who had recently studied under the German physics masters.
Regards,
Jack

On Wed, 8 Feb 2006, Anthony Lapinski wrote:

It has been my experience that physics books at ANY level are too hard for
students to read. Too much information, and/or too few
diagrams/explanations. It's no wonder students are turned off by them.
Physics should be the most exciting field to study, but the thick
textbooks don't present it that way. It is a shame. Not that I could write
a better book, but most of the ones out there basically look the same. A
great TEACHER inspires kids, so who really needs a book? I type up my own
math problems in the regular course.

Forum for Physics Educators <PHYS-L@list1.ucc.nau.edu> on Wednesday,
February 8, 2006 at 1:33 PM -0500 wrote:
Priscilla Laws commented that their students hardly crack open the
text, so the problem is not unique. Indeed in the stone age when I
went to school that was also a problem.

One comment was made that the PER methods are designed to get student
to do in class what they used to do outside of class. This is
slightly incorrect. It gets them to do in class what they SHOULD do
outside of class. There is no evidence that they ever did it outside
of class. Feynman complained about lack of student understanding long
before the FCI was developed. Some PER methods, notably Mazur's,
requires students to come into class after having read the text. He
enforces it with a short reading quiz every lecture.

The real difficulty that students have is that they don't know how to
think about things, so they need the sort of guidance provided by the
PER curricula.

John M. Clement
Houston, TX


Even w/ a free text some won't read it. The last week of my ten
week
stint teaching Chem. at North High several of my "A" students
admitted
they never opened the text except to do the assigned chapter end
problems. They said they got all they needed from my lectures. A
left
handed compliment on my teaching?

bc, if he had the chance would now minimize the "direct" method

Spagna Jr., George wrote:

Bernard asks



p.s. George, did you readopt a text because their grades plummeted?



And Joel adds



Or because you got tired of listening to the complaints on student


evaluations?



Or, what was the reason?



It's a bit more complicated - top grades slipped a little, and more
students "fell off" the bottom of the distribution. More
importantly,
it became clear that by not using a set textbook we were apparently




cut


--
"Trust me. I have a lot of experience at this."
General Custer's unremembered message to his men,
just before leading them into the Little Big Horn Valley
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