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Re: [Phys-l] not our majors now!

History show us time and time again ...for every new weapon, there is
a new defense that quickly develops.

For every new technique that instructors use when trying to make their
students learn, students will always find ways to thwart them.

The above statement is truye almost 101% of the time.

Herb

On Thu, 5 Oct 2006 12:00:56 -0400 Carl Mungan <mungan@usna.edu> writes:
I'm teaching E&M to a class of 8 majors. I'm using Griffiths as
I've done for over many years, and actually think I'm doing a
better job in teaching the course than ever (practice makes
perfect). I think the "disease" that seems to be infecting the
general student population has made its way into our majors. The
students are not engaging the material; i.e. they are not putting
in the work to stay up with the course and often wait until the
last night to start the problem assignment. They don't seem to
have a grasp of even basic concepts from the intro. course. I
gave a pop quiz to confirm my suspicions which consisted of intro
course level problems and except for 2 students, the other 6 failed.
I've talked to them about keeping up, how this is a challenging course

for majors, etc. etc. etc. The worst of it is for the "6" their
problem sets are near perfect and closely resemble Griffiths'
solution manual, yet when I ask them basic question in class,
none can come up with the answers. I've told them that I can't stop
them from using such a manual, but it will do them no good on the
exams, and will probably contribute to their failure if they are
not truly trying to work on the material. I've never expected this
from junior level physics majors. GE students in an intro course, yes,

but not here. I've taught this course probably 15 times and this
is the first instance that I've seen such a lack of effort on the
part of the students. Oh, by the way, the 2 who seem to be keeping
up are both foreign students, the "6" are American.
Rant off. Any ideas folks?
Mike Monce

A few simple ideas and things I've actually tried and found
successful when teaching majors:

Problem: Students wait until the last minute to do homework.

Solution: Divide each homework into parts due on successive
lectures.
Rather than 9 problems due on Monday, how about 3 problems due each

lecture?

Problem: Students don't "get religion" until tests come around.

Solution: Have tests more often. (Call them quizzes but make them
worth more points.) Every chapter instead of every 5-6 weeks.
Sometimes every single lecture (but maybe just one 10-minute problem

-- but in different varieties to avoid complacency: today a HW
problem, next time a reading quiz, next time a group problem, then a

review of major concepts, etc).

Problem: Students take a very compartmentalized view of course
topics. (Dump after a test; forget from one course to the next.)

Solution: Require integrative tasks. Such as have them write a
paper,
make a class presentation, develop an experiment, etc.

Anyways. This is the kind of thing I do every semester when I review

the course, read student evals, etc: I write down some ideas of
changes I'm going to make next time to address such student
problems.
FWIW, Carl
--
Carl E Mungan, Assoc Prof of Physics 410-293-6680 (O) -3729 (F)
Naval Academy Stop 9c, 572C Holloway Rd, Annapolis MD 21402-5002
mailto:mungan@usna.edu http://usna.edu/Users/physics/mungan/
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