Re: [Phys-l] God as an explanation (WAS: Darwinism underattack?andthephysicsclassroom)

[Hugh Haskell <hhaskell@mindspring.com>]

At 22:03  -0500 8/1/08, Jack Uretsky wrote:

> But, to what extent were the students able to reproduce what you "taught",
> and to what extent did you challenge their ability to do so?

Good point, poor choice of words on my part. What I was trying to do 
was to get them to realize that, even though they might not be able 
to derive the formulas they were using, that they weren't just 
something someone thought up that was useful, or that someone said 
was useful. What they did was to work problems, both numerical and 
descriptive that illustrated the principles that they had seen me 
"derive," and in this way at least understand that they weren't 
working in a vacuum.

How well did it work? I can't say for sure, but a pretty good 
fraction of my students went on to major in science or 
science-related (medicine, engineering) subjects. I can't say that 
this was all due to my stellar teaching methods, but I've heard 
positive feedback from several of them, that what they "learned" in 
my class useful later on. Since I never expected them to have 
memorized any equation (the basic equations that I had derived in 
class were always available to them), I assume that what they were 
talking about was the idea that applying the principles they found 
out in my class left them on a firm footing in future classes, where 
they might have been expected to be able to derive that stuff.

All of this was mostly based on my frustration as a student that we 
were expected to memorize derivations of various formulas (as well as 
other stuff--I'll never forget my frustration in a course in organic 
chemistry at having to memorize the Solvay process, which, although I 
could reproduce the picture, I never understood). Since I never 
believed in memorization of any sort (as a result, I hated poetry 
classes) I vowed when I became a teacher that memorization would 
never be a part of my course. Naturally, that seriously disappointed 
a good number of my students who had learned from all their teachers 
before me that the key to successful learning was memorization, and 
they had gotten good at it. I never thought much of that as an 
educational method.

Hugh
--

************************************************************
Hugh Haskell
<mailto:haskell@ncssm.edu>
<mailto:hhaskell@mindspring.com>

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