Re: [Phys-l] Textbooks vs multimedia

["Fouad Ajami" <ajami@allstream.net>]

I ask students to bring their textbook to every class. I follow the 
textbook fairly closely, pointing out  important sections, comparing 
some diagram in one chapter with another from another chapter, etc. and 
generally trying to show the richness -such as it is - of the text, the 
explanations, the equations.
It seems when students become familiar with the text, they do read it.
Of course, there are, in every textbook, some chapters that are badly 
written, so I skip them, or go lightly over them.
The main beef over textbooks is the unnecessary new editions every 3 
years or so.

Fouad I. Ajami
Physics Department
Champlain College
900 Riverside Drive,
St Lambert, QC, Canada, J4P 3P2
Tel: 450-672-7360-276Fax: 450-672-9299


<snip>

> The current Am Journal of Physics has a very good PER article where 
> they
> looked at textbooks vs multimedia.  They pointed out that there was no
> evidence that any specific feature of texts improves effectiveness. 
> Indeed,
> from what I have seen texts run contrary to what we know about 
> learning and
> as such are probably not very effective.
<snip>

> Students expressed more likelihood of using the multimedia "text" in
> preference to the standard printed text.  Since students seldom crack 
> open
> the textbook except to do assigned problems this alone would be an
> improvement.

<snip>