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Re: [Phys-L] Survey of Physics

I think _summarizing_ is an ineffectual route to take. Any well thought out and edited text
is already quite succinct and it’s unlikely a neophyte could summarize it into something shorter.

However, we can all extract personal meaning from text —
learn the things we are ready to learn. And reflect on those.

Dan M

On Jul 27, 2020, at 00:14, Timothy Folkerts via Phys-l <phys-l@mail.phys-l.org> wrote:

Thanks for the feedback Hewitt was indeed one of the texts I was
considering. I do hate that texts are so expensive ($220 to buy Hewitt
new; $120 used, $60 to rent) -- especially if they will not read them
anyway. Too often the text becomes just an expensive source of homework
problems. I could go with an earlier addition -- those seem to cost about
1/2 as much (as long as they are still available).

One approach I have tried to get students to read the text is to have them
write down a sentence about
3 things they already knew
3 things they learned
3 things that are confusing (or fascinating).
These then serve as a starting point for class discussions. This was in
astronomy, but should work for a conceptual physics class. It is like a
reading log, but moer structured than "summarize the reading".

Tim



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On Sat, Jul 25, 2020 at 2:36 PM Daniel MacIsaac via Phys-l <
phys-l@mail.phys-l.org> wrote:

Require students to complete reading logs, scan to .pdf with phones using
Office Lens or CamScanner (I prefer CS), and upload to class LMS for
credit.
Make it worth credit and your students will read.
Reading and reducing technical text is worthwhile in itself.

http://physicsed.buffalostate.edu/pubs/Reflection/RdgLogs/ReadingLogV8.pdf
<
http://physicsed.buffalostate.edu/pubs/Reflection/RdgLogs/ReadingLogV8.pdf

http://physicsed.buffalostate.edu/pubs/Reflection/RdgLogs/ReadingLogV8.doc
<
http://physicsed.buffalostate.edu/pubs/Reflection/RdgLogs/ReadingLogV8.doc


Dan M

Dan MacIsaac, AAPT Fellow, Professor of Physics & Graduate Coordinator
Adjunct Professor of Earth Science and Science Education
SUNY Buffalo State College, SAMC278, 1300 Elmwood Ave, Buffalo
NY 14222 <macisadl@buffalostate.edu>




On Jul 25, 2020, at 14:48, Brian Whatcott <betwys1@sbcglobal.net> wrote:

About having a hard time getting kids to read books any more. I have an
instant solution. One that will (usually) engross their attention for many
hours. Something I just learned myself. Let me explain.I set down to
answer a Quora question. These are often at junior high/ high level though
some rise to freshman college level. Specifically I set down an answer
to this question:How can you find the water temperature without a
thermometer?My answer was in lab form: materials, beaker, heater, timer
blah, blah, blah.[find the time to boil a given volume of ice water, and
compare to the time to boil the specimen.]...to which I received the
comment: "Too complicated for the average person."I looked over some other
responses: Index of refraction; thermal co-efficient of expansion.So I
rewrote my answer: find an electric kettle. Waste a little of the test
water to lift the kettle to near test liquid's temperature. Time how long
to boil. Compare with boiling the same volume of ice water.Specific heat is
not exactly linear, but can be sensitive.
Then I was moved to find the sensitivity and linearity of measuring
other physical properties of water.Surface Tension.Viscosity.Speed of
Sound. etc. It turns out, that water properties may vary from <1% to ~80%
over the temperature range 0-100 deg C for these properties.Their linearity
with temperature varies from pretty good, to awful too.
I can suppose that letting kids loose on finding such a measurement
method, might offer worth-while learning, an incentive to look up book data
that would be helpful right there, right then. In other words; learning by
doing. That is in fact what research physicists do !
[Sorry about the long quote trail - I am responding directly on a mail
URL rather than via mail reader ] On Saturday, July 25, 2020, 12:42:25
PM CDT, Richard Tarara via Phys-l <phys-l@mail.phys-l.org> wrote:

Let me add a note here. Unfortunately, you will have a very hard time
getting students to read any book you choose. Even with quiz questions
taken directly from the book, I couldn't get them to read the last few
years. Since by that time I had my lectures all on PowerPoints, I ended up
just posting those with references to books like Kirkpatrick and Hewitt,
but they would barely bother to reread the PPs that they had seen just once
in class.


Richard W. Tarara
Professor of Physics, emeritus
Saint Mary’s College
Notre Dame, Indiana

Free Physics Instructional Software
Windows and Mac
sites.saintmarys.edu/~rtarara/software.html

-----Original Message-----
I can concur on Kirkpatrick, used it for years. I accused him at a
summer meeting of stealing my lectures as we were pretty much of the same
mind. 😉

Richard W. Tarara
Professor of Physics, emeritus
Saint Mary’s College
Notre Dame, Indiana

Free Physics Instructional Software
Windows and Mac
sites.saintmarys.edu/~rtarara/software.html

-----Original Message-----
From: Phys-l <phys-l-bounces@mail.phys-l.org> On Behalf Of Snow POP
Sent: Saturday, July 25, 2020 1:07 PM
To: <Phys-L@phys-l.org> <Phys-L@Phys-L.org>
Subject: Re: [Phys-L] Survey of Physics

Though it has some notable flaws, we are still using Hewitt’s
“Conceptual Physics.” The students generally like it. Students can find the
penultimate edition pretty cheap.

We’ve also used Kirkpatrick and Wheelers “Physics: A Worldview.”

Larry


On Jul 24, 2020, at 9:49 AM, Timothy Folkerts via Phys-l <
phys-l@mail.phys-l.org> wrote:

I am teaching a Survey of Physics class for the first time and I would
love suggestions for a good textbook. I have taught lots of physics
and physical science, so I can build on that background. I would love
something OER, but the Openstax books I am familiar with all seem to
be at too high of a level.

Also, I would appreciate any key suggestions for topics or approaches
that have worked for you for this sort of student in this sort of class.

Tim Folkerts

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