I’m really not a fan of the me-too blog, which just strings together links to the original thoughts of other. But I saw this on Cosmic Variance and thought it was brilliant, so here we go: “Lessons from Monopoly“. It’s an interesting analysis of the socio-economic implications of the Parker Brothers game. As seems to be the case (in my opinion) every time critical thinking is applied to the underpinnings of our economy, it turns out to be a good argument against the current winner-take-all capitalism worship which infects this nation.
Category: teaching
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What’s the Matter with Kansas?
Today, at least, nothing. In a curiously intense summer primary contest for the state Board of Education, the day was won by people who believe that the science standards should reflect, you know, actual science. Their opponents were a cabal of Intelligent Design boosters. There’s a nice wrap-up at Forbes.com and a more gung-ho, in-your-face summary at Thoughts from Kansas.
The Forbes piece quotes a Kansan named Ryan Cole, “I feel like if you give two sides of something, most people are intelligent enough to make up their own minds.” I wonder how many ID proponents would be OK if the history course started teaching Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code version of early Christianity, because after all, millions of people have invested in it.
Yay for the good guys that will put Kansas back into the mainstream on science education. But boo for all of us that we, a supposedly advanced and enlightened nation, need to fight this same battle over and over again.
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Academic Freedom versus Indoctrination?
A week or so ago (2006 July 23), the New York Times had an article (“Conspiracy Theories 101” by Stanley Fish) detailing a brouhaha surrounding Kevin Barrett. Mr. Barrett is a lecturer at the University of Wisconsin who has gotten into hot water because he shared with his students his strong conviction that the World Trade Centers were destroyed not by Islamic terrorists but by the American government itself. Mr. Fish uses the occasion of Mr. Barrett’s controversy to expound the “correct” view of academic freedom, which Mr. Fish thinks both sides have gotten wrong in the Barrett debate. I think he misses the point.
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Another reason why US textbooks are so lousy…
I saw an article in the New York Times (Schoolbooks Are Given Fâs in Originality; 2006 July 13) that detailed a controversy broiling for some American history textbooks. It seems that, in describing the 9/11 attacks, the books A History of the United States and America: Pathways to the Present use virtually identical language. Apparently several other sets of passages dealing with recent history are also substantially the same.
However, the scandal is not what you think.
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Testing and Teaching Physics
Lately I’ve been on a merciless campaign to reduce the paperwork clutter in my lab/office/classroom. Today I dove into the bottom drawer of a filing cabinet (because obviously, bottom drawer = hard to acess = most moldly junk.) and came across an envelope containing the qualifying exam I had to take when starting grad school at Stanford lo those many years ago. The very first piece of paper in the envelope was a cover letter from Dr. Bob Laughlin, who almost single-handedly crafted the qual.
In reading it over, I realized that — consciously or not — it epitomizes a number of common assumptions about testing in physics, or at least, in my teaching of physics. So for insights into the tortured past that made me the teacher I am đ read on.
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From the Past: Instructions for Stanford Physics Qual 1993
In cleaning out a file cabinet, I came across the Qualifying Exam that I had to take in order to pursue a degree in Physics at Stanford University. On top was a cover letter by Dr. Bob Laughlin, which I reproduce below. Hopefully he won’t have any issue with that! đ
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Mainstream acceptance — woo hoo!
Well, I went away to Vermont for four days and nearly missed the telltale sign that my blog is Out There in cyberspace. That’s right, I got my first spam comment yesterday morning. I must be on somebody’s radar… đ Interestingly enough I was wondering if having comment moderation turned on was overkill. Guess that’s been answered.
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Why “Mongrel Dogs”?
First of all, as noted on the About page, the title of this blog comes from a Dylan song, “My Back Pages”, specifically
In a soldier’s stance I aim my hands
At the mongrel dogs who teach
Fearing not I become my enemy
In the moment that I preach
I like the euphony of the line. Also, it’s been said that “My Back Pages” was a reaction by Dylan against the naive rebellion of his earlier songs. And the paradox of the refrain — Oh, but I was so much older then // I’m younger than that now — is just nifty. (more…)
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Snow Day
Not really — not in mid-June in New Jersey — but I’m still learning WordPress and wanted to try uploading a picture.
If I’ve done everything correctly, there should be a thumbnail image above, which links to the full image. This one happens to have been taken from the Russell portico roof on 2003 December 5 and is my favorite of the many many snow day pictures I’ve taken. Yay.
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Old proof but rediscovered
I had to dig this out for a slashdot debate and remembered that I’m reasonably proud of it. It only relates to teaching in that I wrote it up as a handout for my AP Physics class. The basic idea is, it has been asserted that allowing an ice cube to melt in a cup of water does not change the level of the water. Is it true? Check out the handout and see.
It’s important to recognize the limits of this model, such as the assumption that the density of original water and the density of the melted water would be the same, or the fact that the melting ice will cool the existing water and so (conceivably) change its density.
