Five Frequently Fatal Freshman Physics Fantasies

[Dr. Courtney]

http://arxiv.org/ftp/physics/papers/0605/0605152.pdf

I was reminded of this paper this week while preparing a number of Calc 3 instructional videos for a new YouTube channel. An abridged version was published by Physics Education, but I prefer the 3 page version which discusses:

The Fantasy of the Miracle Finish
The Fantasy of the Soft Hearted Professor
The Fantasy that College is a Simple Extension of High School
The Fantasy that Weak Areas Won’t Be Tested
and
The Fantasy that Passing is More Important than Learning

A number of colleagues have found it useful to link or paraphrase our paper in their introductory course materials, and I thought students and faculty here might also find it useful.

Edited to add link to video.

 

[ZapperZ]

There are only 5?!

:)

Zz.

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

There are only 5?!

Let's list more

preparing a number of Calc 3 instructional videos for a new YouTube channel.

Don't forget to add them to our media area!

btw, I think you should have titled the paper "Five Frequently Fatal Freshman Fhysics Fantasies"

 

[blue_leaf77]

Let's list more

Like fantasy that you could excel in all courses while having a serious relationship with an opposite gender?

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Like fantasy that you could excel in all courses while having a serious relationship with an opposite gender?

That was my excuse!

 

[Nugatory]

There are only 5?! :)

The wording of the title (both paper and thread) make it clear that these five are drawn from a potentially larger set.
A question for further research would be whether there an upper bound on the cardinality of that set.

 

[Orodruin]

The wording of the title (both paper and thread) make it clear that these five are drawn from a potentially larger set.
A question for further research would be whether there an upper bound on the cardinality of that set.

$\aleph_{215}$

 

[micromass]

$\aleph_{215}$

Is that more or less than the amount of real numbers to you?

 

[StatGuy2000]

I agree wholeheartedly with Dr. Courtney's summary of the 5 frequently fatal freshman physics mistakes. I would only add that these mistakes are not unique to freshman physics courses -- the same fatal errors also apply to math courses, or really any STEM course (and to many humanities & social science studies as well).

 

[Orodruin]

Is that more or less than the amount of real numbers to you?

Yes.

 

[Drakkith]

Nice article! I also agree with it and always try to instill the idea in the students I tutor that success in physics and math requires consistent practice.

 

[micromass]

Yes.

So definitely not equal, good to know.

 

[RJLiberator]

Good read, I am very intimate with all of them! Fortunately, I've chosen to avoid them (most of the time).

 

[Mark44]

The wording of the title (both paper and thread) make it clear that these five are drawn from a potentially larger set.
A question for further research would be whether there an upper bound on the cardinality of that set.

$\aleph_{215}$

Is that more or less than the amount of real numbers to you?

Yes.

I was going to give this answer, but Orodruin beat me to it.

So definitely not equal, good to know.

I'm confident that the cardinality of the reals is not equal to $\aleph_{215}$. Could be more, could be less, but definitely not equal.

@Dr. Courtney, interesting article. I hope students take it to heart. One thing that puzzles me is how students can reasonably study with all kinds of distractions going - music, TV, etc. If they're able to do this, more power to them, but I find that these external sources of "noise" detract from my ability to focus on what I'm trying to do.

 

[e.bar.goum]

Like fantasy that you could excel in all courses while having a serious relationship with an opposite gender?

Of course, people in same-gender relationships have no such issues with balancing coursework and relationships.

 

[jasonRF]

The Fantasy that Passing is More Important than Learning

I must confess that as a student I sometimes thought getting a good grade meant that I was learning.

 

[Ken G]

I'd add:
The fantasy that things that sound right when the instructor says them will leap into your own mind when you have to do it yourself on the test. But learning does not look like a judgement that something someone else says make sense, it looks like a judgement that something you say yourself makes sense.

The fantasy that copying someone else's solution is the same thing as solving the problem yourself. If that is your strategy, you better sit next to that person at exam time.

The fantasy that the learning process should not feel uncomfortable or frustrating at any time, so if it does, do something else. Actually, learning typically does have a phase that feels uncomfortable and confusing, possibly even frustratingly so, but this is a normal phase that must be persevered through and not given up on, to reach the payoff when the "light bulb" finally goes on.

 

[Ken G]

I must confess that as a student I sometimes thought getting a good grade meant that I was learning.

Hopefully it usually does, but there definitely can be a phenomenon of the "illusion of learning." This is as much a caution for instructors as for students-- it works like this. The instructor says A, and the student hears it, but does not understand it. Then on the exam, the instructor asks if A, B, or C, and the student answers, A. The instructor smiles, gives the student a good grade, and imagines that the student understands A. The student, having forgotten that they never really understood A, takes their good grade as evidence that they must understand A. This is the "illusion of learning."

 

[atyy]

Hopefully it usually does, but there definitely can be a phenomenon of the "illusion of learning." This is as much a caution for instructors as for students-- it works like this. The instructor says A, and the student hears it, but does not understand it. Then on the exam, the instructor asks if A, B, or C, and the student answers, A. The instructor smiles, gives the student a good grade, and imagines that the student understands A. The student, having forgotten that they never really understood A, takes their good grade as evidence that they must understand A. This is the "illusion of learning."

Like in analyzing alternating current circuits, I think it us possible to get an A yet not know the electron doesn't jump across the capacitor plates.

 

[Ken G]

Like in analyzing alternating current circuits, I think it us possible to get an A yet not know the electron doesn't jump across the capacitor plates.

Ah yes, "displacement current", everybody's favorite!

 

[Student100]

One of the biggest, and maybe the most detrimental, fallacies that many of the introductory students have is that physics is what they've seen in popular renditions on TV. I cringe when I see freshmen show up to mechanics wearing Schrodinger cat t-shirts - I feel like a piece of me dies on the inside.

Obviously many of these "fantasies" aren't so much a problem internal to the student, but to the failings of the education system in general.

 

[Jeff Rosenbury]

One of the biggest, and maybe the most detrimental, fallacies that many of the introductory students have is that physics is what they've seen in popular renditions on TV. I cringe when I see freshmen show up to mechanics wearing Schrodinger cat t-shirts - I feel like a piece of me dies on the inside.

Isn't that just an extension of the: http://www.altpress.com/features/entry/the_10_commandments_of_show_going? They certainly can't wear their Schrodinger cat shirts to physics class. That would be smh.

 

[Dr. Courtney]

Obviously many of these "fantasies" aren't so much a problem internal to the student, but to the failings of the education system in general.

They may not have had their origins internal to the student, but they sure need to get fixed internal to the student if the student is going to succeed in a STEM major. Responsible teachers work hard not to allow these fantasies to continue propagating in students who have passed their courses. I've found the best way to do that is to bring the misconceptions out into the open and talk about them, and to uphold appropriate standards of academic rigor so that students persisting in their fantasies are unlikely to succeed.

You are right that most students who arrive at college entrenched in these fantasies represent systemic failures of high school education. Expecting a miracle finish and getting grade bumps from soft hearted teachers works pretty well in high school, and a lot of teachers cater to student weaknesses with multiple choice tests and overly specific study guides as if the teacher and student are working together to redefine success as getting past the obstacles to graduation put in place by curriculum designers rather than really learning things that are important to know.

Some time after writing Five Frequently Fatal Freshman Physics Fantasies, a colleague and I published a follow-up paper entitled, "Science and Engineering Education: Who is the Customer?" The bottom line is we thought it would be wise to address many of the systemic issues in education by considering the customer to be the taxpayers, future employers, and downstream courses rather than an undue emphasis only on the student as the customer of education. Who doesn't wish a student had been better prepared for their current course by the science and math courses they took in the past? Don't we owe the same consideration to the future profs and employers of the students sitting in our classes?

Moaning about the global state of education is of limited utility. Making sure every student in our classes has mastered the material needed to succeed downstream before we assign a passing grade is something we all can do. Fantasies only grow if you keep feeding them.

 

[jasonRF]

Hopefully it usually does, but there definitely can be a phenomenon of the "illusion of learning." This is as much a caution for instructors as for students-- it works like this. The instructor says A, and the student hears it, but does not understand it. Then on the exam, the instructor asks if A, B, or C, and the student answers, A. The instructor smiles, gives the student a good grade, and imagines that the student understands A. The student, having forgotten that they never really understood A, takes their good grade as evidence that they must understand A. This is the "illusion of learning."

It can be more subtle. My third semester of college I took an intermediate level microeconomics class where the professor insisted on using lots of math. I found that I could simply setup the optimization problem, solve it with Lagrange multipliers, and pop out the answer. Repeat. I learned essentially no economics but got an good grade.

Regarding the fantasies, I think parents play a role here, too. I had a friend that had gone to Stuyvesant Highschool (a magnet school in New York) whose parents had always been on top of his homework to make sure he got everything done on time. When he showed up at college he no longer had that, and almost flunked out. He didn't know how to manage himself. I think we need to let our kids learn some lessons the hard way in middle school and high school. It may mean their GPA when they graduate isn't quite as good and they may go to a less selective college, but they may be better prepared to succeed. Especially in the age of 'open grade books' where parents can see every grade of every assignment in real time online this can be a problem.

jason

 

[Choppy]

The Fantasy that "Passing is More Important than Learning" Somehow Translates Into Grades Not Being Important
Building on this earlier point it's not uncommon to see students complaining about how exams don't represent one's true knowledge, or that those who are successful have studied "for the test" but don't understand the material, or that grades don't really matter so long as one understands the material. The practical reality is that if you don't pass the course, you're not going to move on in academia, and in competitive circumstances (scholarships, graduate school competitions, etc.) the GPA is what is most often used to striate students. Learning is the "most" important thing, but examinations and grades are the tools that are used for objectively measuring that.

The Fantasy That a Miracle Reference Letter Will Make Up for Years of Mediocre Results
Reference letters do generally pull a lot of weight for graduate admissions, but I think there are a few points that often get missed by students. First, GPA correlates highly with how students are assessed in reference letters. It turns out most of those guys with the 4.00 GPA also have strong work ethic and outstanding research potential. Second, most reference letters aren't going to it can be very difficult to use reference letters to stratify candidates, particularly if you have a lot of candidates to sort through.

The Fantasy that You're Going to be the Next Einstein
You did well in high school. You're doing well as an undergraduate. You don't need to bother with labs, group work, or learning any of those pesky "applied" branches of physics because you're going to lock yourself in a room and single-handedly derive a theory of everything... from first principles... without ever having read any work that anyone else has done.
Unfortunately this common misconception is that physics is performed in some kind of intellectual vacuum and that lone individuals are going to come along and revolutionize the field with new ideas. While the notion is romantic, I think a lot of students fail to see that a lot of very smart people have been working on a lot of the big questions in physics for a very long time and we've reached a point where a lot of the new insights come through large collaborative efforts.

The Fantasy that the Courses You Chose This Semester Will Determine Your Career
While the educational path a student choses is likely to have an influence on a student's career, the fact that you're signing up for an astrophysics major as an undergraduate does not mean that all you have to do is pass your courses and you'll become an astrophysicist. Education and career tend to be two separate things. Careers result from the opportunities that are available when a person choses to search for one. Education will obviously influence those, but there's a lot of serendipity involved as well.

 

[Jeff Rosenbury]

The Fantasy that "Passing is More Important than Learning" Somehow Translates Into Grades Not Being Important
Building on this earlier point it's not uncommon to see students complaining about how exams don't represent one's true knowledge, or that those who are successful have studied "for the test" but don't understand the material, or that grades don't really matter so long as one understands the material. The practical reality is that if you don't pass the course, you're not going to move on in academia, and in competitive circumstances (scholarships, graduate school competitions, etc.) the GPA is what is most often used to striate students. Learning is the "most" important thing, but examinations and grades are the tools that are used for objectively measuring that.

When I was in school, the problem seemed the opposite. I got some of my best grades in subjects I didn't know from beans. I could grind equations all day, but tell you what they meant? No.

In other classes I was a wiz. I understood what was happening and could frequently anticipate the answers to the equations (which I still ground out). I remember one course where I was the only one to even complete the final exam, which I aced. The instructor still gave me a B.

Doing the work is necessary but not sufficient.

(You are correct about the collaboration issue. I didn't smooze an instructor. I got a B. Sleep with the prof for the win!)

 

[alw34]

Like in analyzing alternating current circuits, I think it us possible to get an A yet not know the electron doesn't jump across the capacitor plates.

That's the kinda thing might get you by in an EE course, less likely to get you by in a physics course.

 

[Vanadium 50]

The Fantasy That a Miracle Reference Letter Will Make Up for Years of Mediocre Results

Agreed. There's also a huge disconnect between what the student thinks is a great reference and what actually is a great reference. "Bob got an A in my class and was my best student this year" is an average letter.

 

[Ravi Mohan]

The Fantasy That a Miracle Reference Letter Will Make Up for Years of Mediocre Results

I guess the media hype of instances such as this, gives rise to such fantasy.
https://spthumbnails.5min.com/10377506/518875269_c_570_411.jpg
And even for this case, one can see the application documents https://webspace.princeton.edu/users/mudd/Digitization/AC105/AC105_Nash_John_Forbes_1950.pdf which contain a brilliant academic record backed by two other very strong recommendation letters.

 

[Dr. Courtney]

Regarding the fantasies, I think parents play a role here, too. I had a friend that had gone to Stuyvesant Highschool (a magnet school in New York) whose parents had always been on top of his homework to make sure he got everything done on time. When he showed up at college he no longer had that, and almost flunked out. He didn't know how to manage himself. I think we need to let our kids learn some lessons the hard way in middle school and high school.

This is a great point. I think the greatest academic blessing parents can bring to their children is imparting good (yet independent) homework and study habits that will serve them well in college. For most teenagers, they'll need to stay on top of it daily during the middle school years, but then back off to less regular reminders as appropriate during the high school years so that students learn to own the habits and the consequences. The delicate balance is backing off the accountability in a way that allows students to crash a few times without falling unrecoverably behind.

Parents would also do well to grasp that good (yet independent) homework habits are more important than the number of AP courses on the high school transcript. I'd far prefer to be working with students in intro physics courses who have good mastery of algebra and trig (pre-calc) and good study habits than who took AP Calc and all the rest but can't apply problem solving without the recipes right in front of them and who are incapable of doing all their homework without the constant reminders (nagging parents) who aren't close enough to be effective any longer. By the time students get to college, parents have either successfully imparted an independent work ethic and habit or work before play, or they haven't.

A student who only makes it to pre-calc in senior year is not unrecoverably behind if they truly master that material and have the needed habits to succeed in Calc, Chemistry, and Physics freshman year. Really, they are not "behind" at all.

 

[Catria]

The Fantasy of the Miracle Finish
The Fantasy of the Soft Hearted Professor
The Fantasy that College is a Simple Extension of High School
The Fantasy that Weak Areas Won’t Be Tested
and
The Fantasy that Passing is More Important than Learning

The soft-hearted professor fantasy usually works best when you have actual grounds for complaining about a miscarriage of justice so that may also be an indictment of the instructor's grading skills (or the TAs') if it actually works. Especially when your miscarriage of justice is about using an alternate method compared to the posted solution when no method was specified in the statement.

Perhaps those in whom it persists most either had high school teachers that are prone to giving extra credit assignments on a whim or prone to miscarriages of justice in grading.

About passing being more important than learning: it often seems that good grades are often valued more than actual learning by some parties. Law school, med school being the best examples I know of such parties (and also allied healthcare professions, like optometry), and also a few employers. So it's not simply "passing" but also "grades" being more important than learning.

Like in analyzing alternating current circuits, I think it us possible to get an A yet not know the electron doesn't jump across the capacitor plates.

Even though I am otherwise a decent (and prompt) grader, because I feel as if grading promptness makes the student learning more efficient, I often assume that a rigorous mathematical derivation will enhance students' understanding and hence put a lot of weight on the math (to the point, perhaps, of being accused of being too hung up on the "algebra" by the thermo instructor I graded homework and tests for).

My third semester of college I took an intermediate level microeconomics class where the professor insisted on using lots of math. I found that I could simply setup the optimization problem, solve it with Lagrange multipliers, and pop out the answer. Repeat. I learned essentially no economics but got an good grade.

Perhaps that particular instructor insisted on using lots of math because he feels that conceptual knowledge is best gained with a thorough understanding of the math behind it. Don't get me wrong, conceptual knowledge alone can only bring one so far. After all, quantitative skills (physics being just one) are best learned through practice.

And I am often tempted to teach a physics course while insisting on the mathematical aspect of solving the problems because 1) intuition is often fallible and 2) practical usage of the material often seems to be a matter of doing the math (or otherwise going through the motions) properly.

The fantasy that the learning process should not feel uncomfortable or frustrating at any time, so if it does, do something else. Actually, learning typically does have a phase that feels uncomfortable and confusing, possibly even frustratingly so, but this is a normal phase that must be persevered through and not given up on, to reach the payoff when the "light bulb" finally goes on.

I also heard the opposite of that, albeit it seems to form up at a higher level: the fantasy that the learning process should feel uncomfortable or frustrating at all times or else you are not actually learning. It can be frustrating but it doesn't have to always be the case.

 

[Dr. Courtney]

The Fantasy that "Passing is More Important than Learning" Somehow Translates Into Grades Not Being Important

The Fantasy That a Miracle Reference Letter Will Make Up for Years of Mediocre Results

The Fantasy that You're Going to be the Next Einstein

The Fantasy that the Courses You Chose This Semester Will Determine Your Career

These are awesome observations, but I expect they are more common in 2nd to 4th year Physics courses than in the 1st year sequence.

With respect to the balance between passing and learning, it is natural for students to approach a grade with a grade goal and presume that achieving that grade goal means adequate learning has happened. However, under the pressure and time squeeze of a semester, they often are tempted to take the path of least resistance while trying to pass or reach their grade goal. My experience in the introductory courses is that this usually includes abandoning the idea of doing all the homework and then often leads to some combination of blame shifting, academic dishonesty, and arguing about grades.

Teachers bear the burden of designing grading policies and graded events to maintain as close a correspondence as possible between grades received and real learning. For courses that are essential pre-requisites for downstream courses, I always felt a useful assessment of the correspondence between grades and leaning in my courses was to consider how well grades in my course predicted student success in the first try of a downstream course. I thought an A in my course should predict at least a 90% chance of success, a B at least 80%, a C at least 70%. If I was passing students who were unprepared (or underprepared) for downstream courses, it was my fault.

 

[greswd]

Like fantasy that you could excel in all courses while having a serious relationship with an opposite gender?

its not possible to study and sex at the same time?

 

[greswd]

Where I'm from, hardly anyone falls for the first four fantasies, but nearly everyone falls for the last one.

 

[Vanadium 50]

its not possible to study and sex at the same time?

The books kind of get in the way.