Why? Why oh why do students have so much trouble in physics

[Pengwuino]

So this semester I've been teaching some of our universities physics labs. My labs are the intro series... not for the totally clueless non-science majors, but the semi-science/"soft science" (or well, more accurately non-calculus required science) majors. It seems like people just have so many problems with physics. We don't exactly have the best instructors teaching the lectures but it seems universal that people just have problems with it. What gives? In my experience, other courses in our university just require an hour of study before their exams, 30 minutes for homework a week or so... and it seems as courses get more advanced (from what I hear from friends), that doesn't change too much. Now in hindsight, the way to really do well in my upper division undergrad classes was to study and take a good deal of time to do the homework even if it meant multiple sessions and office hours. Is this idea of studying just lost on less advanced students? Maybe most students just want the degree so they don't have to put on their resume "high school educated"? It's a strange climate...

DISCUSS.

 

[sportsstar469]

So this semester I've been teaching some of our universities physics labs. My labs are the intro series... not for the totally clueless non-science majors, but the semi-science/"soft science" (or well, more accurately non-calculus required science) majors. It seems like people just have so many problems with physics. We don't exactly have the best instructors teaching the lectures but it seems universal that people just have problems with it. What gives? In my experience, other courses in our university just require an hour of study before their exams, 30 minutes for homework a week or so... and it seems as courses get more advanced (from what I hear from friends), that doesn't change too much. Now in hindsight, the way to really do well in my upper division undergrad classes was to study and take a good deal of time to do the homework even if it meant multiple sessions and office hours. Is this idea of studying just lost on less advanced students? Maybe most students just want the degree so they don't have to put on their resume "high school educated"? It's a strange climate...

DISCUSS.

well, if theyre only soft science majors, I am guessing they just wnt to pass your course. i can give you a personal experience however. i do not care about chemistry, or biology. i just want to get my A'S, and get onto dental school. unfortunately this is the way the majority of this generation is. i am a little different though. i actually want to develop my critical thinking skills. I've never been great in math, and itd be cool to get atleast a b in calculus when i take it summer 2010 (along with orgo chem 1 and orgo chem 2...kill me now)./

but once again i don't actually care about calculus, or chemistry. i don't care, about a plants reproductive system in biology, or that paramecium caudatum is in phylum ciliophora, and has a macro and micro nucleus. i asked a chemistry professor for help on a trig problem for my class. and he said, i don't remember this, i had to take calculus to be a chem teacher, but i don't remember this. i never use this anymore and you never will either! he made a joke though , that in dental school, i ll have to learn calculus to calculate the surface area of someones mouth and how to properly drill through their teeth and all./

 

[mgb_phys]

These are the worst to teach.
The 'physics for poets' stuff can be quite fun if you are allowed to teach what you want - you can explain how physics is a series of more detailed understandings, how all models are wrong but some are useful, theory an experiment proof etc.
But soft science is terrible, there is no chance that anyone cares - they just need to pass this course - and you have to teach them without having the useful tools (like calculus).

Think of it the other way around. If you are a hard science student then a descriptive history or anthropology class would be interesting - a poetry appreciation class where you have to use all the technical terms of poetry but nothing is explained would be horrible.

 

[Choppy]

I can think of a few factors that might come into play:
- unqualified high school teachers not grounding the students properly in physics in the first place
- cramming the night before worked in high school and therefore it is still applied in univeristy
- students interested in the squishy sciences who enroll in physics because it's a requirement and not because they have a desire to learn it start off on the wrong foot
- rote learning doesn't really work for physics

 

[stewartcs]

So this semester I've been teaching some of our universities physics labs. My labs are the intro series... not for the totally clueless non-science majors, but the semi-science/"soft science" (or well, more accurately non-calculus required science) majors. It seems like people just have so many problems with physics. We don't exactly have the best instructors teaching the lectures but it seems universal that people just have problems with it. What gives? In my experience, other courses in our university just require an hour of study before their exams, 30 minutes for homework a week or so... and it seems as courses get more advanced (from what I hear from friends), that doesn't change too much. Now in hindsight, the way to really do well in my upper division undergrad classes was to study and take a good deal of time to do the homework even if it meant multiple sessions and office hours. Is this idea of studying just lost on less advanced students? Maybe most students just want the degree so they don't have to put on their resume "high school educated"? It's a strange climate...

DISCUSS.

Possible reasons:

1) Poor instructors
2) Student doesn't have a "Physics mind" (i.e. no aptitude for science)
3) Poor study habits
4) Student doesn't ask questions in class
5) Student doesn't practice, practice, practice...

CS

 

[union68]

Apathy. They're there to get the grade and pass, that's it. After all, our society has relegated the education-system to play the role of a mere tool; it's a tool whose only purpose is to get a job and make money.

The ones who are getting hurt are the people who do give a damn about the quality of their education.

 

[Want to learn]

Apathy. They're there to get the grade and pass, that's it. After all, our society has relegated the education-system to play the role of a mere tool; it's a tool whose only purpose is to get a job and make money.

The ones who are getting hurt are the people who do give a damn about the quality of their education.

That is very true. Many people when they see that they are struggling end up dropping the course because it will affect their GPA. They are not willing to work at it and put in the hours to understand the material on a deeper level. It's all about staying competitive and get the most money possible, which , in my opinion, is sad.

 

[rubrix]

speaking for my own...

1) Our instructors are HORRIBLE. The one i have this semester in particular is AWFUL. We have a class of 50 students and more than 1/2 the class does not show up. Once i counted 13 students in my class. Few go to another professor who i hear is good...the rest, I'm assuming try studying on their own and left behind.

2) A vast majority in introductory physics courses (especially in non-calc based) are just taking it for the requirement. In my calc-based Physics I course there was only one Physics major, the rest were bio, chem, engineering...they only cared about passing.

3) Exams are bad, they really are. Even in an introductory Physics class the average was ~ 40. imo that is not uplifting for students taking introductory course.

4) add stupid Mastering Physics homework. I personally learned better when we did hand written homeworks. Then again, that's prolly just me...i don't like online homeworks.

5) and of course there is lab. Thankfully our labs were computer-based. There was no pre-lab or a lab report to be written. BUT for each course there were 2-3 "standard" (non-computer based) lab...and oh boy...i couldn't believe how anyone who had to do all "standard" lab went through those.

6) chances of getting left behind is high. Usually they cover 1 chapter a week. All physics chapters are packs with problems. In most other courses it usually takes multiple weeks to get a chapter done. Say, in mathematics, it usually takes a month to get a chapter done...but that's prolly b/c they have buncha sub-sections.

 

[Andy Resnick]

So this semester I've been teaching some of our universities physics labs. My labs are the intro series... not for the totally clueless non-science majors, but the semi-science/"soft science" (or well, more accurately non-calculus required science) majors. It seems like people just have so many problems with physics. We don't exactly have the best instructors teaching the lectures but it seems universal that people just have problems with it. What gives? In my experience, other courses in our university just require an hour of study before their exams, 30 minutes for homework a week or so... and it seems as courses get more advanced (from what I hear from friends), that doesn't change too much. Now in hindsight, the way to really do well in my upper division undergrad classes was to study and take a good deal of time to do the homework even if it meant multiple sessions and office hours. Is this idea of studying just lost on less advanced students? Maybe most students just want the degree so they don't have to put on their resume "high school educated"? It's a strange climate...

DISCUSS.

In my experience, this particular student faces a considerable hurdle with the use of mathematics. First, there's the overall lack of proficiency (some of my students don't remember how to calculate the area of a trapezoid), but possibly worse is the student's self-perception that 'I'm not smart enough to understand this stuff'. Plus, the course is one of many that are required to graduate that have (in the student's mind) no bearing on their life/employment goals.

Toss in an instructor that blindly marches through the textbook without stopping to consider that a student may wonder how the (grossly simplified to the point of a cartoon) material has any bearing on real life, when everything they see and read about physics (in the popular media) is full of "quantum mysteries" and "Einstein's genius", etc., and it's no wonder the average student is quickly bored.

And the introductory labs have even less connection with daily life. Force tables? Air rails? And if the instrumentation doesn't work perfectly, or if the data obtained fails to obey what the person in the front of the class demands, the student is likely to just accept that Physics makes no sense (or the student will claim they are not smart enough to understand).

It's ok to blame poor instructors, but to be fair, one must also look at the *material* being taught, the book used, the lab excersises, and the reason why those seats are occupied. Personally, I see it as an opportunity to experiment- two examples:

I am in the middle of introducing general relativity to my physics I (algebra-based) class, using the context of angular motion. So far it's working; the students understand Newton's bucket, and they are motivated to stay interested because GR is a 'sexy' topic. More sexy than Atwood's machine, at any rate.

Second, I related the conservation laws (energy, momentum, angular momentum) to invariance of time, position, and orientation. Although I did not derive those relationships, the students accept them at face value and thus see the conservation laws not as some arbitrary statement, but as a reflection of intuitive experience. So, when I claim 'perpetual motion cannot occur', it's not because of some arbitrary statement conserning unfamiliar concepts that some future smart person can violate, but because of the invariance of performing the process in time- if the machine works tomorrow the same as yesterday, it must obey the conservation of energy, and so cannot be a perpetual motion device.

Finally, I meet with every student in a small group setting at the beginning of class and find out what they are majoring in, what they hiope to get out of the class, etc. and then tailor the homework/test problems to make them as relevant *to them* as possible. Points are not awarded based on calculator proficiency, they are awarded when a student can communicate to me that they understand the underlying concepts.

 

[Pengwuino]

Sometimes I wonder about the typical reasoning for people doing poorly and not understanding the physics courses and what not. For example, saying it's something they're not interested in and just want a grade. In pretty much every non-science course I've taken, I did well and did my work and tried to understand what was going on and in general, had respect for the class. I hate to outright criticize other majors, but is it because in science courses, we actually learn to do stuff and think whereas non-science majors simply just learn about stuff? So when non-science majors attend science classes, they're dismayed by the fact that they aren't there to simply memorize facts and hope to regurgitate them on a test?

 

[Andy Resnick]

Having some unmotivated students is normal. Consider this: why have they not dropped the class? Surely there are other core classes that satisfy a requirement for their degree. If there is not, perhaps the student feels compelled to take a class they don't want to and thinks the requirement unreasonable.

That said, it's also entirely true that there are students at college that probably should not be in college. As a college degree becomes more and more a prerequisite for 'decent jobs', there will be more and more unqualified graduates. In practical terms, I am always willing to help a floundering student if that student is actively trying to learn the material. Otherwise, it's all up to the student how well they do in my class.

 

[ChemHopeful]

up until the wheatstone bridge i breezed through physics, and even after that still did fairly well from natural aptitude. if only it were possible to pursue a career in solving physics 101 homework problems, i would be a happy man

 

[johnnyies]

1. problem solving is a skill - it's a lot different than just memorizing what steps to do and regurgitating them on an exam. You really have to have a thorough understanding of the concepts and know how to apply them.

2. physics is generally a harder class to teach - in my experience, most physics teachers can be smart as hell but they have a harder time conveying the subject to students

3. apathy to the subject - class that is used as a prerequisite for a lot of majors even though it may not have anything to do with it. So students are less likely to give a crap about really learning it.

 

[naele]

I seriously think that students have no idea how to actually study for physics, and this is partially the lecturer's fault. Generally, an instructor for a general physics series will lecture on the concepts, show some derivations, and do the occasional worked example. For students majoring in softer sciences like biology they probably don't have the notion drummed into their skulls that to really understand physics they have to work problems.

Precisely because instructors either don't, or can't devote time necessary to work out problems the students don't realize that they won't develop the physical intuition necessary to set up a problem and apply the necessary equations. I once ran into a group of pre-meds from my physics class that were studying. Over the course of an hour all they did was go over the lecture notes and talk about conceptual ideas instead of trying to solve problems.

I really do think that these students don't have it impressed on them hard enough that they should be solving problems. Even if it's rote copying down answers from the solutions manual, if it's done enough the sheer mechanical procedure should translate over to a test.

 

[OmCheeto]

So this semester I've been teaching some of our universities physics labs. My labs are the intro series... not for the totally clueless non-science majors, but the semi-science/"soft science" (or well, more accurately non-calculus required science) majors. It seems like people just have so many problems with physics. We don't exactly have the best instructors teaching the lectures but it seems universal that people just have problems with it. What gives? In my experience, other courses in our university just require an hour of study before their exams, 30 minutes for homework a week or so... and it seems as courses get more advanced (from what I hear from friends), that doesn't change too much. Now in hindsight, the way to really do well in my upper division undergrad classes was to study and take a good deal of time to do the homework even if it meant multiple sessions and office hours. Is this idea of studying just lost on less advanced students? Maybe most students just want the degree so they don't have to put on their resume "high school educated"? It's a strange climate...

DISCUSS.

It might be that there are inconsistencies, anomalies, and quirks in physics, that the physicists just take for granted, and just move on to the next subject, but the lay person can never quite get past.

T = (5252 x HP)/rpm
How does this equation resemble reality in a locked rotor electric motor?

Sometimes a foot pound is a pound force moved a linear foot and other times a foot pound is a pound force acting around pivot at a distance of a foot but doesn't move anything and that's a pseudovector called Torque, and don't ask me why we don't use real vectors.

Europeans measure the mass of things while the Americans measure the weight so everything has to be converted into kg's otherwise we end up with slug feet/second which has no corresponding conversion at the end of the book.

Then there's the hundred different ways to measure a single thing: 1 Btu = 1E18 ergs = 778 ft-lbs = 4E-4 hp-hr = 1055 joules = 252 calories = 2.9E-4 kw-hr = 6.6E21 ev.

Perhaps the first day of class should be spent explaining quirks that people will run into so they don't think they're idiots and sit there like all the other idiots when things don't make sense.

 

[Klockan3]

Well, at least in Sweden you do everything with the same units (the standard SI) so there are no such "quirks".

 

[symbolipoint]

naele commented about a group of students studying together:

I once ran into a group of pre-meds from my physics class that were studying. Over the course of an hour all they did was go over the lecture notes and talk about conceptual ideas instead of trying to solve problems.

That gives the impression that these people have a different style of thinking than most physical science major students. No matter, what you determined to be missing was what these students needed to learn to do: to SOLVE some problems. Problem-solving is one of the main parts of physics study. Reading and discussing concepts is not enough.

 

[lubuntu]

At my school, as I've ranted before I am in calculus based Physics II. At my school I think nearly all of the students fall into one of 2 categories, besides physics majors:

1. They are rather dumb.
2. They don't care even in the slightest about physics.

Granted my school is rather unique and has people from all sorts of backgrounds but even the kids who spent a good chuck of time after hours with the professor just don't get the material. To give you an example I am in Intro E&M and halfway through the semester we have covered up to Capacitors!

Secondly it seems like the people who take these classes don't really have any conceptions of how physics and math relate besides there are some relations that the professor will make you learn to do good on the test.

That's really the thing isn't it? I think in the end 90% of the kids in a regular intro physics course don't want to do anything besides get in and get out with an ok enough grade to continue. I think it is kind of a waste the time that some professors put into trying to teach them the material, they don't not get it because they are dumb - although a few of them are- they mostly don't get it because they don't care.

As a side note as a prospective physicsist, I have hated pretty put everything about Intro Physics and can see how it can be frustrating to anyone. Tons of hand waving explanations, trying to cram a ton of material into a semester and really only cover it at a very light level. I'd rather have dived into a physics class where we get taught everything from the very basics of some topic to an intermediate understanding of it in one foul swoop, I think that would have been a much rewarding year of my life. I'm guessing such classes don't really exist?

 

[ice109]

what kind of ¨skill¨ is problem solving? problem solving is inherently a spontaneous occurrence! if you mean by problem solving using the algorithms physics students are taught then those are just as formulaic as anything else.

every statics problem ever:
¨draw the force diagram -> resolve the forces into components -> sum the forces in x,y and z to 0 -> solve for unknowns. ¨

every e&m problem ever:
¨draw the charge distribution -> find the field or potential (mirror charges or w/e) -> solve for unknowns¨

every qm problem ever:
¨draw the potential -> solve schrodinger´s eqn (it´s probably an infinite square well so just ¨guess¨ cosines and sines or complex exponentials) -> solve for k¨

i think the problem is the lie. don´t preach ¨problem solving skills¨ - preach what it really is algorithmic solutions. at least then students won´t be deceived.

 

[Pengwuino]

what kind of ¨skill¨ is problem solving? problem solving is inherently a spontaneous occurrence! if you mean by problem solving using the algorithms physics students are taught then those are just as formulaic as anything else.

If it were this easy, half the students who take the courses wouldn't be taking it for the 2nd/third time practically.

 

[turbo]

My freshman year, we had to live on-campus, and my roommate was pre-med. He took some of the same courses that I took, but his courses were stretched out over 2 semesters for every semester that I took. It was frustrating, because he expected me to carry him through the material, and he did not have the fundamentals to understand the basics of the materials. He was clueless, and did not study properly (he didn't have the foundation to do that anyway) and crammed relentlessly for exams, trying to memorize stuff. It was sad.

 

[Andy Resnick]

I've been thinking about this topic a lot- here's another item to consider:

In what other field (science or otherwise), does the curriculum start with a very simplified introductory explanation, and the as the student advances, they are told (time and again), that what they learned before "isn't really true, there's a better explanation, and here it is..."

I submit that Physics is the only branch of science that does this: not chemistry, not biology, not math, not any branch of study of any subject. To an outsider, this must appear very strange! How can physicists claim to know *anything*?

 

[flatmaster]

One thing I've noticed is all of the combinations of skill and motivation in students.

1 Skilled - Motivated
2 Skilled - Unmotivated <--me
3 Unskilled - Motivated
4 Unskilled - Unmotivated

I've had the opportunity to 1 on 1 tutor several of each of these students. I'd have to say that unskilled - motivated can be fixed overtime with 1 on 1 tutoring.

 

[turbo]

I've been thinking about this topic a lot- here's another item to consider:

In what other field (science or otherwise), does the curriculum start with a very simplified introductory explanation, and the as the student advances, they are told (time and again), that what they learned before "isn't really true, there's a better explanation, and here it is..."

I submit that Physics is the only branch of science that does this: not chemistry, not biology, not math, not any branch of study of any subject. To an outsider, this must appear very strange! How can physicists claim to know *anything*?

In the 60's this happened in chemistry, too. Students were weaned from a view in which electrons occupied orbital "shells" and were told that there were discrete energy levels that they could exist at around any given nucleus. That was an eye-opener to many.

 

[ice109]

In the 60's this happened in chemistry, too. Students were weaned from a view in which electrons occupied orbital "shells" and were told that there were discrete energy levels that they could exist at around any given nucleus. That was an eye-opener to many.

and i bet in the 60s chemistry classes had terrible passing rates too.

 

[lubuntu]

My post above was rather rantish but thinking about it more closely. I think that students do bad in intro physics mostly because they have never( and will probably never have again) a clsss where the tests are mostly based on how you can solve problems given a collection of concepts and see how they relate. Most of there classes are just learn concepts, terms,etc, write them on test, rinse and repeat.

 

[Phrak]

"Why? Why oh why do students have so much trouble in physics[?]"

Compared to chimps?

This is a science forum, Jim, and I demand a scale of comparison.

 

[Pengwuino]

"Why? Why oh why do students have so much trouble in physics[?]"

Compared to chimps?

This is a science forum, Jim, and I demand a scale of comparison.

With some of the students I've seen, chimps might be a fair comparison.

In comparison with other classes a typical student typically takes in a typical degree, typically.

I think anyone I've ever talked to who has taught physics says students complain they just don't get it more then any other subject.

 

[Moonbear]

I think Andy Resnick has made some excellent contributions on potential difficulties and ways to avoid them by making the course RELEVANT.

Also, for a non-science major who may have more experience with classes where creative thinking or writing is the major skill being used, switching to problem-solving mode can be quite challenging. They're two different skill sets, and the same reason a physics major might struggle in an intro creative writing course that the English majors can breeze through.

I must, again, object to the other comments being tossed around that the other sciences are somehow "soft" sciences. The same scientific method and rigor are applied to biology and chemistry as to physics. Perhaps, in such cases, it is the mindset of the instructor that the students are not as "worthy" that is putting them off from the subject. I'm also not sure what majors we are talking about here, since both biology and chemistry majors would also need to take calculus.

Likewise, are you adapting the curriculum and your expectations to the right level? If these are students who have not had calculus, are the concepts being explained in a way that you can understand without calculus? And what types of problems are they being given to solve? I honestly don't think physics is very easy to learn without calculus, so it takes a very skilled instructor to present the material to students who have never taken calculus. My guess is that instead of getting the most skilled instructors, they are getting the most novice TAs who do not have a lot of practice explaining physics in non-mathematical conceptual ways.

I also think there is a lot of bias in how people view student difficulties in their own subject area. Have those who are teaching physics ever taught any other subject to know how student complaints compare to other subjects? And, if the students ARE frequently struggling or complaining about the course, have they considered that it may be the teaching methods that need to be adjusted? For example, if you have a lot of bio or pre-med majors, there are numerous situations where physics gets used. You could use those examples to make it relevant to them. In fact, my undergrad anatomy students have not had a physics course, and that does cause problems with some things I try to teach them. I needed to explain to them that a lens inverts an image so they can understand why cutting a particular part of the optic nerves or optic tract or optic chiasm would result in blindness in particular areas of their visual field...they kept forgetting to invert the image from visual field to retina as it crossed the lens. And, when I teach them about muscle actions, some fundamental understanding of levers and pulleys would sure help them understand that better. And, when I taught about myelination on nerves, I had to oversimplify that it just "insulates" and just mentioned for the sake of any who actually do know a little physics that it's really increasing the capacitance. Not to mention that anyone who goes into radiology is going to need to learn a lot of physics.

It's not too difficult to go out to the other sciences and find relevant examples of physics in use to capture the interest of the students. And, when all else fails, you can always default to, "when you're working on improving your golf swing..."

 

[mvantuyl]

I took an introductory astronomy course a couple of summers ago. The vast majority of the students in the class were non-science majors. I talked with a couple of students who had dropped a geology class because it was too 'hard'. They were complaining that the astronomy course was also too 'hard', because it required some basic math (algebra) skills.

I made the point that since astronomy is a physics course, they should expect that a certain amount of math will be involved.

Their responses were basically that since they're required to take two science (Physics, Chemistry, Biology, or Geology) courses in order to graduate, the freshman-level classes should be easy.

 

[Dembadon]

I've noticed a disturbing trend since returning to school; students seem to have a greater tendency to fall into the "I just don't get it" mentality.

Given the high availability of an internet connection this day in age, I don't believe the "I just don't get it" excuse is valid. If one has issues with how the instructor is presenting a certain topic, one is sure to find something to one's liking on what is arguably the greatest resource on this planet; the internet.

I believe it boils down to the student simply not wanting to spend the extra time to understand difficult concepts.

- Robert

 

[rubrix]

In the 60's this happened in chemistry, too. Students were weaned from a view in which electrons occupied orbital "shells" and were told that there were discrete energy levels that they could exist at around any given nucleus. That was an eye-opener to many.

and it still happens. When i first learned of elector orbits, we were told each orbit fill step by step i.e. unless the prior one fills elector does not go to next one. We were of course told that this was an incomplete idea and does not work for elements with higher atomic number. That was idk...8th grade? Then in high school the s,p,d,f came up.

I submit that Physics is the only branch of science that does this: not chemistry, not biology, not math, not any branch of study of any subject. To an outsider, this must appear very strange! How can physicists claim to know *anything*?

I know what you mean. In primary school the Eath is round, in midschool it becomes orange, then in high school it turns into a sphere, and then later in college it turns out to be oblate spheroid.

 

[Sankaku]

Given the high availability of an internet connection this day in age, I don't believe the "I just don't get it" excuse is valid.

It might be the part of the source of the problem. Kids are now so used to 'instant gratification' that they want to understand any concept in under 3 minutes. Just flip to Wikipedia and bingo...

...or not. In which case "they just don't get it."

Discipline comes hard to homo sapiens. Modern culture isn't helping that.

 

[Phrak]

It might be the part of the source of the problem. Kids are now so used to 'instant gratification' that they want to understand any concept in under 3 minutes. Just flip to Wikipedia and bingo...

...or not. In which case "they just don't get it."

Discipline comes hard to homo sapiens. Modern culture isn't helping that.

...do I have to bring up the Chimps again?...

 

[davesface]

Sophomore physics/math dual major here, and I can definitely agree with a lot of what people are saying about students being lazy, used to instant gratification, etc. On the other hand, I've been having second thoughts about deciding to pursue a physics degree because of problemz with the math.

Now before somebody points out the obvious fact that physics majors should expect to use math, let me elaborate. My Physics I class focused on classical mechanics and was calculus-based, which was fair enough because most people were taking Calculus I at the same time. As that course moved towards the end, though, we were already being asked to solve elementary differential equations. The only explanation given to us by the professor was that we should be able to "just guess" the solution to the problems. The mathematician in me was absolutely livid.

Then came Physics II, which was essentially an introduction to electricity and magnetism. Now there were line integrals, surface integrals, volume integrals, vector operators, and I was in Calculus II (which covered 0 of these things). I struggled a lot with this class, and was really only able to get an A in it because I found an old edition of the Calculus III textbook and VERY slowly taught myself the math. Not an experience I care to soon repeat.

Now that I'm done with the basic math courses and have more freedom to take extra math classes before the typical physics student schedule plans for me to take them, I'm having a lot easier of a time. That being said, I can completely understand the frustration that somebody might be feeling in an introductory physics course due to the school's mismanagement of math classes because I was there myself. I don't hold it against the professors, because I think that they did their best, but they just were clearly not math teachers.

 

[Count Iblis]

The students have trouble because they are learning things at age 18 to 24 that they should have learned at age 12.

 

[symbolipoint]

Why? Why oh why... That is a big part of the difficulty. More Mathematical courses are really important. The minimum "prerequisites" are not often enough. You really need most or all of Calculus 2&3 for the most effective study of Physics 2 (Electricity and Magnetism).

 

[davesface]

The way the classes are structured (at least where I'm at, I can't speak in generalities) I wouldn't even be able to graduate in 4 years if I waited until I had taken Calculus 2 and 3 before taking Physics 2.

 

[Count Iblis]

Just flip to Wikipedia and bingo

Wikipedia will soon be the place to go to learn something from first principles. You can already learn about topics such as

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Method...80.93_logarithms_and_the_residue_at_infinity" that are explained in more detail than in most textbooks.

 

[symbolipoint]

The way the classes are structured (at least where I'm at, I can't speak in generalities) I wouldn't even be able to graduate in 4 years if I waited until I had taken Calculus 2 and 3 before taking Physics 2.

You're right, and not everyone can put all of their courses inside of 4 years. The academically less-developed people need to progress through some redemial courses, at least for Mathematics, before reaching Trigonometry or Pre-Calculus. Some of these people do not see the value in this effort and choose a major field that does not require Calculus; and others are very decided on studying one of the "hard" sciences and will go through the effort; doing so and finally graduating would require maybe 2 or 3 more years, depending on intermediary paths which such students might take.

 

[Sankaku]

Wikipedia will soon be the place to go to learn something from first principles.

I agree - I love Wikipedia.

What I am saying is that kids don't have to invest time or money into getting information now. Before, you would have to discover which book you needed for the topic you wanted to understand, then order it and pay a substantial amount of money. Then you would go home and devote some time to actually reading the thing.

Now, if they can't make sense of a wiki article in 3 minutes, they just give up and flip back to facebook.

It is the fallacy that knowledge should be instant because it is only a click away. Most people here know that the info is useless without a heck of a lot of work.

Not a criticism of wiki - it is a criticism of the instant culture...

 

[Jammin_James]

I don't know if people are being lazy, to be honest.

Some people are just raised to believe that if they don't grasp the material the first time they will never understand it. I used to be that way anyways.

 

[Pengwuino]

I think Andy Resnick has made some excellent contributions on potential difficulties and ways to avoid them by making the course RELEVANT.

Also, for a non-science major who may have more experience with classes where creative thinking or writing is the major skill being used, switching to problem-solving mode can be quite challenging. They're two different skill sets, and the same reason a physics major might struggle in an intro creative writing course that the English majors can breeze through.

This is a pretty typical explanation I hear. What I don't understand is that I do well in every other class I took, but I think I'm unique. Amazingly it seems like most people I know in my department have trouble in a lot of non-science course.

I must, again, object to the other comments being tossed around that the other sciences are somehow "soft" sciences. The same scientific method and rigor are applied to biology and chemistry as to physics. Perhaps, in such cases, it is the mindset of the instructor that the students are not as "worthy" that is putting them off from the subject. I'm also not sure what majors we are talking about here, since both biology and chemistry majors would also need to take calculus.

At my university, by most accounts the biology courses are very easy. I think a lot of people see biology as a possible means into pre-med or simply a soft science they can handle. With this in mind, I think a lot of people run into biology like a brick wall. I think our department has a 70% major switching rate or something ridiculous. I wonder if the professors dumb down their courses to keep this problem down at my university.

Likewise, are you adapting the curriculum and your expectations to the right level?

The course I teach the lab for is almost all taught by PhD professors (the lecture that is) who all teach is without a person having to even known what calculus is. Sometimes I think it's just people having a terrible grasp of algebra since we amazingly have a mathematics standards test to enter the university... yet we also have remedial classes that tecah stuff that... was on the test?

I also think there is a lot of bias in how people view student difficulties in their own subject area. Have those who are teaching physics ever taught any other subject to know how student complaints compare to other subjects? And, if the students ARE frequently struggling or complaining about the course, have they considered that it may be the teaching methods that need to be adjusted?

In my experience, it's the students who actually complain that physics is the hardest courses they take. I feel like sitting in on one of the classes the students complain about and see just exactly what their complaints are.

 

[Office_Shredder]

Maybe it's just that ridiculous proportions of people are going to college now, whereas it used to be only people who were better qualified went to college. Since the only people who can be added to the college pool tend to be those on the lower end of the scale, you would expect the average to drop.

That effect may not be able to explain away how many students have issue with working hard, since you would expect those good enough to have gone to college in the past to continue to work hard, but there's definitely a psychological knock-on effect. People who used to be at the bottom of the class in college, and would have to work hard to keep up with their peers, now sit comfortably in the middle range with little incentive to keep pushing.

 

[Andy Resnick]

I really uncomfortable with the quantity of people here blaming 'lazy students'. I think it's more of a reflection on the commenter- specifically, an elitist attitude that does not encourage the non-physicist to develop even a passing interest in physics.

You all who claim all "those students" are lazy and should not even be in college should remind yourselves that *they* outnumber *you*, *they* elect politicians that determine research funding levels, *they* elect people to school boards, etc. etc. So if you are not happy about the overall scientific illiteracy in this country, *you* should do a better job of reaching out to *them*.

 

[lubuntu]

I really uncomfortable with the quantity of people here blaming 'lazy students'. I think it's more of a reflection on the commenter- specifically, an elitist attitude that does not encourage the non-physicist to develop even a passing interest in physics.

You all who claim all "those students" are lazy and should not even be in college should remind yourselves that *they* outnumber *you*, *they* elect politicians that determine research funding levels, *they* elect people to school boards, etc. etc. So if you are not happy about the overall scientific illiteracy in this country, *you* should do a better job of reaching out to *them*.

Ok? So what? I do think it is a bit elitist but why shouldn't it be? To value hard work in difficult subject over not? Just because there is more of them doesn't mean they are correct. Certainly there is room to bridge the gap and allow non-physics people to learn about the science, but to be honest it seems like intro physics(as it is taught now) isn't a very good place to do it. The students I've seen in classes are indeed lazy and apathetic when it comes to physics. If you really want to change that and spark an interest it seems like a mickey mouse class in mechanics where you lie to them isn't the way to do.

 

[Count Iblis]

I agree - I love Wikipedia.

What I am saying is that kids don't have to invest time or money into getting information now. Before, you would have to discover which book you needed for the topic you wanted to understand, then order it and pay a substantial amount of money. Then you would go home and devote some time to actually reading the thing.

Now, if they can't make sense of a wiki article in 3 minutes, they just give up and flip back to facebook.

It is the fallacy that knowledge should be instant because it is only a click away. Most people here know that the info is useless without a heck of a lot of work.

Not a criticism of wiki - it is a criticism of the instant culture...

I agree that this is a problem. On the other hand, you now also have ten year olds who just by browsing the internet for a few minutes can pick up some interesting mathematics or physics that the previous generation would only have encountered at university.

If someone gets interested in calculus at the age of ten then that person will have a huge advantage over people who only learn it at university.

 

[rogerharris]

a different perspective on the original question is that the average mind does not cope well with physics. the average mind wants information that pertains to getting along in the social environment. Physics is about intrinsic deep understanding that's outwith all that, and uses different parts of the brain.

I read an article in scientific american that describes how these parts of the brain are competing for neural resources. Social information vs intrinsic physical information. I think this translates to a frontal lobe vs sensory cortices struggle. The frontal lobe is shutting out the physical world basically.

there is a new branch of physics which predicts social behaviour using physical laws, so that might be an angle to get the average socially orientated person interested in the subject.

 

[Dembadon]

I really uncomfortable with the quantity of people here blaming 'lazy students'. I think it's more of a reflection on the commenter- specifically, an elitist attitude that does not encourage the non-physicist to develop even a passing interest in physics.

You all who claim all "those students" are lazy and should not even be in college should remind yourselves that *they* outnumber *you*, *they* elect politicians that determine research funding levels, *they* elect people to school boards, etc. etc. So if you are not happy about the overall scientific illiteracy in this country, *you* should do a better job of reaching out to *them*.

I appreciate your perspective, Andy. I didn't mean to imply that all students who "don't get it" are lazy. I realize that there are many people who could possibly obtain an interest and a passion for science if they were properly mentored / instructed.

I was mainly expressing my disappointment with those who seem to give up without putting much effort into their studies.

 

[Sankaku]

I agree that this is a problem. On the other hand, you now also have ten year olds who just by browsing the internet for a few minutes can pick up some interesting mathematics or physics that the previous generation would only have encountered at university.

Yes, the internet is the ultimate double-edged sword. I really wish that I had had wikipedia when I was 10 years old!

What is happening is a kind of exaggeration effect. Those people who are motivated now have almost unlimited access to information in order to pursue their passions. Those that have been trapped by instant culture now have even less motivation to work hard at the sciences (or other 'difficult' subjects), because the homework assignments in their OTHER classes can just be copied from somewhere online.

I think that it is important to have mentoring and positive experiences early on in life. These can show the student that hard work brings rewards and that difficult subjects like the sciences are worth studying. Whether everyone gets a PhD is not the point. Whether we have a scientifically literate society is more important...