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 ==Abstract==
 Jack Uretsky, in a Phys-L post "Re: Student engagement"
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 ==Body==
-Mike Horton (2009) in his Phys-L post "Student engagement" wrote:
+...
 <blockquote>Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University

Shawn: Created page with '==Abstract== Jack Uretsky, in a Phys-L post "Re: Student engagement" wrote: "American education has produced a number of physics Nobelists. How many were products of physics co…'

2009-12-09T03:12:03Z

Created page with '==Abstract== Jack Uretsky, in a Phys-L post "Re: Student engagement" wrote: "American education has produced a number of physics Nobelists. How many were products of physics co…'

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==Abstract==
Jack Uretsky, in a Phys-L post "Re: Student engagement"
wrote: "American education has produced a number of physics
Nobelists. How many were products of physics courses that would be
approved by PER enthusiasts?" My answer: "Probably near zero. BUT SO
WHAT?" Physics Education Researchers (PER's) have attempted to design
courses which enhance the learning of the vast majority of AVERAGE
students, not potential Nobelists. Why the emphasis on the "average
student" rather than the "exceptional student"? Because most
exceptional students will learn on their own, even despite the (for
them) usually helpful but unnecessary "interactive engagement." On
the other hand, the fate of life on planet Earth is in the hands and
minds of the masses of "average students" who, at least in
democracies, control national policy - see e.g., "The Threat to Life
on Planet Earth Is a More Important Issue Than David Brooks' 'Skills
Slowdown [Hake (2009)].

==Body==
Mike Horton (2009) in his Phys-L post "Student engagement" wrote:

"In a conversation at work recently, I came to realize that everyone
defines 'student engagement' differently. I was in a group where
'engagement' meant 'students are busy.' What they are busy doing
was unimportant. When I explained that it means something totally
different in science, they had never heard of such a thing. Then
when I said that there are mountains of PER showing that the type of
engagement that we scientists are speaking of is far more effective
than lecture (no matter how 'engaging' the lecturer thinks his/her
lectures are) the conversation really got heated."

For the record, in "Interactive-engagement vs traditional methods: A
six thousand-student survey of mechanics test data for introductory
physics courses" [Hake (1998a)], I defined "Interactive Engagement"
(IE) methods as those "designed at least in part to promote
conceptual understanding through active engagement of students in
heads-on (always) and hands-on (usually) activities which yield
immediate feedback through discussion with peers and/or instructors."

Horton's post initiated a thread of 40+posts (as of 12 Dec
09:45:00-0800), one of which was by Jack Uretsky (2009), who wrote:

"American education has produced a number of physics Nobelists. How
many were products of physics courses that would be approved by PER
enthusiasts?"

Probably near zero. BUT SO WHAT?

The hard facts are that the *average* present-day student of
introductory physics - even at Harvard and MIT - reacts passively to
lectures and learns very little from them. This has been
demonstrated, for example, by the very low class-average *normalized*
gains <g> of 0.23 [plus or minus 0.04 (std dev)] on a test of
conceptual understanding of Newtonian Mechanics in 14 traditional
lecture courses surveyed in "Interactive-engagement vs traditional
methods: A six-thousand student survey of mechanics test data for
introductory physics courses" (Hake 1998a,b). These gains are to be
compared with <g> = 0.48 [plus or minus 0.14 (std dev)] of 48
traditional lecture courses that I surveyed. Similar results have
been reported in about 25 other physics education research reports as
listed in "Design-Based Research in Physics Education Research: A
Review" (Hake 2008).

Long aware of the deficiencies of the average introductory physics
course - see e.g., the review by McDermott & Redish (1999) - Physics
Education Researchers (PER's) have attempted to design courses - see
e.g., Hake (1998b) - which enhance the learning of the vast majority
of AVERAGE students, not potential Nobelists.

Why the emphasis on the "average student" rather than the
"exceptional student"? Because most exceptional students will learn
on their own, even despite the (for them) usually helpful but
unnecessary "interactive engagement." On the other hand, the fate of
life on planet Earth is in the hands and minds of the masses of
"average students" who, at least in democracies, control national
policy - see e.g., "The Threat to Life on Planet Earth Is a More
Important Issue Than David Brooks' 'Skills Slowdown [Hake (2009)].

A quote from the late physics education guru Arnold Arons (1997, p.
vii) seems appropriate:

"I point to the following unwelcome truth: much as we might dislike
the implications, research is showing that didactic exposition of
abstract ideas and lines of reasoning (however engaging and lucid we
might try to make them) to passive listeners yields pathetically thin
results in learning and understanding - except in the very small
percentage of students who are specially gifted in the field."

<blockquote>Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University
24245 Hatteras Street, Woodland Hills, CA 91367
Honorary Member, Curmudgeon Lodge of Deventer, The Netherlands
rrhake at symbol earthlink.net>
http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake/
http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi/
http://HakesEdStuff.blogspot.com/
http://iub.academia.edu/RichardHake</blockquote>

"A remarkable feature of American colleges is the lack of attention
that most faculties pay to the growing body of research about how
much students are learning and how they could be taught to learn more.
Derek Bok (2005) in "Are colleges failing? Higher ed needs new
lesson plans."

==References==
[Tiny URL's courtesy http://tinyurl.com/create.php.]
Arons, A.B. 1997. Teaching Introductory Physics. Wiley. Amazon.com
information at http://tinyurl.com/ykx4bak.

Bok, D. 2005. "Are colleges failing? Higher ed needs new lesson
plans," Boston Globe, 18 December, copied into the APPENDIX of Hake
(2005a). Bok wrote: ". . . . studies indicate that problem-based
discussion, group study, and other forms of active learning produce
greater gains in critical thinking than lectures, yet the lecture
format is still the standard in most college classes, especially in
large universities. Other research has documented the widespread
use of other practices that impede effective learning, such as the
lack of prompt and adequate feedback on student work, the
prevalence of tests that call for memory rather than critical
thinking, and the reliance on teaching methods that allow students
to do well in science courses by banking on memory rather than
truly understanding the basic underlying concepts."

Hake, R.R. 1967, "Paramagnetic Superconductivity in Extreme Type II
Superconductors," Phys. Rev. 158(2): 356-376.

Hake, R.R. 1998a. "Interactive-engagement vs traditional methods: A
six thousand-student survey of mechanics test data for introductory
physics courses," Am. J. Phys. 66: 64-74, online at
http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi/ajpv3i.pdf.

Hake, R.R. 1998b. "Interactive-engagement methods in introductory
mechanics courses," online at
http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi/IEM-2b.pdf (108 kB). A crucial
companion paper to Hake (1998a). Average pre/post test scores,
standard deviations, instructional methods, materials used,
institutions, and instructors for each of the survey courses of are
tabulated and referenced. In addition the paper includes: (a) case
histories for the seven IE courses whose effectiveness as gauged by
pre-to-post test gains was close to those of T courses, (b) advice
for implementing IE methods, and (c) suggestions for further
research. Submitted on 6/19/98 to the Physics Ed. Res. Supplement to
Am. J. Phys, but universally ignored because it was rejected by the
editor on the grounds that the very transparent Physical-Review-type
data tables [see e.g., Table II of Hake (1967)] were "impenetrable"!
<nowiki>:-(.</nowiki>

Hake, R.R. 2005. "Are colleges failing?" AERA-L post of 19 Dec 2005
17:54:37-0800; online on the OPEN! AERA-L archives at
http://tinyurl.com/2rdc88. The APPENDIX contains a copy of Bok
(2005).

Hake, R.R. 2008. "Design-Based Research in Physics Education
Research: A Review," in Kelly, Lesh, & Baek (2008). A pre-publication
version of that chapter is online at http://tinyurl.com/2lsgzl.

Hake, R.R. 2009. " 'The Threat to Life on Planet Earth' Is a More Important Issue Than David Brooks' 'Skills Slowdown', " online at http://tinyurl.com/l28ojd with a provision for comments.

Horton, M. 2009. "Student engagement," Phys-L post of 4 Dec 2009 01:39:05-0600, online on the OPEN! Phys-L archives at https://carnot.physics.buffalo.edu/archives/2009/12_2009/msg00014.html.

Kelly, A.E., R.A. Lesh, & J.Y. Baek. 2008. "Handbook of Design Research Methods in Education: Innovations in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Learning and Teaching, Routledge. Publisher's information at http://tinyurl.com/4eazqs; Amazon.com
information at http://tinyurl.com/5n4vvo.

McDermott. L.C. & E.F. Redish. 1999. "RL-PER1: Resource letter on physics education research," Am. J. Phys. 67(9), 755-767; online to subscribers at
http://scitation.aip.org/dbt/dbt.jsp?KEY=AJPIAS&Volume=67&Issue=9.

Uretsky, J. 2009. "Re: Student engagement," Phys-L post of 5 Dec 2009 22:33:27-0600, online on the OPEN! Phys-L archives at online on the OPEN! Phys-L archives at
https://carnot.physics.buffalo.edu/archives/2009/12_2009/msg00031.html.

Hake:20091208 - Revision history

Shawn at 03:17, 9 December 2009

Shawn: Created page with '==Abstract== Jack Uretsky, in a Phys-L post "Re: Student engagement" wrote: "American education has produced a number of physics Nobelists. How many were products of physics co…'