A New Model for Academic Faculty IV: One Can’t Fix What Isn’t Really Broken

TL;DR I conclude that the equity movement is well intentioned but is a waste of time until we reassert classroom autonomy that has literally been taken from us by administrators and outside parties (e.g. the testing industry), and autonomy that we have ceded without resistance. Once again this is mostly a brain dump of thoughts […]

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The Hypocrisy of Traditional Tests

TL;DR Traditional tests require students to work a few (hopefully) appropriately chosen, illustrative problems to demonstrate proficiency. What does it matter if they do these few problems early in the semester or later in the semester? What does it matter if they do them with us watching or not? What makes one essentially random problem […]

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Conceptual Understanding in Introductory Physics XXXVI: Geometry and Work

This question is particularly revealing in that it assesses whether or not students understand the coordinate-free nature of work as a dot product. Be prepared to hear such nonsense locutions as “negative force” or “negative displacement” but don’t be shocked when you hear them. I think it’s a product of the relatively poor treatment vectors […]

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Conceptual Understanding in Introductory Physics XXXV: Free-body Diagrams

Free-body diagrams are ubiquitous in introductory physics courses. They should be straightforward, but I’ve noticed that student frequently struggle with them at first because they want to include velocity or momentum in addition to forces. For this question, choose an arbitrary (the more arbitrary, the better) physical situation. It could be something from your or […]

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