Social media, like all things on the internet, can provide great benefits or be a total cesspool depending how it is managed. On the plus side, a teacher can funnel new discoveries directly to students. This is much preferable to waiting a few years for that to be published in textbooks. On the downside there are the usual trolls waiting for you. And obviously, we don’t want the classroom to resemble a website comments section. For this post, I’ll focus on Twitter and Facebook.
I was reluctant to sign up on Twitter with its 140 character limitations. However, I teach astronomy, and NASA is a Twitter machine. This is particularity true with ongoing missions. Once a mission has ended, but the data is still being processed, NASA seems to prefer Facebook to make those announcements. In Twitter culture, there is an emphasis on acquiring large amounts of followers. Unless you work in mass media, I would recommend looking for high quality of interaction over quantity. The Twitter landscape is populated by trolls and bot accounts. Target certain accounts that are subject related and be quick to use the block feature to prevent an interloper from ruining the experience. If Twitter is being used in a class, using a private account may be a good option.
Twitter is at its best when researchers are disseminating and reviewing results. At times, you may get to see the scientific process at work when scientists debate their results. In the class, this can be a demonstration of the dynamics of scientific discovery. Sometimes it’s messy! It can be used to display professionalism when researches volley back and forth over the meaning of their data. It can also be used to demonstrate that even professionals can stumble and personalize their arguments. In science, its the argument, not the person, that wins the day. Used wisely, Twitter can be a useful mechanism to bring current research results into the class.
Facebook is a different animal. With greater privacy settings, it is easier to contain the trolling element without going completely private. Once a mission has ended, NASA’s twitter accounts tend to go silent while further discoveries are announced on their Facebook accounts. For example, after the Messenger mission ended, the discovery that Mercury was shrinking was released on Facebook but not on Twitter. For astronomy, this makes Facebook a key supplement to Twitter. Unlike Twitter, Facebook does not have a character limit allowing for more descriptive posts. Also unlike Twitter, you are not likely to see scientific debates on Facebook. However, Facebook has a higher quality interface for images which is especially helpful for astronomy. To start off, below are some links.
For Twitter, you do not need an account to access a public Twitter feed. The blue check marks next to an account name verifies this is a legit feed.
Of course, as you explore various Twitter accounts you’ll find others that strike your fancy. Like Twitter, Facebook allows accounts to verify themselves as legit with a blue check mark. Facebook requires an account to view other feeds. Some good Facebook feeds to start with:
Over a thousand years ago, the Silk Road served to transport knowledge and ideas between Central Asia, China, India, and Western Europe. The internet serves the same purpose today and social media is a key component. With a little experience and time to manage it, social media can play a constructive role in the classroom.
“A metropolitan economy, if it is working well, is constantly transforming many poor people into middle-class people, many illiterates into skilled people, many greenhorns into competent citizens.” – Jane Jacobs
During the 1960’s, an urban dispute broke out between Jane Jacobs and Robert Moses. Nominally, the quarrel originated from Moses’s desire to build high speed expressways and master planned communities wiping out existing neighborhoods. However, it was really an age old debate on how to build communities. Moses favored a top-down process while Jacobs felt cities were best served by allowing neighborhoods to develop from the bottom up. While watching the documentary Citizen Jane which explored this era, it occurred to me this topic is universal in nature and applies just as well in education. If cities, as Jacobs said, transform illiterates into skilled people, certainly schools do the same. What can we learn from this era?
The challenge Moses faced was how to integrate a new technology (automobiles) into cities and relieve overcrowding. Urban renewal was not a new phenomena. The streets of Paris were widened and many older, medieval neighborhoods cleared out by Georges-Eugene Haussmann between 1853-70. Modern Paris largely owes its appearance to Haussmann’s efforts. Moses’ efforts were less successful integrating the automobile into the existing city and along with his master planned communities broke down crucial social connections. As the saying goes, bridges, not walls, build cities. Moses’ work effectively built walls in the city.
Cross Bronx Expressway dividing north and south Bronx. Credit: NYCEDC
Things came to a head when Moses proposed to build a highway through the SoHo and Little Italy neighborhoods in Lower Manhattan. A grassroots resistance effort led by Jane Jacobs put a stop to this plan and began the downfall of Robert Moses as a major power broker. Jacobs was opposed to master planning and felt cities become great organically by problem solving decisions made on the street level. As a result, there has been a tendency to view this as a you’re with us or you’re against us kind of debate. The truth is, you need central planning to provide a framework for individuals to make those uncoordinated decisions to complete a city.
Moses left his imprint all across New York State and Buffalo was no exception. Like New York City, neighborhoods were divided by the Kensington Expressway and waterfront access blocked by the Niagara Thruway. An expressway was constructed across Delaware Park that was designated as vacant land on the planning maps. Does this prove planning inherently to be a bad idea? Not when you consider the parkway system destroyed was master planned by Frederick Law Olmstead in the 1800’s. The highly successful existing street plan had been designed by Joseph Ellicott based on the same blueprint his brother used for Washington D.C. What differentiates good planing from bad planing and what can we take from that from building communities in classrooms?
Olmsted park and parkway system (green) complimented, rather than disrupted, the exiting city plan. This map of Buffalo is from 1896.
Infrastructure should not be viewed only as a means of moving material, but transporting and exchanging ideas as well. This was Moses’ key mistake. Interstates can move tens of thousands of cars in and out of a city, but unlike city streets, are not places for people to exchange ideas or build social connections. When that aspect of a community is taken away, the community begins to decay. When attempting to integrate new technology into the classroom, it has to be more than just delivering content, there has to be a mechanism in place to allow the class to exchange thoughts on the content delivered. Many students I have talked to have felt alienated, especially in online classes, by the lack of interaction made available.
Ideological arguments often take the form of all or nothing stances. In this case, whether discussing cities or the classrooms, we can’t look at it as all top down micromanagement vs. total freedom on the ground level. It’s like saying you only need air or gasoline in an automobile engine. One without the other will not make the engine work. You need the right mixture for optimal performance and the same is true for planning vs. ground level innovation. In education, the framework should be as follows:
A master curriculum for the course to cover, but allow the instructor the freedom to decide how to address it. The instructor will know the students needs and abilities much more than the bureaucracy above.
Within the framework of the class, students should be allowed to explore their own interests within each topic after a minimum proficiency is proven. In my course, this takes the form of discussion segments where students are allowed to present findings on a subject they have selected. Students have to be allowed to breathe and choose how they delve deeper into the subject.
Going back to the city analogy, without an overall plan to provide a framework, the result is a free for all situation. This would be reminiscent of when I lived in Houston during the late 1970’s when the city had no zoning laws. You ended up with adult book stores, strip joints, and message parlors located next to schools, an obviously undesirable situation. On the other hand, too much planning leaves neighborhoods devoid of any sort of vibrancy. This was seen in the high-rise projects all across the nation that were eventually imploded.
When something implemented does not work out as planned, adaptability, rather than doubling down on a poor idea, is desired. The aforementioned high rise projects looked great on paper, offering green space and play areas for children. In fact, Jane Jacobs herself originally thought these would be great for city life. Once the reality failed to match expectations, Jacobs reevaluated her position whereas Robert Moses did not. The same is true for a lesson plan that looks great on paper but fails to light a spark in the class. Keep what works, change what does not.
When introducing new technology into an existing classroom, it should compliment and enhance the current course structure. While I teach online, I am wary of high-tech evangelicals who view the internet as a cure all for what ails education. Technology can be a helpful tool. but the rush to “disrupt” the education sector can have the same results building highways in residential neighborhoods and parks did. That’s not disruption, it was destruction. We want to think in terms of improving the student experience, not to destroy it.
Come to think of it, that’s the approach to take in any community endeavor.
Awhile back, I stumbled across the 1976 TV movie Time Travelers. Originally intended as a series pilot, it did not sell and was broadcast as a stand alone movie with a story developed by Rod Serling in what was one of his last writing credits. The plot involved two scientists going back in time to 1871 on the eve of the Great Chicago Fire to track down a doctor who mysteriously had been able to cure a fatal disease. For a TV sci-fi movie, it had a solid plot but as one would expect, the special effects do not hold up well after four decades. Still, it got me thinking how different history could be taught now as compared to the pre-internet era when I originally saw the movie while I was in grade school. Also, if sci-fi can inspire students to study science, why not history as well?
Back in the 1970’s, studying history was basically a static exercise reading a history book. With the internet, many historical archives are at your fingertips and can make history a more interactive subject. Going back to the movie, when the scientists arrive in 1871 Chicago, one mentions they must have arrived in the Summer and not in October as it was too hot. His partner replies that Chicago endured a heat wave in October, 1871. Is that right? President Grant established the National Weather Service the same year, so daily records are a bit sparse, but the answer can be found online.
What you’ll discover is that the temperature in Chicago on the day of the fire soared to a summer-like 79 degrees with winds gusting from the Southwest at 22 mph. Also, precipitation the month leading up to the fire had been sparse, making the conditions ripe for the disaster. So, the movie was spot on about the weather conditions that day. By delving into old newspaper archives, we can find out more.
Back in the day, if you wanted to look at historical newspaper accounts, you went to the library and headed towards the microfilm machines. Today, many newspapers have digitized their archives. In the case of the New York Times, the online archive goes back to 1851. Looking into the Times account of the fire, I found a few surprises.
On October 7th, there had been a sizable six block fire in Chicago that served as a prelude to the main event. That fire raged until the morning of October 8th and was reported in the Times as the worst fire in Chicago history up to that point.
Credit: New York Times
On October 8th came in a report of a second fire now raging in Chicago even greater than the first. The progression of events in this article is not unlike the What’s Happened So Far features you now see in online formats today.
Credit: New York Times
October 10th would bring full front page coverage of the fire including a map of Chicago where the damaged occurred. The graphic is very unusual for papers of that era. The article, titled A City in Ruins, would go on to describe the damage as 12,000 buildings lost and 100,000 homeless, and remember, there was no FEMA back then. The cause was still being investigated. In fact, the Times made no mention of the infamous O’Leary cow until November 29th. A Chicago reporter later admitted making up the story, saying it made better copy. Unfortunately, fake news is nothing new. When O’Leary died in 1895, the obituary in the Times still repeated the fake story.
Credit: New York Times
The Times even repeated the story for O’Leary’s son’s obituary in 1925. This, despite the Times publishing an article four years earlier exonerating O’Leary’s cow, proving the stubborn power of a false myth.
Credit: New York Times
The fire did start near the O’Leary residence at 137 De Koven St. You can locate this spot using Google Maps but you’ll need the current address of 558 W. De Koven St. What you’ll find there is, not by coincidence, the Chicago Fire Training Academy. Switching to 3-D gives this overview:
558 W. DeKoven St lower left. The Chicago river to the east failed to act as a fire break as hoped when flames moved across river bridges towards downtown. Credit: Google Maps.
As noted before, there was a strong wind from the SW the day of the fire and you can see from the image how that would have swept the flames into the heart of downtown Chicago inflicting maximum damage on the city’s residents. The fire had economic effects beyond Chicago. The price of stocks dropped 10% the days after the fire. This was a prelude to the economic crisis of 1873 which prompted a depression lasting until 1879. Chicago, then and now, is the United States’s largest railroad center and the fire had a disruptive effect throughout the nation. And that is probably what led to my biggest surprise on this project.
The Chicago fire was not the most deadly fire in the United States that day. The drought conditions that led to the Chicago fire sparked forest fires throughout the Upper Midwest. The worst of which was north of Green Bay and engulfed the town of Pishtego, WI killing over 1,200, four times more than in Chicago. The first and only article on this event appeared in the Times on October 15th and soon faded into obscurity.
Credit: New York Times
I hate to admit it, but this was the first time I had heard of the Pishtego fire. It deserves a more prominent place in grade school history books and provides a greater understanding of the Chicago fire as part of an overall regional disaster.
I would be remiss in pointing out that as great as it is to have these internet resources at our fingertips, there are still some historical items not available online and it never hurts to check out your local library, especially the closed stacks, to see what might be there. You’ll never know what surprises are in store.
Returning to the movie that started me on this topic, while travel back in time is allowed in general relativity, it is not remotely doable with current technology. One solution is to have an infinitely long, rotating cylindrical tube that can drag and distort space-time to the point where you travel back in time. Good luck finding one of those lying around. Another solution allows for backward time travel but only until your time machine became operational. In the case of the movie, you could only travel back in time to 1976, but not before. However, the engineering involved would be much, much more advanced than what we now have at our disposal. In fact, a civilization would require the ability to harness the energy of an entire galaxy to attempt this.
As long as you are careful to discern fact from fiction, time travel stories can be an entertaining way to explore history. In the case of Time Travelers, other concepts besides the fire touched upon includes the traumatic impact of Civil War deaths on the civilian population, and the romantic idea of traveling to the past would be diminished greatly if you had to use the medical facilities at the time. Unlike in 1976, when I first saw the movie, technical improvements today make it possible to examine historical documents of the Great Chicago Fire at home or in the classroom. I must admit, I would jump at the opportunity to travel into the past, but I also realize there are lots of things about life in 2017 that are really great.
*Image atop post is a Currier & Ives lithograph of the Great Chicago Fire.
Feynman begins his tale with the travel arrangements from Ithaca to Buffalo. He was spared the three hour drive by flying Robinson Airlines, with the plane piloted by Mr. Robinson himself. This regional airline was one of the many that began service after the war and would supplant train travel over the next few decades. Robinson Airlines eventually became Mohawk Airlines which was bought out by Allegheny Airlines in 1970. Allegheny changed its name to US Air in 1979 and was folded into American Airlines in 2015. A picture of a Robinson airplane along with Mr. Robinson can be found here.
Cornell gave Feynmen a $35 ($350 in 2017) stipend each week for his trouble. At first, Feynmen considered saving the money, but Feynman being Feynman, decided to use the funds to look for some adventures while in Buffalo after his lectures at the Cornell Aeronautical Laboratory. The facility was originally operated by Curtiss-Wright, but as the war ended, the company downsized its production in Buffalo greatly and turned the lab over as a gift to Cornell. During its run as a Cornell facility, the staff invented the crash test dummy, seat belts, and developed aircraft simulators. Now privately operated, the facility is still located across the street from the airport and is known as Calspan.
Feynman was hired by Cornell after working at the Manhattan Project where he became known for his uncanny ability to quickly solve equations and for picking locks. The latter was Feynman’s way of irking the powers that be at the project. During the first atomic test at the Trinity site, Feynman threw off his eye protection gear so as to be one of the few to actually witness the blast. However, Feynman eventually became melancholy over both the destructive nature of the atomic bomb and the death of his wife in June 1945 from tuberculosis. This may have contributed to his slow career start at Cornell.
“I would see people building a bridge and I would say “they don’t understand.” I really believed that it was senseless to make anything because it would all be destroyed very soon anyway, but they didn’t understand that and I had this very strange view of any construction that I would see, I would always think how foolish they are to try to make something. So I was really in a kind of depressive condition.” – Richard Feynman from the documentary The Pleasure of Finding Things Out.
Nonetheless, when Feynman got to Buffalo, he asked a local cab driver, a man named Marcuso, driving cab No. 169, to take him to a bar “with lots of interesting things going on.” The cabbie drove Feynman to the Alibi Room located at 8 W. Chippewa near the corner of Main St. The late 40’s, at the start of the post-war boom but before the exodus to the suburbs starting in the ’50’s, was when downtown was in its peak. The Alibi Room was situated in the heart of the theater district and the scene would have looked like this as Feynman’s cab approached the bar.
Main Street one block north of Chippewa, 1950, from a postcard of the era.
The Alibi Room itself was new, first appearing in the Buffalo Register in 1946. Feynman described it as a place where, “The women were dressed in furs, everybody was friendly, and the phones were ringing all the time.” As Feynman would later find out, the phones were ringing all the time as it was a local bookie joint, and the women in furs were ladies of the night. This is confirmed by my discussions with those familiar with the Alibi Room. Eventually, Feynman settled into a routine where he would order shots of Black and White scotch with chaser of water and close the place down at 2 AM – Buffalo’s current 4 AM closing time did not go into effect until the 1970’s.
This went on for the duration of the semester. Sometimes, Feynman would end up at an after hours speakeasy. Following his last lecture of the semester, Feynman found himself in a fight in the restroom at the Alibi Room. Once the situation calmed down, Feynman downed a shot of scotch, started talking loud, almost caused hostilities to resume at the bar with three friends of the original antagonist. Another regular at the bar, whom an appreciative Feynman later described as a first-rate expert in diffusing bar fights, interceded by pretending to be a friend of Feynman, then convinced Feynman to leave. Returning to Cornell with a black eye, Feynman went to teach his class, looked at his students, shiner and all, toughened up his tone of voice and asked…
“Any Questions?”
That was the end of Feynman’s adventures with Buffalo nightlife. In 1951, Feynman moved on to Caltech where he developed a quantum theory of electromagnetism. Referred to as quantum electrodynamics (QED), this theory incorporated relativity with quantum mechanics. Merging the two fields is the holy grail of physics. There are four basic forces of nature, electromagnetism, weak nuclear (released in radioactive decay), strong nuclear (released in nuclear explosions), and gravity. The first three are explained by quantum mechanics, the physics of atomic scale. Gravity is explained by relativity, the physics of large scale that we can see. Finding a quantum theory of gravity would unify relativity and quantum mechanics into “the theory of everything.”
Interestingly enough, despite unifying electromagnetism into quantum mechanics, Feynman was ambivalent about finding the theory of everything…
“Are you looking for the ultimate laws of physics? No, I’m not, I’m just looking to find out more about the world and if it turns out there is a simple ultimate law which explains everything, so be it, that would be very nice to discover. If it turns out it’s like an onion with millions of layers and we’re just sick and tired of looking at the layers, then that’s the way it is, but whatever way it comes out its nature is there and she’s going to come out the way she is, and therefore when we go to investigate it we shouldn’t pre-decide what it is we’re trying to do except to try to find out more about it.” – Richard Feynman from The Pleasure of Finding Things Out.
A decade later, around the time he was awarded the Nobel Prize, Feynman found himself in Buffalo once again and paid the Alibi Room a visit. His former adversaries were nowhere to be found. What would have happened if he had bumped into them again? Knowing Buffalo, and that generation, they probably would have bought Feynman a beer (or a Black and White) and had a good laugh.
This time around Feynman found the scene different, describing the formally posh bar and neighborhood as seedy. During the 1950’s, in Buffalo and across America, the middle-class fled the cities for the ranch houses and shopping malls in suburbia. The downtown stores started to close and buildings became vacant. Chippewa St. was on its way to becoming a red light district populated with flop houses, topless bars, and adult book stores. The street reached its nadir in the 1970’s.
Oddly enough, there was an optical lab located on Chippewa during the ’70’s. How do I know this? Before the age of one hour glasses, a repair job for broken glasses could take a week or more. After breaking my glasses in 6th grade, my eye doctor suggested I take them directly to the lab on Chippewa for a quick repair. I hopped on the No. 24 bus, got off at the foot of Chippewa, and headed for the Root Building where the lab was located. This was intriguing as Chippewa was the focal point for much of our middle school humor, but my trip was uneventful. I walked by the Alibi Room without taking note, unaware a Noble Prize physicist once hung out there. Got my glasses back, walked back past the forlorn Chippewa storefronts, noting how much the street resembled the ones television detective Baretta worked.
By the late ’70’s, the Alibi Room changed owners and was now operated as the New Alibi Lounge. I was not able to find any images of the original Alibi Room, given the going ons inside, I imagine photography would have been frowned upon. One image does survive from 1980 which shows the overall decline of the area Feynman commented on.
New Alibi Lounge is red building in center. The brown building to the left was once a Gutman’s store. Credit: Buffalo Department of Community Development/The Public.
Within a few years, all the buildings, including the former Alibi Room, would be gone. Cleared out in an urban renewal project, this block was an empty lot for most of the ’80’s when Feynman wrote Surely Your Joking, Mr. Feynman! The book was a best seller and Feynman became even more well known to the public as a member of the commission to investigate the Challenger disaster. It was Feynman who demonstrated to the public how the O-rings in the shuttle’s solid booster would have become brittle during the cold weather conditions the Challenger launched in.
Feynman passed away in 1988. At the same time, Fountain Plaza was rising on the former site of the Alibi Room. Once home to local banking operations, Fountain Plaza is now the site of IBM’s Buffalo Innovation Center as part of the continuing transition of the local economy.
Fountain Plaza in 2016. The Alibi Room was on the corner where the North Tower sits in middle of picture. Credit: Gregory Pijanowski
Throughout the 1990’s, Chippewa and the surrounding Theater District experienced a renaissance. Mark Goldman got the ball rolling with the Calumet Arts Cafe, also played a key role in the development of Canalside. The Root Building is now home to Emerson Commons, part of Emerson High’s Culinary program. Once again, Chippewa is an entertainment center in the city.
Beyond physics, Feynman’s legacy continues in education. During a stint on California’s Curriculum Commission, Feynman was critical of common educational techniques. For example, rather than emphasize memorization, Feynman pushed for comprehension of physical concepts. Feynman also wanted children to understand there are a variety of ways to solve mathematical problems. His reasoning is that scientists focus on getting the right answer, not a rote process. This is the underpinning of common core curriculum.
Common core is part of an overhaul to move education away from being geared toward the old industrial economy to one more suited for the 21st Century. During the early 1900’s, rural residents moved to cities as farming became mechanized, reducing the need for labor. The educational system was geared to train students for life in the manufacturing economy. Now, 100 years later, manufacturing is becoming more robotized, meaning labor has to switch over to a knowledge based economy. Feynman’s insights from his stint evaluating textbooks in the 1960’s influences science education to this day.
Chippewa Street today. Credit: Gregory Pijanowski
Last summer, a friend visited Buffalo and arrived at a downtown hotel. She asked the staff where was a good spot to eat. Like Richard Feynman some 70 years earlier, was suggested to go to Chippewa St. Upon arrival, she witnessed a bar brawl that had extended out onto the sidewalk.
The more things change…
*Image atop post is Richard Feynman giving a lecture on planetary orbits in 1964. Credit: United States Department of Energy/Wiki Commons.
Imagine building a new home with a flimsy frame, then subjecting it to the rigors of winter. As you might expect, the house would not stand up very well. That is what making an argument without credible facts is like. Governments generally try to spin the facts in their favor, but the new Trump administration has shown a propensity to discard facts all together. The first week in, this has resulted in mostly silly arguments over the size of the inauguration crowd. However, if government agencies such as the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) are politicized, important scientific and economic research can be compromised.
Most of us do not deal with economic statistics, or even think about calculating those figures. I’ll start with another example. Imagine being a baseball scout. Well, most of us have never come close to employment in baseball either, but at least have pulled a George Costanza and pretended we were. Lets consider the following scenario:
You are scouting a minor league prospect for a possible promotion to the majors. The player’s batting average is a mediocre .250, but since you get a bonus for scouting a player that makes it to the majors, you decide to report the player hits a stellar .350. Are you performing the service asked by your employer? Will your employer benefit from this falsified data. Is taking the money and running a good career move? Sound unrealistic? This is exactly what happened in the mortgage industry during the bubble years as substandard loans where classified as prime in quality.
Now consider this, you are employed by MLB to maintain and archive statistics. Your boss, who is a Yankees fan, orders you to lower David Ortiz’s career home run total from 541 to 200. Now imagine five years from now, when Ortiz is eligible for the hall of fame, your boss loudly proclaims via his Twitter account and media that Ortiz should not be considered for induction as his home run total of 200 does not merit it. The fan reaction would be, regardless of whether they think Ortiz belongs in the hall or not, justified outrage. As Bill Veeck once jokingly said, the baseball record book is cast in bronze, carved in marble and encased in cement. And, exaggeration aside, there is a reason for that.
It’s simply a matter of integrity of the game. When you want to find out what Ted Williams career on base percentage was, then see the staggering figure of .482, you want assurance that is a legitimate stat and not just something a Red Sox fan entered to puff up Williams reputation. You can argue who was better, Williams or DiMaggio, but you can’t argue Williams did not reach base 48% of the time. If the record book was not reliable, you really couldn’t have the who was better argument at all.
Now I want to ask is this, why should we place a higher standard on the baseball record book than government research? Nobody (except the players) would be harmed if baseball records were tampered with. That is not the case with government work. Economic policy is difficult enough with reliable data, almost impossible with tampered data. Considering suicides increase with unemployment, faulty policy due to rigged data would put lives at risk. It is imperative that the BLS is not politicized. The same holds true for government climate studies. If policy is not informed by reliable data, you can rest assured there will be a body count associated with that.
How can you tell the data is reliable? Replication of results is a good metric. The famous hockey stick graph indicating a climb in global temperatures over the past century has been replicated by independent sources. The same is true with the government inflation rate which has matched MIT’s Billion Price Index. One data set that was not replicated? Andrew Wakefield’s claim that vaccines cause autism. As it turned out, every one of Wakefield’s child subjects had their medical records falsified. The result? As the public received false data, vaccination rates fell in the U.K. and U.S., causing needless outbreaks of preventable diseases.
If we are going to treat politics as sport, the least we can do is demand the same honesty in government record keeping. The public will not be able to argue the pros or cons of policy without reliable data to go by. If we do not maintain the validity of government data, besides endangering lives, we endanger the integrity of our democracy.
During the next year I will be making the switch in my astronomy course from the standard textbook (Explorations/Arny) I have been using for ten years to an open source text. Not an easy decision to make. The text I have been using always got great feedback from my students and in a pedagogical sense, was quite excellent in relating astronomy to phenomena we see in our daily lives. When I designed the course back in 2005, the text, smartly sequenced, served as the backbone to organizing the course.
When I started teaching, the text ran from $75-$110 (used/new) and included the Starry Night planetarium software. Starry Night runs about $50 if buying separately so the students got an excellent value here. Around 2010, the publisher discontinued including Starry Night but I was able to replace that in the course with the freeware Stellarium. Still, the cost of the text (along with all other texts) continued to skyrocket. Currently, the new edition goes for $240 placing a financial hardship on the students. Too many students were delaying or avoiding all together buying the text and the change simply had to be made. For all the great attributes of that text, none of it is any good if the students are unable to purchase it.
Switching to the OpenStax Astronomy text has some definite advantages. The online versions has links for each section that can be embedded in the course web platform. The big plus is its free, meaning the students will have access to it as soon as the course opens up for the semester. The text was designed for a two semester sequence and as my course is one semester, it does require some significant planning to pull out which sections to use and which ones not to. Obviously, I can’t expect my students to read 1,100 pages for a three credit hour course.
Given the current inability of traditional publishers to provide affordable textbooks, this does appear to be the future. When it comes to change, it’s better to be ahead of the curve rather than behind.
That being said, the original text book has become almost like an old friend. Even though it will cease to be used in the course, it will always have a prominent place on my bookshelf as a reminder of the over 1,000 students I have taught with it.
We tend to think of the Earth as apart from the rest of the universe. That is natural as astronomy is the science of looking away from our home planet. While there are many things in space we do not experience in our daily lives such as relativistic effects and black holes, there are other phenomena in space that are closely related to our day-to-day lives. Some introductory astronomy texts lump the Earth and Moon in a chapter with all the other inner planets. I think this is a mistake. A separate section should be dedicated to the Earth and Moon as a starting point to understanding space.
There are many Earth to space examples to pick from and below I’ll describe a few.
I’ll start on the ground level. The Earth experiences plate tectonics along with resultant earthquake and volcanic activity. Lets take a look at shield volcanoes. These volcanoes vent liquid lava rather than explosive pyroclastic material we typically associate with such events as the Mount St. Helens eruption in 1981. Shield volcanoes are gently sloping (Hence, they resemble shields) as liquid lave runs downhill quickly preventing the buildup of steep slopes. A prominent example are the Hawaiian Island chain situated above the Hawaii hot spot. Why is there a chain rather than just one island? As the Earth’s tectonic plate slides over the hot spot, a chain of islands are formed.
Shield volcano of Mauna Kea in Hawaii where the Keck Observatory sits at the summit. Credit: Wiki Commons.
The largest shield volcano in the Solar System is Olympus Mons on Mars. This volcano stands 16 miles high (Mt. Everest is 5.5 miles high) and has a base the size of Arizona. The low gravity of Mars, a third that of Earth, allows for the extreme height of Olympus Mons. And why is Olympus Mons a single volcano rather than a chain like Hawaii? Mars does not have plate tectonics as Earth does. Hence, the crust of Mars never slid across the hot spot as the Hawaiian Islands did on Earth. Understanding the nature of shield volcanoes on Earth can be integrated into an comprehension that Mars has smaller mass, thus, smaller gravity than Earth and no plate tectonic activity either. Land features are not the only place to find planetary similarities.
Computer generated image of Olympus Mons using data from Mars Global Surveyor laser altimeter. Credit: NASA/MOLA Science Team/ O. de Goursac, Adrian Lark.
The rotation of Earth affects air circulation via the Coriolis effect. In the Northern Hemisphere, air movement is deflected to the right. In the Southern Hemisphere, air movement is deflected to the left. What this means is in the Northern Hemisphere, low pressure systems rotate in a counterclockwise pattern. You can see this in radar shots of hurricane systems which are massive regions of low pressure. High pressure systems rotate in a clockwise pattern. The pattern is reversed in the Southern Hemisphere.
Hurricane Mathew circulating in a counterclockwise fashion. Credit: NOAA.
Now lets take a look at Jupiter’s Giant Red Spot from this time lapse video of the approach of Voyager I in 1979.
Jupiter rotates in the same fashion as Earth. That is, counterclockwise if looking down from the North Pole. At first glance, the Giant Red Spot seems to resemble a hurricane and it might be easy to assume it is an area of low pressure. However, it is in the Southern Hemisphere and rotates counterclockwise. By understanding how the Coriolis effect works on Earth, you can deduce the Giant Red Spot is actually an area of high pressure. Beyond this raging centuries old storm, understanding the nature of Earth’s magnetic field will help one understand the space environment surrounding Jupiter.
Most of the matter we encounter is electrically neutral. That is, their constituent atoms contain as many negatively charged electrons as positively charged protons. In space, the Sun is hot enough to break the atomic bonds between electrons and protons. The result is an electrified gas called plasma. Neon lights are filled with plasma. When plasma encounters a magnetic field, it’s electrically charged particles travel along the path of a magnetic field line in helix pattern seen below.
Credit: cnx.org
This can be visualized on the Sun which has a more complex magnetic field than the Earth. The Solar Dynamics Observatory images plasma traveling along the solar magnetic field lines in formations referred to as coronal loops.
Coronal loops. Credit: SDO/NASA
Back on Earth, these charged particles move along the magnetic field lines until they hit the upper atmosphere in the polar regions. Nitrogen and oxygen atoms absorb the kinetic energy of the incoming particles causing electrons to jump to a higher energy orbit. When the electron moves back to its usual lower energy orbit, the absorbed kinetic energy is converted and released as light. This light is known as the aurora. Earth is not the only planet with an aurora, the gas giants have strong magnetic fields that produce the same effect, albeit mostly in ultraviolet. This presents a good opportunity to understand that light and ultraviolet are both electromagnetic radiation. The difference is our eyes are not designed to detect ultraviolet rays, but our skin can in the form of sunburn. The aurora of Saturn as imaged by the Hubble can be seen below.
Credit: NASA/ESA/J. Clarke (Boston University).
Electrons, when accelerated, will emit radio waves. This is the principle behind radio transmitters. Electrons are accelerated up and down a radio tower causing the transmission of a radio broadcast. The same thing happens in space when electrons are accelerated along the path of a magnetic field line. Jupiter emits radio waves in this fashion that can be detected on Earth with ham radio sets. This process plays itself out in the deepest regions of the universe. For one such example, we’ll take a look a the galaxy Centaurus A located 12 million light years away. Below is an optical image of the galaxy.
Credit: ESO
In 1949, it was discovered this galaxy was a strong emitter of radio waves. Below is a radio image of Centaurus A.
Credit: NRAO/AUI
The radio source emanates perpendicular to the mass of the galaxy. Each lobe is a million light years long (10 times the width of the Milky Way) and would appear 20 times the size of a full Moon if we could see radio waves. This suggests a massive stream of plasma being ejected from the galaxy. What could cause this to happen? In the core of Centaurus A resides a black hole 55 million times the mass of the Sun.
It seems counter-intuitive that a black hole could result in such a massive ejection of matter. We think of black holes as objects that suck in everything, including light. However, some of the matter in the accretion disk surrounding the black hole hits a magnetic field before crossing the event horizon. So instead of continuing into the black hole, the plasma is accelerated and ejected violently along the magnetic field line exiting the galaxy. Below is a composite image of Centaurus A with optical, radio, and x-ray imaging.
Credit: ESO/WFI (Optical); MPIfR/ESO/APEX/A.Weiss et al. (Submillimetre); NASA/CXC/CfA/R.Kraft et al. (X-ray)
There is a tendency to think of Earth science and astronomy as separate fields of study, but as we live on Earth we are also living in space – under the protective cover of the atmosphere. The first step in understanding space is to learn the science behind what we experience in our surroundings. From there, we can explore and understand the universe.
*Image atop post – Earth and the Milky Way from the International Space Station. Credit: NASA.
And by that, I do not mean the administration of an educational institution should not be conducted in a businesslike manner. What I mean is that students should not be treated in the same fashion as a business treats a customer. Recent events have focused on for-profit colleges such as ITT Technical Institute which has closed due to irregularities in both academic standards and financial aid. However, a well funded ideological movement is in place at a state level to promote a profit orientated curriculum. Nominally, this is free-market ideology but as we’ll see, in fact, this is detrimental to a well functioning market economy.
Free market models taught in undergrad micro incorporate some pretty abstract concepts. These include competition to the point that neither an individual buyer or seller can impact the price of a product. Also, both buyer and seller has perfect knowledge of the market which leads to a rational transaction process. These conditions result in an optimal allocation of resources. This model is akin to the Carnot engine in physics. No engine can run more efficiently than a Carnot engine. However, the Carnot engine is impossible to build as it requires zero friction and would violate the 2nd law of thermodynamics. What the Carnot engine does is help us understand the inefficiencies of real engines and the same is true of basic free market models. In the case of education, perfect knowledge, or lack thereof, is the key.
Asymmetric information in a competitive situation presents profit opportunity depending on who holds the upper hand. It is why inside information, despite its illegality, is often sought in financial markets. It is why websites offer pricing information on products such as gasoline to arm consumers in the market. In its more egregious forms, it is how some auto repair shops dupe customers in repairs they do not need or doctors charge for procedures a patient does not require. In a non-business sense, it is why a sports team will attempt to steal signals from the opposition to get the advantage in a competitive contest. Information asymmetry is not always unethical, but it is why businesses do not voluntarily disclose their hands when making a deal, and why businesses, if they are smart, require due diligence before closing a deal.
Education has information problems on two fronts. One is temporal and the other is the lack of information the student has enrolling in an educational institution. As Alfred Marshall noted in 1890, students are in the dark as to how valuable in monetary terms their education will be years down the road. Conversely, future employers have no way of investing in education years before they even meet a student. For Marshall, this meant the free-market would in general fund education below optimal levels and necessitated public funding to make up the gap. The lack of information on the student side of the equation also means an educational institution operating on a for profit basis may seek to exploit this asymmetry for gain just as a business would.
In terms of social policy, the role of education is to reduce, not to exploit, information shortfalls a student possesses.
Kenneth Arrow, in his landmark paper on asymmetric information in the health care industry, notes that social structures are established to protect a patient against exploitation. Arrow notes that the societal expectation of a physician’s behavior towards a patient is much different than that of a salesman towards a customer. A doctor is expected to act with the patient’s welfare in mind. Some of the expectations are by nature of the social contract such as the Hippocratic Oath, some are monetary in nature such as ACA regulations which stipulate that reimbursement for services are tied to patient health outcomes. Given that students enroll in a school with the same kind of information disadvantage, it is sensible that educational institutions operate within a similar framework.
Recently, the Frank-Dodd Act has enacted regulations upon financial institutions to act on a customer’s behalf in situations when the institution has a higher degree of product awareness. One, of many, of the factors leading to the mortgage bubble was a lack of understanding of the product customers were signing into. One such example would be daily simple interest mortgages. These mortgages accrue interest on a daily, rather than a monthly, basis as most standard mortgages do. The end result is that homeowners who paid their mortgage bill after the due date but before the late fee grace period expired would still be left with thousands of dollars in unpaid principal balances when the loan matured, risking default. The new regulations endeavor to ensure customers do not enter such agreements without an understanding of such details.
If financial institutions are being required to act on a customers behalf, why on Earth would we not expect educational institutions to do the same, if not even more so, on a student’s behalf?
And if the role of education is not to arm students with information, what is it for? One suspects those who desire to enforce free market ideology on education wish to keep students in the dark so they are always potential marks for the next scam. Part of the current free market movement is to provide economic instruction based on an uncritical study of the works of Ayn Rand, a fiction writer, into the classroom. That’s like teaching astronomy based on an uncritical viewing of Star Wars films. I happen to enjoy Star Wars, but I am not going up to a NASA engineer and suggest they use The Force to get to Mars. The role of education is to prompt students to up their intellectual game, to challenge assumptions, to bump their preconceptions against empirical observations, the exact opposite of what ideologues of any stripe do. There may be an Absolute Truth to the universe, but it’s not going to be held in the confines of a single mind.
As for those who believe only “career-orientated” curriculum should be offered, Alfred Marshall, the father of classical economics, had this to say:
“For a truly liberal general education adapts the mind to use its best faculties in business and to use business itself as a means of increasing culture“
After all, a market-based economy, like democracy, will operate most efficiently with a well informed citizenry.
Recent misgivings expressed by Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein on the safety of vaccinations has created another round in the vaccine/autism debate. I use the word debate loosely here as we’ll see, there really should not be a debate at all on this topic. In all fairness, Stein expressed concerns over potential industry capture of vaccine regulators, but that concern has been shot down effectively and some view this as merely a dog whistle for anti-vaxxers. To be clear on this, the purported link between vaccines and autism is simply a case of scientific fraud and should be reported as such without mitigation. However, once an idea, even a fraudulent one is let loose, it is very difficult to dislodge from the public mindset. And that presents an arduous challenge for educators and policy makers alike.
The case for linking autism with vaccines began with the 1998 paper authored by Andrew Wakefield and 12 others stating their case. Serious reservations regarding the research was expressed shortly after its publication. The study had a small sample size and relied too heavily on parents recollections rather than hard data. As is the case for scientific protocol, attempts were made to replicate the results of the Wakefield study. In 2004, an extensive report by the National Academy of Sciences refuted any link between vaccines and autism. The Center for Disease Control has followed up with nine studies confirming the National Academy of Science’s report. As it turned out, there was a reason the Wakefield study was not confirmed. The Wakefield report was not just bad science, but a fraud perpetrated to cash in on a potential lawsuit against manufactures of vaccines.
This is how the original paper purporting a link between vaccines and autism now appears on the Lancet website.
“Is it possible that he (Wakefield) was wrong, but not dishonest: that he was so incompetent that he was unable to fairly describe the project, or to report even one of the 12 children’s cases accurately? No. A great deal of thought and effort must have gone into drafting the paper to achieve the results he wanted: the discrepancies all led in one direction; misreporting was gross.”
The BMJ also published an article by journalist Brian Deer that exposed Wakefield’s motivation for engaging in the fraud. As it turned out, the medical records for all 12 children in the study were falsified. The motive? Wakefield was receiving compensation by a law firm to provide research that could bring a favorable result in a lawsuit against vaccine manufactures. The compensation amounted to £435,643 ($700,000 in 1999). And the damage done? In the UK, the vaccination rate for measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) dropped to 80% by 2003. Fortunately, that has rebounded back to 92%. In the United States, vaccination rates held steady between 90-92%, but geographical pockets of low immunization rates put children at risk of acquiring easily avoidable diseases such as the 2015 measles outbreak in Southern California.
So how could such a fraud still be considered a legitimate topic to debate in some quarters? The answer lies in confirmation bias. Science works by matching theory with data. Sometimes, the theory comes first and is later proved by experiment. This happened with James Clerk Maxwell’s theory of electromagnetism developed in 1867 and proved correct with the discovery of radio waves in the late 1880’s. Sometimes the data comes before a theory is devised to explain it as the case with dark energy discovered in 1998. Astrophysicists are currently attempting to devise a theory to describe the accelerated expansion of the universe caused by dark energy. Sometimes both, as in the case of general relativity published by Einstein in 1916. Einstein’s theory solved the existing problem of Mercury’s orbit that Newton could not, but had to wait until the Eddington Expedition in 1919 to prove space-time could bend light waves.
The key point here is that in science, a theory or model of a physical process must match the experimental data or it is wrong. If an experiment cannot be devised to prove a theory, such as currently the case with string theory, it is simply unproven until such an experiment is produced. However, those not trained in science tend to construct understanding via a narrative. In the case of autism, the vaccine issue fills a gap in the narrative that science presently does not, that being an understanding how to prevent it. And once a narrative is constructed, confirmation bias develops when facts that go against the narrative are rejected which is the opposite of how science works. So how to go about getting the facts out?
To begin with, especially in a classroom situation, do not belittle the other person. Doing so only motivates retrenchment. This is why arguments are rarely, if ever, resolved on social media. Once the insults start flying, forget about it. In the class, it is important for each student to feel they have a fair role in the discussion. For example, if a student holds creationist beliefs, I point out the father of the Big Bang really was a father, that is, Fr. Georges Lemaitre who was both a Catholic priest and astrophysicist responsible for conceptualizing the Big Bang by analyzing relativity theory. Holding religious beliefs does not preclude someone from appreciating science and in the case of Lemaitre, performing scientific work at a high level. In the case of vaccinations, expressing an understanding the other side’s concerns with a serious children’s health issue can go a long way in creating a constructive dialog. The public generally does not read medical journals and the media, in some quarters, has been irresponsible in its reporting leading to the construction of a false narrative.
Once the student understands you are giving them a place at the table in the debate, go over the scientific method once again. In a one off argument this is a bit difficult and thus, is something that is to be emphasized throughout the course. Theory must meet experimental data which must be independently confirmed. Over the course of time, the goal is to move a student from an ideological to a scientific mindset. Doing so will open the student up to being more receptive to data that contradicts a previously held belief which in turn can reduce confirmation bias. And sometimes, it is best to acknowledge science does not currently offer an explanation. In the case of autism, we have to admit we do not know what its cause is rather than allowing a charlatan to fill a gap in a narrative.
On the other hand, those such as Andrew Wakefield, who have perpetuated this myth with the intent of monetary and/or political gain, simply deserve to be rebuked and marginalized from any policy debate regarding vaccinations.
*Image atop post is polio vaccinations during 1954 in Kansas. Credit: March of Dimes.
Most historic figures have myths attached to them and certainly Albert Einstein is no exception. Among them, Einstein failed math in high school and did his famous work on relativity in “splendid isolation”. After reading Walter Isaacson’s biography on Einstein, one can see the social influences that shaped Einstein in his early years and how it enabled him to make advances in physics that others could not. And much of that is rooted in modern educational theory.
Jean Piaget’s research on child development concluded there are four stages of development. The final transition usually occurs around age eleven when a child moves from a concrete understanding of the world to an ability to solve abstract and hypothetical problems. The age this transition occurs can vary with each individual and also with the subject matter. Contrary to the struggling student myth, Einstein began thinking in abstract terms at a very early age. A compass given to Einstein at age five demonstrates this. Rather than thinking of the compass in concrete terms, that is, a mechanical device that points north, Einstein conjectured on the invisible magnetic field that caused the compass to always point north. And this trend continued in Einstein’s early life.
During the 1930’s, a Ripley’s Believe It or Not! column stated Einstein failed math in high school and has remained part of the Einstein lore. Truth is, Einstein had learned calculus by age 15. And physics? Einstein was at a college level by age 11. How did this myth begin? More than likely from Einstein’s days as a student in Germany’s authoritarian educational system. Einstein thought little of rote learning, and was not afraid to make his teachers aware of that. In today’s parlance, that bit of acting out probably gave the impression of a troubled student. So what was it in Einstein’s background that allowed him to advance so quickly in his studies?
The second pillar of modern educational theory is Lev Vygotsky’s theory of learning by social interaction. Part of that theory is the concept of the zone of proximal development. Here, a student is placed in contact with a more skilled partner to help master a subject. In Einstein’s case, his parents provided the first zone of proximal development. Hermann Einstein, Albert’s father, partnered with his brother Jakob building electric generators and lighting. This surrounded Albert with a technical/scientific background from the get-go not unlike, say, Bill Belichick growing up in a household with a football coach as a father. Pauline, Albert’s mother, was a pianist and Albert would play the violin most of his life to catch a break from physics.
Einstein plays the violin during the charity concert in the New Synagogue, Berlin, January 29, 1930. Credit: Institute of Czech Literature, Czech Academy of Science.
At age 10, Einstein was introduced into another zone of proximal development in the person of Max Talmud, a 21-year-old medical student who had dinner with the Einsteins weekly. Talmud introduced Einstein to many subjects including geometry and Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Talmud’s greatest gift to Einstein may have been Aaron Bernstein’s 21 volume People’s Book on Natural Science. Bernstein encouraged constructive learning techniques, in particular, thought experiments such as what it would be like to ride along a light beam. These thought experiments played a crucial role in Einstein’s relativity breakthroughs and his attempt to describe the theory to the public in his book, Relativity: The Special and General Theory.
As one might imagine, Einstein raced out of Talmud’s zone of proximal development in short order. Not unlike the first time a student realizes they have raced ahead intellectually of their teacher. Nonetheless, Talmud served as a rich pipeline of learning resources for Einstein. In some sense, Talmud was Einstein’s version of the internet without all the negative distractions. This resource enabled Einstein to think in ways that provided insights to solve problems other physicists were not able to. Young Albert Einstein also possessed a fierce streak of individuality.
Self-identity is typically formed during high school years, but can be delayed beyond college. By all indications, Einstein’s self-identity was molded by his family and his ethnicity. Of the four general parenting characteristics, the Einsteins would fall into authoritative (not to be confused with authoritarian). This engaged parenting style typically endows a child with high self-esteem and confidence, which certainly Albert Einstein possessed. As a Jew in Germany, Einstein was an outsider in German society (as Isaacson notes, only 2% of Munich’s population was Jewish) and this reinforced Einstein’s contempt for the German authoritative educational system. The Swiss educational system was another story.
Aarau, Switzerland. Credit: Roland Zumbuhl/Wiki Commons
Fed up with Germany, Einstein moved to Switzerland at age 16 and spent a year at the Aarau Cantonal School. This school favored a constructionist educational philosophy where students build their own knowledge rather than simply accepting what was told to them by an authority figure. Part of the instructional technique at Aarau included an emphasis on visualization of mathematical concepts based on the ideas of Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi who also valued student individuality. Einstein thrived at Aarau and its visualization techniques played a significant role in Einstein’s breakthroughs in relativity.
Einstein’s Aarau transcript. Grade scale is 1-6 with 6 being best grade. Credit: Wiki Commons. Translation can be found at: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Albert_Einstein%27s_exam_of_maturity_grades_(color2).jpg
However, Einstein’s professional academic career did get off to a slow start. In fact, he was working at a Swiss patent office in 1905 when he published four landmark papers on special relativity, mass-energy equivalence (E = mc2) the photoelectric effect (proving light acts as particles as well as waves) and Brownian motion (which established the existence of atoms). Einstein’s anti-authoritarianism during his college years at Zurich Polytechnic rubbed some of his professors the wrong way and he had difficulty obtaining good references. This has led to the myth of Einstein working in “splendid isolation” during this time. And in a sense, Einstein was isolated from the heavy hitters in physics. However, this may have been a godsend as those heavy hitters made discoveries that pointed towards relativity, but lacked the creativity Einstein possessed to put all the pieces together. In pursuit of this, Einstein found one more learning social component in Zurich.
The Olympia Academy founders Conrad Habicht, Maurice Solovine, and Albert Einstein. Credit: Wiki Commons/Emil Vollenweider und Sohn
Had Einstein been discussing the current problems of physics in academia after the turn of the century, he would have been hamstrung by the Newtonian concept of absolute time. That is, clocks run at the same pace for every observer in the universe. Einstein and a group of friends formed what they jokingly dubbed the Olympia Academy. Of the many topics discussed during these weekly sessions were David Hume’s and Ernst Mach’s rejection of absolute time. This skepticism of Newtonian absolute time is the linchpin of special relativity, which states the speed of light is constant to all observers in the universe and time is variable as a function of velocity (times moves more slowly the faster you go, reaching a standstill at the speed of light). Special relativity also put the universal speed limit at light speed leading to general relativity, which redefined gravity as curvatures in space-time which ripple throughout the universe at the speed of light and not instantaneously via Newton’s gravitational fields.
So is there anything we can apply from Einstein’s education?
To begin, don’t expect your students to become Einstein – the human race is lucky to experience such a genius once a century. Great disasters are usually the result of many little things going wrong, great successes require many little things going right. Replicating Einstein’s education will not likely produce another Einstein anymore than putting a hockey stick in a child’s hand will make him a Wayne Gretzky. But to continue the sport’s analogy, Red Auerbach expressed a coaching philosophy that his job was to help his players reach their differing levels of maximum potential. To illustrate, I am the same height as Larry Bird and Magic Johnson, but my maximum potential as a basketball player is significantly lower. Rather than concern myself with that, with proper instruction, I should focus on reaching my personal potential level.
For example, if a student is struggling putting the ball in the hoop, rather than give a wedgie George Costanza style, have the player perform a thought experiment Albert Einstein style. Instead of traveling with a light beam, imagine moving along with a basketball headed for the rim. Take two scenarios, a shot with a low arc and one with a high arc. How does the hoop appear as you are headed with the ball towards it? The ball with the high arc “sees” more area in the hoop to enter, increasing the odds of making two points. It might not make the child into Larry Bird, but will move forward into reaching their full basketball potential wherever that may fall.
Techniques such as this allows a student to internally construct knowledge and not simply take a teacher’s word for it. And student’s can apply these techniques in other subjects. Also, the social component of learning cannot be ignored. Ridiculing, instead of providing instruction, for a poor performing student causes social isolation not only in that class, but can cascade throughout the educational experience. All the educational resources in the world cannot help a student who is socially isolated. And likewise, lack of community resources in the educational system can thwart good instruction. Teaching someone to fish may keep them well fed, but it only works if they actually have a fishing rod to use.
To maximize a student’s potential a rich social experience is required where ideas are passed back and forth as well as contact with more experienced learners. This does not stop after childhood. As the great economist Alfred Marshall noted, inexperienced workers are more productive when teamed with more experienced workers. This is also why industries tend to form geographic clusters such as Silicon Valley. In fact, despite his disdain for Germany, Einstein moved to Berlin in 1914 as that was the center of physics on the continent. The diaspora of Jewish scientists, including Einstein, in the 1930’s had the opposite effect of diminishing Germany’s physics research. Also, adequate resources must be available to apply what is learned. Can a student without computer resources expect to function well in today’s society? Finally, do not burden the student with unrealistic expectations. Focus on what the student can do, not what they cannot do, and use that as a base to build upon to reach their own level of maximum potential.
*Image on top of post is Einstein presenting a lecture at American Association for the Advancement of Science in Pittsburgh on December 28, 1934. Credit: AP/Public Domain.
