Teaching Of Physics

ead er professional Htbrarjj EDITED BY NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER THE TEACHING OF PHYSICS THE TEACHING OF PHYSICS FOR PURPOSES OF GENERAL EDUCATION BY C. RIBORG MANN ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF PHYSICS THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO fgotfc THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1917 All rights resewed TO MY FATHER AND MOTHER WHOSE WISE AND PRACTICAL INTERPRETATION OF LIFE MADE THIS BOOK POSSIBLE AUTHORS PREFACE ONE of the Kveliest themes of present educational discussion is that of the distinction between vocational and cultural work. According to the old ideas, certain subjects are preeminently cultural, while others are distinctly vocational and in any scheme of general education, the cultural studies must predominate. The present insistent demand for industrial training has brought these ideas into the limelight of investigation, and has divided the forces of education into two parties, which may be called the culturalists and the vocation alists. This distinction between cultural and vocational seems to be wholly beside the mark in any true system of general education. It owes its origin to the mistaken ideas of the doctrine of formal discipline. This book is an effort to show how, in the case of physics, the two points of view may be amalgamated into one. The fundamental thesis of this union has been stated by President G. Stanley Hall, in his Educational Problems, in the following words Vol. I, p. 614 In point of fact, we psychologists must make the mortifying con viii AUTHORS PREFACE fession that we know almost nothing of pure culture values, either what they are or how to acquire them. But we do know that to succeed an individual must put his whole soul into his work, and that the study of even Greek, Latin, and logic in a half-hearted way is demoralizing and soporific. We know, too, that if most men do not find culture value in their own vocation they will never find it. Anything is cultural that arouses the ambition of young people to do their best hence whether a topic is cultural or practical depends wholly upon the point of view and the spirit. The book is divided into three parts. The first of these traces the development of the present situation. The second traces the origin of physics, and seeks to establish its leading characteristics and to define its possibilities as a means of general education. In the third part the purpose of physics teaching is stated, and hints are given as to how this purpose may be attained. The physics teacher will doubtless find this third part unsatisfactory in that it gives few specific directions as to how to proceed. The reason for this is obvious. Physics teaching has suffered in the past from over specification. While it is true that young teachers want to be told in detail just what to do, it is equally true that such detailed instructions are a very serious obstacle to effective work. Every successful teacher AUTHORS PREFACE ix must think for himself and adapt his work to his special environment. A detailed specification of just what to do is incompatible with the educational ideas expressed in this book. In addition to the references given as footnotes to the text, the chapters in Parts II and III are supplied with lists of collateral reading. In order to make these lists brief, they include in general only references to works published within the past ten or twelve years. Older works are included when they contain material that has not beendealt with more briefly in recent writings. The author wishes here to express his sense of deep obligation to the many hundred physics teachers who, by correspondence and discussion, have contributed ideas to the New Movement among Physics Teachers, of which this book is the outcome. He also wishes especially to record his obligation to the editor of this series, President Nicholas Murray Butler, of Columbia University, and to Professor J. F. Woodhull, of Teachers College, New York, Professor O. W. Caldwell of the University of Chicago, and Professor G. R...