Thinking in Physics: The Pleasure of Reasoning and Understanding

ISBN-13: 9789401786652 / Angielski / Twarda / 2014 / 161 str.

L. Viennot

Opis

Read this book if you care about students really understanding physics and getting genuine intellectual satisfaction from doing so. Read it too if you fear that this goal is out of reach - you may be surprised Laurence Viennot here shows ways to deal with the awkward fact that common sense thinking is often not the same as scientific thinking. She analyses examples of frequent and widespread errors and confusions, which provide a real eye-opener for the teacher. More than that, she shows ways to avoid and overcome them. The book argues against over-emphasis on "fun" applications, demonstrating that students also enjoy and value clear thinking.
The book has three parts:
- making sense of special scientific ways of reasoning (words, images, functions)
- making connections between very different topics, each illuminating the other
- simplifying, looking for consistency and avoiding incoherent over-simplification
The book is enhanced with supplementary online materials that will allow readers to further expand their teaching or research interests and think about them more deeply.

Spis treści

Part I Acquiring reasoning skills: words, images and functions.- Some tools essential for comprehension.- Words we have to understand.- The image: is it really doing its job?.- Graphs and functions.- Some surprising invariances.- Introduction.- The speed of light in vacuo.- Propagation of mechanical signals.- Coefficients of friction.- When mass doesn't count.- The mirror.- The power and non-obviousness of invariance.- Analysis of functional dependence: a powerful tool.- Numerical or functional?.- Even before values: the form of the relationship.- Keeping an eye on a causal reading of relations.- Some factors not apparent in a relation between quantities, by no means always trivial.- Functional dependencies and graphs: an example in geometrical optics.- Neglected treasures, and some hazards highlighted.- Putting into practice.- Introduction.- The field of a mirror.- Deflection of a charged particle by a magnetic field.- Sliding on an inclined plane.- The slide projector.- Flotation between two immiscible liquids.- Part II Physics: linking factors.- Links between phenomena in terms of type of functional dependence.- Introduction.- Delayed signals: from stars to bats.- Graphical version of the Doppler effect.- Even more links? Doppler and Römer.- Investing?.- Links between different approaches to the same phenomenon.- A hot air balloon for teaching.- A ritual colluding with inconsistency.- A very unusual linkage.- Some evidence of intellectual satisfaction.- Yet more links? Weight and gas pressure.- The benefits of changes of scale in analysis.- Part III Simplicity: ruin or triumph of consistency?.- Simple experiments: how to optimise their use.- Is simplicity relevant?.- Archimedes' weighing machine.- The upside-down glass.- The upside-down test-tube.- Beyond the ritual.- Echo-explanations and linear causal reasoning.- When simple experiment challenges simplistic reasoning.- The "Lovemeter".- Final remarks.- Popularising physics: what place for reasoned argument?.- Mission essential, mission impossible?.- Reason and rigour: some critical points.- A tendency among non-specialists: liking stories.- Authors (as teachers): tendency towards the "echo-explanation".- A real margin for manoeuvre.

O autorze

Laurence Viennot is emeritus professor at the Université Denis Diderot (Paris 7) and contributed to the creation of the LDPES (Laboratoire de Didactique de la Physique dans l'Enseignement Supérieur) laboratory, now part of the Laboratoire André Revuz. She has for a long time been responsible for the Master's course in science teaching, but devotes herself equally to training physics instructors. Her books and publications are recognised worldwide as sources of reference (Teaching Physics, Enquête sur le concept de causalité, etc.).
Previous books:
VIENNOT L. 1979. Le raisonnement spontané en dynamique élémentaire. Paris : Hermann.
VIENNOT L. 1996. Raisonner en physique: la part du sens commun. Avec la contribution de A. Benséghir, H. Caldas, F.Chauvet, J.L. Closset, W. Kaminski, L. Maurines, J. Menigaux, S. Rainson, S. Rozier, E. Saltiel, Bruxelles: De Boeck.
VIENNOT L. 2002. Razonar en fisica. La contribucion del sentido comun. Trad: M.J. Pozo Municio. Madrid: Ant Machado libros (Visor Distribuciones).
VIENNOT L. 2001. Reasoning in Physics   The part of common sense, Trad. A. Moisy. Dordrecht: Kluwer Ac. Pub.
VIENNOT L. 2002. Enseigner la Physique. Avec la collaboration de U.Besson, F. Chauvet, P. Colin, C. Hirn-Chaine, W. Kaminski, S. Rainson. Bruxelles: De Boeck.
VIENNOT L. 2003. Teaching physics. With the collaboration of U. Besson, F. Chauvet, P. Colin, C. Hirn-Chaine, W. Kaminski, S. Rainson. Trad. M. Greenwood & A. Moisy. Dordrecht: Kluwer Ac. Pub.
VIENNOT L. & DEBRU C. (Eds.) 2003. Enquête sur le concept de causalité. Paris: PUF.
VIENNOT L (Dir.) 2009. Didactique, épistémologie et histoire des sciences – Penser l’enseignement. Collection Sciences, histoire et société, Paris : PUF.
VIENNOT, L. 2011. En physique, pour comprendre . Collection Grenoble Sciences. Paris : EDP Sciences.

Blurb

Read this book if you want to know how to give students the intellectual pleasure of understanding physics. Read it even if you fear that this goal is out of reach – you may be surprised! Laurence Viennot shows ways to deal with the awkward fact that common sense thinking is often not the same as scientific thinking. She exposes frequent and widespread errors and misunderstandings, which provide a real eye-opener for the teacher.  More than that, she shows ways to avoid and overcome them. The book argues against over-emphasis on “fun” applications, demonstrating that students also enjoy and value clear thinking.

The book has three parts:
• Making sense of special scientific ways of reasoning (words, images, functions)
• Making connections between very different topics, each illuminating the other
• Simplifying, looking for consistency, and avoiding incoherent over-simplification 

It offers a magnificent supply of insight and ideas, all of which can be put to use no matter what physics programme you teach. The examples provided in this book shed light on the processes of teaching and popularization of physics, from the high school to the early undergraduate level.

"I recommend this book to all my colleagues engaged in teaching physics and other scientific disciplines, but also to students, future teachers and all those who take pleasure in understanding"
Guy Aubert
Emeritus Professor, Université Joseph Fourier, grenoble, France