Education

© Norman Sperling August 15, 2012

After 15+ years of parent-teacher meetings, I've attended my last. I've heard what happens, in and around those groups, since before my older boy entered Kindergarten. I've taught K-12, undergrad college students, and a few grad students. I've listened to a whole lot of students at all levels.

The Big Things that are wrong with Education are going to stay wrong. Almost all the "reforms" proposed by politicians, teachers, administrators, scholars, and the public, would accomplish very little. They nibble around the edges of the problems, because current Political Correctness won't let anybody address true and big problems.

That's because by far the biggest influence on how children succeed, and especially on how children fail, is their parents. In my first stint as a teacher, I figured out that almost every student problem I saw was traceable to their parents.

I never found a culturally-acceptable way to influence those parents. Parents are politically untouchable and unmentionable. The school and the government can't tell parents how to raise their children. Most governments, and many schools, are less competent than many parents, and would pick the wrong factors to squeeze parents on.

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Since you can't blame children for acting like children, and politically you can't blame parents, the only target left is the schools. Bad choice. Kids can be spectacularly unresponsive or contrary. A whole lot of students don't do their homework. Schools can grade them accordingly, but without parent support, that accomplishes nothing. So schools conduct class as if that was the place to do what ought to be homework. Without parents scrupulously, patiently, and methodically helping students do every assignment, the kids drift, and the school cannot accomplish much.

Most teachers enter the profession because they want to teach. Most leave because of burnout. Teaching is extremely frustrating, and results from students just not doing what they're taught. That results from parents just not helping the students learn. To improve teaching, reduce teachers' frustrations.

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At this point, insert your favorite litany of why parents are overburdened and overmatched and just can't: working too long hours, poorly educated themselves, not knowing enough English ... . Get real: add alcohol, and drugs, and temper, and selfishness, and neglect.

Student failure isn't rooted in poverty: I often encounter successful people who rose from poverty. They almost always tell of a strong adult who helped them learn (most often, their mother). That's what it takes, and the other factors are minor.

Wealth doesn't assure success: I've encountered many people who accomplish little despite prosperous starts.

Working too-long hours is a bad choice. Drop the worst part-time job. Use the liberated hours to help the children. They'll gain much more from the attention than they'll lose from the dollars. I've never heard an adult criticize their own parents for not having more money, but I often hear regrets that their parents didn't pay enough attention to them.

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The PTAs and PTSOs I've been in are full of parents who pay a lot of attention. Their students do relatively well. They have relatively few problems. But the organization fritters a lot of effort.

From students and sometimes parents, I hear of certain students who show occasional sparks. They have ability, and decent minds. But they're mired in unsupportive families, do-nothing mentalities, and sometimes gangs. I think that a few percent of the student population can be identified as slackers who might catch on. Scuttlebutt can identify such people, so the administration doesn't have to. Individual parents in the PTSO could reach out to those students, and where possible, their families. Incorporate them as much as practical in some patterns of success: bring 1 or 2 along on cultural trips. Include 1 or 2 in study sessions. Include 1 or 2 in activities ("hey, could you please pitch in on stage crew? It's fun, and we sure need your help.") If the involved parents at my kids' high school privately targeted 20 such kids a year to draw in, maybe half would "take". Changing 10 F-and-D students into B-and-A students, per year, would raise the school's academic numbers at least as much as most traditional proposals.

I've also noticed repeatedly that kids hear what they're told even if they don't react immediately. It may take years, but some lessons do eventually click. So some students who don't respond right away will benefit eventually.

While I can spot what needs to be done, I'm not very good at doing most of it myself. We did invite a wide variety of kids to join us at baseball games and museums and other jaunts. We did provide some support for neglected kids (especially rides, food, and a few sleepovers).

I could have done more. Maybe I could have learned how to drop some hints with other parents. Maybe I could have included kids more. But I was always so preoccupied just minding my own kids.

© Norman Sperling, April 15, 2012
Part of a series on Educational Star Parties:
Star Parties Designed for Students (July 7, 2012)
Trading Cards for Telescopes and Celestial Objects (September 20, 2012)
Telescope Triplets (November 25, 2011)

When I teach about stars, the 7 main spectral types usually seem rather abstract. I show their different spectra, but that's hard to relate to what students actually see in a starry sky. I show Planck curves and explain how surface temperature results in color differences that you can actually notice. Star colors aren't the sharp tones of advertising signs, but you can definitely notice the tinges.

Star tinges are less than impressive to the naked eye, because starlight is so dim that it mostly triggers the black-and-white-registering rod cells in your retina. Only the 20 or so brightest stars deliver so much light that they also trigger a few color-sensitive cone cells.

But even a small telescope collects enough light to trigger a whole lot more cones in your retina, making the colors appear much bolder. So a star party that is deliberately planned for student education should use 7 small telescopes to point at a bright star of each of the 7 spectral types, to emphasize their different colors. Arrange the scopes so a single line of viewers looks through all 7 scopes in order, either OBAFGKM or MKGFABO. After everybody has seen that, re-aim those scopes to their next targets.

Yes, A and F stars really do look white, but now you appreciate how real that is, unlike an artifact of not triggering enough cone cells.

For each spectral type, at any position of the sky, you can find examples at third magnitude or brighter.

All 7 spectral types are blatant around the Great Winter Oval:
O: Mintaka and Alnitak
B: Rigel, Bellatrix, El Nath, Alnilam, and Saiph
A: Sirius
F: Procyon
G: Capella
K: Aldebaran and Pollux
M: Betelgeuse

The Great Winter Oval has many advantages. It's accessible late in the Fall semester, late in the evening; all winter long; and just after dusk well into Spring semester. Since it straddles the equator, it's easily seen from practically everywhere that people live. Only in May, June, and July is it not available - parts of it even then.

When part of the Great Winter Oval is hidden by the Sun's glare, here are some bright alternatives:
O: zeta Ophiuchi and zeta Puppis
B: Alpheratz, Algol, Regulus, Spica, and Alkaid
A: Denebola, Alioth, Mizar, Gemma, Vega, Deneb, Altair, and Fomalhaut
F: Polaris, Algenib, and Sadr
G: the Sun, beta Corvi, Vindemiatrix, eta Bootis, eta Draconis, and beta Herculis
K: Alphard, Dubhe, Arcturus, and Kochab
M: Antares, Mira, and beta Andromedae

Decrease the number of telescopes needed, and make the contrast more vivid, by showing wide, bright, color-contrast double stars:
Algieba: K + G
Albireo: K + B
gamma Andromedae: K + B
Cor Caroli: A + F

Bigger scopes show color contrast in:
32 Eridani: G + A
h3945 Canis Majoris: K + F

Don't try to add spectral class W unless you're far enough south to see gamma Velorum. There are only about 150 Wolf-Rayet stars known in our galaxy. No others are close enough to look brighter than 6th magnitude. The biggest bunch is around the Summer Triangle.

I'll comment more on planning star parties for student education in later postings.

© Norman Sperling, January 25, 2012

Norman W. Edmund founded Edmund Scientific Company on a card table in his home in 1942. When he retired in the mid-1970s, it had over 200 employees. He died at the age of 95 last week in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to which he had retired.

I vividly remember devouring every new issue of the Edmund catalog while I was growing up in the 1950s and '60s. The catalog always had a lot of "tutorial" segments - several paragraphs each, usually with diagrams, so the users could understand the technicalities of the equipment. They weren't particularly slanted toward Edmund products, and they taught a great many people a lot about their hobby and its hardware. Only a few catalogs (like Orion) continue to do that, though it's absolutely the best policy and should be fostered. Tutorials are NOT waste-space, and they foster brand loyalty: I trust the company that makes the effort to tell me the straight information.

I met Norm several times in the 1970s, while I consulted for his son Robert. In those years Norm kept his desk in the main office, kept a bunch of neat science-thingies around, and had appropriate input. But I also sensed that he kept his distance from daily operations, carefully avoiding stepping on toes.

What always impressed me was how nice he was. Plain, no affectations, no flaunting. And he passed all that on to the rest of his family, several of whom I met. They're all nice. They treat people well. They treated me very well. It wasn't just a put-on performance, it was genuine.

To Norman and Robert, "treating people nicely" is business policy as well as personal. While it's true that being nice to people is good customer service and good business, I think they are nice to people simply because they think that is the right way to be. I learned a lot from that.

They didn't outsource service. Callers were transferred to people who knew the technicalities they needed. Customers could get replacements and refunds.

Robert once told me "Customers will always complain. They'll complain about price, or they'll complain about quality. As long as I'm president, they aren't going to complain about quality." Which is to say, the stuff he designed, produced, and marketed would actually work well. And it did. Sure, humans aren't perfect and hardware isn't perfect, but when problems cropped up, the company tried hard to fix them, and usually succeeded.

Norman Edmund was well-respected as a leader in science business, an advocate of science education, a business leader of Greater Philadelphia, an expert fisherman, and a gentleman who "lived long and prospered". I'm really glad I knew him.

© Norman Sperling, November 25, 2011
Part of a series on Educational Star Parties:
Star Parties Designed for Students (July 7, 2012)
7 Spectral Types in 1 Big Loop (April 15, 2012)
Trading Cards for Telescopes and Celestial Objects (September 20, 2012)

For decades, I have been proclaiming that focal ratio is one of the most important characteristics in choosing a telescope. Most authorities tout aperture instead. But none of us has ever conducted a true visual test, isolating the variables of focal ratio, aperture, and eyepieces.

I propose that 3 triplets of Newtonian telescopes be made to demonstrate the effects of focal ratio, aperture, and eyepiece. They can be used for classes and at star parties to teach about the properties of the telescopes themselves. Mount each triplet so that viewers can easily shift among all 3 eyepieces to instantly compare views.

The "focal ratio" triplet should consist of 3 telescopes, all with the same aperture and eyepiece. Make one f/5, another f/10, and another f/20. For this triplet, I think 3-inch (76 mm) apertures are best: even the f/20 would be a manageable 5 feet (1.52 m) long. Users will see that Jupiter looks best at f/20, and the Great Andromeda Galaxy best at f/5. Trying this battery of telescopes on the sky's enormous variety of targets will probably reveal very few objects that look best at f/10.

A second application of this same telescope set will use different eyepieces that all result in the same magnification: a long eyepiece on the long scope, a short eyepieces on the short scope, and a middling eyepiece on the middling scope. How different are the views of different targets?

The "aperture" triplet should consist of 3 telescopes, all with the same focal length (perhaps 4 feet = 1.22 m) and eyepiece. Make one 3 inches (76 mm) aperture, the second 6 inches (152 mm), and the third 12 inches (304 mm). Users may be surprised how much even the 3-inch shows.

The "eyepiece" triplet should consist of 3 identical middling telescopes, perhaps 4-inch (102 mm) f/8. Insert eyepieces of equal focal length but different optical designs (such as Huygens versus orthoscopic versus Nagler). A second application of this same telescope array will use eyepieces of equal design but different focal lengths (perhaps Plossls of 6 mm, 12 mm, and 25 mm ...).

Make each triplet so the scopes, and their eyepieces, can also swivel to allow 2, or even 3, different people to watch through one of the scopes at a time. This is because, perhaps once a decade, some sky event brings out throngs, and the host needs to move a whole lot of eyeballs through the scopes in minimal time.

These triplets could be built by amateur-telescope-making workshops, such as several clubs run, or perhaps by a veteran scope-maker. Most are quite small, only one is large. Try hard to hold all but one factor constant so they really test that single variable.

A whole metropolitan area probably needs only one set. Telescope triplets can be passed around among nearby colleges, astronomy clubs, planetaria, etc., to use at their classes, star parties, and member-events.