A New Writing Intensive Physics Course (PHY220W) Steven Schwarz, Dept. of Physics, Queens College

1. Figure and Caption Exercise: Students accessed a short list of numerical data on our class Blackboard site, and were asked to plot the data in publishable format, with a caption included. They were not told what the data represented, and were allowed to invent a situation where such data might be produced. (In fact, the data describe the behavior of the consumer price index over a 90 year period.) Here is one student’s output: Examples of Good Science Writing: The class discussed the American Scientist 1990 article (vol. 78, pp. 550-558) by George Gopen and Judith Swan entitled The Science of Scientific Writing. This article pays particular attention to sentence structure. David Custer (MIT) has a fascinating style manual on-line at http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Writing-and-Humanistic-Studies/21W-783Science-and-Engineering-Writing-for-Phase-IIFall2002/StudyMaterials/detail/style.htm. In the excerpt below, he has improved a good paragraph, but his example illustrates how difficult it is to provide students with the level of detail required to restructure their prose. A New Writing Intensive Physics Course (PHY220W)Steven Schwarz, Dept. of Physics, Queens College Copenhagen: The class viewed the PBS movie version of Michael Frayn’s 2000 Tony Award winning play Copenhagen. The play addresses a fateful conversation between Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg during WWII, and raises the question as to whether Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle might describe the interaction between people as well as between particles. Students also viewed small segments of 12 hours of symposia proceedings in which scientists, historians, and critics discussed the play. These tapes are available at http://web.gc.cuny.edu/sciart/copenhagen/nyc/order.htm Students voiced their opinions in an in-class essay. Examples of Bad Science Writing: The class explored two interesting examples of bad technical prose. The first was an excerpt from a popular textbook on scientific writing that devotes three pages to the use of a computer mouse. The second was an excerpt from the famous 1995 hoax by Alan Sokal entitled Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity. Sokal was able to publish his lengthy but nonsensical tome in a leading humanities journal. A good description of the Sokal Affair may be found at the Wikipedia website. Library Research: Students were asked to select an article of interest to them from a late 90’s technical journal. They searched for citations on-line using Google Scholar and Web of Science. They searched in the library using the paper format of Physics Abstracts and Science Citation Index, as well as the CD format of the latter index. Finally, they submitted short descriptions of the relative advantages and disadvantages of these resources. As a model technical paper, the class studied a controversial report by R.P. Taleyarkhan, et al. (Phys. Rev. E69, 036109 (2004) in which the authors claim to observe fusion induced by bubble collapse. C.V. Exercise: Students received a short description of a mythical physics major by the name of John Smith, as well as an actual employment ad from the NY Times. Each student prepared a C.V. and cover letter. In class, unsigned copies were examined, and one of the Smith applicants was “hired.” Seminar Review: Each student attended one technical seminar on campus and wrote a short review. Research Paper and Oral Presentations: The paper and oral presentations accounted for about half of the students’ efforts in the course. Students chose a recent paper in a major technical journal, and rewrote the paper in the style of Physical Review Letters, but at the level of a typical physics undergraduate. First drafts were edited by the instructor and by a fellow student. Each student delivered a 12 minute oral PowerPoint presentation on their research topic in conference style. Students also presented a 5 minute talk, in lieu of a final exam, on a newsworthy technical development. Physics 220W – “Current Issues in Physics” was offered for the first time in the Fall of 2005. The class was designed to allow students in the sciences to delve deeply into a specialized topic of their choice, while simultaneously developing skills in technical presentation, both written and oral. Some of the resources and exercises employed in this course are highlighted below: Style and Grammar Exercises: Michael Alley and colleagues have created a wonderful web resource entitled Writing Guidelines for Engineering and Science Students, http://www.writing.eng.vt.edu. Students performed weekly on-line exercises, and turned in one paragraph summaries of the exercise that most surprised or confounded them. Three quizzes were based on this material. The Galileo Exercise: Students examined and commented on abstracts from a recent meeting of the American Physical Society. They were then given two pages of excerpts from Galileo’s The Starry Messenger, and asked to write a conference abstract based on this material. Unsigned copies of the abstracts were analyzed in class. Here, with permission, are examples: V14 5 Heliocentric Universe: The discovery of new Celestial Bodies. GALILEO GALILEI, Galileo Institute of Technology The Earth Centered Universe, a philosophy proposed by Aristotle and Ptolemy has been the standard, of how most of the world views the composition of the universe. My discovery of three new celestial bodies orbiting around Jupiter refutes idea of an Earth Centered Universe. After creating a telescope based on Fleming’s spyglass, I was able to study the three prominent starlets around Jupiter. After my first observation (January 7, 1610) I witnessed 2 starlets to the east of Jupiter and one behind the planet, believing all were fixed stars; however, after observing on January 8, 1610, I noticed that the starlets were now west of Jupiter. This refutes the idea that the earth is the center of all celestial motion and validates the Copernican Heliocentric Model of the Universe. Also, in studying the moon I have discovered that the moon does not have a smooth surface, rather a very rough and cratered once, refuting the idea that the moon has a smooth texture. Spyglass uncovers revolving moons about Jupiter. GALILEO GALILEI. The importance of understanding the effects of the planets and stars within the universe is invaluable. With my advances in spyglass, using both concave and convex lenses fitted to a lead filled tube, I have made numerous discoveries, furthering man’s knowledge of the solar system. In the following report I have detailed my discoveries and have made conclusions about the activity of planets, more specifically about Jupiter and its four moons that revolve around it. Although these starlets are the backbone of my findings, I have also discovered smaller spots on the moon with the use of my spyglass. Case Studies in Ethics: The Poynter Center provides a valuable booklet entitled Moral Reasoning in Scientific Research, available in pdf format at www.indiana.edu/~poynter/mr-main.shtml. The class examined case studies addressing such topics as lab notebook ownership, data manipulation, and plagiarism. Students also examined a particularly fine discussion of the various levels of plagiarism at www.ccc.commnet.edu/mla/plagiarism.shtml