A question in a physics exam at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark several decades ago said: "Describe how to determine the height of a skyscraper with a barometer."
One student replied: "You tie a long piece of string to the neck of the barometer, then lower the barometer from the roof of the skyscraper to the ground. The length of the string plus the length of the barometer will equal the height of the building."
This highly original answer so incensed the examiner that the student was failed. The student appealed on the grounds that his answer was indisputably correct, and the university appointed an independent arbiter to decide the case.
The arbiter judged that the answer was indeed correct, but did not display any noticeable knowledge of physics. To resolve the problem it was decided to call the student in and allow him six minutes in which to show a minimal familiarity with the basic principles of physics.
For five minutes the student sat in silence, forehead creased in thought. The arbiter reminded him that time was running out, to which the student replied that he had several extremely relevant answers, but couldn't make up his mind which to use.
On being advised to hurry up the student replied as follows: "Firstly, you could take the barometer up to the roof of the skyscraper, drop it over the edge, and measure the time it takes to reach the ground. The height of the building can then be worked out from the formula H = 0.5g x t squared. But bad luck on the barometer."
"Or if the sun is shining you could measure the height of the barometer, then set it on end and measure the length of its shadow. Then you measure the length of the skyscraper's shadow, and thereafter it is a simple matter of proportional arithmetic to work out the height of the skyscraper."
"But if you wanted to be highly scientific about it, you could tie a short piece of string to the barometer and swing it like a pendulum, first at ground level and then on the roof of the skyscraper. The height is worked out by the difference in the gravitational restoring force T = 2 pi square root (l / g)."
"Or if the skyscraper has an outside emergency staircase, it would be easier to walk up it and mark off the height of the skyscraper in barometer lengths, then add them up."
"If you merely wanted to be boring and orthodox about it, of course, you could use the barometer to measure the air pressure on the roof of the skyscraper and on the ground, and convert the difference in millibars into feet to give the height of the building."
"But since we are constantly being exhorted to exercise independence of mind and apply scientific methods, undoubtedly the best way would be to knock on the janitor's door and say to him 'If you would like a nice new barometer, I will give you this one if you tell me the height of this skyscraper'."
The student was Niels Bohr, who went on to win the Nobel prize for Physics.
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That long prelude, which came as a e-mail forward, sums up what our education, science education in particular, lacks. Making our children think!
French anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss said: 'The scientist is not a person who gives the right answers; he is one who asks the right questions.' Or, as mathematician Jacob Bronowski put it: 'That is the essence of science: ask an impertinent question, and you are on the way to a pertinent answer.'
Newton’s law of motions, far from drawing innovative solutions, elicit a drawn-out ‘boring!’ from students of class 9. Forget inventive ways of deriving the height of a tower. “So many formulas to remember. So many problems to work out,” lament the students.
Very few students will cite science or maths as their favourite subject. It’s a pity because these are the subjects that can provide some relief for the students from rote learning. Once you get the concept right, and the final conclusion in mind, the rest is child’s work, really.
But as Dr D Anvekar notes, our education system focuses on cramming information instead of concentrating on methodologies. Crushed under the burden of a vast syllabus and a deadline, the teachers cannot be blamed if they do not cajole the students to think and ask questions. Their job is to ‘finish’ chapters.
“Science education has become rote-and textbook-based learning. There's a complete absence of the joy of learning - developing an understanding of first principles from nature, through observation, tinkering and experimentation. Hence our inability as a nation to produce genuinely new ideas, products and breakthroughs,” comments Ramji Raghavan, founder of Agastya Foundation which is doing its bit to spread the joys of science to the rural children through their various programmes.
The NCERT has now come up with a suggestion that students be assessed continuously through the year, with more marks given for such internal assessment rather than exams that test the memory alone. This could ease the pressure and allow teachers to meander a bit through the fascinating alleys of science.
However, part of these assessments for many schools still would be unit tests and projects. The less said about projects the better. It is just another ‘headache’ added to the students’ woes. A project in every subject, even in the languages! Time was when projects were relegated to the sciences but not anymore. In most cases, they anyway mean a simple download of information from the Net and a scramble for pictures to paste.
Science projects have fallen into a pattern. Innovative projects are very few. Original concepts fall by the wayside as more tested, well-packaged units walk away with the prize.
This is where Dr Vijaysarathy’s observation comes in. There is no connect between the world around and what is taught.
Science as defined by the Oxford dictionary is ‘the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behaviours of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment’.
At least as far as that definition goes, there is no science done at most of our schools. This is also the reason why we do not make products like a Japan, says Vijayasarathy. He goes on to note how in science teaching the four ingredients are language, contents, pictures and applications. “The last has to be tackled first,” he says, adding, “how many teachers know that it is the same energy frequency that operates in a modem, microwave oven and cordless phone?”
We should be able to make the children look around them and draw comparisons to what is being taught, he adds. “To introduce combustion engine, ask them what is common between a car and a stove? The wonder of chemistry can be communicated by showing them what makes a ruby a ruby. It is after all just alumina and chromium. So also how coal and diamond are made of the same carbon but one is found on the surface where pressure is low, and the other way below under extreme pressure.”
Such focus on concepts is lacking in our science education, according to him.
This is so true. When I told the kids at home that I wanted water boiling at 150 deg C, they thought I was kidding. Water, they had memorised, has a boiling point of 100 degrees. True, but that is at normal atmospheric pressure, I explained. When you apply more pressure on the water, it needs more energy (heat) to escape freely as gas.
It was very clear that they hadn’t been trained to think of boiling as ‘escaping’ molecules of water vapour.
At least as far as science goes, if we are really keen to have budding innovators, we will have to go beyond the textbooks. Where, alas, is the time?
Another important point is the need for regular updating of the knowledge of science teachers. The field is evolving and this is not only to cover IT and BT. Even in subjects like physics and chemistry, there are some fundamental assumptions that stand a bit wobbly today. The standard model of particles in physics stands questioned by the observations of quantum physics. In biology, we have progressed even beyond the DNA to proteomics (study of proteins) which is seen as crucial for diagnostics and drug discovery. Nanotechnology which deals with the scale where elements turn total strangers (gold is no more the yellow material in this realm!) and material sciences threaten and promise a new world of amazing (and sometimes ‘dangerous’ as coined by some) smart stuff.
Stem cell science is fast progressing in our own country.
Can a science educator afford not to be updated in such a scenario? Even if the text books are caught in a sort of coma.
In the final analysis, it will boil down to ‘where is the time?’ “We would like to spend more time on experiments and questioning students but we will be pulled up if we do not complete the portions,” is the common refrain of most teachers.
Unless the education system with its faulty assessment methods is rectified, there is not much that can be done. The sky will remain blue and the leaves green. Our children will not think twice why!