For my qualitative research project, I’ve been talking to physics students. Although I have a big pile of transcribing to do (2.5 hours of recorded goodness), I’ve begun noticing a pattern through the interviews. The pattern is a lack of confidence from the people I talked to. In my experience with physics, the culture lends [...]

Dr. Tae is featured on the front of the Chicago Reader website. I met him during my time in physics grad school; he was an adjunct professor. Because of his work on the Tony Hawk video game and his unique position of being both a physicist and skateboarder, the Reader decided to write about him. [...]

I’ve been hesitant to write much about this, but I applied for physics education doctorate programs for fall 2010. I got into one about a month ago and still waiting to here back. For me, switching fields is kind of shocking and I suppose I’m still thinking about that. While I believe that switching fields [...]

If you talk to me outside of this blog, I don’t think I’ve made it much of a secret that I’m not really interested in doing physics research anymore. There is a host of reasons why (I don’t want to be locked into one specific research area for the rest of my life, I don’t [...]

My advisor decided I needed to update a graph that I made used Matlab. A small theoretical curve graph, nothing fancy or labor intensive. I thought that it would take 5 minutes to make the small changes. I was wrong, it turned out. Matlab became screwy after I upgraded to Snow Leopard (the latest Mac [...]

I’m preparing my students for the next exam, which is fast approaching. I forgot how long the semester system can be; when I was doing my graduate degree, we were on quarter system. That means we would end right before Thanksgiving. I used to prefer the semester system, but now I’m not so sure. Perhaps [...]

Moving and working means I’ve been quite busy. Last week, I was keeping myself afloat best I can in life. I luckily have been able to keep myself ahead of the game with the students, but I’ve also had a mound of grading to do. Then I come home to clean, figure out how I’m [...]

I had my first bout with cheaters this past weekend. Kind of soured the weekend, even though I can’t take it personally. Cheating bothers the heck out of me. Besides the idea of people learning to learn and enjoying it, it just makes me uncomfortable to have that dishonesty. Cheating is a really bad idea. [...]

Tomorrow my students have their first midterm. Some of them were thankful to have a practice, some of them- well, not so much. Unfortunately, I’m afraid some of them won’t take the tips and advice that I’ve given to them to heart (I have a few “too cool for school” types). These are actually things [...]

My week has consisted of getting my students ready for their midterm. While my boss is fine with me delaying exams, I want to get them used to my exams as well as get them motivated to learn the material. I find it odd being on the other side of the table. Making problems up [...]