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Finally completed Intro to Physics at Udacity!

In the scheme of things, a basic physics course isn’t a big deal. But, I’m excited about this! This pursuit is a huge part of something I want to dedicate my life to, and here’s one more step in the right direction.

The course was an amazing educational experience, thanks to the instructors Andy & Jonathan, the students who participated in the forums, and the Udacity team. I learned a lot and it was the most fun I’ve ever had with math, which is { saying something }.

Hoping to take a more advanced course soon. Until then I’ll be busy with { these } and Khan Academy.

…I’m especially glad to hear that you like the exam format (try until you get it).

Working at Udacity is really exciting. We get to try to rethink education every day. Often it’s easy to get stuck in our preconceived ideas of what education ought to look like, and these ideas are hard to approach objectively. One of the Udacity decisions that I’m most excited about is the way we do our exams.

Education shouldn’t be a sieve. The goal isn’t to separate students into “those who get it” and “those who don’t” groups, yet this notion seems to be the commonly held one as far as assessment is concerned. What’s the point in that!? Education should be empowering. Instructors should be ashamed when they have students in the “those who don’t get it” group.

I think the fundamental problem is that people who become instructors were often in the “get it” group, and they like to attribute that to something special about themselves. It makes them feel smart. They want to believe that there really are smart people and not-smart people in the world and that they are the smart ones.

But that is complete nonsense. I’ve done a lot of tutoring, and I’ve never met anyone who actually couldn’t understand physics. I’ve just met people who haven’t been taught in a way that makes sense to them. Everyone is smart.

When you really believe that everyone is smart, assessment is no longer about identifying who has ability. It’s about confirming that everyone does. If you can’t ace the exam, it doesn’t mean you have failed. It means you haven’t yet fully succeeded. This, to me, is an infinitely better approach to learning.

{ Networks: An Introduction } by Mark Newman
& { Basic Physics: A Self-Teaching Guide } by Karl F. Kuhn

I’m really excited about both of these books and want to share them with those of you who have interests in science (physics), networks, and systems theory.

Of course, I’d read good reviews about both of these prior, but actually beginning to read them solidified any preconceived notions: I downloaded them both in one evening, meant to check them out quickly before tuning out for the night… and ended up staying up until 4 am. It’s rare to find a non-fiction so engaging, especially as both of these are quasi-textbooks.

I’ve put Basic Physics on hold momentarily, but got 10% through Networks — ~ 72 pages. (Tilde because both of these are available on Kindle! Amazing, for someone who often reads on the go and likes to take notes while reading (without carrying a whole bunch of crap around), and to have instant dictionary access (& Wikipedia where there’s wifi) for learning about new terms.)

As the author states, Networks increases in difficulty with each chapter. Not sure I’ll be able to have a grasp on some of the matter in the later chapters just yet, but so far (through Chapter 5) it’s easy to understand and I’ve learned quite a bit.

Basic Physics is basic, but offers hope for anyone seeking to gain a deeper understanding of nature, “from the ground up”. Just like Networks, it’s easy to follow — no BS. A good companion for an interactive online class like Udacity’s { PH100 }. …And well worth $9.99.

Getting a master’s degree might cost just $100 from education startup Udacity
…
[However] It’s pretty obvious that degrees will go away … The idea of a degree is that you spend a fixed time right after high school to educate yourself for the rest of your career. But ­careers change so much over a lifetime now that this model isn’t valid anymore.

The importance of learning to code isn’t so that everyone will write code, and bury the world under billions of lines of badly conceived Python, Java, and Ruby. The importance of code is that it’s a part of the world we live in. I’ve had enough of legislators who think the Internet is about tubes, who haven’t the slightest idea about legitimate uses for file transfer utilities, and no concept at all about what privacy (and the invasion of privacy) might mean in an online space. I’ve had enough of patent inspectors who approve patents for which prior art has existed for decades. And I’ve had enough of judges making rulings after listening to lawyers arguing about technologies they don’t understand. Learning to code won’t solve these problems, but coding does force engagement with technology on a level other than pure ignorance. Coding is a part of cultural competence, even if you never do it professionally. Alsup is a modern hero.

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I’m proud of this.

Another small step on the journey…
to a future doing something I can’t seem to explain to anyone at present.

••••••

Many thanks to the likes of the Udacity, Khan Academy, etc. for propelling education into the future — free & open, as it should be.

Programming High ›