In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, dennis roberts <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >At 08:19 PM 2/11/2003, Herman Rubin wrote:
>>However, I believe that interaction between students >>of comparable ability can help in the learning process. >>But not if the abilities differ widely. >>-- >for better or worse ... school systems have more or less abandoned ability >grouping long ago ... some of it is federally mandated And this is why we must have affordable schools not government controlled. About 70 years ago, the "progressive educators" imposed this, and education went downhill fast, and will need decades to recover. >BUT, do you really think that having a group of low ability students ... >ie, say those really struggling in math ... are going to be able to help >each other with their math work? i don't think so The interaction need not be in the direction of helping, but in discussion of the concepts. At this time, not only are concepts not taught, but the teachers cannot understand them. >apply this to the basic intro stat course at a place like ... er hm ... >purdue ... if you had a pretest ... then isolated the low 10% (the ones who >for SURE hate math and statistics) ... not only with this NOT be of benefit >but, it will hurt their chances of making any progress in this course What "basic intro stat course"? The people at Purdue are quite aware that I consider the present low-level courses to do far more harm than good. I do not think that anyone can understand statistical concepts starting with manipulation and methods, except some of those with research ability. >i think your argument has merit at the top end ... but, from there down i >have serious doubts One of the things discouraged by the educationists is that of asking "stupid" questions. Students of comparable ability will have comparable questions. Also, they can be taught at comparable rates. -- This address is for information only. I do not claim that these views are those of the Statistics Department or of Purdue University. Herman Rubin, Deptartment of Statistics, Purdue University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Phone: (765)494-6054 FAX: (765)494-0558 . . ================================================================= Instructions for joining and leaving this list, remarks about the problem of INAPPROPRIATE MESSAGES, and archives are available at: . http://jse.stat.ncsu.edu/ . =================================================================
