2002-03-07 I agree. Also, let the students find out or research their own conversion factors. Once they find out what a bother it really is, they will be more eager to embrace SI 100 %. But, because there are so many people out there, mostly in the media, doing conversions for the public and making it easier to use FFU, then there is no big urge to do things metric.
John ----- Original Message ----- From: "Gene Mechtly" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: "U.S. Metric Association" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Thursday, 2002-03-07 14:20 Subject: [USMA:18606] Re: power = energy/time, all kinds > On Thu, 7 Mar 2002, Jim Elwell wrote: > > after Gene Mechtly wrote: > > > > > >Students in all other countries and future US students would not have > > >the burden of non-SI source data, and have to make conversions from ifp. > > > ... I teach US citizens in the US, > > and they are going to have to deal with food in calories, electricity in > > kilowatthours and natural gas in dekatherms for a while yet, so I think > > they should know how to get from colloquial units to metric units. > > True, Jim (E), but teaching conversion skills should be a separate > lesson (with a sunset provision for phase out after 20xx); and not mixed > with the more important demonstration that in SI the unit of energy of all > kinds is the joule, and that the unit of power of all kinds is the watt. > > *Isolate* conversion burdens as much as possible from teaching the basic > study of the SI, its simplicity, and its applications. For example, draw > on Pat's database of examples in SI. > > Gene. >
