Nonlinear Psychometric Thresholds for Physics and Mathematics

pathways
Mon, 02 Jan 2012 17:36:45 +0000

^^ My D is taking AP Physics and AP Calc right now. She’s acing both because can see the relevance of one to the other. I agree that lectures don’t lead to understanding forfor highly conceptual subjects. I see my children learning while they work on problem sets…flip back a few pages in the text, go “ahhh” and redo a problem. As part of her online Physics course she watches lectures online from MIT…she admits that those are not very engaging.

BTW: She’s not a high SAT kid (mid-600s, but mid-700s on SAT IIs). Her GPA/Rank is much better (top 3%)…and I think it is mostly a matter of motivation (she loves math & science and HATES taking the SATs, worse than going to the dentist, writing endless essays or raking leaves). Some of her peers enjoy the challenge of the SAT and thus have prepared for it and retook it a few times.