What's the closest star to the earth?

[tnf]

who cares about stupid stars?
i dont think astronomy is a high priority in education

maybe you could have quized them on something more relevent to prove your point

My point was just proven, again, by you.

Yea, this was all about their lack of knowledge in astronomy.

I think that post outdoes any of the responses I got to the question in terms of an overall lack of mental acumen.

lol a highschool teacher trying to act smart

Yea, you apparently don't know much about my background, do you champ?

[Tsakali_]

tnf I can't help but think that you are enjoying the lack of education your students posses . you're discouraged to the point of not caring anymore...it's sad really specially since your choice of profession is an honorable one, what's keeping you going other than a paycheck?

[feedback]

Here's a question. Since our star/sun is called sol we have solar flares. What would flares be called on other stars that might have them.

-ar is just a suffix meaning pertaining to. A flare on another star would probably be be name-ar flare

[Captain]

"Solar" can refer to sunpower, which is no different than "starpower".

[Scourge]

Here's a question. Since our star/sun is called sol we have solar flares. What would flares be called on other stars that might have them.

-ar is just a suffix meaning pertaining to. A flare on another star would probably be be name-ar flare

That's kinda what I was getting at. But apparently they're all solar flares. Wierdo scientists. :icon26:

[Foo]

That, and also stars and 'suns' are interchangeable. The one we call The Sun is just our sun.

Reference as a Sun is usually tied to solar systems (see the use of solar again, there). Our solar system is just one solar system, which as far as I know just means a body of planets orbiting around a star (which is those planets' sun).

Given that astronomers have now found another object in our solar system which is larger than pluto, and hence either our solar system now comprises one extra planet or pluto is no longer considered a planet - they haven't decided which course of action to take yet - I wouldn't get too bent up over space terminology.

[Scourge]

That, and also stars and 'suns' are interchangeable. The one we call The Sun is just our sun.

Reference as a Sun is usually tied to solar systems (see the use of solar again, there). Our solar system is just one solar system, which as far as I know just means a body of planets orbiting around a star (which is those planets' sun).

Given that astronomers have now found another object in our solar system which is larger than pluto, and hence either our solar system now comprises one extra planet or pluto is no longer considered a planet - they haven't decided which course of action to take yet - I wouldn't get too bent up over space terminology.

I know all that. Just being facetious.

[Foo]

FASCWhatnow?

[Scourge]

[Transient]

75% missed the question. Answers ranged from Mars to the Big Dipper to "why are you asking us questions about stuff you don't teach us?"

I've heard similar responses to similar questions, such as on a Tonight Show segment called Jaywalking. Leno asked people which was bigger, the sun or the moon, and a surprisingly large amount of people said the moon was bigger. Their reasoning when asked was that it looked bigger in the sky...

How can people be that goddamn stupid? I don't mean that rhetorically, either. You're a teacher, maybe you can shed some light on this. How can some incredibly obvious facts (which I apparently take for granted) be lost on people? Grown men, even.

[Captain]

They're the same people who think the sun will come crashing down to Earth but end up no larger than a basketball, because that's how big it "looks"

[mik0rs]

Wow...sounds like you got some smart asses in your class, eh?

Alpha Centauri is the closest, no? Besides our own fucking sun, of course.

Yeah, besides our own. Alpha Centauri's about 4 light-years away though (if memory serves), so not a close second.

[tnf]

tnf I can't help but think that you are enjoying the lack of education your students posses . you're discouraged to the point of not caring anymore...it's sad really specially since your choice of profession is an honorable one, what's keeping you going other than a paycheck?

Not sure what you mean about 'enjoying' their lack of education. My rant here actually has more to do with the system than with the kids. No Child Left Behind has dramatically increased the importance of standardized testing across the country. As a result, school districts are re-vamping their curriculum to address these tests specifically (they need to, because to keep the federal funds coming their students have to show improvement on these tests). Because of that, students are less and less able to think on their own. From kindergarten on up they are being prepared for a few standardized tests. In our state, they will taken them in 4th, 7th, and 10th grade. What we are seeing in these laughable answers to simple questions is, in my opinion, the result of the fragmenting of science education in an attempt to cover all the random and disjointed subjects that students need to be knowledgeable in for the state mandated tests. The result of this is that their brains are filled with a bunch of random facts that they are unable to really apply to anything beyond the most direct questions - because there isn't time in the educational process to teach them to think in the lower grades.
What keeps me going is the fact that students are subjected to so many science teachers with no real background in science. If nothing else, by being in my class, they will be getting instruction from someone who actually did some real high level science before they decided to teach. Real content area experts are too few and far between in the high schools.

[Tsakali_]

They should look into the socratic system of education, where the teacher does not "teach" direct informatrion instead poses the right questions which allow a student to think and come up with an educated guess on their own. At this point they'll be more likely to retain and trully understand the subject at hand.

But as you said the schoolboard's requirements are prolly so extensive that time and resourses doesn't allow for such teaching methods

[Transient]

I had a teacher that half-taught that way. It worked relatively well, but only because most of us knew of the method he was using to teach.

[Foo]

It teachers were treated as pupils for the purposes of testing, they wouldn't be so able to target the exact questions.

What I mean is, there's a level of secrecy between the pupils and the teachers in terms of what will appear on the tests - and it's tightly controlled. However I think there should be that same level of secrecy extended between the teachers and the examining boards.

This certainly isn't the case for UK schools across the board although I think it happens with GCSEs - not sure... Either way, I think it'd work out.

[Tsakali_]

Trans-
that's a roll reversal in a way, where the teacher is the student and the student becomes somewhat the teacher. Now imagine all your teachers using a similar method, in effect they have introdused the students with all these different methods of tackling a problem/question...what level was this teacher on? highschool/ college?

[tnf]

Teachers asking lots of questions is great - like Tsalki mentions with the Socratic method. But kids still need to have some basic knowledge before this really works.

[Foo]

A lot of the issue arises from forced education - it's a tricky subject which rarely recieves any direct attention at a high level.

But you must surely see that there is a big gap between college/university level education where the students are there voluntarily, and mandatory education levels.

I can't think of a smug simple solution, but if I do I'll post it here

[MKJ]

obviously people will neglect the sun as their answer - even though they know its a star. society (scientists included) make single out the sun entirely when talking about space - "the sun, the moon and the stars" for instance. referring to the sun as "a sun" rather than "a star" is as common as naming God "God" rather than "a god named [insert one of the biblical variations here" or calling the moon "the Moon" rather than "Luna" or even "a sattelite".

for a teacher you kinda word your questions poorly, tnf you shouldve asked "what kind of body is the sun?" a) star b) planet c) sun is a classification by itself
homo

[I cant spell u]

Okay, your students have no excuse to say the astronauts suits weighed them down on the moon. I really don't pay attention much but correct me if I'm wrong.
All matter has gravity.
The sun is the closest star.
Right?

[tnf]

obviously people will neglect the sun as their answer - even though they know its a star. society (scientists included) make single out the sun entirely when talking about space - "the sun, the moon and the stars" for instance. referring to the sun as "a sun" rather than "a star" is as common as naming God "God" rather than "a god named [insert one of the biblical variations here" or calling the moon "the Moon" rather than "Luna" or even "a sattelite".

for a teacher you kinda word your questions poorly, tnf you shouldve asked "what kind of body is the sun?" a) star b) planet c) sun is a classification by itself
homo

Odd that you would think I don't write good questions....I guess I write test questions well enough to have been one of the people who wrote questions for the test bank that accompanies this textbook series:
http://www.whfreeman.com/thelifewirebridge2/

I also co-wrote the instructor's manual for that series, and for another book by the same company designed for non-science majors taking biology.

Good thing they didn't talk to you before paying me for the work.

People who think this was in some way a trick question need to realize that students today do not STOP AND THINK about questions. They cannot decode questions. And the bottom line is this is FAR from a poorly worded question. There's absolutely no trick to it. But you need to STOP AND THINK before you answer it. That was the point here. I am trying to get kids to STOP AND THINK before they answer questions. Forgive me for being a bit put off by the insult. I struggle mightily getting young people to apply logic to an answer. They are so trained by this age to simply look up info and regurgitate it that they rarely engage the material before answering. If I give a simple reading assignment with some questions to accompany it, most of the students will read the questions, then just skim around the text until they find direct answers. They write them down and call it good. It works in history and other subjects for them, or they wouldn't do it. But I give them questions that they won't find direct answers to in the reading. They'll get the information they need, but they will need to understand and apply it to answer the question. Drives me nuts, because you'll always hear someone complaining "I can't find the answer to #4. It's not in here." Again, they will be looking for a section in the text that directly answers the question - something akin to "What is the closest planet to the sun?" for the question that would let them scan the reading until they found "THE CLOSEST PLANET TO THE SUN IS MERCURY."

It's not a poorly worded question, and I am able to tell the difference between a good and bad question.

[tnf]

And for the record, these two questions were asked at the end of a quiz over the atmosphere - we aren't even discussing astronomy at the moment. I can see the gravity one being a challenge for them (this was a class of freshmen) because they really haven't been taught a lot about it, other than that it is what makes things fall to the ground - teachings from their elementary school or junior high teachers.
I asked the question because I had recently read a statistic that stated that almost 50% of Americans didn't even realize the Sun was star, and because the day before the quiz a student had asked me how the sun was able to stay on fire if there was no oxygen in space. Again, you need to think about the fact that they've never been introduced to nuclear fusion or anything like it at this age - so I could understand the fire question being a source of some confusion.
But I was really surprised with the Sun question.
Getting people to think is really tough these days, because the public school system has let kids get away without having to do it for so long. When I stand in front of a class and tell them, flat out, that they will not pass unless they pass every single test they look at me like I am Hitler. When I tell them that you aren't entitled to an "A" just because you turn in all your homework, they look at me like I am Satan (there are a lot of 4.0 students who average B's on their tests, but get by because they turn in all their work and ask for extra credit.) They think it is quite unfair that I require an "A" level of subject mastery to get an "A" - and that I don't give extra credit (or, more appropriately, 'what can I do instead of really learning the material?')

But I'll keep fighting the good fight.

[mjrpes]

Now that you know students don't want to stop and think, the question is how do you make them WANT to stop and think. Especially when it comes to math and science.

[Foo]

I respect that man, but I perceive that there are also vultures amongst our converts who would use this same cause as a source of personal vindiction.

You know?

I think we're on the same page here.