As a teacher, I find the most challenging thing is to capture the interest of the students and ignite their creativity and imagination. Walter Lewin, former professor of physics at MIT, USA has been very successful at doing just that. A sampling of his video lectures on YouTube shows how easy it is to be seduced by his approach to teaching physics.
At the end of a long career at MIT, Walter Lewin, along with history professor Warren Goldstein, has written an utterly delightful book For the Love of Physics: From the End of the Rainbow to the Edge of Time - A Journey Through the Wonders of Physics (2011) which is almost as good as his video lectures.
This book is part scientific tour and part scientific autobiography. Lewin starts with his early life in Netherlands where he evaded the Nazi terror as a child and then went on to do his PhD at the Delft University of Technology. In 1965, he went to MIT, USA as a post-doctoral student and was soon appointed a faculty member there. He never moved again.
Lewin's teaching philosophy is simple and yet (as I found out the hard way) hard to emulate. He says: "My goal was to impart ... enthusiasm to my students, to help them see the beauty of the world all around them in a new way, to change them so that they would see the world of physics as beautiful, and would understand that physics is everywhere, that it permeates our lives. What counts, I found, is not what you cover, but what you uncover. Covering subjects in a class can be a boring exercise, and students feel it. Uncovering the laws of physics and making them see through the equations, on the other hand, demonstrates the process of discovery, with all its newness and excitement, and students love being part of it."
In this book Lewin answers several questions that a layman would have wondered about from time to time: why is the sky blue, why are sunsets red, why are clouds white? He explains the law of conservation of energy in a mind-boggling manner. (For a practical demonstration, check out the video For the Love of Physics on YouTube).
Lewin brings a child's curiosity and delight to the learning of physics. As he says: "I have never ceased to be delighted by the discoveries of physics, both old and new; by its rich history and ever-moving frontiers; and by the way it has opened my eyes to unexpected wonders of the world all around me. For me physics is a way of seeing - the spectacular and the mundane, the immense and the minute - as a beautiful, thrillingly interwoven whole."
Lewin and Goldstein, in the chapter "Bodies in Motion" give the best explanation of Newton's three laws of motion I've ever come across. Other things like air pressure and static electricity are equally well explained. The authors go even further: how is a rainbow formed, why does lightning strike?
The latter chapters in the book are devoted to Lewin's research in the specialized field of X-astronomy. I found it personally spellbinding and inspiring how much he and his colleagues had to toil to establish the then-nascent field of X-ray astronomy and how it has contributed to the modern study of black holes and neutron stars.
Walter Lewin was seventy five when the book was published in 2011. He was emeritus professor at MIT then. However his life at MIT came to an unpleasant end in 2014 when an online student accused him of sexual harassment. After conducting an internal investigation, MIT stripped him off his emeritus professorship and removed all his courses from the MIT OpenCourseWare website.
His failings notwithstanding, Lewin's lectures remain popular on YouTube with about 5000 views per day the world over.
Let me leave this review with Lewin's words: "My goal is to make [my students] love physics and to make them look at the world in a different way, and that is for life! You broaden their horizon, which allows them to ask questions they have never asked before. The point is to unlock the world of physics in such a way that it connects to the genuine interest students have in the world. That's why I always try to show my students the forests, rather than take them up and down every single tree. That is also what I have tried to do in this book for you."
At the end of a long career at MIT, Walter Lewin, along with history professor Warren Goldstein, has written an utterly delightful book For the Love of Physics: From the End of the Rainbow to the Edge of Time - A Journey Through the Wonders of Physics (2011) which is almost as good as his video lectures.
This book is part scientific tour and part scientific autobiography. Lewin starts with his early life in Netherlands where he evaded the Nazi terror as a child and then went on to do his PhD at the Delft University of Technology. In 1965, he went to MIT, USA as a post-doctoral student and was soon appointed a faculty member there. He never moved again.
Lewin's teaching philosophy is simple and yet (as I found out the hard way) hard to emulate. He says: "My goal was to impart ... enthusiasm to my students, to help them see the beauty of the world all around them in a new way, to change them so that they would see the world of physics as beautiful, and would understand that physics is everywhere, that it permeates our lives. What counts, I found, is not what you cover, but what you uncover. Covering subjects in a class can be a boring exercise, and students feel it. Uncovering the laws of physics and making them see through the equations, on the other hand, demonstrates the process of discovery, with all its newness and excitement, and students love being part of it."
In this book Lewin answers several questions that a layman would have wondered about from time to time: why is the sky blue, why are sunsets red, why are clouds white? He explains the law of conservation of energy in a mind-boggling manner. (For a practical demonstration, check out the video For the Love of Physics on YouTube).
Lewin brings a child's curiosity and delight to the learning of physics. As he says: "I have never ceased to be delighted by the discoveries of physics, both old and new; by its rich history and ever-moving frontiers; and by the way it has opened my eyes to unexpected wonders of the world all around me. For me physics is a way of seeing - the spectacular and the mundane, the immense and the minute - as a beautiful, thrillingly interwoven whole."
Lewin and Goldstein, in the chapter "Bodies in Motion" give the best explanation of Newton's three laws of motion I've ever come across. Other things like air pressure and static electricity are equally well explained. The authors go even further: how is a rainbow formed, why does lightning strike?
The latter chapters in the book are devoted to Lewin's research in the specialized field of X-astronomy. I found it personally spellbinding and inspiring how much he and his colleagues had to toil to establish the then-nascent field of X-ray astronomy and how it has contributed to the modern study of black holes and neutron stars.
Walter Lewin was seventy five when the book was published in 2011. He was emeritus professor at MIT then. However his life at MIT came to an unpleasant end in 2014 when an online student accused him of sexual harassment. After conducting an internal investigation, MIT stripped him off his emeritus professorship and removed all his courses from the MIT OpenCourseWare website.
His failings notwithstanding, Lewin's lectures remain popular on YouTube with about 5000 views per day the world over.
Let me leave this review with Lewin's words: "My goal is to make [my students] love physics and to make them look at the world in a different way, and that is for life! You broaden their horizon, which allows them to ask questions they have never asked before. The point is to unlock the world of physics in such a way that it connects to the genuine interest students have in the world. That's why I always try to show my students the forests, rather than take them up and down every single tree. That is also what I have tried to do in this book for you."
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