Although I do not agree with Feynman's very crude style of criticizing the school teaching system, I fully agree with his idea of how physics must be taught, in a practical way. During my senior year of high school, I took AP Physics. Due to scheduling issues, I had to take the course as independent study instead of in class. This decision prevented me from attending workshops intended to work in parallel with the curriculum and reinforce the content and concepts we were taught. I was very capable of giving definitions and explaining ideas that we studied in class; however, I was almost helpless when asked to provide an example that represented a concept we had learned. This situation escalated significantly when the AP exam took place last spring, where I received a very unsatisfactory score by my standards. I can empathize with Feynman's frustration with students who were unable to articulate the details of concepts that physics students were supposed to know. Feynman wrote: “I discovered a very strange phenomenon: I could ask a question to which the students would answer immediately. But the next time I asked the question – the same topic and the same question, as far as I knew – they couldn't answer it at all” (Feynman 54). Feynman described a situation in which he asked what polarization was, to which students could give a textbook-like definition. When Feynman asked a more specific question, asking for a real-life example of polarization, the students were silent and confused. I know the feeling of not being fully able to relate scientific concepts due to inadequate education through lectures and experimentation. I think the way Feynman states his views on the Brazilian form of “education” was a bit brazen. I can give him credit for being one of the best known and most respected scientists of the 20th century. I'm not sure how welcomed and powerful it was by the
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