Re: when is a C not a C

[dennis roberts]

At 08:19 PM 2/11/2003, Herman Rubin wrote:

However, I believe that interaction between students
of comparable ability can help in the learning process.
But not if the abilities differ widely.
--

for better or worse ... school systems have more or less abandoned ability grouping long ago ... some of it is federally mandated

BUT, do you really think that having a group of low ability students ... ie, say those really struggling in math ... are going to be able to help each other with their math work? i don't think so

apply this to the basic intro stat course at a place like ... er hm ... purdue ... if you had a pretest ... then isolated the low 10% (the ones who for SURE hate math and statistics) ... not only with this NOT be of benefit but, it will hurt their chances of making any progress in this course

i think your argument has merit at the top end ... but, from there down i have serious doubts
.
.
=================================================================
Instructions for joining and leaving this list, remarks about the
problem of INAPPROPRIATE MESSAGES, and archives are available at:
. http://jse.stat.ncsu.edu/ .
=================================================================