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Comment by dannypgh | Hacker News Reader

I strongly believe math should be taught with the science that motivated its development- calculus should be taught with classical mechanics. But I'm less sure the history of science is worthwhile.

The problem is opportunity cost. Schools (highschool, college intro physics) spend a great deal of time discussing previous models of the atom. What's the value of teaching Thomson's plum pudding model of the atom, really? They could start with the current model and list all of the observations/experiments that have shown the model to be useful. Previous models could be relegated to an appendix, or a history class.

This would free up time to more comprehensively discuss 20th and 21st century physics, which are sorely neglected at this level.

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The value of teaching Thomson's plum pudding model of the atom is to understand the evolution of ideas. It also helps the young minds understand that solving problems is often messy and we have to revisit our understanding of scientific models as new facts emerge. It might be obvious to you but the young students would feel that solutions would come in a single shot.

Ideally if the students have strong basics 20th and 21st century physics should be tried by the students themselves.

I think there is value in teaching that there have been prior models (but more energy should be spent on the current thinking) because it shows that good scientists are constantly researching and revising their ideas as they get more information. Science is never done.

To be clear I agree there's value, I just don't think the value is as high as the other things that could be taught in that time.

I think appendices are really a good solution here. Those who are curious can read them- I know I would have. Those who aren't, can stick to focusing on the current model.

I'm not sure I agree. I think that understanding that knowledge is never done, and that science is about exploring new ideas and questioning our current understanding is much more important to the layperson than knowing how atoms are structured.

I also think that couching science as a journey--a mystery to be solved, with clues and red herrings along the way--will help to get students interested in learning the details. (This is all just my gut instinct; I have no experience in science education, so I might not know what I'm talking about).

Yeah, calculus seems really abstract and pointless until you realise that it's 90% of physics. At school they shy away from calculus so much that you just do a version of physics where they've simplified away the calculus, which is extremely confusing.

Sometimes it's worthwhile to explain how things are by first talking about how things aren't.

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