Galen T. PickettAssoc. ProfessorPhysics and AstronomyPH3-103
California State University Long Beach 1250 Bellflower Blvd. Long Beach, CA 90840-3901 (562) 985-4934 vc (562) 985-7924 fax
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Analysis of written comments:
At the time of evaluations, enrollment in the course was 85, and 59
students filled out evaluation forms. Of those, 36 had extra
written comments to make.
The course seems to have converged. Roughly equal voices in the comments below ask for more home work, and less, more of it online and less of it online. I still get a bit of a rap for going too quickly in lecture, and this has been a constant theme for me, form my first days on campus. Teaching the course at a chalkboard *has* significantly slowed me down, but at the cost of there being a lot of information for students to copy. At any rate, morale in the course seems high, and that is the basic feature I try to engineer with my policies and demeanor.
Comments made during standard class evaluations:
1. I like the HW and EC. Very
helpful. I like 0.5 part of class where we ask you questions.
Labs should be worth more points or shortened.
2. Hw (pickett) should continue the
email student-professor communication! *VERY* helpful. Thank
you.
3. Dr. Pickett, according to my experience is the most well-rounded
and helpful professor in physics. His classroom strux. is perfected
by opinion of his students. Class is fair and goes over material
throughly and clearly despite the difficult subject.
4. The lab instructors could learn a little more english and
not spend so much time reviewing. labs were overall good.
5. If possible, incorporate setup, evaluate, execute and Identify
in the homework set.
6. The lab was not very helpful in making concepts clear.
The labs had to much error built into them due to equipment and dependence
on human intervention. They showed me more about built in error than
physics.
7. I wish the tests were real numbers and not variables.
Caluclators should be allowed, too.
8. The tests were a little hard to finish in the amount of
time given.
9. The course was well structured with the homework and lab,
but the labs were always off from the topics that we were studying at the
time. The labs were either ahead of class topics or behind it.
10. Extra credit is very helpful, homework is good prep. for
tests. Sometimes hard to tell what is going to be on the test, but
otherwise good course.
11. Fast lectures. Lectures go perhaps too far beyond
the scope of this class.
12. Needs to slow down while teaching. Should lecture
from book more instead of doing homework most of the time during class.
13. Excellent teaching experience. Recommended.
14. An excellent professor that goes above and beyond what
most other instructors do to help students understand the material.
15. More than fair graded; class designed so that a majority
of students can pass; extra credit on homeowrk was a BIG help.
16. The way you structure your class is very effective and
I feel more confident in this class than most of my other classes.
17. The way the lab is presented is different from lecture.
The way lecture is presented is logical; lab is confusing. Only the
lab instructor clarifies, but not always. The final for lecture should
be same format as other exams.
18. Very good professor. I would have liked to have
more time for the exams. I will be taking this professor for PHYS
152, but I will make sure I take the twice a week classes so I can have
more time for exams.
19. Probably my favorite teacher in college so far!
I would definitely take him again. Homework is perfect the way it
is. If you put the time into doing it all, the benefits of extra
credit are huge.
20. You presented the material well enough to understand the
concepts. Some labs about rotating masses were not useful.
They don't make sense. Also explain well about how you want the exams
to be done .. ISEE format.
21. I think homework should have more extra credit.
Also more feedback is needed while doing the homework so one can know what
they are doing is right or wrong.
22. On board examples were very hard to follow for me.
Possible going a little slower might help.
23. Dr. Pickett should hold more office hours. He is
a great physics teacher!
24. You are a great teacher.
25. Good instructor, very helpful, maybe be more specific
with lecture. I got confused sometimes because there were too many
variables.
26. I found this class to be very insightful and I really
liked the way you approached the testing. I apreciate the accomodation
to my personal situation. Thanks for a great semester!
27. Something for next year to do is to maybe give an option
for homework to be handwritten. I know personally that I learn better
by doing the problem, bringing it in and then finding out what I did wrong.
Sometimes web work is just frustrating.
28. Instructor did very well in teaching the course.
Everything taught in class was on exam, there were never any major suprises.
The grading was easy as well, there was more than enough extra credit available.
The main change that I believe is needed is the office hours. The
few times I went he was not there.
29. I think that there should be more consistency in the way
that the labs are graded. People in some labs only had to do half
as much work and got better grades than those of us who had to do more
work.
30. I found Prof. Pickett's class enjoyable. He made
everything clear and easy to understand.
31. Very interesting...
32. Dr. Pickett was a good teacher. He understood that
not all of us learned physics right away. He would help us through
email and our assignments. I enjoyed his class and look forward to
PHYS 152 with him. I would reccommend that HW be EXTRA CREDIT.
The HW problems were somewhat tedious and long.
33. I don't know if this can be attended to due to the time
restraints of the class, but its hard to copy down what you're explaining
and also listen to the explaination at the same while you're writing it
down... maybe go a little slower while doing problems so we have
time to understand what's going on rather than just copying things down.
34. Great teaching style. I had a few enthusiastic teachers
this semester and that is the kind I like to learn from. I was reminded
of my high school physics teacher who I loved learning from and I was glad
to be taught physics by a friendly and approachable, enthusiastic teacher.
35. The way the lectures were presented are very well done.
Most other lecture instructors have the students take pages and pages of
notes which often, for the most part, leaves them even more confused, thus
a higher fail rate. Looking around the classroom, there seems to
be a higher number of students passing. The way how tests were done,
first half alone, then second half in groups is much more realistic in
the real world, but the 50 minute time constriction is a bit harsh at times.
36. The instructor was very helful during office hours.
His lectures were clear and very through, especially because he solved
problems from the homework. Besides, he was always willing to explain
anything you didn't understand during class. The extra credit was
the most helpful part of the course, it can bump your grade up a lot.
Awesomest physics class.
last updated: Jan. 14, 2008
