行萬里路 讀萬卷書

這個網址裡有美國麻省理工學院71歲的物理學教授瓦爾特．勒溫(Walter H. G. Lewin)精彩的教學影片，影片剪接得很棒，非常精彩！

http://potw.news.yahoo.com/s/potw/63302/high-wire-act/

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網路開放教學 MIT老教授勒溫爆紅

中時電子報 更新日期: 2007/12/21 04:39 　楊明暐／紐約時報十九日報導

美國麻省理工學院71歲的物理學教授瓦爾特．勒溫（Walter H. G. Lewin）在校內原本就擁有一票崇拜追隨他的學生，拜該校所辦網路「開放式課程」（OpenCourseWare）所賜，他現在成了桃李滿天下的巨星級「大師」。

勒溫錄製的物理學教學影片，透過「開放式課程」免費供學子上網觀看學習，結果勒溫不僅在全美擁有眾多弟子，還吸引不少外國人奉他為師。他的電子郵件信箱經常收到來自各地的推崇和感謝信件。

一名17歲印度學生在寫給他的電子郵件中說：「透過您激勵人心的教學，我才曉得物理學很美，讓人既感到驚奇，也覺得很簡單。」

聖地牙哥62歲的花店老闆史帝夫．博根則寫道：「我跨出的步伐有了新的活力，我現在用充滿物理學色彩的眼睛來看待人生。」

勒溫運用電視名廚茱莉雅．蔡爾德（JuliaChild）指導觀眾法式烹調的誇張技巧，以及類似影音分享網站YouTube熱門短片的滑稽戲劇手法，讓學習者對其教學內容留下深刻印象。

「開放式課程」網站（ocw.mit.edu）提供的勒溫教學影片裡，他曾用貓毛拍打一名學生，來說明靜電原理。為了解釋物體在自由墜落時的軌跡，勒溫穿短褲、拖鞋還戴了一頂遮陽帽，開砲發射一顆高爾夫球，射向一隻穿著防彈背心的玩具猴子。儘管年逾七旬，勒溫卻成了網路新一代學術明星之一。蘋果公司今年5月透過iTunes Store線上商店開辦iTunes大學提供免費課程，勒溫的教學影片一度在下載排行上名列第一。如今越來越多教授向他看齊，透過網路開班授徒。

上星期，耶魯將大學部若干受歡迎的課程和教授們的教學錄影免費公布上網，如查爾斯．貝林（Charles Bailyn）的「天體物理學中的爭論」，朗登．哈默（Langdon Hammer）的「現代詩」和克莉絲汀．海耶斯的「舊約導論」。

麻省理工學院最近增設一個針對高中生和高中教師的網站。勒溫是該網站「名師」之一。有些來信將勒溫與諾貝爾物理獎得主理察．費曼（Richard Feynman）相提並論。費曼透過出書、演講和上電視，積極推廣物理學（《別鬧了，費曼先生》是他最出名的著作之一）。

勒溫雖沒有諾貝爾獎光環加持，但他生動活潑的教學方式，卻令學生獲益匪淺。這位身高188公分，滿頭白髮的教授，為了介紹鐘擺的週期與吊掛物體的質量無關，曾躺在從天花板垂下的吊索上，讓自己像鐘擺一樣擺盪。「各位請看，這可是鐘擺之母。」接著他在講台上盪來盪去。然後喊道：「物理學果然不假！」教室立時爆出歡呼聲，這個畫面透過網路傳遍全世界，使他成了萬千學子頂禮膜拜的對象。

High Wire Act

MIT professor and Web star Walter Lewin swings from pendulums and faces down wrecking balls to show students the zany beauty of science.

BY KEVIN SITES, TUE MAR 11, 1:44 PM PDT

Walter Lewin is not merely dangling at the bottom of a 15-foot pendulum. He is swinging high and wide, his rapt audience of 300 counting off each cycle.
At 71, he's likely missed his window for a shot at Cirque du Soleil, but the Netherlands-born MIT physics professor seems happy with his own high wire act -- revealing to students, in the most unorthodox ways, the beauty of science.
 
MIT professor Walter Lewin's elaborate physics demonstrations are a hit in the classroom and online.
His pendulum ride comes at the end of a lecture on Hooke's Law, in which he proves the pendulum's period, or time that it takes to complete one cycle, is not affected by the mass at the bottom -- in this case, his own body.
He will also, on other occasions, suck helium and continue his lecture sounding like a Dutch Daffy Duck to highlight the differences in the speed of sound in certain gases. He'll shoot across the classroom stage astride a bicycle mounted with fire extinguishers to demonstrate a rocket's change in momentum.
"It took me a decade to come to the realization," says Lewin at his MIT office, "that really what counts is not what you cover, but what counts is what you uncover."
What Lewin has uncovered is that requiring the memorization of formulas and equations is not the most effective way to teach. Teachers must, he believes, engage students with action.
One of his students, Carolyn Crull, a civil engineering major from San Diego, says Lewin's classroom theatrics have helped open her eyes to her surroundings.
"A lot of students spend their days just staring at the ground as they walk around," she says, " but, maybe you will look up every once in a while and see the beauty in the world."
While Lewin's students can see this first hand, a thousand others, many with little connection to the science world, watch each day online, sampling one of his 100 videotaped lectures made available through MIT's open courseware site.
His devoted Web following routinely makes him the most downloaded podcast on the Apple Store's "iTunes U." From email responses to his lectures, he's purportedly help snap some viewers out of depression, inspired career changes and even attracted two marriage proposals.
"You have to challenge [students]. You have to be a little fun. I could make them sit on the edge of their seats, I could make them wet their pants." — Walter Lewin
But Lewin says one of his most meaningful notes was from a man claiming to be from Iraq.
"In spite of the bad occupation and the war against my lovely Iraq," it reads, "you made me love USA because you are there and MIT is there."
The adulation is understandable. Lewin's lectures are not improvised, slapped-together affairs. They are intricate three-camera shoots, with each lecture taking forty hours to prepare and Lewin rehearsing them completely three times before students ever see them.
With cranes, pendulums and a number of construction-size visual aids that often have to be custom built in a university workshop, the lectures aren't cheap either. The series, funded by an outside grant, costs as much as $300,000.
At that price tag, it is important students are actually learning. Lewin ensures this, he says, by adhering to three principles; clarity, timing and suspense -- keep the focus tight, be precise and end with a big finish.
In one of his most dramatic and popular lectures, Lewin's big finish involves putting his face in the trajectory of a 33-pound steel wrecking ball to demonstrate Hooke's Law.
He holds the ball near his face and tells his audience if he provides even the slightest push, rather than just allowing the ball to swing away on its own momentum, it will be his last lecture. Students edge forward in their seats as he begins the countdown.
 
In one of his more famous demonstrations, Lewin faces down a wrecking ball.
"You have to challenge them. You have to make them laugh occasionally; you have to be a little fun. If I want to, I could make them cry, I could make them sit on the edge of their seats, I could make them wet their pants," Lewin says with unabashed confidence, "If you are really an artist, you can do all these things."
And there's little doubt that while he has a head for science, he also has the heart of an artist. That's fitting for a man who earned his PhD at the University of Delft, located in the hometown of one the most famous 17th century Dutch painters, Johannes Vermeer.
Inspired by his parents' love of art, Lewin himself has become an avid collector, but focuses on the modern. In his home he showcases works from such acclaimed contemporary artists as Julian Schnabel, Larry Rivers, John Wesley and Jacques Lipchitz.
"My interest in visual effects in my lectures may well have been influenced by my love for contemporary art," he reluctantly offers, after being pressed on the subject.
He's admittedly eccentric, sporting a revolving array of interesting rings and jewelry in the classroom, including broaches in the shape of bananas or fried eggs.
Lewin's commitment and enthusiasm are never in question. Especially in videotaped moments like this one:
"Five, four, thee, two, one," Lewin counts and very, very, gently releases the wrecking ball.
It swings back on a wide arc until it loses forward momentum and then drops back in the other direction, headed right for Lewin's face.
The professor close his eyes as a puff of wind from the ball blows kisses to his face, but the ball itself stops just millimeters from the tip of his chin. Students gasp.
"Physics works! And I'm still alive," Lewin exclaims to thunderous applause.
It's clear that those present or watching online will not soon forget this lesson on the conservation of mechanical energy -- nor the man who taught it to them.
-Producers: Erin Green, Robert Padavick
-Video editor: Jon Brick
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