Individual aid worries prof
Faced with 1,110 students in two beginning chemistry courses, Clark E. Bricker, professor of chemistry, had problems.
He had to be sure every student got the same material in lecture, in order to give each a fair chance on the examinations, and he had to be sure every student got as much individual attention as he needed.
THE SOLUTION TO the problem of individual attention required Bricker and five other men to work 10 hours each just on the mechanics. Using entrance examination scores—it took six men four hours just to dig out the scores for 1,110 students—Bricker and his assistants divided the group into four "grades": high, good, fair, and poor.
Bricker then formed 53 weekly recitation classes of about 20 students each. High students are in one group of recitation classes, poor students in recitation classes of their own.
"We get the less well prepared students to the blackboard and drill the dickens out of them," Bricker said. "The students who have good chemistry backgrounds can go on more swiftly. We enrich their course material."
RECITATION CLASSES ARE taught by experienced teachers. Thirty-five are taught by senior staff members who volunteered for the job. The other 18 are taught by five carefully chosen graduate students, all of whom have had at least three years of graduate study.
"We will not put inexperienced
NFS award to museum for trips
The Museum of Natural History has been awarded a grant of $3,250 by the National Science Foundation to finance next summer's field trips.
Last summer ten zoology students participated in the program. One group studied live animals in their natural habitats. Eight graduate students were taught by Dr. Richard F. Johnson, associate professor in zoology, to trap, skin and preserve animals.
A graduate and undergraduate student studied ancient animals. Led by Dr. William A. Clemens, associate professor in zoology, they learned to discover, remove and package fossils.
Both groups brought back specimens and made complete records for future study.
Rules of the Foundation require that not more than half the students who are granted fellowship support to the program of field study may be from the sponsoring university.
Tiny radios, club topic
Biotelemetry will be the subject of discussion at the first meeting of the year of the KU Amateur Radio Club. The meeting will be held tonight at 7:30 in room 115 Learned Hall.
Tony Shirer, professor of Electronic Engineering and Biological Life Sciences, will speak. He will talk about the research being done in studying the natural habits of animals with the aid of tiny radio transmitters.
The sub-miniaturized radio beacons transmit information on animal body temperature and heart rate.
men in these classes," Bricker said.
He solved the problem of uniform lecture material two ways. Bricker lectures to one 570-student class, and Richard L. Middaugh, assistant professor of chemistry, lectures to a class of 540. Both use a projector to demonstrate experiments.
"I can show things better to 600 people with overhead projection than I can to 20 people using conventional equipment," Bricker said.
WITH THE PROJECTION screen, he gets a test tube a foot wide and four feet tall; everyone can see it.
"I defy anyone to use that kind of equipment on a lecture desk," he said.
Use of the recitation classes gives Bricker more time for visiting the laboratories and talking to students.
"I TRY TO BE available," said Bricker. He looked at the door to his office, where freshman chemistry students were standing patiently. "I've got three waiting that I can see, and I don't know how many more."
Bricker received his Ph.D. from Princeton and taught there for 13 years. He also taught at Johns Hopkins University, where he was put in charge of general chemistry after seven months on the staff.
He was dean of the College of Wooster, Ohio, before coming to KU in 1963.
KU students study ancient village sites
An archeological dig last summer just 10 miles southwest of Lawrence uncovered remains of villages dating from the time of Christ.
Alfred E. Johnson, assistant professor of anthropology, worked with 13 students on the site of the Clinton Reservoir for eight weeks.
Three of the nine village sites excavated were productive. One was inhabited by Woodland people about 1 A.D.; the other two by Central Plains Indians about 1000-1200 A.D.
The later agriculturally based group showed more permanency
and had houses of brush plastered with mud. More pottery and remains of corn, beans and squash were found with this group.
Johnson said the three most productive sites were valuable because they were the rare unplowed sites.
14
"We can now tell the story of man's occupation in the small stretch along the Wakarusa," Johnson said.
Daily Kansan Tuesday. October 4. 1966