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Michael Faraday and the art of lecturing

AUG 01, 1968
An intimate understanding of Faraday’s unique approach toward education adds new dimensions to one’s perspective of the old art of teaching

DOI: 10.1063/1.3035100

Raymond J. Seeger

Michael Faraday’s contributions to our understanding of electrical and magnetic phenomena are generally well known. Less familiar to many people is the importance of lectures in Faraday’s own self‐education and his subsequent teaching of others. He possessed an exceptional capacity for research and communication, a quality still evident in The Royal Institution, of which he had been director. This capacity was evident to all, both young and old, in a manner that was strikingly unique. For in his lectures he expressed all of the emotional and intellectual attributes of the natural philosopher possessed of genius. Lectures, for Faraday, reflected an approach to life involving all aspects of the personality in intimate relation to phenomena.

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References

  1. 1. J. Rorie, ed., “Select Exhortations Delivered to Various Churches of Christ by the late Michael Faraday, Wm. Buchanan, John M. Baxter, and Alexander Moir,” John Leng, Dundee (1910).

  2. 2. H. B. Jones, The Life and Letters of Faraday, Longmans, Green, London (1870), vols. 1 and 2.

  3. 3. M. Faraday, Advice to a Lecturer, The Royal Institution, London, (1960).

  4. 4. M. Faraday, On the Various Forces of Nature, Thomas Y. Crowell, New York (1961).

  5. 5. W. Crookes, ed., The Chemical History of a Candle by Michael Faraday, Viking, New York (1960).

  6. 6. J. Tyndall, Faraday as a Discoverer, D. Appleton, New York (1890).

  7. 7. M. Faraday, Experimental Researches in Chemistry and Physics, Richard Taylor and William Francis, London (1959).

  8. 8. L. P. Williams, Michael Faraday, Chapman and Hall, London (1965).

  9. 9. B. J. Bok, M. W. Mayall, Scientific Monthly 42, 233 (1941).

  10. 10. R. J. Seeger, Physics 8, 220 (1966).

  11. 11. J. A. Crowther, The Life and Discoveries of Michael Faraday, Macmillan, New York (1920).

More about the Authors

Raymond J. Seeger. National Science Foundation.

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Volume 21, Number 8

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