While many of my friends in blogland are dealing with the joy and pain of the beginning of the fall term, yours truly is still on break. The summer session ended two weeks ago. My college does not start the fall term for another two weeks. (In my defense, we run a trimester system and complete three 15 weeks session in a year).
Usually, I am bouncing off walls, itching to get back into the school routine. I am one of those people who gets bored rather quickly. I get stir crazy when I am stuck at home or unengaged for an extended period of time. But this year, I am so enjoying my time off.
I think part of the reason for my relaxed state is that I only have a week between the end of the Spring semester and the beginning of the Summer semester. That is not enough time to recharge and regroup. Usually, it takes a week for me to recover from the previous semester's heinousness. So when the Summer semester starts, I hit the ground running on fumes.
The other reason is that the Wicked Witch (AKA, the Dean of Instruction) is gone. No more micro-management. No more stupid faculty meeting where we have to turn to our college and tell him or her that he or she is doing a fabulous job. No more stupid activities that require faculty to divide into pairs and discuss articles from the ERIC Digest. The college has not named a new Dean yet. So, I shouldn't be careful about getting too comfortable. The new person could be the total opposite or could be the former Dean's evil twin!
I have taken some time to work on sylabi for next semester. The email from Ding Dong student really made me think about whether my expectations are clear. Don't get me wrong. I do not think I am to blame for what that student said. But after reading that, as well as B* post about students v. kids, it makes me wonder about my expectations of my students and if I am being realistic.
So here are my questions:
- Am I giving too many assignments, projects and other assessments that interfere with student success? (I think back to my Law School days where there was only one exam, the finial. That was it. I am not thinking going that drastic. But maybe less is more???)
- Are my standards too restrictive? If my goal is to prepare them for the working world, should I treat them as such. (I teach at a career college, so this a big issue).
- Should I consider every possible issue that could arise and have it covered in my syllabus. (I have been burned by that one. Something comes up that is not covered by the syllabus and the student wins because of it. Hence my syllabus is about 10 pages long).
I have not experienced any major ephiphanies yet. I guess I still have some time to figure it all out.
5 comments:
I think students will complain no matter what, but I do believe there is a difference between assignments we give them for us and those that we give them for them.
I inherited syllabi when I came to NewU that were little more than ways to gain power over students with assignments that would never convert to real-life high school teaching (like perfect APA 5th edition references on EVERY lesson plan written). First thing I did (when I could) was cut about half of the assignments. I mean, literally, there were 900 possible points in one class!!!
I got it down to 400 but can't cut anymore as the State controls most of what we do. However, that did not stop me from removing pointless assignments.
I make thm read and reflect each week; we have a blog they post to 1+ times per week; there is a midterm and final; there is a unit plan (with only one individual lesson plan to write); and they come up with a possible action research topic. That is enough for them--they will be busy.
I hate grading, and wish we didn't have to. But, if there were no grades, would they honestly do the work at all? Sadly, I think I know the answer.
RL friend's friend: Welcome to the Waiting Room! I will add you to the Friends in Low Places.
Thanks for your comments. It is true that no matter what, students will complain!
To Cut Back on Complaints:
The complaints I get are about grades, so to cut back on those I make a really strict syllabus. 1. attendance-- no excuses accepted, everyone gets 2 free abscences to SAVE for emergencies. (Of course if there is a HUGE emergency contact my ASAP). 2. disscusion grade-- as part of the syllabus I include a discussion grade break down where C= Quiet in class but engaged, plesant and respectful to others.
Maybe you should set out general principles in the syllabus rather than get to specific (which the students will then lawyer). A principle like: I am always right.
1. Too many assignments is bad, but students don't like too few assignments either. My rule of thumb is that no assignment should equal more than 30% of the grade and that ideally 50% of the grade for the course will be calculable at 3/4 of the way through the semester. That means assignments that come in around 10, 15, or 20 percent for the most part. I got complaints in the first lit class I taught where there were 5 parts to the grade - participation, two papers, a midterm, and a final - because there weren't enough "opportunities" to make their grades better.
2. I think that maybe the preparation for the working world question answers itself - you should be _preparing_ them, which means explaining how what they're doing relates to the real world, and giving them the tools they need to do those tasks. If you just throw them in and treat them as if they are in the real world, then you're not preparing them. So I'd say, think of what the real world would expect and then think of steps to get them there. Your expectations can ultimately be real-world expectations, but you have to have mini-expectations built in too, maybe. (Sorry about all the shoulds and have-tos in this part of the comment - I'm too lazy to edit them out. Obviously you've got to do what feels comfortable to you, and there is no one way to do this thing right - this is just the way that I see it.)
3. I agree that you've got to outline all of the major things on the syllabus, or if not on the syllabus (with the course schedule and goals and such) then on a separate course policies document (I choose to do this because then it separates the hard-ass stuff from the "fun" that is the course. I think this is more for my benefit than theirs.)
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