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October 18, 2007
The Most Exciting Thing I Have Ever Done
Would not be proctoring a freshman midterm. Though that is how I am spending my morning.
Right now, I am sitting with my feet up on a table, occasionally peering over my laptop at the worried freshmen in front of me to make sure they're doing their own work. They are. I know that the fact that I could easily get a high B on the exam without studying at all means more or less nothing. After all, I wrote part of it. But still, it's fascinating to see the faces that look exactly the way I know mine looks when posed a question on an exam that I wasn't expecting.
And also a little strange. This is the first midterm I've ever given. I don't like to give tests. I prefer making them think on their feet, via discussion. When it's time to synthesize a lot of information, I prefer papers. Something they have time to think about and consider. Tests, though I am a very good test taker, always annoyed me. I mean, most of the time, I forgot the information right after, so I'm not sure what purpose they serve.
THIS test is designed to do a couple of things:
1) Make sure they understand they should be taking notes & doing the reading;
2) Help them figure out how to take tests in college to be sure they can hack it as they get further along in academia.
I'm not much of a fan of grades, either. I think they cause more damage than they are worth. I mean, look at No Child Left Behind. Exactly how does that testing system teach our children the things they will need to get by in life? Plus, with grades you get students like the one who came up to me just before the midterm, panicking because his printer stopped working, so he can't turn in the papers that are due for class. He's already in a state of terror because of the midterm today (his grades are not that good right now), and the printer thing took him over the edge. HOW is he going to be relaxed enough to take this test now, with so much riding on it? What benefit will he accrue from this experience?
I wish there was some other way to assess student progress than grading. And testing. Though I will admit that nothing makes a student pay attention in class like an F at midterm. Or drop, if they've decided the F means the class is stupid. Because it's the class' fault. A failing grade has nothing to do with personal responsibility and participation.
Part of the reason I'm musing on this right now is that I had to turn in failing grades for 1/3 of the students in one core class. Not because I'm hideously strict. I'm not. Because they weren't turning anything in. And let's face it, the assignments aren't that hard. Really. "Draw a picture of a doorway symbolizing your transition into college. Consider how you want to represent your past & your future. Is the door open or closed ? Which direction are you facing? What surrounds the doorway on either side?" This is not, as I said, a huge project. It is an interesting one. And yet, people didn't turn them in.
I think part of the issue may be that the class has the word "Art" in the title, which is apparently synonymous with "easy" in some minds. Trust me. As a working artist, I can tell you right now, Art ≠ easy. Ever. Sometimes it's glorious and soul-filled and things just flow out of you. But you have to do a lot of work to get to those places, and they're not places you get to stay for very long. And then you have to do a lot of work again.
Dude. A student just got here. Forty minutes into the seventy-five minute class period. Good luck with that.
Posted by sally at October 18, 2007 10:20 AM
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