Thanksgiving week was certainly busy for us! We were able to drive home on Tuesday night, and stayed until after dinner on Saturday. We were so happy to be able to spend time with family and friends, but the weekend felt incredibly short. It seemed like we didn't get to see anyone as much as we'd have liked. But, we will be back in just about 3 weeks (which is really hard to believe!) and we'll be able to stay in town for at least a week.
Mark had a steel band concert last night (that's why we left on Saturday night--he had set-up/rehearsal starting at noon on Sunday). I've never seen a steel band group perform before, so it was really cool. I was surprised by the range of music they performed--from traditional pan music to an arrangement of Bach. Mark even played a solo in one of the pieces. It was very fun--I was disappointed that our families couldn't be here to see it, too, especially since it's so different from what Mark's done in the past. They do have a website with some video clips of old concerts, if anyone wants to take a look.
Today, we're just trying to get back into the swing of things. I am really thankful that I planned ahead enough with school and teaching that I didn't have to do any work over the weekend. (I did some reading yesterday, but that's it.) The trouble is that now I'm having a hard time getting back to work! I have just a few assignments left this semester for the classes I'm taking, a little lesson planning for English 101, and, by 3 this afternoon, I'll have a giant stack of papers to grade. The next two weeks will be very busy.
I do want to get some feedback about how quickly I should to try and get these papers graded. So far this semester, I've always graded and returned the essays within a week. These will probably take me a bit longer because the essays are longer and I'm using a different rubric. The question is, should I try to get them returned before (or on) the last day of class, or wait till the day they turn in their finals. I had been thinking I should give them back as soon as possible (as I've done for the others), but my TEAD suggested holding on to them until the finals are due. In her experience, students work harder on the final when they don't know their grade. If they know their grade, they tend to do the minimum to get the grade they want. So, what do you think? Should I aim to return the essays so they'll have their grades or wait in hopes that it will lead to better final exams?
2 comments:
If the TEAD person is correct, then I think you have a philosophical question to ask yourself: How important is the class you teach for your kids?
If your class is super important, then you should make them work as hard as possible in the hopes that they learn more. If your class is not that important, then you should allow them to put less effort into your class so that they are able to focus on other things that are more important.
I will point out that the other side of the coin is that some students may assume they are doing better than they really are and actually try less hard than they should. This has happened to me before.
That's a good question. I hadn't heard it from the teacher's perspective, though.
As a student, I would want to get the paper back as soon as possible. Also, I'm not sure that only studying the minimum for a final is a bad thing. In the past, I've taken 5 or 6 classes in a semester, and I always found it very stressful trying to get all of the studying done (especially if I had more than one final on a particular day). It was always useful to me to know my grade so that I could prioritize my studying.
On the other hand, students in English 101 are probably not taking that many classes (since most of them are probably freshmen), and it might be good to have them stressing out a bit so that they actually do some studying (it seemed to me when I was at NMSU, that most freshmen are still in high school mode, where they were able to get away with not studying or doing homework).
Personally, I would probably try to get the papers back to the students as soon as possible (since I'm still thinking like a student). For you, though, I think that you should do it at your convenience. If you wind up with lots of spare time, grade them quickly, but if you get really busy, don't worry about it.
Derek
Post a Comment