I have been using little mini-quizzes for several years now….
I have been using little mini-quizzes for several years now.Prior to this, I had either weekly or biweekly (every other week) quizzes that covered more material and were worth more points. What happened in those cases was that many students would just skip the chapters altogether, take the quizzes blind, and then fail them (and the course) because they weren’t learning anything.I realize that many students view the class with a “let me just complete the assignments without doing the reading and see what happens” attitude, so the mini quizzes are my attempt to a) help make the quizzes less scary since they’re worth a few points each b) get the students who want to speed through the class to slow down and actually read the material so that they don’t failThe problem is that it’s increasingly apparent that some students are still not pacing themselves. Folks get confused because they’re taking all of the quizzes at the same time on Sunday night, not one a day throughout the week (which is how they would learn best). So I am left with a dilemma, and that’s what I’d like your feedback on in this question: Please share your opinion about the way the class organizes the quizzes (1 paragraph):Should the class keep the mini quizzes as they are, hoping that students will read a chapter and take the quiz immediately after (as is intended) throughout the week? Should the class go farther and hide each chapter until the previous quiz is taken? This would help some people stay on top of the work since they wouldn’t even have access the material before taking the quiz. This would also inevitably doom other students who would never get access to the material, or who would still wait until Sunday and fail anyway.Should the class go back to just one larger weekly quiz (which is a little scarier for some students) and perhaps see even more students try to take the quiz without even reading the chapters?Please explain your thoughts on these suggestions and offer any others that you might have.
Read DetailsPart of my job is to prepare you to write papers in other co…
Part of my job is to prepare you to write papers in other courses, including (for most of you) English 1302, which is focused on research and argument. Our three big papers cover many different writing concepts that we do need to address in order to meet these goals. These concepts includeUse of the writing processBasic academic essay structureUse of examples and detailsUse of descriptive language/focus on word choiceText analysisUse of citations This semester, we covered these concepts inPaper 1: Discussion of who you are through the lens of two random topics.Paper 2: Descriptive art analysis.Paper 3: Research and ESCAPE analysis. There are myriad different paper topics we could choose, of course. (Each one would take dozens of hours for me to rewrite the lessons, find the examples, and so forth, so I don’t change these lightly.) Now, I already avoid these types of papers:Creative writing or personal stories (“The time I did XYZ”). This is not useful in preparing for academic writing, and it would take a whole quarter of the semester that we could be using to better prepare you for what lies ahead. Yes, it would be easier. Yes, it would be more enjoyable. But if you show up in 1302 with nothing but personal stories under your belt, you’re going to struggle.Typical personal topics (“My role model” and things of that nature). The reasons are the same as above.Argument. English 1302 is already focused on these for the whole term. We have been writing arguments all semester anyway (any piece of writing that asserts an opinion is an argument). But we save the more typical issue-based argument for 1302 since it’s more complicated than most people realize, and I don’t want you writing a half-@$$ed argument here thinking it’s enough since it isn’t. With all of those caveats, then, please share your opinion about the major assignments (1 paragraph):What are your thoughts on our paper topics? What did you most/least enjoy? Learn from the most? Please explain.What suggestions do you have for paper topics that still meet the criteria discussed above? Please explain.
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