Mid-point Turnaround
Oct. 22nd, 2009 10:45 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kyrasantae
Week 8
Day 14
My buddy David was doing his presentation today so I made it a point to have read the reading (the full 50 pages, even though he was only presenting on the first half of it, and someone else the second half) and be at class on time. But before he began, the teacher wanted to make some announcements.
That's right, announcements. She'd summarized the student feedback onto a couple of slides. First, the slide of things people liked. People liked having the variety of assessments (reflective essay, research essay, presentation, exam), having relevant discussions, having videos, etc. etc. Of course people will write down stuff if asked to comment on something good.
Next was a list of things that she was going to change. People wanted a bit more structured lecture, focusing on key terms and ideas on which we're to be tested. I agree that the lecturing should be more structured, but I don't necessarily agree that we need more of it. But then again, some people prefer that, in order that the course has some kind of continuity and organization.
So, in order to get up to speed on focusing on key terms and concepts, we're going to have a review period next class where, uh, yeah, she'll review the key terms and concepts so far. Presentations scheduled for next class are postponed. And from now on the lectures will focus on that kind of stuff, and she'll post the slides online.
A lot of comments were on time management. Some students felt that discussions sometimes kind of get sidetracked, and then go on for too long. To fix this, presentations are now going to be 15 minutes per person, and the remaining time will be split evenly between lecture and discussion. (Reminder: this is an 80-minute class.)
For those who haven't done their presentations yet, that's great. I, for one, am happy about that. But for those who have already done it, it seems a bit unfair that they had to do more.
Lastly, people complained that there was too much reading. (YES!!!) So now the only mandatory readings are the ones marked "Assigned Reading" on the syllabus. Let's recall that this is what led to the whole annoyingness over my presentation date/topic anyway. It also means that I can do a longer recap of my presentation reading because I can no longer assume that the class has read it (this is kind of good and bad, I guess).
Now it's time for David's presentation. It was exactly the kind of presentation that catches people's attention and keeps it, and treats us as people who can read and have read the required reading. He had a catchy opener and kept the slides as a visual aid rather than pages of text. He spent very little time on the reading itself but used analogies and examples to illustrate. He is (was?) a practicing engineer so he's had experience doing presentations both during his studies (yes, engineers have a presentation skills class) and probably his work.
The teacher steals the stage back after David is done. She wants to do her lecture, to 'recap' his presentation. This lecture opens with a few questions, which we're to discuss in small groups and then she'll "give [us] the answers." These are definition questions, for example "what is gender segmentation?". Argh, this isn't discussion, it's like exam review. A few minutes later, she gives us the answers, assuring us that the slides will be put online. The only unfortunate side effect of this is that we run out of time for the second student presentation and we're dismissed five minutes early.
Laying out a noble plan, but not even being able to pull it off. Maybe if she'd accounted for the 15 minutes about the student feedback she might have made it.
David's notes and slides were posted in the afternoon, since he'd passed them to her the night before. But the teacher's slides? Oh yes, they were posted, but on Wednesday afternoon. Does it really take her that long to remove her script from the bottom of the slides? (Yeah, she reads off a script. I noticed this when she accidentally revealed her slides outside of the full-screen presentation.)
Stuff from other classes:
* Psych prof: "I'm not wearing a costume [to class for Halloween]. I am a costume."
* Existentialism class cancelled Thursday due to Swine Flu. Essay assignment to be handed out then (obviously) postponed. This relieves my Nov. 2 load, but who knows where it'll end up.
Day 15
Something happened, and our teacher came in 10 minutes late. You are correct if you're thinking that hey, it's 10 fewer minutes for the class. It would be overboard if she didn't appear at all, since she'd sent out a reminder email last night about coming to the "review" class today.
There's a different projector machine in the room today, and our student presenter couldn't get his computer to work on it, and the teacher didn't bring hers today because she's doing the review thing. So while the student fiddles with the projector and his computer, she passes out a two-page document with the title of each of the readings so far and a selection of important words and her discussion questions for each. Evidently someone else also thought the same way as me about the discussion questions. But I remind you that they're still "study guide"-style questions and not really open-ended discussion questions, so they suit this purpose.
There's some bad subject/verb agreement in the questions, but bad grammar I can deal with. (EPIC FAIL, on the other hand, is bad English but involves much more than just bad grammar.)
"Does anyone have any questions on David's presentation or comments on his discussion questions?" she asks. David can't even remember what the questions in his presentation were.
She wanted to point out one question that we didn't get to in class about "teaching your own culture" and then I said something about bi-/poly-cultural people and she construed it into something about cultures being mutable and that no one can truly represent any culture and that wasn't what I said at all because I was talking about people with divided cultural identities. But at least she acknowledged what I was saying.
And that "for those of you who want to teach in international school, there are so many people from all over the world that you have to find a way to address the diversity." In my opinion, there's one thing that is common to almost all international students: they're upper (or diplomat) class. The equalizing power of their social class and the culture associated with it (affecting the selection of an appropriate teaching style/set of values), I think, probably overpowers the divisive power of their diverse ethnic backgrounds.
The student did his presentation just orally without the visual slides that he had prepared. It was okay though, because it forced me to listen to what he was saying.
For some unknown reason, discussion on reproduction of lower socio-economic classes went back to talking about school dropouts and why people drop out of school rather than, say, why people choose trade school. They're equally valid examples to illustrate whatever point. It just seems kind of weird. Not because of the student, but because of the teacher. She keeps bringing up dropouts.
Later she reveals that she has a brother, a successful businessman. Wait, what? What Chinese businessman isn't "successful"? I wouldn't be surprised that her family just happens to know the right people to pay off to be allowed to have two children, and to let her get two masters degrees and come to Canada to do a Ph.D.
Anyway, in the last 20 or so minutes of the class, she splits us into groups to look at some of the questions on the study guide. We run out of time to "share" the "answers" with the rest of the class and only get one group's "answers" "shared," so for the rest of the term she wants us to "share" one group's "answers" at the beginning of class, going down the page. This incremental review idea is the most confusing and not very well-conceived thing I've heard of.
Outlook: not good.
Mispronunciations of the day:
* "dah-VID"
* "ig-NOR-ence"
* the "in-TER-per-EH-tive analysis" one still bugs me a lot.
Day 14
My buddy David was doing his presentation today so I made it a point to have read the reading (the full 50 pages, even though he was only presenting on the first half of it, and someone else the second half) and be at class on time. But before he began, the teacher wanted to make some announcements.
That's right, announcements. She'd summarized the student feedback onto a couple of slides. First, the slide of things people liked. People liked having the variety of assessments (reflective essay, research essay, presentation, exam), having relevant discussions, having videos, etc. etc. Of course people will write down stuff if asked to comment on something good.
Next was a list of things that she was going to change. People wanted a bit more structured lecture, focusing on key terms and ideas on which we're to be tested. I agree that the lecturing should be more structured, but I don't necessarily agree that we need more of it. But then again, some people prefer that, in order that the course has some kind of continuity and organization.
So, in order to get up to speed on focusing on key terms and concepts, we're going to have a review period next class where, uh, yeah, she'll review the key terms and concepts so far. Presentations scheduled for next class are postponed. And from now on the lectures will focus on that kind of stuff, and she'll post the slides online.
A lot of comments were on time management. Some students felt that discussions sometimes kind of get sidetracked, and then go on for too long. To fix this, presentations are now going to be 15 minutes per person, and the remaining time will be split evenly between lecture and discussion. (Reminder: this is an 80-minute class.)
For those who haven't done their presentations yet, that's great. I, for one, am happy about that. But for those who have already done it, it seems a bit unfair that they had to do more.
Lastly, people complained that there was too much reading. (YES!!!) So now the only mandatory readings are the ones marked "Assigned Reading" on the syllabus. Let's recall that this is what led to the whole annoyingness over my presentation date/topic anyway. It also means that I can do a longer recap of my presentation reading because I can no longer assume that the class has read it (this is kind of good and bad, I guess).
Now it's time for David's presentation. It was exactly the kind of presentation that catches people's attention and keeps it, and treats us as people who can read and have read the required reading. He had a catchy opener and kept the slides as a visual aid rather than pages of text. He spent very little time on the reading itself but used analogies and examples to illustrate. He is (was?) a practicing engineer so he's had experience doing presentations both during his studies (yes, engineers have a presentation skills class) and probably his work.
The teacher steals the stage back after David is done. She wants to do her lecture, to 'recap' his presentation. This lecture opens with a few questions, which we're to discuss in small groups and then she'll "give [us] the answers." These are definition questions, for example "what is gender segmentation?". Argh, this isn't discussion, it's like exam review. A few minutes later, she gives us the answers, assuring us that the slides will be put online. The only unfortunate side effect of this is that we run out of time for the second student presentation and we're dismissed five minutes early.
Laying out a noble plan, but not even being able to pull it off. Maybe if she'd accounted for the 15 minutes about the student feedback she might have made it.
David's notes and slides were posted in the afternoon, since he'd passed them to her the night before. But the teacher's slides? Oh yes, they were posted, but on Wednesday afternoon. Does it really take her that long to remove her script from the bottom of the slides? (Yeah, she reads off a script. I noticed this when she accidentally revealed her slides outside of the full-screen presentation.)
Stuff from other classes:
* Psych prof: "I'm not wearing a costume [to class for Halloween]. I am a costume."
* Existentialism class cancelled Thursday due to Swine Flu. Essay assignment to be handed out then (obviously) postponed. This relieves my Nov. 2 load, but who knows where it'll end up.
Day 15
Something happened, and our teacher came in 10 minutes late. You are correct if you're thinking that hey, it's 10 fewer minutes for the class. It would be overboard if she didn't appear at all, since she'd sent out a reminder email last night about coming to the "review" class today.
There's a different projector machine in the room today, and our student presenter couldn't get his computer to work on it, and the teacher didn't bring hers today because she's doing the review thing. So while the student fiddles with the projector and his computer, she passes out a two-page document with the title of each of the readings so far and a selection of important words and her discussion questions for each. Evidently someone else also thought the same way as me about the discussion questions. But I remind you that they're still "study guide"-style questions and not really open-ended discussion questions, so they suit this purpose.
There's some bad subject/verb agreement in the questions, but bad grammar I can deal with. (EPIC FAIL, on the other hand, is bad English but involves much more than just bad grammar.)
"Does anyone have any questions on David's presentation or comments on his discussion questions?" she asks. David can't even remember what the questions in his presentation were.
She wanted to point out one question that we didn't get to in class about "teaching your own culture" and then I said something about bi-/poly-cultural people and she construed it into something about cultures being mutable and that no one can truly represent any culture and that wasn't what I said at all because I was talking about people with divided cultural identities. But at least she acknowledged what I was saying.
And that "for those of you who want to teach in international school, there are so many people from all over the world that you have to find a way to address the diversity." In my opinion, there's one thing that is common to almost all international students: they're upper (or diplomat) class. The equalizing power of their social class and the culture associated with it (affecting the selection of an appropriate teaching style/set of values), I think, probably overpowers the divisive power of their diverse ethnic backgrounds.
The student did his presentation just orally without the visual slides that he had prepared. It was okay though, because it forced me to listen to what he was saying.
For some unknown reason, discussion on reproduction of lower socio-economic classes went back to talking about school dropouts and why people drop out of school rather than, say, why people choose trade school. They're equally valid examples to illustrate whatever point. It just seems kind of weird. Not because of the student, but because of the teacher. She keeps bringing up dropouts.
Later she reveals that she has a brother, a successful businessman. Wait, what? What Chinese businessman isn't "successful"? I wouldn't be surprised that her family just happens to know the right people to pay off to be allowed to have two children, and to let her get two masters degrees and come to Canada to do a Ph.D.
Anyway, in the last 20 or so minutes of the class, she splits us into groups to look at some of the questions on the study guide. We run out of time to "share" the "answers" with the rest of the class and only get one group's "answers" "shared," so for the rest of the term she wants us to "share" one group's "answers" at the beginning of class, going down the page. This incremental review idea is the most confusing and not very well-conceived thing I've heard of.
Outlook: not good.
Mispronunciations of the day:
* "dah-VID"
* "ig-NOR-ence"
* the "in-TER-per-EH-tive analysis" one still bugs me a lot.
