Because nearly every student—even the conscientious ones---did abysmally on the midterm, I have given the class an opportunity to purge their miserable midterm grades by taking a test on every grammar chapter we studied this semester. Given that it would prepare them for the final, it made sense to offer this alternative rather than curve the grades, which wouldn’t contribute to anyone’s knowledge of the grammar they do need to learn.
All of the exam questions on both the midterm and this more comprehensive test were adapted from material that accompanied the text we are using, so either I did a poor job of choosing the questions or did a very bad job of preparing the students and/or teaching grammar.
Fortunately, most all the students did well on the second, more comprehensive test which incorporated the material tested on the midterm. Most everyone, probably me in particular, was very relieved by the improved test scores.
Given the very inconsistent attendance and performance by many of this year’s students, I requested feedback, suggestions, accolades and criticism to be written in the empty space at the end of the test. Since this feedback was not submitted anonymously, it is probably less reflective of reality and more brown-nosey than is the survey conducted by the English Department. Still, I found it informative and somewhat helpful in coordinating our semester’s end work.
Below, I will attach the often disturbingly ungrammatical, unexpurgated and uncorrected snippets from students who responded to my request for feedback, included as the last question of the test:
Essay Question: In an attempt to continuously improve my classes, I utilize student feedback. Please specify how I could make the 099 experience more helpful. What could have been improved, changed, omitted, etc.? Is there anything you especially liked or disliked about the class? Please be honest. This won’t affect your grade.
1) “I really believe that writing 5 draft for our paper help out a lot. I’ve never had a teacher tell us to do that and now that I know this method I can take it with me in other classes. The only problem I had was that a lot of my Ch. Review were missing from my book. Other than that the class is fun and I actually learned how to notice my grammar errors.”
2) “The thing that really helped in this 099 class is definatly the chapter reviews. It is a way to test yourself to see if you truly understood the concept. The subject that should be omitted should be illogical shifts. That was hard but you have to learn it. Also the talks as a class where everyone says something personal, I think brought the class together.”
3) Everything has gone well in this class and I have not complaints. I think the best thing was meeting up and discussing our papers. I learned a lot more doing that. It also helped improve my writing.
4) I liked this class a lot. It really helped me look at my writing diffently. But the one thing I would change is more time for 1 on 1 with a teacher. I feel it helps me more than sitting in a class.
5)I really like the conferences. They work well. And help a lot. I think I enjoy this class most out of all of my classes. The only thing try and narrow down topics for papers. It’s hard trying to pick one.
6) More lecture time in class, not just writting. I think the class would learn more material if the teacher explained writting rules and techniques a lot more.
7) My 099 experience even though it was minimum due to my absent days, has been educating. The days that I actually showed up to class helped in abig way. I believe you shouldn’t change one thing. The way you are unpredictable keeps the student guessing about the next class.
The one thing that I honestly disliked about the class is the time that it starts. I’m really not a morning person, so if it was an afternoon class I would’ve showed up more often instead of sleeping straight through. In conclusion, you are a great teacher. Never change.
8) Fastwrites are helpful as well as the meetings to review papers.
9) It’s perfect, we just have lazy people in the class.
10) I like your class. I feel that you are willing to help us learn and pass. I believe I just need to go over some of the practices from the book in class, other than the rewrites.
11) The only problem in the class is the time. 9:30 am is too early, but you have no control of that. Otherwise the class is good.
12) I personally enjoyed this class, I feel when papers need to be handed in we should only hand in the rough and final draft. I enjoy the topics that we get to write about and would not change that. I also thought by having a say in what we do in class has made it worth comming.
13) I think it is a good class. I wish I could of taken it later on in the day.
14) I do like the class, I have improved my writing since the beginning of the semester. I also like the class because we do get into side conversations which gives us a break from actual work. I also would like more group work. Personally, I work better with a partner or in a group.
15) I think that this class was very helpful. I wish I didn’t have it this early but that is anther story. I have learned many new things. But overall it was a good class.
16) I think that a way to improve the class would be to let the students out early, every once in a while. This way, if the students are bored, they won’t have to be bored anymore. I also think that if there is no response from the students, then to have a talk about what is going in the news. This will allow students to participate more. And when they participate more, their grade will go up. In the long run, it will help out the students.
17) I like how the class was set up. It’s easygoing, but still important. The students know what has to get done and what will happen if it doesn’t. It has a friendly atmosphere, it makes me want to come to class to see what will happen today or what stories will be told. I enjoyed this Eng 099 much more than the other one I was in.
18)Well, I really liked the way you taught us things I don’t really know what could be improved or changed. But in my opinion the papers and the step by step were really helpful because if we did the brainstorm and fastwrite in class we already had half the paper already done. That’s a creative way to go. None of my past teachers have done that so I liked that.
19) I liked everything except dangling modifiers, parallelism and all that crap. But overall this class is fun and I enjoy coming!
20)Believe it or not, I love this class there is absolutely nothing I would change about this class I’m relaxed when I’m hear and I don’t feel stressed or pressured in any way or form.
I will comment on these comments in a future blog entry. It will also be very interesting for me to see whether this feedback from identified students is at all similar to the contents of anonymous evaluations the same students fill out and submit to the department.
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