100 Most Irritating Things Students Do in Class.

1. i have one student like this, he always refers back to what other students' say, citing them sarcastically, using air quotes. and he always thinks he has The Answer--and looks at me as though i'm going to nod in acknowledgment.

― by another name (amateurist),

2. I'm still scarred by the debate with a student last week, who kept insisting that Hamlet was "obviously" manic-depressive, then kept triumphantly looking around the class, as if affixing this label explained everything.

you could at least have edited out my useless apostrophe.

although as a teacher i have to say the most annoying thing is when they are texting on their cell phones/iphones/whatever and have it sort of tucked into their hoodie as though i can't see them.

though this does provide a golden opportunity to psych them out by nonchalantly saying, "tom, will you put your phone away" as you are turned away from them, writing something on the board.

do u ever call your students MISTER or MISS such-and-such

you could at least have edited out my useless apostrophe.

ah, but then I would have qualified for "100 Most Irritating Things Professors Do in Class"

do u ever call your students MISTER or MISS such-and-such

I look and AM too young to get away it. I mean, I have to dress in shirt and tie the first week so they don't think I'm a fellow student -- as they did when I was a graduate student.

does any kind of school other than law school do mister and miss? maybe med school

i have a lot of things to list but i don't want to remember school right now

i mean like in a sarcastic way when u want to put them on the spot

3. Stretch while you're in the middle of asking a question, so that you think they're raising their hand.

4. Pluck their eyebrows using a phone as a mirror.

5. Tell me elaborate lies about why they didn't do their homework.

6. Plagiarize as if I don't know how to use Google.

could go on and on and on

The over-the-top laughter at a private joke, and dramatic entrances into the room that they would like you to think are just part of their 'zany', devil-may-care personality. Especially with the 8th/9th grade girls, who are starting to like the idea of getting the attention of an entire room while pretending that they don't care. It kind of trickles over to the 14 year olds at the mall persona, where suddenly everything that your friends say is the most hysterical thing you've ever heard.

I haven't taught in a classroom for more than 10 years but this still drives me crazy!

I told my wife (former professor) about this thread and she asked me to pass this one along.

7. Ask a question, the answer to which was in what you just said.

8. emailing me with details of how sick they are why have to miss class. dude, you're an adult, miss class if you want to, what do you want me to do about it?

wait, that's not IN class. sorry. start at 8 again folks.

9. After they've explained why they've missed class they ask, to show how much they care, what they missed. It's in the syllabus, fool.

8. emailing me with details of how sick they are why have to miss class. dude, you're an adult, miss class if you want to, what do you want me to do about it?

― by another name (amateurist), Monday, February 15, 2010 7:21 PM (43 seconds ago) Bookmark

tbf most standard-ish attendance policies want you to email the prof before class explaining that you won't be there

9. After they've explained why they've missed class they ask, to show how much they care, what they missed. It's in the syllabus, fool.

― Inculcate a spirit of serfdom in children (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, February 15, 2010 7:22 PM (9 seconds ago) Bookmark

tbf they're probably wondering in earnest if there was any interesting in-class discussion that they've missed out on.

Yes, but they and I both know that there's nothing we can do reconstruct the debate, especially after you've spelled out your absence/lateness policy in your syllabus.

call all destroyer: no. just no.

xpost

in any event, re. being sick, i know they are lying half of the time.

especially when, a few days before a paper is due, suddenly everybody's aunt and uncle and grandma starts dying.

The over-the-top laughter at a private joke, and dramatic entrances into the room that they would like you to think are just part of their 'zany', devil-may-care personality. Especially with the 8th/9th grade girls, who are starting to like the idea of getting the attention of an entire room while pretending that they don't care. It kind of trickles over to the 14 year olds at the mall persona, where suddenly everything that your friends say is the most hysterical thing you've ever heard.

Yes! Although I am not a teacher, I ride the subway a lot. UGH, teenagers.

oh, c'mon, they're teenagers. it's cute.

lol maybe you are some rad professor who accepts non-attendance for what it is but i assure you most students are going to give you the courtesey email no matter what, i don't think it's really "irritating"

and alfred--i've waited a long time for the professor who could summarize in-class content in the way you describe; i assume i'll keep waiting.

btw what do you guys think of this: a class last wednesday was snowed out. professor scheduled a makeup session for saturday from 2-5 which i did not attend. i'm kind of of the opinion that the prof should've collapsed two lessons into one rather than schedule a makeup at a time that's not really convenient at all, but i can see both sides.

wait kids really text IN CLASS now? jesus i could never be a teacher.

cad i think it depends of it's an attendance-mandatory class or not? all but maybe three of my lecture classes (not including labs) didn't have mandatory attendance, so if i were a prof i'd prob be like "uh, ok don't care" if i got all those emails

cad my professors posted online lectures for the classes we missed on wednesday - ime that's usually been standard. that or "read the notes and the chapter on your own time, i'm moving on"

attendance-mandatory class

waht

10. Interrupt me to ask a question that would have been answered shortly if they HAD NOT INTERRUPTED ME.

profs that schedule makeup classes are retarded

they often don't have a choice -- there are regulations that determine contact hours at some schools

i know :(

I usually allow two unexcused absences; I perform a lot of group work.

yeah k3v if it's a big lecture i'm not going to notify but like in the grad program i'm in now class is 30, tops. so i'm going to email if i can't come, no matter what the reason. this has always been met by a polite "thanks for letting me know," fwiw.

like i'm not sure if the actual given reason matters (maybe i'm sick, maybe i just have tickets to something) but i think saying you're not going to be there is just courtesy.

alfred if i were in your class i would be absent no more than once; promise.

and alfred--i've waited a long time for the professor who could summarize in-class content in the way you describe; i assume i'll keep waiting.

Yeah, but, see, my classes are capped at 29 students, so I can separate the fools from the bright ones. If one of the latter approach me after an absence I'll usually summarize the class, expecting h/she will ask pithy questions. It's the dumb asses looking for brownie points for whom I have no patience.

well i'm thinking of one guy i had who worked half the week at a think tank and flew to dc every wednesday night and back on sunday. he would sometimes (like 6 times over the semester) have to miss wednesday classes for meetings and we would have to make them up by having double-long classes. RUDE

also i would say a reason for being out if i knew ahead of time and hope that didn't annoy the professor geez

alfred if i were in your class i would be absent no more than once; promise.

You'd be the one I'd invite for coffee afterwards!

profs/teachers itt, what do you teach?

Intro comp and lit classes.

wait--i'm not paid to tutor my students. why should i spend 30 minutes getting you "up to date" if you missed class (as if such a thing could even be done)? it's your responsibility to get notes from another student.

office hours?

the problem w/ the emails is that the message isn't solely or even primarily "as a courtesy i wanted to let you know i won't be there" but "listen isn't my excuse amazing oh please don't actually hold me accountable to the attendance policy written on the syllabus that doesn't make a distinction b/t excused and unexcused absences."

yes, they can come to office hours, but that's not what they want (evidenced by how few actually show up). they want me to tell them, "no, you didn't miss anything important" (!!) or "let me spend 60 minutes typing you up a summary of our discussion today" (!!).

wait--i'm not paid to tutor my students. why should i spend 30 minutes getting you "up to date" if you missed class (as if such a thing could even be done)? it's your responsibility to get notes from another student.

― by another name (amateurist), Monday, February 15, 2010 8:03 PM (54 seconds ago) Bookmark

so you actively resent talking to your students outside of class time? harsh.

i mean i'm sorry your students are shitty, i guess

no, i love talking to students. but at the rate they are absent (for being "sick" and for being sick) i would be spending 40 hours/week getting them "up to date." if you want to talk about the ideas in class, the papers, the exam, whatever, cool, i'm game. if you want a synopsis of the section you missed, sorry, that's really not my job.

are you folks kidding?

i mean this is really standard stuff. i even went to a liberal arts college and knew not to ask professors to fill me in on what i'd missed.

ok i guess i have an overly optimistic view of students or i assume they're all like me.

i mean i never missed more than one class, always participated, got good grades. so if i missed that one class and came to you and said "hey were there any interesting discussions in the class i missed?" would that be ok?

if a student who is really obviously dedicated and attentive misses a class and wants to chat about it, fine. but honestly it's precisely those students who know not to bother me about it. it's typically the students who miss every other lecture and section and don't know when the paper is due that email me with (a) the implicit insistence that i NOT count them absent for THIS VERY EXCELLENT REASON and (b) the demand that i "let them know what they've missed."

so yes, i think you are overly optimistic.

one important piece of background info: at our university, we are not allowed to ask students if they've been sick, or ask them for doctor's notes etc. nor does the health service give out such notes. so unless we are just to take EVERY absence as somehow "excused," we have to eliminate the distinction between excused and unexcused absences, barring major emergencies. some professors handle this in a very draconian way and some are more lenient. i'm a TA and don't set the policies, but have to be the face of them nonetheless.

if i sound cynical, here's a reason: big state universities don't generally breed students who want to spend part of their day chatting with their TAs and professors, asking questions that imply some serious intellectual engagement. i think the culture here encourages them not to do so. so with some splendid and life-affirming exceptions, the ones you hear from most (by email, ALWAYS by email) are the fuck-ups. so your view of students altogether can be colored by the disproportionate number of immature emails you get providing excuses, asking for special favors, etc.; unless you take pains to remind yourself of the quietly mature and thoughtful students who you don't hear much from outside of class.

and i actually had a GOOD teaching day today! and yes, most students are just fine! and even the ones that send annoying emails are generally fine, if a bit immature. but that doesn't mean i'm going to spend 40 hours a week tutoring them.

wait kids really text IN CLASS now? jesus i could never be a teacher.

SO glad my own teaching run went from 1993 to 1996.

amateurist OTM. Which leads me to:

10. Students who ask, "What do I have to get an A?" or "I have a B+. What do you want me to write in my essay so that I can get an A?"

*what do I have to DO to get an A

i dunno man, i hear what youre saying, and that policy is tough, but i thought that as a ta it kind of WAS your job to handle student questions, be they dumbshit or not. so yeah, you can say they're irritating, but all this "knowing not to bother me" and "that's not what i get paid for" is kinda o_O imo.

lol i never really bothered the ta's i had maybe it's because i got this vibe off them

er i handle student questions ALL THE TIME.

student questions DO NOT EQUAL "tell me what i missed"

It's too bad that professors can't, after getting the "so wut did I miss, prof." e-mail from an absent student, just give a good, gossipy account of the class period e.g. "what did you miss? well Melissa seriously asked 'what came first: the Pilgrims or the Revolutionary War' at one point. Jeff and Brenda were making serious eye contact with each other whenever I looked at them (are they dating or what?), I played Mafia on Facebook while everyone took the quiz. What happened when you went to the dentist??"

ha yes, exactly, i always felt afraid to ask anything in case i seemed annoying or dumb :( xxp

yeah i guess you're seeing a distinction i'm not. and you're the ta here, so it's cool.

It's too bad that professors can't, after getting the "so wut did I miss, prof." e-mail from an absent student, just give a good, gossipy account of the class period e.g. "what did you miss? well Melissa seriously asked 'what came first: the Pilgrims or the Revolutionary War' at one point. Jeff and Brenda were making serious eye contact with each other whenever I looked at them (are they dating or what?), I played Mafia on Facebook while everyone took the quiz. What happened when you went to the dentist??"

Cuz I don't have time?

xp to amateurist

example student question = "so how do we make an argument about style in this film?"

another example student question = "what sort of material will come up on the exam?"

not a question = "tell me what i missed in section today"

I have ILE posts to write.

haha i was gonna say.

ILE is _recreation_, fools!! like, to unwind after i've just taught for FIVE HOURS STRAIGHT.

anyway, i don't mean to shock or offend. some of this is just practical.

i'm paid (not much) for 20 hours of work a week.

if i made a point of providing detailed and useful synopses of section discussion and lecture to every student who was absent (for whatever reason, including being "sick"), i would be doing nothing else.

instead, that student can email a classmate and get their notes and/or start attending regularly. meanwhile, i can spend time answering real questions.

but um "hey, what kinds of things came up in the discussion in section today?" is the same thing! youre just making it an imperative!

nobody asks that question, c.a.d. they ask, "did i miss anything important?" or "let me know what i've missed."

i should start forwarding you my emails from students, i think you'd get the picture.

honestly this only applies to < 15% of students, the rest are no problem.

and that's sort of all i have to say on the subject.

nobody asks that question, c.a.d. they ask, "did i miss anything important?" or "let me know what i've missed."

yesyesyesyesyesyes

hahaha that just means people need to learn how to phrase things better.

"no, you didn't miss anything important. in fact, nothing that happens in class is important. why are we showing up anyway? why don't i just see you in may for the final exam. have a nice semester!"

don't you guys post your notes online? doesn't that kind of preempt those q's?

you can't post discussion notes online! and a lot of professors don't like posting lecture notes online, and frankly i don't blame them. some stuff isn't transmitted well in note form, and it encourages students either to skip lectures altogether or to spend lectures cruising on facebook in the expectation that the notes will fill them in later.

also if you can't get enough of salty academics complaining about undergrads: http://rateyourstudents.blogspot.com/

but yes on a tactical level posting notes online preempts some dumb questions

wait kids really text IN CLASS now? jesus i could never be a teacher.

when i was in grad school (just a couple years ago) there was one girl in class who spent the entire time AIMing with her friends, on her laptop. in a painful twist of fate, she ended up getting a cushy job after graduation.

yeah discussion notes are different i guess. i don't know if i've ever had a prof w/in my major not post his or her lecture notes online, just seems like it makes it easier on everyone involved.

guys are really making me psyched for going back to school next year btw.

when i was in grad school (just a couple years ago) there was one girl in class who spent the entire time AIMing with her friends, on her laptop. in a painful twist of fate, she ended up getting a cushy job after graduation

Yes but did you fuck her?

it makes more sense to post notes for sciences imo, it's almost necessary

guys are really making me psyched for going back to school next year btw.

you KNOW what I'll say if I catch you on Facebook during class.

it makes more sense to post notes for sciences imo, it's almost necessary

yes, it all depends on the nature of the information being transmitted.

it makes more sense to post notes for sciences imo, it's almost necessary

― this is awful I want Togo home (harbl), Monday, February 15, 2010 8:37 PM (1 minute ago)

yea i was gonna say, maybe the nature of most of my courses makes me biased

i don't know if i've ever had a prof w/in my major not post his or her lecture notes online, just seems like it makes it easier on everyone involved.

Aren't you majoring in finance or economics or something?

(xpost)

xls malfunction - pharmacy

guys i have one!

1) call their T.A. AT MIDNIGHT the night before a paper is due, asking that she READ THEIR DRAFT and get back to them with comments, presumably immediately, given how little time remains before the time the paper is due.

this was two students who were roommates, actually. i don't even know how they got my number! they woke me up because i wasn't 18 and living in a dorm! they were nice girls in general; i think they had just worked themselves into a frenzy and lost all sense of perspective and propriety. man it still pisses me off, this one.

also the fucking around on the internet while i'm lecturing really bothers me.

i just tell people to put their laptops away.

can't do this when i'm just the TA and the prof is lecturing, though

I've a strict no-emails-after-10-pm rule.

also the fucking around on the internet while i'm lecturing really bothers me.

i agree this is awful and i hate that laptop-bringers look all studious when in fact theyre on the internet the entire damn time

lol ok horseshoe i would literally just send that person a virus

What -- AIDS?

devil's advocate:

if someone can not pay attention and still do fine in class, is it really their fault for not paying attention? I mean they're paying $$$$$ to sit in that room and hopefully come out with a diploma - if the work/grading policy is one where they can graduate without paying much attention, I think a lot of the blame can be put on the institution and teachers

(fwiw if I were a prof/TA I'd have a no laptop policy)

i was tired and out of it when they called and i was almost like, "WERE YOU RAISED BY WOLVES???"

every 3rd year law student and most 2nd years spend the entire class on the internet, old professors wanted to ban laptops. but classes were boring!

i think they had just worked themselves into a frenzy and lost all sense of perspective and propriety.

Haha, horseshoe, that reminds me of when I was a junior in high school and was studying for the U.S. history final with three friends, and we were so fried from having studied all day that we impulsively decided to drive to our teacher's house 40 minutes away to ask him a question about the test. Probably would not have done it with anyone else but him, though, since he was basically the sweetest guy in the world, and he warmly invited us in and introduced us to his wife and took us down to the basement and gave us Cokes.

aww

that was really nice of him. i think the crazy girls from my anecdote thought i was that nice, but they learned.

if someone can not pay attention and still do fine in class, is it really their fault for not paying attention? I mean they're paying $$$$$ to sit in that room and hopefully come out with a diploma - if the work/grading policy is one where they can graduate without paying much attention, I think a lot of the blame can be put on the institution and teachers

i somewhat agree. they are being rational agents.

still, in this society it is rude to be at a lecture or meeting and to flagrantly not be paying attention. or even worse, to distract those around you by messing around on the internet. and as a lecturer, it is mighty distracting when you look out and see several students blatantly chatting away about something one of them has up on his or her computer.

perhaps the attendance policy should be such that only those who want to pay attention should come. however, this raises other problems, which we've been hashing out all thread, namely how to respond to the inevitable "sorry i'm sick tell me what i missed" emails.

many 19-year-olds are not very mature and responsible so policies have to be set with this in mind.

i agree that classes can be boring. hell, i'm bored by the professor's lectures in the class for which i'm the TA. but, you know, grow the fuck up people.

It's a question of rudeness. Since a lot of the troublemakers already regard education as a service, well, service works both ways. If you want something from me, don't insult me by sending texts in class or not agreeing to the "terms of service" (i.e. syllabus).

When I took pedagogy classes in the mid nineties my professor used business lingo already; by consenting to take the class and accepting the terms of the syllabus, whatever it contains (as long as it follows university policy), the student is yours.

it's tough with laptops tho because a few of my friends type notes right on their powerpoint slides on the computer - it's hard to discern someone legit following along and someone facebooking.

no doubt--i just see a lot more of the latter

the real problem is--why the fuck do they have wireless in classrooms? or at least, why can't you shut it off? in the lecture hall i'm thinking of, there is NO reason students will ever need to be on the internet.

i mean removing the temptation would be like 75% of the battle.

ahh i disagree with that - i use my phone's internet a lot to look up terms i don't know on wikipedia etc, or other background/supplementary stuff. but that's because i don't bring my laptop

then again, if it's a boring lecture i'd be just as likely to ilx or otherwise kill time, idk

I agree about the rudeness and I think profs/TAs should have the right to kick distractions out of class. otoh mandatory attendance policies are also quite patronizing - and I think being treated like a child makes people act sorta childish

i mean removing the temptation would be like 75% of the battle.

this much is true. I didn't take my laptop to lectures until senior year of college - and when I did it was SO much harder to not get distracted. my generation is pretty damn ADD to begin with.

this is a challop but i feel differently about professional degrees than any other type of degree in that (sadly) you're not really there to learn in upper level classes. it does tend to make education like a service. you need the degree to practice whatever and you need the credits to get the degree. if you do the reading you can pass the exam and get the credit but since attendance is mandatory you have to go to class and it's guaranteed to be boring. don't get me wrong, i love learning and do a lot of professional-type learning on my own. but the structure of it is just bad. the question of rudeness is separate though, i agree it's rude.

otoh mandatory attendance policies are also quite patronizing

i agree. unfortunately i don't set the policies. but my evals are still impacted by them.

ok i guess what i said can apply to any mandatory-attendance class but there is still more of an element of choice where you can say the student consented to whatever was in your syllabus

I don't see how professional degrees are any different than undergraduate degrees in this case

I don't have mandatory attendance -- I insist on minimum attendance.

this is a challop but i feel differently about professional degrees than any other type of degree in that (sadly) you're not really there to learn in upper level classes. it does tend to make education like a service. you need the degree to practice whatever and you need the credits to get the degree. if you do the reading you can pass the exam and get the credit but since attendance is mandatory you have to go to class and it's guaranteed to be boring. don't get me wrong, i love learning and do a lot of professional-type learning on my own. but the structure of it is just bad. the question of rudeness is separate though, i agree it's rude.

― this is awful I want Togo home (harbl), Monday, February 15, 2010 9:07 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark

sadly this is otm

xp i basically use "mandatory attendance" to mean a class for which atendance is taken

I take attendance every day! But it's up to students to know how many classes they miss -- they're adults! I deduct points at the end. Like I explained, though, my classes aren't so much lectures as workshops, so missing class isn't just non-productive, it's offensive.

I try not to go on the internet during lecture that much, but there are just some lectures where you can pay like 30% attention and still get everything necessary out of it, and every now and then there's a lecture that's just completely impossible to follow, where I make the executive decision that it is better to see what is new on Facebook or EDSBS or something. And sometimes if I think of a question that is too esoteric to ask in class I will call for a quick consult with Dr Google and Dr Wikipedia. (I do this a lot with drugs whose names are vaguely familiar to me, especially.)

The only thing that really bothers me is the general attitude of students trying to figure out what is the minimum amount of effort they have to expend in order to produce their desired grade. I was a very disgruntled premed back in the day because of how rampant this was.

I feel like non-science undergrad degrees need to be 'harder' in the sense that they should require more work and harsher grades - this is something of a tangent, but def not entirely unrelated. if you have to pay attention because your grade is going to be at risk (which is generally true in 'hard' classes), you're much more likely to close the fb window.

entire university grading system fatally flawed imo

Fuck a bunch of mandatory attendance. Those are the only classes I ever failed.

yes when i teach a small (12-student) freshman seminar on writing and preparing and giving speeches, then mandatory attendance only makes sense. for big lectures, i'm not so sure.

there are just some lectures where you can pay like 30% attention and still get everything necessary out of it

i'll take your word for it, but i think a lot of students THINK this is the case when it isn't. "if i write everything down that the professor places on powerpoint slides, and ignore the rest, i should be fine."

And sometimes if I think of a question that is too esoteric to ask in class I will call for a quick consult with Dr Google and Dr Wikipedia. (I do this a lot with drugs whose names are vaguely familiar to me, especially.)

The only thing that really bothers me is the general attitude of students trying to figure out what is the minimum amount of effort they have to expend in order to produce their desired grade. I was a very disgruntled premed back in the day because of how rampant this was.

― C-L, Monday, February 15, 2010 9:16 PM (19 seconds ago)

yeah this is basically what wiki and google are for, otm

i assume you've noticed the same thing but now that i'm in a professional curriculum there just aren't people who straight-out ask profs about this kind of stuff - it's pretty insulting and basically embarassing to the student if it's a class you're supposed to give a shit about

i'll take your word for it, but i think a lot of students THINK this is the case when it isn't. "if i write everything down that the professor places on powerpoint slides, and ignore the rest, i should be fine."

In my experience, this logic is like 90-95% sound for science courses (or really anything where the student's responsibility is primarily to know facts), but much less so in the social sciences and humanities.

Everything Kevin is posting on this thread is making me feel like a cranky old man.

I think the logic is also sound for a lot of intro liberal arts classes, which are the only ones I encountered with attendance punishments.

hmm, you are sorely mistaken if you think science classes are about knowing facts.

xpost

also feeling cranky old mannish

I don't see how professional degrees are any different than undergraduate degrees in this case

― iatee, Monday, February 15, 2010 9:09 PM

the effect can be the same because there are general education requirements and core courses or whatever but the requirements and goals are way different. you're there to get the degree/credential you need for a specific job, which doesn't always overlap with learning a subject you're interested in. if you find yourself not liking most of the requirements in an undergraduate major you can switch to a different one and still come out with a bachelor's degree. and it's not the case that if you hate a lot of your classes in a professional degree you shouldn't do that job, because most people specialize in something they really like. you just have to sit through a lot of stuff you don't like or need and learn enough to pass licensing exams, which is way less than they teach you in classes (in my experience anyway).

i am actually pro-mandatory attendance but in the sense that you should feel like "wow i'm glad i didn't miss that class" because you couldn't have learned it the same otherwise. not just subtracting points.

GRades for attendance and participation are a good way to go in my book, if only because I like turning up and love the sound of my own voice.

i always turned up but didn't really like being around people who wouldn't be there if not for the threat of punishment, or worse, were just talking to get their participation credit (though profs can see straight through that)

i assume you've noticed the same thing but now that i'm in a professional curriculum there just aren't people who straight-out ask profs about this kind of stuff - it's pretty insulting and basically embarassing to the student if it's a class you're supposed to give a shit about

Yeah, there is, thankfully, a stigma towards grade-grubbing here (our school actually has a reputation for being loaded with gunners, though, and there have been incidents that are just smh-worthy). I have no doubt that people still do go all the way to pull down Honors grades in the preclinical curriculum, but they at least know better than to publicize it. I worry about the clinical curriculum, because those are the grades that really matter, although by all accounts curriculum directors know when a student is trying to succeed at the expense of others, and they enjoy making those students pay.

hmm, you are sorely mistaken if you think science classes are about knowing facts.

Premed courses with 400 people in them are absolutely not about learning a style of thinking, just about knowing what you need to know for later, and in some cases about making people who are in it for the wrong reasons question whether they want to be there. Preclinical sciences in med school are also information that is necessary to know for later, and there are a bunch of courses that are nakedly honest about being geared towards preparing you for success at the USMLE Step 1 exam.

That was kind of a blanket statement that probably applies less well to engineering and like professional science, though. My bad.

yeah i'll cosign that the vast majority of biological/chem sciences is memorizing shit and applying shit you've memorized

I look and AM too young to get away it. I mean, I have to dress in shirt and tie the first week so they don't think I'm a fellow student -- as they did when I was a graduate student.

― Inculcate a spirit of serfdom in children (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, February 16, 2010 8:09 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

this. ;_;

re: the laptop thing, in one of my classes there's a whole row of boys in the back with laptops. one session I told them all to put their laptops away. they proceeded to spend the next 2 hours chatting up the girls in front of them. this is a 25 person class.

this happens nearly every class:

-student receives phone call in class, answers. whispers into the mouthpiece, using the other hand to cover their mouth. usually sitting somewhere near the front row, close enough that I can reach out and smack them, but apparently thinks I don't notice.

xpost

that's when you need to tell them to get the fuck out. seriously.

actually, that applies in both cases. never underestimate the persuasive power of just telling a student to get lost.

if you think it's tough being a young looking man, try being a young looking woman
i was going to post more but it feels unprofessional

this is my full time job, teaching a full load and coordinating usually 8-10 adjuncts, developing curriculum, etc.

would have to develop an alias/sock if i want to talk about hardcore teaching shit online and that is too much trouble.

heh, this semester none of the classes I'm teaching have a classwork/participation component - so the students show up by their own volition. I try to maintain a good rapport with them, because it's easier to get them to do things and be active than if I'm some sort of stern authority figure. (NB I teach in Hong Kong, where the default student behavior is to act like a clam. they will literally sit there for 2 hours straight without moving a muscle if they feel threatened.) so I tend to let these kind of things slide, but I do make mental notes of who's doing what and grade them harder on their assignments. (this, I realize, is a very passive-aggressive way to deal with things.)

My favorite professor of all time would stop class cold whenever someone's cell phone went off, demand the phone from the person, and then answer it by saying something like "The shipment has arrived in San Pedro," under the assumption that the only reason you should keep your cell phone on during class is if you are running drugs on the side.

haha the associate dean at my school threatened to do shit like that on the first day of class, and i don't think we had a problem with cell phones ringing after

My favorite professor of all time would stop class cold whenever someone's cell phone went off, demand the phone from the person, and then answer it by saying something like "The shipment has arrived in San Pedro," under the assumption that the only reason you should keep your cell phone on during class is if you are running drugs on the side

Not very funny. I'd plant drugs in his garden and call the fuzz.

lol I would totally create a sock too and post in your hardcore bitching about teaching thread LL.

i once took a class with a girl who sat in the front row nodding her head and saying things like 'yeah... yes!... oh definitely... oh i get it' etc., like she was the only student - except it was a class of about 100.

haha, that reminds me - I have some students who will nod vigorously whenever they think I'm looking in their direction. I could be talking about the price of tea in china when they do this.

ha
i mean, try to keep a strict attendance policy when your students are working 3 jobs and using their vacation time to come to class and miss class for the fatal third time because their youngest kid is in the hospital.

i will say that i teach at a community college, which has its own challenges (speaking of adult students)

aw :(

I'm just past the halfway point of my first term teaching at a cc (paralegal program) and my students so far are kind of awesome. I'm a little concerned this is just beginner's luck, although I will probably have at least two or three of them in my other two classes (I teach three subjects).

1) call their T.A. AT MIDNIGHT the night before a paper is due, asking that she READ THEIR DRAFT ...

I'm shocked by the utter masochism of tolerating students calling one's home. Is it a humanities and/or small college thing? There was a piece on the chronicle of higher ed website from some professor complaining about this and I was thinking "well then don't put your home # on your syllabus, and if it's still a problem, tell the kids you'll knock their grade down for it!"
(obviously I don't know where or what you personally teach, just talking about this phenomenon in general)

helicopter students, lol

I teach at a cc too but situation's different - I mainly teach students who missed out at getting into university the first time around, who have the possibility of being admitted if they do well in getting an associate's degree. so it's mostly 19-22 year olds, who don't really have anything better to do with their lives anyway. but you do get a lot of students who are just being bankrolled by their parents and see the whole endeavor as perpetual secondary school (i.e. endless socializing and fooling around).

My students are all adults who are trying to increase their skills and increase the chance of getting a job in this crap economy so they are not fucking around with the internet during class, bless 'em.

i dunno what the last actual number was but: professor is using text-heavy powerpoint slides to accompany his lectures; after moving onto the next slide, one or more students asking if the prof could go back to the previous slide because they weren't able to copy down all the text in time

eh professor shares some of the blame for making text heavy slides (unless this is in a field where it is de rigueur)

i mean the ppt didn't contain anything that he wasn't already saying out loud, plus iirc he posted the slides on the internet after class anyhow

it's tough with laptops tho because a few of my friends type notes right on their powerpoint slides on the computer - it's hard to discern someone legit following along and someone facebooking.

― vag gangsta (k3vin k.), Monday, February 15, 2010 7:58 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

i've had classes where TAs stand behind the students and if someone goes onto the internet, the TA raises their hand, the student has to close their computer for the remainder of the class & after it happens 3 times computers are banned from the class as a whole

i don't like text heavy powerpoints bcuz i think it encourages not listening to the prof -- a good professor should be able to talk at length w/o a slide in a manner that students can understand & synthesize for notes

tbh i prefer classes w/ no slides where i only have a chance to look up like 4/5 times a class

looooooool xp

I have been known to read/post to ILX while teaching btw

if i was a professor, i would make computer kids sit in the back because i think it's personally distracting to have a girl sitting in front of you who's scrolling through facebook photos of when her & her friends were on spring break -- but otherwise if the student wants to show up to class and jerk around on the internet then so be it, it's the student's money & time

Notes written directly onto the ppt files is like my 3rd option (behind writing notes on printouts of slides and writing notes on prepared handouts), partially because I know I will given into the urge to visit my dear friend the internet.

*give

Also J0rdan I am sorry you seem to attend a school run by fascists with crazy narc policies on computer use.

I was thinking "well then don't put your home # on your syllabus, and if it's still a problem, tell the kids you'll knock their grade down for it!"

I didn't put my phone number on the syllabus because I'm not a masochist. I really don't know how the kids in question got it--I suspect it might have been attached to the original graduate student directory from the year I enrolled but it's amazing to me that they would have been able to find it. It creeps me out to contemplate a little.

That's the only time that happened to me, though email abuse was rife. It was an English class for first-year undergraduates--they were babies, fresh out of high school and some of them were very entitled. I think they hadn't learned how to act yet, basically. Though I would never have done that at 18, and I don't really understand it. I did reprimand those students, though I didn't really make a general rule out of it. I kind of didn't want any of the rest of the students to even know it was possible.

Also J0rdan I am sorry you seem to attend a school run by fascists with crazy narc policies on computer use.

― C-L, Monday, February 15, 2010 10:23 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

ha, i never bring my computer because i won't be able to stay focused so i find it pretty amusing

i can't believe that i'm only like 6 or 7 years older than J0rdan, but I came from a time where no one brought a laptop to class ever

i use powerpoints for:

- embedded images
- charts and graphs
- statistics (if they need to remember them)
- embedded video
- title of lecture
- very occasionally, simple bullet points that are more like general topic headings (e.g., "acting")

that is it. if students only what to write down what is on the slides, they will have problems when studying for the exams. if they want to listen to me (and i always signpost my points very carefully, so my lectures aren't particularly confusing) they should do well.

agreed that too much stuff on powerpoints just encourages students to tune out.

i know some profs who make computer people sit in the back. i agree that it is a problem in part because it distracts the people around you; another student is trying to pay attention and the person in the next seat is browsing photos of her boyfriend doing bong hits.

it depends on the context but if a student called me at home i'd be sort of o_O and might report it to the dean.

xxxxxxxpost

yeah nobody had laptops in class when i was in college. no powerpoint either. hell, pretty much no computers in classes whatsoever.

also let's not get into (or shall we?) skeevy TAs who _give_ undergrads their cell phone #s.

man i have so much to say about that. from time to time i'd get a student who was like, "do you know x grad student? he's great; we hang out all the time." ugh.

I've hung out with my TAs a couple of times ;_;

you just have to trust me on this one. the TAs in question were notorious. and the undergrad students in question were very pretty 18-19 year old women.

Stuff like that honestly never occurred to me, but I'm pretty sure some of the more gregarious TAs in this department are just totally swimming in it.

I keep in touch with a group of students from last semester - we go out for lunch sometimes, they have my cell #. but it's never one on one, and I never initiate it?

I used to hang out with tons of grad students. Still do.

the thing is, it's easy for that kind of thing to happen. there are so many wide-eyed undergrads who are enchanted with everything about their college experience, including their professors and TAs, especially when the latter display a modicum of social skill/charisma and that can be a really engaging quality. and graduate students aren't as far from them in age as professors are. it's just gross for teachers to let the boundaries blur.

an economics lecturer in nz was recently convicted of viciously (stabbed her to death with a pair of scissors - i think the stab count was over 200) murdering the undergrad student he was dating

i don't want to be puritan about it. if grad students want to hang out with undergrads, then fine. they often aren't all that much apart in age (as for me, the problem rarely comes up, since i am at least a decade older than all but the "non-traditional" students, some of whom i've made friends with).

if you are presently teaching a student, or there's any possibility you are teaching them in the future, it is a VERY BAD IDEA to socialize with them and blur the lines. it may end up fine, but it may not and you will not look good to any professor or administrator who is reviewing a situation.

xpost

eeeesh.

it kind of weirds me out tbh when ppl meet professors outside of class after the semester/year is over

i admit i can be a little more severe about this stuff than other TAs. i won't add students on facebook, for example.

i think nz universities have much laxer rules/regulations about student/teacher relationships; the teacher has to notify the dean or something, and it can't be a student they are directly teaching, but that's about it.

it can't be a student they are directly teaching,

right, that's the whole point. otherwise, get to it.

i feel like i can't get much more specific without going into a lot of boring detail but the TAs i have in mind were creepy and if y'all knew them you'd agree. also, they were in school forever, so they'd befriend undergraduates who'd then seek out their classes even after the inital class in which they'd met was over. which just seems like it could foster badness.

7. Ask a question, the answer to which was in what you just said.

― blow it out your bad-taste hole (WmC), Monday, February 15, 2010 7:19 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

related: Ask a question that you don't want to know the answer to but demonstrates that you know some bit of trivia

i like when students are pretentious, though--to a point. and i wouldn't want a whole class full of knowitalls.

feelin like ted bundy over here ;_;

there definitely is massive potential for the shit to hit the fan, which is why I try to keep them at arms' length.

i've had classes where TAs stand behind the students and if someone goes onto the internet, the TA raises their hand, the student has to close their computer for the remainder of the class & after it happens 3 times computers are banned from the class as a whole

― nagl wayne (J0rdan S.), Monday, February 15, 2010 11:12 PM (44 minutes ago)

ok this is absurd, how old are we faculty

it kind of weirds me out tbh when ppl meet professors outside of class after the semester/year is over

Any time it happens? Or just in skeezy situations?

i kinda feel like if u have to be in graduate school might as well fuck some impressionable hotties, u know

Notes written directly onto the ppt files is like my 3rd option (behind writing notes on printouts of slides and writing notes on prepared handouts), partially because I know I will given into the urge to visit my dear friend the internet.

― C-L, Monday, February 15, 2010 11:20 PM (37 minutes ago)

this is exactly how it is for me, honestly if i didnt have hardcopy powerpoints i'd go crazy

it kind of weirds me out tbh when ppl meet professors outside of class after the semester/year is over

Any time it happens? Or just in skeezy situations?

― Lusty Mo Frazier (jaymc), Monday, February 15, 2010 10:58 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

just in general. idk i've never had that relationship w/ a professor before so it's a foreign relationship to me.

i love the students who exaggeratedly nod, i have to say. i like feedback.

i feel the need to nod egregiously when i ask a question & a professor answers me directly

I continue to meet with some of my undergrad professors even after I graduated. I was close with some of them in undergrad (my thesis advisor, people like that). Why not continue to be friendly with them especially if I continue doing work in that field?

i feel the need to nod egregiously when i ask a question & a professor answers me directly

― nagl wayne (J0rdan S.), Tuesday, February 16, 2010 12:06 AM (29 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

<3

it's like a pavlovian response -- i even tell myself "okay stop nodding so much" but i never can...

i had a professor once who would always call on me when i had nothing to say. a friend who was in the class told me it was because i always made eye contact and looked really attentive and no one else in the class did, and our professor was desperate to know how we were all reacting to everything. and then later i started teaching and i totally understood how he felt.

I usually call on those who are blatantly chatting w/ friends or goofing around. hah

well he was calling on me (i think) in less of an evaluative way and more of a dear god please help me out way. teaching is hard.

Hahaha I was about to say I am getting the sense that k3vin and I (and probably all my other health professions grad school bros) seem to have a much different perspective on this than everybody else, but yeah if I ask a question and the professor stares right back at me as he/she answers it I immediately go into the internal monologue of "Keep looking at them, nod vigorously, keep looking at them..."

I usually call on those who are blatantly chatting w/ friends or goofing around. hah

― dyao, Monday, February 15, 2010 11:10 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

see... i'm always like "why don't they call on the people who are blatantly not making eye contact" but i guess if you really want feedback then you're goal is not to embarrass mind wanderers

i don't really think it's good to betray to the students that you're desperate for feedback, but i have definitely been guilty of it

this reminds me, I worked with a lecturer last year who would talk to me about which students he found the most attractive in the class. he would also tell me about what new tattoos he was contemplating getting. he was 44.

if i sound cynical, here's a reason: big state universities don't generally breed students who want to spend part of their day chatting with their TAs and professors, asking questions that imply some serious intellectual engagement. i think the culture here encourages them not to do so. so with some splendid and life-affirming exceptions, the ones you hear from most (by email, ALWAYS by email) are the fuck-ups.

Read this to my wife (prof at big state university party school whoohoo) and she kind of put her head in her hands and groaned a bit. Inevitably these emails refer to her as either "Hey" or her last name - no Dr., no Prof., nothing, just her last name, like she's their frat brother or something.

Now she's just randomly saying things like "skipping class and posting on facebook during class time" and "obviously not doing the reading and then arguing about how the reading doesn't apply to anything we're currently discussing".

A friend who's an econ professor recently told me how when a student emails him that they're sick on the day that homework is due, he writes back and gives them ten minutes to send him a picture of the homework because he assumes they all have at least a cell phone camera.

I've gotta say tho, there have been a number of times I tried to engage with professors about texts or send them emails about the work to discuss it and they were utterly uninterested. I was in a class last semester where whenever I tried to contribute to the discussion, the professor totally zoned out and it was clear no one was listening to me. This was in a 6 person graduate course. About halfway through the semester I stopped participating and then got an email from the professor asking if I was no longer doing the readings because my participation in the course wasn't good enough. UGH.

a common occurrence (to me and other TAs here):

1. due date for paper arrives. student x's paper is nowhere to be found.

2. student comes up to TA within the next few days. asks if TA got his paper. answer: no. reply: hmm, well i put it in your box... TA responds: fine, if you can email me a copy when you get home this afternoon, i won't count it as late.

3. student doesn't send paper that afternoon.

4. days pass ::crickets::

5. weeks pass. ::crickets::

6. end of the semester. student does poorly on final exam. student emails TA, 24 hours before grades are due: did you ever get my paper?

in other words, they lied about handing in the paper to buy time, but then (predictably, inevitably) couldn't finish the paper before they were caught in the lie. what's oddest about this scenario is how often the students seem to have no idea that you might be wise to them, like they've hatched some foolproof plan.

I've actually sent papers and the professor wouldn't acknowledge getting it and I've had to send follow-ups like every day for two weeks until the professor acknowledged getting it. I imagine if I just sent it and didn't follow-up, they'd be asking me at the end of the semester where the paper is. Nowadays when I submit a paper by email I include in the email something like, "Please let me know when you get this and that you're able to open it without any problems."

Not classwork related, but I sent a professor an email a few months ago. When I saw him a few weeks ago I asked him why he never got back to me about my email. He said that he never received it. Apparently tho he believed it, because he made me stand there while he went through his archives to prove that he never got it. Of course, then he found it in his archives... and asked me to resend the email again when I got home.

that's the same stuff people do in every workplace, though.

"did you get those files i put on your desk?"

"what files"

"the red files"

"never seem 'em"

"they're right behind you"

"oh, these, hehehe"

Listen, we know that you know exactly what we're doing, but at the same time we know that you really can't call us on it because there is a legit chance that what we are saying is the truth

Tbh, I found professors were lenient enough that kind of stuff that I've never had to lie. I've turned papers in weeks late. I just tell the professor that I'm working on it but it's not done yet and if they have to take points off, they should do what they gotta do. I've only rarely lost points for turning a paper in late.

I usually allow two unexcused absences; I perform a lot of group work.

― Inculcate a spirit of serfdom in children (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, February 16, 2010 12:40 AM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Oh man, sorry, but for an English class, this def belongs in "100 Most Irritating Things Professors Do"

Also, professors, do you have students who laugh at every joke you make? Like even ones that don't merit laughter? Do you want to punch them or do you find that charming?

I'll punch them in the face for you.

I have found the opposite to be true: in both undergrad and grad school many teachers took a ZERO TOLERANCE approach to late papers, automatic zero's if they were submitted even an hour later than the due date, etc.

xxxpost.

Also, professors, do you have students who laugh at every joke you make? Like even ones that don't merit laughter? Do you want to punch them or do you find that charming?

― autotuna fish (Tape Store), Tuesday, February 16, 2010 12:59 AM (33 minutes ago) Bookmark

but all of my jokes are funny.

n: Students who come to class sick, thinking they're being noble or something.

I get irritated when students chat to each other class or twiddle with their cell phones. I offer as a disincentive for this both extra credit for participation in class discussion, and equally substantive grade subtraction for chatting or cell-phone-twiddling. This works pretty well. I care less about laptops b/c (a) they *might* be using them to take notes, and (b) if not, I'll take constant screwing-off-in-class over distraction, because the distracted student might (wrongly) think she's getting something out of class, while the complete screw-off knows she's not.

I've come around to ways to avoid irritating late homework/exam requests: all homework has an automatic one-class-day extension and then after that, no hw accepted for any reason; and I give makeup exams at my own discretion but the makeup exams will not be like the exams the other students take, in format and material. These tend to strike students as generous and fair yet worth respecting, and I've had few problems in the couple of years since I adopted them.

These have worked well at the big public university where I presently teach. When I taught at fancy private universities different irritants and strategies were called for.

Round mah way (ENGLAND) I got a receipt from the office for every essay I ever handed in and was ruthlessly downgraded for being over deadline

A guy on my course told me that if you submitted mitigation that used the word "depression" they'd pretty much waive it instantly but that wasn't really my style

A lecturer also once chided me for putting my name on an essay instead of just an anonymous student ID, saying "for all you know I have a grudge against you. In fact, for all *I* know I might have a grudge against you."

The idea of blind grading of papers or exams is completely alien in most of the rest of the world. Most other places rely on the professionalism of the grader.

Blind grading is a big deal on exams here in Norway, as I recall it -- you're only to identify yourself using a number you're handed when sitting down for the exam, and the grading is usually done together with censors from different schools (usually in other counties) to hinder recognition.
Not on papers, however.

My typical intro courses have 50 students each, which means that I rarely know very many of my students' names anyway---call this "practically blind grading".

Oh man, sorry, but for an English class, this def belongs in "100 Most Irritating Things Professors Do"

Nope; it's practically required, and works beautifully. They edit each other's shit, I moderate, everyone leaves happy.

i have never submitted anything for "blind grading". seems pretty stupid tbh

What's blind grading?

Blind grading was pretty much the way it was done in law school. For take home exams and papers in some classes (not all), we had to bring them to the receptionist in the faculty office area and have them date/time stamped, and tough shit if we were late (which was terrifying because in some courses, the ONLY grade we got was for whatever we were turning in at the end of the semester).

xp blind grading is when you don't put your name on the paper so the prof doesn't know whose paper s/he is grading. It's supposed to avoid favoritism. We got anonymous exam numbers every semester.

i did all of the irritating things when i was in college

But we play favorites all the time!

also i hung out with a couple of my profs once, it was simultaneously really fun and really bizarre, dont know that i could do it again

some of my friends used to get high w/ their philosophy advisor, i thought that was realllly weird

humanities grading is so subjective anyway, if we don't have favorites how can we be fair?

rubrics create the illusion of fairness at least

I don't play favorites---I need to keep 50 students into what's going on, and favoring a few students puts off the others. And when it comes to grading, I'm equally dispassionate. Relative judgments only come into play when recommendations are on the line.

Late to this thread but am completely o_0 that cellphones are allowed/used at all during class. People are paying more for college than the movies but we appear as a society to be interested in enforcing better manners at the cinema, where we are asked to turn them off.

At my liberal arts college a student got 1/6 of her year's credit having an affair with a prof, but this was classed as 'independent study'. Far and away the least appropriate relationship in the whole place. Some of the writing teachers seemed to have their particular favourites; I only minded on one occasion but was secure enough in what I was doing that I was unsurprised my publication record eclipsed this woman's by the time I was 30 (not a difficult prospect, so has half of ILX).

hi suzy. no, cell phones aren't permitted, but it's difficult to enforce and sometimes just isn't worth it unless you want to constantly interrupt lectures to play "bad cop." in section i will call people out, usually with a combination of humor and firmness.

a gentle "hey, whatcha doin?" often suffices. if someone is a repeat offender, i will either ask them to leave or just quietly tank their attendance/participation grade (something explicitly mentioned in the syllabus), or both. this has only happened two or three times in five years.

p.s. if you come to section every week and say nothing, no, you do not get an "A" for participation.

haha. Students pull that shit all the time. "I was there!"

I would have to surgically remove cell phones from my students if I enforced a no cell phone policy. it just isn't done here.

not mine, but the ones who're nervous about talking front of their peers grouse a bit about having no route for participation bonuses. My view is that I give participation extra credit for the sake of making the class run well, not to boost individual students' fortunes. (How Protestant of me!)

haha yeah I don't care if my students have cell phones. Everyone knows that taking a call in class shows that you're a moron (in the USA at least; in France I've had (senior) people come to my talks and chat on their phones for 3/4 of the time). If they're texting the whole time then I punish them, but a little texting now and then doesn't hurt anything.

I can't prohibit cell phones entirely because so many of my students have young kids and they insist that their children need to be able to contact them in an emergency. I just tell them (students) that the phone must be on vibrate or we will all stare at the offender until his/her phone stops ringing. (humor + tiny bit of intimidation)

This is illegal, but I still kind of want it:

http://www.ecrater.com/product.php?pid=6891860

Those are not illegal in the UK.

See, I would be mortified if my phone rang in class, or in any meeting. I can understand the kids/emergency thing but otherwise, forget it.

I would also be tempted as faculty to ban other devices because (wild theorizing follows) I really do think we need to use and exercise various parts of the brain as part of scholarship. The physicality of writing is important and so is the idea of being able to stay focused in attention on one thing. Taking things down in a clear hand, having to process defintions or larger ideas without the safety net of Google right there - all these things are good for our thinking processes and we should create opportunities to learn off the grid as enhancement.

Those are not illegal in the UK.

maybe to own, but you can't use them.

My feeling was that those things would be most fun to use on a bus, but then experience shows that these are the kind of people who just shout "HELLO" for 15 minutes if their call gets cut off

students showing up late is a pretty big uugggghhh too

This is illegal

and cheap!

That's why it is so so tempting. College students are supposed to be adults, but they are the most disgusting savages.

This is illegal, but I still kind of want it:

http://www.ecrater.com/product.php?pid=6891860

― ô_o (Nicole), Tuesday, February 16, 2010 9:23 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

do want

Funnily enough:

Q. So how does this manifest itself in your students? How are they different, and what do you -- ?

A. I teach at MIT. I teach the most brilliant students in the world. But they have done themselves a disservice by drinking the Kool-Aid and believing that a multitasking learning environment will serve their best purposes, because they need to be taught how to make a sustained, complicated argument on a hard, cultural, historical, psychological point.

Many of them were trained that a good presentation is a PowerPoint presentation -- you know, bam-bam-bam -- it's very hard for them to have a kind of quietness, a stillness in their thinking where one thing can actually lead to another and build and build and build and build.

I don't blame them. I think that there really is a change in the educational sensibility that they've come up with. I think it's for a generation of professors to not be intimidated and say, "Oh, this must be the way of the future," but to say: "Look, there really are important things you cannot think about unless you're only thinking about one thing at a time. There are just some things that are not amenable to being thought about in conjunction with 15 other things. And there's some kind of arguments you cannot make unless you're willing to take something from beginning to end."

Q. When you look out and see that sea of students in front of you, to what degree do you think they actually are Googling you, Googling their possible new boyfriend --

A. Every professor who looks out onto a sea of students these days knows that there's e-mail, Wikipedia, Facebook, Googling me, Googling them, Googling their next-door neighbor -- that that's happening in the classroom. And every professor makes a different call, and often we change our calls from one class to another and from one semester to another.

Very often now I will start my class and say: "You know, this really is not about more information. What we're doing in class is learning how to think together, and I need your full attention, and I want you to be really thinking with me. I want you to be interrupting me; I want you to be having new ideas. But I don't really want you to be having new ideas because there's some new piece of information you found out on the Web. So no notebook laptops. If you have a note, you need to take a piece of paper." And then I've had people say, "Oh, well;" then they'll be doodling. And I think doodling is actually kind of interesting. I think doodling is a way in which people visually represent in some way something they're hearing. I'm comfortable with doodling. I don't get upset if people doodle.

It's going to be because there's something about my reasoning or something about your reading and experience that you've thought about before coming here that you want to contribute. And that's pretty much how I'm handling it now.

Q. And lectures?

A. Well, I've changed my lecture style so that it is really more about showing them how to think. I say: "These lectures are not about the communication of content. I'm going to be thinking through complicated material. I'm going to be asking for input from you. I'm going to be showing you how to think through a problem. My lectures are designed to help you think through a problem, and there's really no new information that's required to both watch me do that and for you to participate in helping me do that, because if I'm thinking in a way you think is problematic, I will call on you, and we can take it back and think through a different way."

So I think it's changed my teaching style in a sense that I want to get rid of the fantasy that there's something in Wikipedia or on the Web that's going to turn this all around. They're paying so much money for this education, and I think I have something very special to offer, and I want them to be there.

But listen, I feel the same way about my colleagues. You go to a conference, and the person on your left is downloading images from The New Yorker that they want to use in their presentation, the person to the right is doing their e-mail on their Blackberry, and the speaker knows that they're speaking to people who are really otherwise occupied.

So I don't want to lay this on my students. I think we're living in a culture where we're really not sure what kind of attention we owe each other. People put their cell phones on the table now. They don't turn them off. One of my students talked about the first time he was walking with friends, and they received a cell phone call, and they took the call. And he said: "What was I, on pause? I felt I was being put on pause." I think that we're socially negotiating what kind of attention we feel we owe each other.

I have come to feel that in order for me to love my job, I'm willing to change the nature of what I present in order to honestly be able to say to students: "What I'm here to do with you is to think about how to think about a problem. I need your full attention. There's no more information you need. Everybody off the Web." And then it's for me to make sure I can make good on that promise.

I don't think of myself so much as old school as feeling that technology has its place. And there were some very good things about thinking together with a speaker and not talking to each other about free associations and contradictions to what the speaker is saying. And I think it goes along with a kind of lack of willingness to hear a complicated point out to the end.

When I've tried to analyze the cross-channel conversations, which are so scintillating and smart and witty and fun, they often don't allow a complicated point to mature, because while you're making a complicated point, you can say things that can be easily refuted, or, you know, it needs to mature.

We're becoming quite intolerant of letting each other think complicated things. I don't think this serves our humans needs, because the problems we're facing are quite complicated.

I have complicated ideas about when to use technology in education. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. For different students it's good in different ways. And we're just becoming like, "Sherry, is it good, or is it bad?" Well, sometimes it depends on the kid. These are complicated points, and I think we need to hear each other out.

That's kind of brilliant.

Well, I've changed my lecture style so that it is really more about showing them how to think. I say: "These lectures are not about the communication of content. I'm going to be thinking through complicated material. I'm going to be asking for input from you. I'm going to be showing you how to think through a problem."

Tbh I can only remember like 4 classes in my entire 4 yrs of college that would have qualified for that statement.

That reminds me of Paulo Freire's two models of pedagogy: the banker model (teacher deposits info into students' heads) vs. the midwife model (teacher draws out knowledge and helps students come to their own ideas).

5. Tell me elaborate lies about why they didn't do their homework.

Had a lecturer bring a student into our office the other day (we've tech/AV support for teaching, amongst other things).

Lecturer: My student has to give a presentation but he says it's an Apple Keynote file rather than a Powerpoint file and he can't load it onto the PC in the room.

Me: (with a vague sigh) You can export a .ppt file straight from Keynote; Macs and PCs are very compatible these days. Have you got it on a USB stick?

Student: (spots MacPro on my desk with Keynote in the dock; eyes widen with PH3@R) I don't have it on a stick, only in my email.

Me: (open up web access to uni email) Oh well, download it here and I'll export it for you.

Student: (growing panic in eyes) Oh, OK. (miraculously fails to type his password correctly; I try mine to check the server's working; it is)

Lecturer: You HAVE done this presentation...?

Student: Yes, yes. (tries again, 'fails')

Me: gtfo of my office, liar.

the midwife model is from the symposium, right?

eh i look back on all my schooling and i feel like i could have skipped every discussion. i'd kill for a decent informative lecture! like, you're the one with the PhD, tell me something. why are you listening to me? why am i listening to my classmates? they know exactly what i do: dick.

A good moderator is hard to find.

after listening to some of those lecture series on academicearth, it just seems like anything less is a waste of time.

I'm sympathetic to your complaint, goole, but then I guess I'd have to wonder what you're paying for. I can get the information from a lecture in a number of other places without paying the steep tuition, but it's a lot harder to create an environment similar to a discussion class, where you're engaging with the material in a different way, having your ideas challenged, etc.

I dunno - what you're paying for is the piece of paper you leave with. I don't think anyone really believes that the stuff they learned in 4 years was worth 200k. I agree that the discussion environment is the most important part of college though.

in my classes the content is generated together: we are thinking together about deep things and there is not just one way to talk about it, so from term to term and in class to class the content changes. And indeed one class might be inquisitive about one matter more than another, and as a result we'll focus on that matter more. But perhaps not in another section. As a result: if you miss a lecture there is no other way to get its content.

I kind of love when a kid texts in class bcz then I get to do this whole goofball riff about how it's important to help w/homeland security & I know we're all trying hard to find & beat Osama bin Laden but sharing those leads can wait 20 minutes until after class, just going on & on while they get this look on their face like "I promise if you stfu w/this stupid routine I will never touch my phone in class again." Dad joke 'em to death! It works.

It helps that I don't do a lecture but lead a class where they work in groups & I go from table to table talking to students 3 or 4 at a time, so it's not like in front of the whole class-type embarrassment, just me being interminably dorky around that person.

back of class last night--dude next to me was half taking notes, half watching espn over slingbox. dude next to him was taking no notes and playing some top-down strategy game that looked like age of empires or some shit.

As a university dropout I only later realised some of my undergrad lecturers might in fact have been trying to teach me new ways to think, and I wish I'd known that at the time and not just been like "uhhh, I can miss this one or turn up basically brain-dead from weird sleep patterns and google it all later, right?", cz a decade on I am short of not only a bit of paper but also feel pretty short on ways to think.

Though if someone had spelt it out I would probably still have been like "oh yeah, get over yrself, never mind this thinking business we are here to write down FACTS" so yeah, lead a horse to water etc

Annoying things my fellow students have done in class:

- Derailed entire lecture by saying to Prof: "WHY ARE WE STUDYING THIS ANYWAY." - bait to which the prof unfortunately rose. For an hour - which was good of him, but mostly for that one student.

- Texted. It's off-putting for fellow students as well as for the poor teacher. Click click clickety click. Bzzzzzz.

- A presentation consisting of a) long film clip, which we'd all already seen b) blow by blow description of film clip as if we hadn't just seen it, containing zero analysis or any insight whatsoever into why the scene might have been shot that way.

- Presentation consisting of unashamed reading out of a Wikipedia page. Followed by showers of praise from tutor. GAH.

- Sitting in on group discussions, silently writing down everybody else's ideas so they can bung it all into their essays.

Oh, and multiple examples of students giving a presentation on a topic, starting with something like "This book was written in 1954 by Mr Writerman. It is about (...insert entire plot here...)". WE KNOW. WE'VE ALL BEEN STUDYING IT ALL TERM.

Someone started playing with my hair once, too, asking me what shampoo I used. THAT was irritating.

One thing I will say for my students is that what they lack in basic understanding of how language works they make up for in enthusiasm for learning most of the time. I don't see a lot of the behavior you guys are mentioning on this thread.

I do, occasionally, see things that are not only plagiarized, but also run through a very bad translator that turns años into anus. You can probably imagine the fallout that creates.

In fairness, this is pretty much ALL that's irritated me in five years of undergrad study.

I forgot - it irritates me when people bitch at me about their grades and feedback ("it's just so RUDE of him to say my spelling is bad") as if they have a god-given right to a good grade without having made any special efforts or any effort at all. Whither the effort -> reward -> motivation cycle?

run through a very bad translator that turns años into anus. You can probably imagine the fallout that creates.

looooooooooooooooool

"The art of the ancient Greeks has been enjoyed for thousands of...wait."

except there's no "wait". they just turn it in, full of anus errors.

Ha, that is actually something that comes up every so often on the crossword-constructor listserv I'm on: since there are no diacritics in American crossword puzzles, should we avoid ANO (usually clued as "Calendario unit" or "Year in the Yucatan" or some such) as fill?

the clue should be "year in the Yucatan, no wait, butthole in the Yucatan"

Do you guys totally hate that girl that sits in the front of class and overattentively nods her head to most everything you say and raises her hand too much? Do you savor it when she gives really obviously stupid/misinformed answers?

GIRL STAPLING MORE THAN 20 COPIES OF HER STORY IN THE MIDDLE OF SOMEONE ELSE'S CRIT, PLZ GO FUCK YR RUDE SELF

Do you savor it when she gives really obviously stupid/misinformed answers?

I usually say, "What on earth are you talking about?"

i just nod

be nice guys!

there's this really annoying/stupid girl in my american lit class who answers every single question. she's so wrong and stupid. but no one else will talk. today she said that the abolitionist movement was 'annoying.' my professor was confused and asked her to clarify, she said there were too many views--'like free soil and frederick douglas and all of these other opinions.' My professor attempted to coax a different adjective out of her--'you mean it's really complex?'--but to no avail--'no, it's just annoying.'

Maybe she meant, "It's annoying to read about them."

no, not to add too much context to a boring story, but this was in response to another student's ten minute presentation about the abolitionist movement

The girl I'm talking about brought up all the "Star of Davids" after a screening of Metropolis. For reference:

http://marcoponce.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/lang-metropolis-robot-with-devil-star.jpg

I tried not to LOL.

loool

there were too many views--'like free soil and frederick douglas and all of these other opinions.' My professor attempted to coax a different adjective out of her--'you mean it's really complex?'--but to no avail--'no, it's just annoying.'

ha, wow: to her credit, she seems to have homed in on some basic existential thing about her own education. like, if sorting out various ideas is annoying, this should probably inform your decisions about paying tuition to do precisely that.

there's this really annoying/stupid girl in my american lit class who answers every single question. she's so wrong and stupid. but no one else will talk. today she said that the abolitionist movement was 'annoying.' my professor was confused and asked her to clarify, she said there were too many views--'like free soil and frederick douglas and all of these other opinions.' My professor attempted to coax a different adjective out of her--'you mean it's really complex?'--but to no avail--'no, it's just annoying.'

brb, committing suicide

I just feel like students think of professors as these alternate beings that love thier asses kissed and have no clue that a lot of them are, you know, regular intelligent people that can see right through all the brown-nosing.

If I were a prof I would detest these people.

Asking for very specific requirements for a writing assignment e.g. word count, font size, margins, etc. Just cover the topic!!!

We're not professors anymore -- we provide a service, like an Arby's cashier.

Asking for very specific requirements for a writing assignment e.g. word count, font size, margins, etc. Just cover the topic!!!

This, but in some students' defense, I had some professors that really made these questions necessary. I mean, never thought I would have UNIVERSITY professors measuring margins and failing people for not using their preferred font, but I did.

how do you think they got tenure?

the students who pull dumb shit and then transparently brown-nose to attempt to make up for it will be rewarded with very poor participation grades. at least in my classes.

i don't mind overeager students. just be prepared not to be called on sometimes when you have your hand raised, if you have been talking a lot and i want to hear from other students. if you haven't been coming to lecture and arrive in section stoned, i don't really want to hear your "opinion" when i ask you what the book's argument was.

i have to admit a satisfaction in not replying to brown-nosing emails. i'm sorry, did you have a question?

and for those who want to cry foul, yes, it's easy to tell the difference between brown-nosing and sincere appreciation (the latter is an absolutely wonderful thing to get, naturally).

I'll repeat: the A students drive me crazy. They're the neurotics who chase you down after class for giving them a 24 out of 25 on a quiz.

I had a writing prof in law school who would dock points for shit like that (xp - picky formatting stuff), and she got really, really fussy if you tried to pin her down on exactly what she wanted, format-wise. Her reasoning for the rule sticklerness was that when we are out there as lawyers drafting legal documents we will have to follow these rules or risk all manner of penalties, and while that is true, she seemed to fail to grasp the corollary to that argument, which is that judges/courts/jurisdictions actually make their document requirements available to the legal document drafting public. I still hate her.

This should prob. go in the annoying prof thread, though. Sorry. In the spirit of this thread, I will say that being on the other side of the desk, so to speak, I know know that I was not fooling anybody when I would try to fluff up my word count on a paper or when I would totally phone in an assignment. That shit is really, really obvious!!!

You guys all seem to think that students are "partners" in their own "education" -- this is clearly unsane and I don't know where any of you went to school. Professors are authority figures who are there to judge you as a person, and without their approval (and you better hope they like you or they will flunk you/never call on you in class) you will never get a job in the Real World. For the privilege of being judged by people you've never met before who don't really know you, you will pay a great deal.

End. Full disclosure: I was "overattentive nodding student who raises hand all the time" only when I really did or really did NOT like the class. If I really didn't like it, over-participation was the only way to stay awake.

i really don't understand your point. what are you suggesting about students? that they shouldn't be held to standards of civility and decorum?

Sry for thread hijack, it's just...I had no concept of being a student that was outside of being subject to authority and judgment. It would have been nice to enjoy college as a pursuit of actual knowledge thing. You guys are so DEMANDING and I feel judged. :(

As a hand-waver and nodder.

F-^^^^^

see me after class

SOB

You guys all seem to think that students are "partners" in their own "education" -- this is clearly unsane and I don't know where any of you went to school. Professors are authority figures who are there to judge you as a person, and without their approval (and you better hope they like you or they will flunk you/never call on you in class) you will never get a job in the Real World.

Exactly, so why are you whining? Write a clear thesis, see me in my office, or drop this thread.

wow i really didn't have that experience. still not sure what implications it would have for student behavior though. honestly much of things being discussed are not all that different from what might be discussed about committee meetings and suchlike. just standards of etiquette, civility, etc. in group contexts.

that said i do think some of the folks on this thread are harsh. and you're probably picking up on the tendency for profs and TAs to whine about problematic students and not to say anything about the good ones, as a way of letting off stress. most of my students are just fine, or better. though i wish they'd do the reading.

if your students irritate u y on earth wld u bother w/ participation marks

This is why I tell my students *just* enough about myself so that they trust me and always use "we" when discussing assignments, goals, etc. You wouldn't believe how subtle clues that we're all in this together really work. I tell them that their success is my success, and their failure is also my failure. We do work through things together. I work with a rather unusual student body, though, so I realize this approach may not work for everyone.

referring to laurel's college experience btw.

i didn't really feel judged, in fact i was probably cockier than i ought to have been. i really felt like i was learning and exploring and all that sort of thing.

As long as you don't say "we" are a "team," cuz that's the motivational twaddle I hear in my other job, the administrative one.

The point, though, is that a good teacher can distinguish between toadies and talent. Last weekend a student turned in a beautiful essay that persuaded me to write, "I really want you to become an English major." I talked to him after class -- a shy, halting, pimply kid -- and he was so grateful he couldn't even look me in the eye.

twaddle is my least favorite word

still not sure what implications it would have for student behavior though.

If you imagine your students as being primarily motivated by fear, does any of the stuff you don't like seem more understandable?

twaddle is my least favorite word

None of your tweets use twaddle?

laurel: what is the stuff i don't like? maybe you're addressing other folks' comments here. i LIKE it when students participate a lot. i just can't necessarily call on them all the time.

some people--like the guy in one of my classes who is always baked--just like to hear themselves talk. very different than angling for professor approval. i can only think of one girl who really seems to design her (usually not very insightful) comments for my approval, and while it's not going to work out the way she might want it to, i still like her a lot and appreciate her earnestness.

honestly complaints about students talking too much, at least from my experience, are usually misplaced. if anything i miss the 25% of the classroom that scarcely talks at all would pipe in sometimes. some may be shy, others may just place a low value on their own ideas, others might just be bored or distracted or disengaged. but class discussion is better when more than four or five people are doing the talking.

Oh I dunno, things that you (collective "you") see as brown-nosing, or coming to your offices to ask what they missed in class when you think there's no substitute for your lecture and you're going to be dismissive of them anyway for asking, frantic phone calls close to deadlines, whatever they do to try and get it together.

Although I guess you always have the good students for contrast to make the bad ones look especially like losers.

no, i don't use stupid business speak. it's more like i take responsibility and i expect them to do the same. i think most of you teach in very different environments than i do; similarly, i think laurel's school and the colleges most of you went to are different than the school where i teach.

most of my students are barely hanging on financially, are adults, have families, are not the type to overthink/overanalyze their relationships with their teachers.

but, for instance, in my speech class last week a student told me that she liked my class because she felt comfortable around me. that is a huge thing -- to not lord over people and act like a fucking big shot. just be a human. a human with boundaries, but a human.

c'mon, Laurel, you can't stop bad acting? That's what brown nosing is!

*spot

I definitely get where Laurel's coming from. I mean, I get the complaints, too. But yeah, the complaints are coming from an adult world where you've figured out this simple thing about how students are paying to learn and be involved and take some interest in their own education -- and honestly, when you're 19, this is not necessarily something that's clicked yet. (I mean, for me personally, I'm not sure it really clicked until my third year of college!) A lot of students are bound to be stuck in this high-school mentality that's more like a job transaction: okay, I'm supposed to be here, I have to take this, so what do I have to do to get an acceptable grade? And how can I minimize the effort I have to put forth to do so? Or else, for some: how can you, professor, cater to me personally to somehow make this worth my while (and help me benefit from it in some results-based way, like a good grade or connection or recommendation)? And to be honest, I don't think even the most amazing teacher can be held responsible for magically inspiring each and every student to break out of that mindset and figure out how to take advantage of their own education. It kinda just has to happen for them personally, at some point.

Which is why the complaints make perfect sense to me, because yes, these are the annoying things students do before they've figured out the productive way to approach being educated, and there is not much you can do about it other than laugh and gripe.

Sure, Alfred, maybe I don't understand what people are trotting out for you to try and sweeten their situation(s). It all just seems awfully harsh if all the students aren't in exactly the same place in life and don't approach their educations the way you'd like them to.

xp, yeah, that. How are they supposed to know how to be college students when they've never been to college??

Or else, for some: how can you, professor, cater to me personally to somehow make this worth my while (and help me benefit from it in some results-based way, like a good grade or connection or recommendation)?

idk this still seems like the best (as in most productive) way to approach most courses

I guess I'm counting brown-nosing as trying to get something "results-based" -- like making a priority of currying favor and approval rather than just trying to learn or do great work. But this is precisely how lots of students are taught to gauge the value of their work -- through the favor and approval of their teachers. I mean, it's like an actual significant point of maturity to figure out how to approach education better.

(Some of this idea might be dated in the face of young people today who are way more striving and results-focused than a decade ago or whatever.)

sorry for the following incoherent post but it was cobbled together in response to about one thousand cross-posts:

laurel, with all respect (i mean that very sincerely, and i am very sympathetic to your wretched experiences in college)--what is the problem you have with your complaints here? that we have opinions about our students just as one might have opinions of coworkers or friends or god knows what else? that we discuss and make assessments of their behaviors? that we don't take into account their desire for our approval?

as nabisco writes, the mature students figure out, first of all, that instructor approval is not the end goal. we are most likely to appreciate those students whose comments and actions seem to come from a sincere place, rather than being transparently designed to achieve our approval and _only_ that.

for example: if a student repeatedly chats throughout lecture, or is texting through section, and gets caught--and "spontaneously" sends you an email about how wonderful the class is and how committed to it they are a few days later--we should feel bad for thinking this person isn't being completely sincere or honest?

at least in my case, i'm careful to ensure that none of my disdain for students' occasional acts of dishonesty or lack of responsibility translates to petulant or patronizing classroom behavior. my classrooms tend to be quite relaxed, and i don't make a point of signaling my approval or disapproval of anyone's comment. if i think something is inaccurate, or i wish to qualify it to make a point stick, i'll do so.

with OUR complaints here

probably are many more typos

Being useful/helping them become invested is sort of part of the job imo. This is why I don't understand why many colleges hire unseasoned instructors for first semester classes. I realize that the pros don't always want to teach these classes, but that's lame.

Sure, Alfred, maybe I don't understand what people are trotting out for you to try and sweeten their situation(s). It all just seems awfully harsh if all the students aren't in exactly the same place in life and don't approach their educations the way you'd like them to.

See, I don't ask them to approach their educations the way I'd like them to -- I expect them to follow the rules of the class for which they registered. The student majoring in business or PR will frequently expect a transactional arrangement: I sit in your class and follow your instructions, you give me the grade I deserve. But as you know and they don't (and believe me, I never tire of explaining the difference), a composition course isn't like trig (e.g. "use this formula and the answer will always be correct). I'm no martinet! Honest. Even accounting for the difficulty in adjusting to adulthood, some of these kids just don't want to work. They shouldn't be in college, frankly, and they would have gone into blue collar work fifty years ago.

As far as brown nosers: they're actually not bad students, and are usually the low A and high B ones. They tend to raise their hands often to make discursive, nattering points that don't demonstrate a knowledge of the material, only what I expect them to say. Most of the time I'll make a wry (never cruel) joke in class at their expense, or will write something on their drafts indicating that I'm on to their game. In nine out of ten cases they'll approach me after class and acknowledge it.

In nine out of ten cases they'll approach me after class and acknowledge it.

Haha. That's the best possible outcome for all parties, I guess.

This is why I don't understand why many colleges hire unseasoned instructors for first semester classes.

$$$$

Most of the time I'll make a wry (never cruel) joke in class at their expense

see, i would NEVER do this. just nod and smile.

i mean, they'll be finished soon enough and someone else will pick up the reins and say something interesting. no need to abuse people for trying to contribute.

eh, I'm a sarcastic motherfucker, and it makes me popular. It also helps that I look like one of them.

xpost

"A joke at their expense" /= cruelty

much less "abuse."

I mean, I understand -- I'm not a moron -- but it's a shitty educational move and leads to more complications with the teacher-student relationship. Part of that is the inexperienced teacher's fault and part of it is the student's fault, but none of it is making higher ed any better.

perhaps, but i do think there's a power dynamic in place that requires instructors to be very careful about such things.

if someone asks a dumb question like, "so for the exam, are we expected to have done _all_ of the assigned reading?" my response is usually an emphatic, "absolutely" delivered w/ a smile. not a sardonic "why do you think it was assigned?" (thinking of an example from this morning!)

so i guess i'm w/ laurel on this one.

Example: Brown noser delivers nattering, discursive monologue, at the end of which he says, "You get what I mean, right?" I say to the class. "Who here gets what he means?" Embarrassed laughter from class, followed by my saying, "No, but seriously, here's the problem..."

A good teacher can also spot the students with whom one can banter.

responding to alfred!!!

xpost!!!

and if you're a grad student, all bets are off: if you kiss ass or say stupid shit in such a small, comfortable environment, you should be told why you're wrong.

alfred: ok, point taken.

one thing that i appreciate is that different teachers have different styles and that's OK. what works for some may not work for others. i know these are banal statements but threads like this tend to lose sight of them (as to many pedagogy workshops i've been to). so maybe it works for you--i banter with students, but possibly in a different way from you.

alfred, you sound like a bit of a classroom peacock
i also "banter" with students, but usually it's in the form of grandpa jokes, as those are the ones that are nonthreatening to anyone and just make me look like a cheeseball, which i don't mind.

I like a little tension; and, hey, look at my Rate My Professor reviews!

for example: if a student repeatedly chats throughout lecture, or is texting through section, and gets caught--and "spontaneously" sends you an email about how wonderful the class is and how committed to it they are a few days later--we should feel bad for thinking this person isn't being completely sincere or honest?

arent u encouraging this kind of dishonest behavior by rewarding participation marks? like in undergrad i never cared if my professors liked me & have no idea how the majority of them felt abt me - probably nothing since i avoided going to class if it was at all possible. but i mean as part of doing an undergrad degree your going to get stuck in courses u dont like or that dont excite u & u still have to get an A. so you have professors demanding "sincere" participation & how do u reconcile that w/o being false?

It's a good question. I treat participation as extra credit: if they're a borderline, attending class and participating will make me err on the side of the higher grade.

i guess what i was trying to say is: there's a way to address inaccurate or uninformed comments without making it personal. sometimes you don't even have to address the comment directly. you can make it clear that you're correcting the comment or critiquing it without calling out the commenter personally. even a modest, "well, here's how i see it..." is a kind way of basically saying "well, not really, here's how it is..." without making the student feel particularly judged or put-upon.

arent u encouraging this kind of dishonest behavior by rewarding participation marks?

honestly i don't get this logic. participation marks are there so that students who come to class, are respectful to other students, and make valuable contributions can be rewarded. if you don't like the class, then you can simply come to class and be respectful of others, and you will get a reasonable participation grade. i'm not grading students on whether i _like_ them so sending flattering emails to make up for distracting behaviors in class bears no real relation to a participation grade (unless students are laboring under a major misapprehension).

ou can make it clear that you're correcting the comment or critiquing it without calling out the commenter personally. even a modest, "well, here's how i see it..."

I do this too, and often. It depends on the situation, student, and how many essays I've graded the night before.

ok, cool

I like a little tension; and, hey, look at my Rate My Professor reviews!

-----

I agree, this class is not hard to pass. The proffesor is very nice and funny. The only problem is that he makes it nearly impossible for anybody to get an A. Gives A- not A. But overall very helpful and not hard at all to get a B in his class.

You monster!

hmm when I was in undergrad I participated a lot for two reasons 1.) I was desperate to prove how smart I was to the prof/TA and 2.) I wanted to break the awkward silence, which was terrible for all involved

you guys are all lucky though that your students actually respond/talk in class. my students sit there like lumps on a log, waiting for me to impart practical & useful knowledge unto them (sorry, I'm a lit major.)

hands up if u got chili peppers

I can only speak to 12-year-olds...

"Take out your math text and turn to page 78, please."
"What page?"
"Page 78."
"Which page are we doing?"
"Page 78."
"Are we working on page 78?"
"Yes, page 78. Someone read #3 aloud, please."
"Which page?"
"Page 78."

It's another world entirely.

Oh gosh yeah dyao, half the time I've been the class talker it's bcz of an insufferable, crushing, endless silence. Even occasionally coming off as an ass, or wrong, or a know-it-all, is better than sitting through that.

Also amateurist I can't believe you have students that come to class toned! This is insane to me!

Oh there are totally kids in my classes that show up high/drunk.

I can't believe I said "toned" instead of "stoned."

OK here I admit I did go to one class stoned a couple times but I never made others notice it by talking.

ha Abbott i was so confused by your post; i was like, college students are 18-22 so they're often in pretty good shape?

Also amateurist I can't believe you have students that come to class toned!

you wouldn't BELIEVE the bodies on some of these kids!

xpost

Huh. I was toned out of my skull for aprox 75% of my undergrad courses. I even lived the whole "study high, take the test high" philosohy.

http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e260/EyEcarumba/body_builder_chick_8.jpg

jenny, the college years

fart

this was a good trehad im glad irea di t

recently discovered:

after allowing the use of laptops again, one guy in the back will attempt to google/look up in a dictionary the answer to the questions I pose in class. wtg, you disgusting savage

I mean, can someone walk me through the thought process here? you're not getting brownie points cause it's blatantly obvious to everyone what you're doing, in fact you're annoying the shit out of me by doing so...you're not proving that you know the answer...are you big upping yourself to your friends, in some sort of ha-ha I'm smarter than the prof move? but why should they be impressed by your ability to google an answer to a relatively simple question?

ugh

Maybe this just makes sense to me b/c I was an English major, but why ask a question that can just be googled?

I'm teaching ESL, so I'm basically testing their language ability

oh yeah. weird move to google the answer then.

I mean, can someone walk me through the thought process here?

i think the point is that the thought process is somewhat... arrested.

Why not call him out on it?

snoring

So today in a lecture of about 50 there was a kid with a laptop and a 100-CD SPINDLE OF CD-RS on his desk and he was burning a ton of cds, like, in class. The professor told him to stop, and as he was putting them away he dropped the spindle of cds. Major lulz.

I am going to try my hardest to write you this email in response to the recent grade received on my paper, without reflecting the anger that I feel as a result. I would like to first express my respect for you and every other teacher that has placed their energy into educating me and my peers, as we all know that teachers are often the unappreciated foundation of our future. However, I must express a slight amount of disrespect, as I do not agree with your perception of my paper one bit. I recently read an article about Bill Gates and the steps he took as he dropped out of Harvard. What I found so interesting was that he had the confidence to leave his schooling behind for the other students that really needed it, as he realized that he had more important things to accomplish in life than to argue with teachers about grades on papers, as we all now know what thoughts he had storming in his mind.

You commented that I had probably the best example, to the assigned question, out of all the students participating. However, you also said that I did not complete the assignment as instructed, because I did not explain with the proper support from the text book literature pertaining to the two gentlemen of which the entire assignment pertained to. I beg to differ on your opinion of my interpretation of the assignment. Proffessor, what you fail to realize is that my story explains the topic in so much detail, that being specific is not in my nature as a writer, or a mathotical student. You see if I was to follow the path as the other students, I would have never gained the respect and admiration of my past teachers. What you failed to realize is that I understand the topic in greater depth than any of the other students. So much so, that I had a smile on my face writing this paper knowing that only an A student would understand my direction. The fact that I knew the topic so thouroughly, that I was able to visualize an event in history that explained the different mindsets of the two philosophers at hand, that it needed no explanation, besides an in depth detailed visual summary of a World War 2 event, that created an anaoly of the two philosopys that needed no explanation. You see the leaders of the two countries show the details that separate their ideology creating a mirror reflection of Mills and Rousseaus’s philosophys with regards to social justice. How ironic is it that justice is not seen by the instructor of a class about the exact topic that leads me to this email.

The paper is so methodically written, that it needs no explaniation. I am so disappointed that you do not understand or see that. Do you seriously think that I don’t understand the topic inside and out? You are so mistaken, as I understood it enough to come up with an example that so vividly creates a perfect analogy to the difference between Mills and Rousseau. That paper is written to perfection whether you understand it or not! The leaders of our country and Japan created a stamp in history that is flawed just as any theory of justice by anyone will never be perfect. Don’t you get it Professor? How do you not see that the government morals and ideas of the U.S. and Japan can directly reflect the differences between Mills and Rousseau? It is clear as day to any person that understands good writing. I am an A student and that is an A paper, and always will be to me. I read some of the other students papers, and to me they were nonsense written to fill pages. I will apologize for this email if you can produce one paper written for this assignment that can come close to competing with the ideas in my paper. I can only dream of having someone like Bill Gates give me advice for this situation. But I will still go on to follow the path that God has paved for me regardless of your opinion, because I already had the guideness I needed to help me visualize my purpose. I want my grade changed, and I am sorry if I offend you by this email, but I put my heart and sole into my education and I believe in myself even if you don’t.

via

http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/03/11/the-status-of-higher-education-in-2010-an-empty-bottle-of-jack-daniels-and-the-greatest-student-email-ever-written/

I put my heart and sole into my education

being specific is not in my nature as a writer, or a mathotical student

What you failed to realize is that I understand the topic in greater depth than any of the other students. So much so, that I had a smile on my face writing this paper knowing that only an A student would understand my direction. The fact that I knew the topic so thouroughly, that I was able to visualize an event in history that explained the different mindsets of the two philosophers at hand, that it needed no explanation, besides an in depth detailed visual summary of a World War 2 event, that created an anaoly of the two philosopys that needed no explanation.

so glad i'm not in school anymore

What you failed to realize What I failed to demonstrate.

fixed

i actually get version of that in office hours:

"but i KNOW this material"

"you don't mention any of these concepts in your essay"

I am sorry if I offend you by this email, but I put my heart and sole into my education and I believe in myself even if you don’t.

Not sure if the misspelling or the laughably insincere "apology" is the icing on the cake

on a more positive note, today my very old (70+) russian student told me that he did not enjoy "the proposal" because it was "very very boring." i asked him, "did you think it was stupid?" and he replied, "no, not stupid. boring. too much boring. man and woman, they have love, they work, they no love. too much boring. boring."

he did enjoy "it's complicated" and is looking forward to "everybody's fine starring robert de niro"

I'd be shocked if the word "mathotical" doesn't appear somewhere in the wu-tang canon.

when he is not talking about the US missiles in poland, he is talking about comedies
he also has taken my class three times (this is his fourth) and he doesn't hesitate to tell me what he likes or dislikes about each time he takes it.

the difference is that he does not use the word mathotical

"he also has taken my class three times (this is his fourth)"

--does this mean he flunked three times?

oh, my saturday class is adult ed. there's no flunking unless they don't show up or show absolutely no progress. i've taught this class 3x a year for almost 5 years, so he has had a lot of chances to disappear, then re-register at the same level. also, he loves me. i know this because he stands about 5 inches from me whenever he corners me to talk about missiles or movies.

post to ILX

mention that they would be 'happy' with a B+

Amanda, I never saw your Russian student stories but they're great. He's talking in a gruff Russian accent in my head, totally.

haha he wants to take my class AGAIN! can you believe that? i want to convince him to start a blog with his movie reviews. he loves computers and is pretty web-savvy, it wouldn't be too far-fetched. he's always sending me weird musical e-cards.

A blog! A blog! If he writes it, I will read it. And maybe he and Dr Morbius can become best friends.

He sounds bored, tbh, and maybe lonely? He must really enjoy getting out and going to school and having lots more opportunities to be grumpy about things.

Yeah, he's like 80. I have three students like that. Two Russians and one Nigerian. They're all men in their 70s/80s and pretty much say the same things on repeat. The Nigerian guy was a real sport when we went on our field trip, though -- he walked for quite a while (with the rest of us) to get to the bus when the train was suddenly not operating. He didn't seem to mind the detour as much as some of the ladies did.

ilikemissilesandmovies.blogspot.com might not be taken...

It is way way annoying when students cry for "losing" ONE round of a game where there isn't really a win/lose structure. They will meld rules of other games into the game I'm teaching them and they get super upset when it turns out my game is different. This is actually kind of cool to think about later but while it's happening and there are 4 or 5 sobbing children crowded around you it's pretty irritating. Well actually my games aren't about winning and losing but you can die in some of them, hypothetically, for one round. I guess this could be upsetting to a 6 year old.

Funniest thing kids do in class? fart.

After determining that the majority of my students in Class A are also going to be in Class B this summer, I bring in the textbook for Class B and I show everybody what it's called and I write the name on the board and then I do it AGAIN during the following class meeting to make sure that everybody knows what the book is and can use the six week break between terms to procure the book as cheaply as possible and when three students fail to show up on the first day of Class B, I email them the syllabus and the first assignment because their grades are based mostly on an ability to show up for class and turn in assignments in a timely fashion, and one of those three students, who was also in Class A and who was present on the days that I told them what book to buy, emails me to tell me that she doesn't have the book yet because of a "credit card info" problem and to ask what she should do about the homework.

Come the hell on.

tell her to call the waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahmbulance

I told her that if I were her, I would contact someone else in the class or see if I could get the book out of the library to complete the assignment on time, then I wished her luck.

I really hope she manages to get it together because I like her a lot and she's one of my smarter students and this is exactly the kind of half-assed bullshit I would have pulled whilst an undergrad, so it will make me v. unhappy to fail her. But damn.

2. I'm still scarred by the debate with a student last week, who kept insisting that Hamlet was "obviously" manic-depressive, then kept triumphantly looking around the class, as if affixing this label explained everything.

these types of students really bring a lot of flavor to class discussions imo

Slightly paraphrased exchange:

Student: Do you think we could meet for lunch so I can discuss the profession to which you belong and into which I hope to gain entry?
Jenny: Sure. If you can come downtown, we can meet on Monday. How does noon sound?
Student: Well, I'm unemployed now and I like to sleep in, so 2 would be better.
Jenny: That's a little late for lunch, but I can do 1.
Student: Okay, great! I'll probably be late though because I'm always late.
Jenny: ...

That is a winning attitude!

My least favorite current student is this young man who likes to do the following when asking me a question: get out of his chair, sneak up behind wherever I am, poke my neck and say, "Miss? Miss?" When I told him he had to sit in his seat & wait like everyone else was nice enough to do, he started crying. :-/

BTW this is a college student.

um, what? oh dear.

does he have an advisor? maybe you could find out if he has any behavioral disorders from that person?

does he wear diapers?

Whoa, yeah. Something is... amiss there.

Note: I did not have high hopes, but the student was on time!

I always wondered if you set low expectations & then acted normal, if that made you look better than just acting normal. Thanks to this story about Jenny's student I am thinking: no.

i just had a hilarious memory of the student who called me "girlfriend" once.
he only did that once because i said I AM NOT YOUR GIRLFRIEND, I AM YOUR TEACHER

he was ok other than that

I'd just like to thank this thread for making me appreciate my students: slow, sometimes, can't spell, and often can't use words properly, but nearly all of them are polite and friendly.