Topic: Bang Your Head on Your Desk - the thread of teaching despair!

[the_geneticist]

I'm pretty sure that students see extra credit as "bonus points" or "last minute please raise my grade" and not an opportunity for growth.

I tell students that I do NOT offer any extra credit.  But if I need student responses on say, what topic they want for a particular module, or who has bean seeds available for a plant project, then I will give a tiny amount of extra credit for completing the survey in a certain timeframe. 

Or when we had in-person labs, the only way to get students to actually take apart and examine flowers was to offer them a whopping 1 extra credit point (in a lab with more than 300 graded points).  It was weird, they were willing to give up existing points on the worksheet since they didn't want to "destroy" a flower for normal credit, but offering them 1 extra credit and they happily dove right in.

[Aster]

I had two students this term that failed to submit their final exams, but strangely completed the small extra credit assignment that was assigned the same day as the exams.

In both cases, the students would have received passing grades if they took their final exams. But they didn't, and one student has a D and the other has an F. The extra credit that they completed was irrelevant.

Extra credit is the junk food of academic curriculum.

[onehappyunicorn]

I had two students this term that failed to submit their final exams, but strangely completed the small extra credit assignment that was assigned the same day as the exams.

In both cases, the students would have received passing grades if they took their final exams. But they didn't, and one student has a D and the other has an F. The extra credit that they completed was irrelevant.

Extra credit is the junk food of academic curriculum.

Yep, had a student complete a very small extra credit assignment at the end of the semester rather than turn in a major project. If they had turned in anything remotely close to passing on the major project they would have passed the class. I generally offer just a few small extra credit assignments. Since I'm in the arts I like to post cultural events and similar opportunities for students to attend and earn a few points.
My experience has been that when a student asks me for extra credit what they mean is that they would like the same grade but for less work.

[apl68]

Or when we had in-person labs, the only way to get students to actually take apart and examine flowers was to offer them a whopping 1 extra credit point (in a lab with more than 300 graded points).  It was weird, they were willing to give up existing points on the worksheet since they didn't want to "destroy" a flower for normal credit, but offering them 1 extra credit and they happily dove right in.

Wonder how many points it would take to get them to take apart and examine a lab rat?


Sorry...random thought.

[Aster]

Or when we had in-person labs, the only way to get students to actually take apart and examine flowers was to offer them a whopping 1 extra credit point (in a lab with more than 300 graded points).  It was weird, they were willing to give up existing points on the worksheet since they didn't want to "destroy" a flower for normal credit, but offering them 1 extra credit and they happily dove right in.

Wonder how many points it would take to get them to take apart and examine a lab rat?

So much for their "morals"... ha ha.

[Anon1787]

Extra credit is the junk food of academic curriculum.

I agree and wish that more faculty would cut back or drop it entirely from their menu offerings.

[Langue_doc]

I don't offer extra credit. I include a sentence in my syllabi stating that there is no extra credit. I also remind students that "extra" means "in addition to", and not " instead of ".

[the_geneticist]

And yet another TA who just doesn't get the idea of fair & equitable grading.
No, you can't just be super lenient/lazy with grading because you "forgot" to do it on time.  Giving full points for incorrect answers means that the students have no idea that their answers were incorrect.  How is that helping them learn?
Yes I do notice and yes you will have to go back and RE-GRADE all of the damn assignments.  I don't care that the students will be upset with you when they see their lower scores.  I am upset with you and I have the power to block you from teaching this class again.

[ergative]

And yet another TA who just doesn't get the idea of fair & equitable grading.
No, you can't just be super lenient/lazy with grading because you "forgot" to do it on time.  Giving full points for incorrect answers means that the students have no idea that their answers were incorrect.  How is that helping them learn?
Yes I do notice and yes you will have to go back and RE-GRADE all of the damn assignments.  I don't care that the students will be upset with you when they see their lower scores.  I am upset with you and I have the power to block you from teaching this class again.

I have one TA who went too far the other way, and repeatedly flunked perfectly acceptable responses, two years in a row. I had to make him go back and regrade them all, both times. The second time he tried to argue with me, so then I had to shut him down about that too.

This year, a colleague suggested getting him to help out with final exam grading, but I shut that idea down right away.

[Langue_doc]

I once had a TA who told me that hu had "philosophical objections to writing on students' papers". This was a writing class; I told the TA that writing, aka correcting/giving feedback was required for the job and to let me know whether hu could do the job. Some "education" schools apparently believe that corrections are detrimental to students' self-esteem!

[marshwiggle]

I once had a TA who told me that hu had "philosophical objections to writing on students' papers". This was a writing class; I told the TA that writing, aka correcting/giving feedback was required for the job and to let me know whether hu could do the job. Some "education" schools apparently believe that corrections are detrimental to students' self-esteem!

That's why red pens are forbidden! (This was a discussion on the old Fora, I believe.......)

[Caracal]

I once had a TA who told me that hu had "philosophical objections to writing on students' papers". This was a writing class; I told the TA that writing, aka correcting/giving feedback was required for the job and to let me know whether hu could do the job. Some "education" schools apparently believe that corrections are detrimental to students' self-esteem!

I'm assuming that's someone's bad interpretation of a theory. It is really misplaced for writing courses. When I taught writing, I made a point to emphasize to students that drafts weren't supposed to be good. We all write crummy drafts which then need to be turned into something decent. Becoming a better writer is mostly about accepting that everything needs revision and learning how to do it.

[marshwiggle]

I once had a TA who told me that hu had "philosophical objections to writing on students' papers". This was a writing class; I told the TA that writing, aka correcting/giving feedback was required for the job and to let me know whether hu could do the job. Some "education" schools apparently believe that corrections are detrimental to students' self-esteem!

I'm assuming that's someone's bad interpretation of a theory. It is really misplaced for writing courses. When I taught writing, I made a point to emphasize to students that drafts weren't supposed to be good. We all write crummy drafts which then need to be turned into something decent. Becoming a better writer is mostly about accepting that everything needs revision and learning how to do it.

Kind of an aside, but one of the practical problems here in teaching is that the good students will often work very hard on the first "draft" and so what they hand in originally is better than what many weaker students hand in after revision, and so if they actually get graded on changes they make then they actually have to "mess up" their draft intentionally in order to have things to "improve".

[apl68]

I once had a TA who told me that hu had "philosophical objections to writing on students' papers". This was a writing class; I told the TA that writing, aka correcting/giving feedback was required for the job and to let me know whether hu could do the job. Some "education" schools apparently believe that corrections are detrimental to students' self-esteem!

That's why red pens are forbidden! (This was a discussion on the old Fora, I believe.......)

Well, I have to admit that when I was a TA grading essays with a red pen it sometimes looked like somebody had been murdered like Marat while grading the paper.

[apl68]

And yet another TA who just doesn't get the idea of fair & equitable grading.
No, you can't just be super lenient/lazy with grading because you "forgot" to do it on time.  Giving full points for incorrect answers means that the students have no idea that their answers were incorrect.  How is that helping them learn?
Yes I do notice and yes you will have to go back and RE-GRADE all of the damn assignments.  I don't care that the students will be upset with you when they see their lower scores.  I am upset with you and I have the power to block you from teaching this class again.

I have one TA who went too far the other way, and repeatedly flunked perfectly acceptable responses, two years in a row. I had to make him go back and regrade them all, both times. The second time he tried to argue with me, so then I had to shut him down about that too.

Getting the level of grading strictness just about right is a tough skill to acquire.  I recall struggling with it as a TA.