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  #651  
Old 02-19-2013, 03:28 AM
naturalist.atheist naturalist.atheist is offline
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

As far as being punished for being litigious, here is a little tidbit. If you claim on your resume that you consulted for any large corporation and some recruiter calls that company to verify your experience, the company will neither confirm nor deny the claim. So now it is common for less than ethical people to claim to have worked on all sorts of large projects (that they did not work on) at big corporation to spiff up their resumes.
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  #652  
Old 03-27-2013, 08:39 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Here's something to think about: if your life's goal is to be a Nurse or a Physician's Assistant, you're going to need a fairly extensive knowledge and understanding of Human Anatomy & Physiology. I know this may come as a surprise, but this will involve taking a few courses in Human A & P. And what may come as an even bigger surprise is that this means you'll occasionally be expected to perform (or at least assist in) dissections.

So if you spend the entire time loudly whining about how much you hate dissection and seeing the insides of people and other animals -- maybe, just maybe, you should reconsider your career choice. Because I can pretty-much guarantee you that if you do become a Nurse or PA -- you can expect to see some blood, guts, and other icky stuff on occasion.


Just some random thoughts from today's lab ...


***


Yesterday, we had a bunch of kids from local high schools visiting the campus. The idea was to introduce them to what college is like. They spent a bit of time sitting in on classes, and a lot of time with various administrators telling them about what college was like. A lot of what they were being told was very good stuff: research the school you want to go to, visit the campus, talk to students and professors, etc.

And an awful lot of it was chirpy talk about how much unsupervised free time you'd have. [To their credit, they were largely emphasizing that if you choose to devote all that "free time" partying and whatnot, instead of taking your studies seriously, things won't go so well.]

Still, I happened to sit in on one of those sessions. After awhile, I began to get tired of all the talk about how very much free time they'd have in college. And I especially began to get annoyed when they started talking about how coming to class is your own choice -- and how you can spend your time checking your mail, you can get up and leave anytime you want, etc.

Again, part of the message was "you must take some responsibility for your own education," but my feeling was they were spending way too much time emphasizing other things, like how much free time you'll have, and how you're pretty-much unsupervised, and how you can just get up and leave class anytime you want.


So I asked if I might have a word -- being an actual instructor and all, I suggested that I might have some useful information to impart. They may have regretted giving me the chance.

I emphasized to them that my assumption is that my students are adults. And I expect them to act like it. And also, keep this in mind: you do not pay my salary; you pay for the privilege of attending my class: that's a very important difference, and one that you should keep in mind.

If you're checking your e-mail in class, coming in whenever the heck you feel like, and leaving class before it's over because you think you have better things to do with your time -- then you're being rude, disrespectful, and worst of all, distracting. And I will throw you out of my class, and I will not feel guilty about doing so.


I'm not sure that's what they were expecting to hear (either the students or the administrators), but I thought it was an important point to make.
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  #653  
Old 03-27-2013, 08:48 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Oh, and: Will you please stop asking, "Do we need to know this?"

No, of course not. I spent time explaining it and dedicated much of the lab to showing it to you just for my own amusement. It's not like it's important or anything.


All you're doing by asking this question is annoying your instructor and fellow students -- and lowering their opinion of you. One of the other students in the class just asked the obvious question of this student: "What is your problem?"
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  #654  
Old 03-27-2013, 08:53 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Oh heck, while I'm on a ramble:

Am I right to be frightened of the fact that the student who's doing worst in the class -- the one who seems to feel no need whatsoever to prepare for class or study, and who betrays very little understanding of the principles involved -- is a licensed EMT?
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  #655  
Old 03-27-2013, 10:27 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Quote:
Originally Posted by The Lone Ranger View Post
Oh, and: Will you please stop asking, "Do we need to know this?"
Announce on the first day any time this is asked, it will automatically add whatever it was to a later test. So... Yes!
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  #656  
Old 04-04-2013, 01:11 AM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Here's a quick article on the Atlanta Public Schools cheating scandal from Slate.

I'm not sure but I think they're trying to say it was Beverly Hall's fault ./s
Atlanta school cheating indictments: Your questions, answered.
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  #657  
Old 04-04-2013, 05:56 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

The student mentioned earlier was making a big fuss yesterday about having to do dissections.

I finally decided that I'd had enough. I pointed out -- in front of the whole class -- that Anatomy & Physiology courses involve dissections, and that anyone who can't handle that really shouldn't be taking such courses. I then told her that I was tired of hearing her complain and that I didn't want to hear another word about it from her.

To her credit, she was somewhat contrite and didn't say another word about how much she hates dissections. And, as so often happens, she soon showed clear signs of actually enjoying the dissection. By the end of the class, she was happy and cheerful, and was, in fact, the last student to leave for the day -- she and her partner continued working on their cat well after the other groups had put theirs away.
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  #658  
Old 04-04-2013, 05:57 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

I just find it wrong that children's answers on tests are the standard by which teacher's pay is evaluated. Just seems like a great place for desperate people to make unethical choices.
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  #659  
Old 04-04-2013, 07:43 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

I just stepped out of my office, and two of my students (two of the better ones, as it happens), are sitting at a computer terminal together, apparently going over their slides and notes.

Though it's none of my business and so I've never asked, I get the distinct impression from the way that they interact that they're dating.

So it was kind of amusing to see and hear her pointing to a slide and saying to him, "No, that's the vagina and that's the testicle."
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  #660  
Old 04-04-2013, 07:57 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

omg ultimate misandry! :freakout:
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  #661  
Old 04-05-2013, 08:18 AM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Quote:
Originally Posted by The Lone Ranger View Post
By the end of the class, she was happy and cheerful, and was, in fact, the last student to leave for the day -- she and her partner continued working on their cat well after the other groups had put theirs away.
You are forcing your students to carve up kitties? You beast! No wonder they hate you, your class and all of science.
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  #662  
Old 04-05-2013, 10:26 AM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

That's almost as bad as making your students stomp on the name "JESUS" on a piece of paper.
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  #663  
Old 04-05-2013, 03:54 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Qingdai View Post
I just find it wrong that children's answers on tests are the standard by which teacher's pay is evaluated. Just seems like a great place for desperate people to make unethical choices.
Bingo. Might as well have added a clause stating "This is a huge incentive to cheat and lie" to the text of the laws/policies tying pay to test scores.
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Old 04-05-2013, 04:01 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

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Originally Posted by Nullifidian View Post
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Originally Posted by The Lone Ranger View Post
Actually, though, several of us in the department were talking about that very article earlier in the week. And also about a recent spate of articles about students suing schools when they don't get the grades that they want.
It's rather like an overweight person suing a gym because they've paid all the dues but they didn't become thin, despite never once entering the gym and working out at the weights and cardio machines that their dues paid for.

These people are going to find out that a reputation for being litigious when everything isn't arranged just as they would like it is going to harm them far more than C's on their transcripts. Now their names are irrevocably in the news and on the internet in association with frivolous lawsuits.
Is this some new social network where people rate each other on their social behavior that I haven't heard about? It sounds just like the sort of place that litigious people would want to sue.
Lots of people- including employers, potential dating partners, and colleagues- check others out on the 'net to see if there are any red flags.
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Old 04-09-2013, 07:44 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Some recent events and the "How Is This Possible?" thread got me to wondering. Are we still teaching kids how to put together and follow outlines?

I'm not being facetious or anything: is how to put together and follow an outline something that is no longer taught in the primary schools? I ask this because over the past few years, I've been seeing more and more students who have absolutely no idea how to listen to a presentation and summarize the key points and how they relate to each other. Worse, when presented with a pre-made outline, a great many of them cannot understand it and regard it as simply a list of key concepts -- that is, they have no idea that its organization is significant and is conveying relationships between concepts.

I've had a great many students flat-out tell me that they've never been taught what an outline is, much less how to read one -- and certainly not how to construct one.



Maybe this is partly a function of "No Child Left Behind"; I dunno. I've known quite a few teachers at the primary level who have told me that in their opinions, the most significant impact of NCLB is that it encourages (if not all but forces) educators to focus on "teaching to the test" and teaching kids to memorize facts -- with little or no emphasis on teaching them to look for relationships between their memorized facts.

So it seems to me that more and more, what I'm encountering at the college level is kids who can memorize "facts," but simply cannot reason even a little bit. Colleagues who've been doing this longer than I have frequently tell me that it's not my imagination; by and large, students seem much less capable of simple reasoning than they were a decade or two ago.



Or maybe it's just a consequence of where I've taught for the past few years. Maybe it isn't a systemic thing at all ...




At the previous college where I taught, one of the first things I was told when I was hired was, "If you expect any students to pass your classes, you're going to have to prepare outlines of each of your lectures and give them to the students, so that they can use them as study guides and to organize their note-taking. You'll find that they cannot and will not summarize lectures and identify key points on their own."

This particular college mostly caters to poor, rural students. Almost all of the students who attend the college are local. And, as both the college faculty and the students themselves were quick to point out, the local primary schools were simply terrible.

And, sadly, I all too quickly learned that my colleagues had not been exaggerating. For the most part, students simply could not and/or would not construct lecture outlines on their own. They could listen to a lecture and maybe even ask a few relevant questions, but they simply could not summarize the key points and indicate how they related to each other. Even though the textbook included "Chapter Summaries" at the end of each chapter and highlighted each concept in the chapter headings. And despite the fact that I did essentially the same thing in my lectures.

In teaching Introductory-level courses, I quickly learned that not only were the great majority of my students incapable of summarizing something they'd read or seen or listened to and making up an outline -- a great many of them had no idea what an outline was. I found that I had to walk them through how to read an outline and understand what it was trying to tell you. This was something that had never been taught to them in their primary education.


Okay. Maybe this was just an indictment of the local schools.



I left that school, and came to one that -- as it turns out -- is rather similar. Again, I'm dealing with students who are overwhelmingly local and who attended primary schools that are -- as both the students and my colleagues are quick to point out -- are simply terrible.

And again, one of the first things I was told by my colleagues was that I shouldn't expect our students to be capable of summarizing information and figuring out relationships.

Things go a bit further here, though. For each class, the lead instructor prepares a "Course Pack." This is sold at the bookstore, along with the textbooks. Each "Course Pack" contains a detailed outline for each lecture topic.

Not only are the students literally given a pre-written outline for each lecture, most of them are structured with lots of space between the lines so that, during lectures, students can simply follow along in their outlines and fill in the gaps between the topic headings.

In short, we literally do everything except take their notes for them. (And don't think for a moment that some instructors don't give the students lecture outlines that are so detailed that they effectively are giving the students pre-written course notes -- so that the students only have to sit in class during lecture and follow along in their notes.)

And once again, I find that in the Introductory-level courses, it's not sufficient to simply give the students pre-written outlines -- I have to explain what an outline is, and how to read one. Otherwise, they tend to regard the outline as simply a list of key concepts, and far too many of them have no idea at all that it's attempting to show relationships between concepts.

And again, the students will frequently come right out and tell me that they were never introduced to the concepts of "outlines" during their primary education, and so have no idea what an outline is. Nor -- as they're generally quick to point out -- have they ever been taught how to summarize the key points of a presentation and indicate how they're related.


Now again, maybe that's more an indictment of the local educational system than a generalized problem.

Still, when I was in college, you were expected to make your own darned outlines, because that was more or less the entire point. You read the assigned readings, you came to class and took notes and then -- you re-wrote your notes, organizing them into an outline format as you did, so that relationships between concepts were clarified. This, as my instructors frequently reminded me, was the point -- by organizing your notes thus, you highlight (and hopefully come to understand) the relationships between concepts.




Now, I don't want to read too much into it, because these last couple of schools and their students are probably not entirely representative. Nor am I blaming the students. After all, as both they and my colleagues are quick to point out, most of them have never before been even introduced to the concept of summarizing information, identifying key concepts, and showing relationships between those concepts.

The result, though, is students who seem to be capable only of memorizing "facts." For the most part, they simply cannot read a text or listen to a lecture and summarize the key points and their relationships. And worse, almost all of them seem to be completely incapable of puzzling out or following even the simplest chains of logic.



Take a couple of recent examples from my Advanced Human Anatomy and Physiology class. Let me stress this: this is the advanced class. They've been through several Introductory-level courses to have gotten this far -- including several courses in Chemistry, General Biology, and lower-level Human Anatomy and Physiology. We're not talking about dummies, here.

And yet, the great majority of them seem to be incapable of anything other than straight memorization.

In a recent lab, we were looking at how the senses function. For one of the exercises, they were shining flashlights into each others' eyes. I had them note that when you shine a flashlight into one eye, the pupils of both eyes constrict. Neat. Their assignment was to work out why this happens.



Here are some of the things that had already been covered extensively in lecture. These are things that (theoretically, at least), they already knew.

The pupillary response is due to the fact that the optic nerves send fibers to the pretectal nuclei of the brain as well as to the visual cortex of the brain. In response to impulses from the fibers of the optic nerves, each pretectal nucleus sends impulses out the oculomotor nerves that trigger constriction of the pupils.

About half of the afferent fibers coming in from the optic nerve cross over (decussate) in the optic chiasma. That is, about half the fibers coming in from the right optic nerve cross over to the left side of the brain, while about half continue on to the right side of the brain. The same is true for the left optic nerve.

The efferent fibers of the oculomotor nerves that originate in the pretectal nuclei don't decussate. So the right oculomotor nerve sends fibers only to the right eye, and the left oculomotor nerve sends fibers only to the left eye.


Now, given what they already knew, it seems to me that figuring out why both pupils constrict when light is shone into only one eye should not be difficult. I gave them an hour or so to work on the problem. I even let them work in groups, so that they could "brainstorm" ideas. I kept giving them really, really, really big clues -- I was doing everything short of actually telling them the answer outright. "Think about what you know of the layouts of the sensory and motor pathways related to the pupillary response."


So you'd think that sooner or later, someone would have said, "Well duh! We know that the sensory fibers from the optic nerve decussate and so impulses from each optic nerve go to both pretectal nuclei. We also know that the oculomotor nerves don't decussate. So logically, if you shine a light into one eye, since both pretectal nuclei are being stimulated, their motor outputs will cause both pupils to constrict. Elementary."

Instead, for an hour, they sat and asked each other, "Do you know why it happens? No. Do you know why it happens? No. How about you?"

And I'd be standing there, saying, "Think about the sensory and motor pathways responsible, and how they're laid out."

And so they'd look this up in their textbooks. And, after reading and re-reading it three or four times, they'd go back to: "Do you know why it happens? No. Do you know why it happens? No. How about you?"


At the end of the lab, not a single student was able to puzzle out the answer to the question. Not. Even. One.

And these are the advanced students.




In the same class, I assigned them a report. The assignment (for which I wrote up a detailed summary of what I expected, knowing that it would be disastrous to simply tell them verbally) was to choose a disease or disorder -- such as, say, diabetes mellitus -- research the disorder, and prepare a properly-referenced, properly-formatted report on the physiology of the disorder.

I gave them the option of turning in their report early. I told them that I would read it, offer criticism and correction, and return it -- so that they could turn in a revised version for final credit.

One of them turned in her paper early. Before I continue, I should stress something: This is the best student in the class. She's conscientious. She frequently asks questions. And she desperately wants to get a good grade. And she does very well on the tests. [The tests are standardized, "multiple-choice" tests. I'm not lead faculty, and so I don't design the tests.]

She's very, very good at memorization.

Anyway, her "report." It consisted of five pages of random facts. There was no attempt at organization. There was no thesis. There was no conclusion. There was no explanation. There was not even one in-report citation -- just a "Literature Cited" section at the end. (As I pointed out to her, it's not entirely accurate to call it "Literature Cited" when there were no actual citations.)

Just five pages of randomly-spewed facts. No organization, no attempt to connect or explain these facts. Just five pages of random facts about diabetes mellitus.

True, her report was organized into paragraphs. But they made absolutely no sense. I can only assume that she put down facts at random until she felt that a "paragraph" was long enough -- at which point she hit "Enter" and started a new "paragraph."



And so it literally read like this:
Diabetes mellitus is a disease. "Mellitus" means "honey." Diabetes mellitus is not the same thing as diabetes insipidus. Diabetes mellitus can cause blindness. If you have diabetes mellitus, there is too much glucose in your urine.

There is more than one kind of diabetes mellitus. Diabetes mellitus is very common in the United States. If you have diabetes mellitus, there is too much glucose in your blood.


And no, that's not an exaggeration. Gods, how I wish it was. This went on for five pages.

And let me stress again: this is the best student in the class, at least in theory. But she has absolutely no idea how to summarize, absolutely no idea how to identify key points, and absolutely no idea how to relate concepts to each other.

Not so far as I can tell, anyway.


And it's not as if this is happening in just my class. I see it in other classes and hear about it from my colleagues. And I spend a ridiculous amount of time in Introductory-level (and even advanced!) classes trying to get students to grasp the seemingly-simple and intuitive notion that concepts are related -- that there's a reason why you have to master the basics before you can hope to understand the more complex material -- and that if you hope to actually understand something, you must do more than simply memorize "facts" and treat them as if they're completely unrelated.




I dunno. Are these things that simply aren't being taught anymore? Is primary education now simply an exercise in getting students to memorize "facts" so that they can regurgitate them onto standardized tests, without any actual understanding expected or required?

Because that's pretty-much what my students are telling me.
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Last edited by The Lone Ranger; 04-09-2013 at 08:05 PM.
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  #666  
Old 04-11-2013, 06:40 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Teacher Resignation Letter from Gerald Conti Says His Profession 'No Longer Exists'


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Originally Posted by Gerald Conti
After writing all of this I realize that I am not leaving my profession, in truth, it has left me. It no longer exists. I feel as though I have played some game halfway through its fourth quarter, a timeout has been called, my teammates’ hands have all been tied, the goal posts moved, all previously scored points and honors expunged and all of the rules altered.

For the last decade or so, I have had two signs hanging above the blackboard at the front of my classroom, they read, “Words Matter” and “Ideas Matter”. While I still believe these simple statements to be true, I don’t feel that those currently driving public education have any inkling of what they mean.
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  #667  
Old 04-11-2013, 06:43 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Kiddo hasn't gotten to the research point of outlines yet, so I've no idea. I remember having to submit outlines for all research papers when I was in high school.
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  #668  
Old 04-11-2013, 07:23 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

I never liked doing outlines. It just seemed like the 'show your work' thing in math classes to me. Like it could be a useful tool to use personally to help you get things sorted, but the only purpose I could see for teachers is that it would I guess discourage cheating.

I would usually just write the paper and then fill out the outline after.

AND I AM NOT SORRY TLR plus the statute of limitations has already passed, so you can't do anything about it anyway. Ha ha!
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Old 04-11-2013, 07:42 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

I may be misunderstanding what TLR refers to when he says "outline". When I think outline, I think a summary of what you are going to discuss before you discuss it. The way you're describing it, an outline is a summary of what was already said by the teacher, which shows how you've synthesized the material. I just call that "notes".

Am I missing something? :whatthe:

Edit: Yeah, okay, I re-read TLR's description of an outline. I never re-wrote my notes, but then I always just took good notes.
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  #670  
Old 04-11-2013, 07:50 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

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Originally Posted by lisarea View Post
I never liked doing outlines. It just seemed like the 'show your work' thing in math classes to me. Like it could be a useful tool to use personally to help you get things sorted, but the only purpose I could see for teachers is that it would I guess discourage cheating.

I would usually just write the paper and then fill out the outline after.

AND I AM NOT SORRY TLR plus the statute of limitations has already passed, so you can't do anything about it anyway. Ha ha!

We had to turn in the outline well before the paper. There was a sort of timeline of submissions: topic, outline, research notes on index cards, first draft with bibliography, then the final paper.

Not sure what the purpose of following the system was, except that it is a system that makes some sense. If I hadn't been required to turn shit in, I would have used a different system...meaning I would have read all the books in one week then written the paper from memory the night before it was due
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Old 04-11-2013, 08:33 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Waluigi View Post
I may be misunderstanding what TLR refers to when he says "outline". When I think outline, I think a summary of what you are going to discuss before you discuss it. The way you're describing it, an outline is a summary of what was already said by the teacher, which shows how you've synthesized the material. I just call that "notes".

Am I missing something? :whatthe:

Edit: Yeah, okay, I re-read TLR's description of an outline. I never re-wrote my notes, but then I always just took good notes.
You haven't missed the point at all.

By "outline," I simply mean the ability to summarize a discussion, identify the key concepts, and how they relate. A good note-taker will do this the first time through.

I do like to emphasize to my students that it's typically a good idea to go through your notes afterward and re-write/re-organize them though. It's a whole lot easier to sort them into a coherent outline after the fact.



Here, though, we've officially abandoned the idea that students are capable of doing that. The same was true at the last college where I taught.
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  #672  
Old 04-11-2013, 08:36 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

I would just call those notes. My working definitions are the same as Waluigi's
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  #673  
Old 04-11-2013, 08:50 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

I am not really surprised that students have a hard time putting information in context, really. I'd blame NCLB for that mostly, in that that's really not important to a school's overall performance according to that criteria.

I thought you were implying that you actually made students show you their outlines for their work or something, though, which is why I was so enraged with you.
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  #674  
Old 04-11-2013, 09:34 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

Quote:
Originally Posted by lisarea View Post
I am not really surprised that students have a hard time putting information in context, really. I'd blame NCLB for that mostly, in that that's really not important to a school's overall performance according to that criteria.
Every teacher I've met sneers at the mention of NCLB. I have yet to meet a teacher who even slightly likes it.
I think it's the pinnacle of the political virus that's invaded the educational system. It's such a political way of looking at things, to dump money into creating a whole new system with lots of administrative positions. This system's job is to quickly crunch the education level of whole schools down into a single number to make it easier for someone in an office to choose which are the sure bets and should be given money.
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  #675  
Old 04-11-2013, 10:15 PM
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Default Re: Fucking education! How does it work?

I like outlines for studying; it works particularly well for the law, I think. One law school prof I had used to drive me nuts, because he would be outlining stuff on the board, and we'd ask, "why did you put that concept there in the outline?" i.e., how is it related to the point you are using it to make? He didn't answer that question; he'd say, "oh, you could put it here, or here, or here instead," and point to different parts of the outline he'd made, which left me totally confused as to where in the topic that point actually belonged. :fuming: So, yeah, I'm kinda outline-dependent, you might say.

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