One of the biggest problems that I have in class is getting students to read the assigned reading. So, usually I have a weekly quiz that covers pieces of the reading. It gives a decent idea of how well folks are digging through. The problem is that while I think it's really helpful to have the quiz and go over the correct answers - sometimes it can even lead to a nice discussion or argument - it eats up a lot of time. I feel like I'm taking up a lot of the class with what I want them to get out of the readings rather than finding out what they're getting out of them.
So. This week I asked them to send me five specific questions that came from the readings, email them to me before class and we'd dig through some of them during class. A lot of the questions were kind of what I expected - simple identification or basic definition stuff, but some were just wonderful. I got some truly thoughtful ideas. I got some questions the untangled problems that I hadn't even seen. I got questions that dealt with overarching concepts from other classes. I hate to admit that I didn't expect such good stuff, but I was really happily blown away.
Then I realized I had no way of distilling all of the good questions into a class period. I ended up copying some of the best ones into a file and giving everyone a copy. We dealt with some big issues in class, but there were so many good questions that we didn't get to. I told them that they could come to office hours to talk about any of the questions, but I'm not sure if anyone will come. I don't want to leave them hanging after some of them went to so much work to put the questions together.
Now I don't know whether I should ask them to build questions for next week or not. One class preferred quizzes and the other preferred making questions themselves. I think that writing the questions really led them to approach the readings more carefully, but I'm not sure how much I can ask of them before they mutiny.
I do really love it when students surprise me like that though - so cool.
So. This week I asked them to send me five specific questions that came from the readings, email them to me before class and we'd dig through some of them during class. A lot of the questions were kind of what I expected - simple identification or basic definition stuff, but some were just wonderful. I got some truly thoughtful ideas. I got some questions the untangled problems that I hadn't even seen. I got questions that dealt with overarching concepts from other classes. I hate to admit that I didn't expect such good stuff, but I was really happily blown away.
Then I realized I had no way of distilling all of the good questions into a class period. I ended up copying some of the best ones into a file and giving everyone a copy. We dealt with some big issues in class, but there were so many good questions that we didn't get to. I told them that they could come to office hours to talk about any of the questions, but I'm not sure if anyone will come. I don't want to leave them hanging after some of them went to so much work to put the questions together.
Now I don't know whether I should ask them to build questions for next week or not. One class preferred quizzes and the other preferred making questions themselves. I think that writing the questions really led them to approach the readings more carefully, but I'm not sure how much I can ask of them before they mutiny.
I do really love it when students surprise me like that though - so cool.
2 comments:
Why not make up the quiz for the class that likes quizzes using the questions that the other class came up with?
I'm thinking that may be what happens. I may end up switching back and forth. Ok, Maybe I don't have a clue what I'll be doing... :)
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