Dear Nick ;
The word tyranny made me sit up and think a little.
I dream of a day when we find a way out of the tyranny that is modularisation
(and not just grading). The addiction that seems to be demanding 'a mark
for things' hamstrings everyone (staff and students alike). Could we not devise
a system for first year undergraduates which frees us from this tyranny and
re-establishes marks through interviews with students. The pragmatic responses
so far to your message do not seem to look for anything radical. I am fully
aware of the difficulties of getting rid of the modular structures, but feel
that a much wider debate on the point of having all these modules and all of
these assessments is needed.
Students in our institution are now hiding within
the modular structures and not taking full responsibility for their own
learning. This is hardly surprising, as we are not engaging them in old
fashioned year group / tutor groups / personal tutoring encounters and in fact
are actively discouraged from doing this by our Faculties.
I know this is a wider debate than that contained
in your question, but thought it worthwhile to post it anyway.
Richard Spalding
School of Geography and Environmental
Management
UWE - Bristol
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, March 04, 2004 4:56
AM
Subject: class
assignments/pedagogy/tyranny of grading
I'm trying to re-work one of my undergrad courses, and the
age-old problem (for me) of class projects has come up. I set the conventional
assignments - a term paper/essay and a final exam. While these have their
uses, including teaching students to research and write, I wonder whether
they're there simply because they are what is expected, and because they allow
me to come up with nice numerical scores to plug into grading
spread-sheets.
I wonder if people have some creative alternatives? For
example, I've noticed that one of the biggest challenges that people seem to
face (myself included) is defining a research project. The execution is often
fairly straightforward. Could the former be an assignment? Group projects are
also something I've experimented with, but while these can be productive, I
know some students find them challenging.
Nick Blomley
Nicholas
Blomley,
Professor,
Department of Geography,
Simon Fraser
University,
Burnaby, BC V5A 1S6,
CANADA
604-291-3713
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