Tuesday, May 06, 2008

CollegeNow Grades

I've been instructing for a collegenow course in Meteorology. I have 30 students from LGHS registered. Around 12-15 tend to show up relatively regularly. We've had two tests. No one got above a 65 on either of them. I've made the tests so that they do what they are supposed to do, test the student's knowledge of the subject matter. I've tried it with a longer test (100 questions) with quick, multiple choice, true/false questions. The students were able to finish on time, even the ones that came in a half hour late to the test. The second test had 24 questions, but they were a combination of question types, and they got at the most basic and fundamental issues that we had been discussing in class and that were also covered in the textbook. And still the students did poorly. They're telling me that having a test on more than one chapter is too much for them. I think that I will infact make the next test on a single chapter. I spoke with Rob Perro from CollegeNow, and he suggested speaking with the HS principle about arranging for tutors for the students, which is a good idea. I had previously spoken with the principle, and he had a lot of students coming to him asking to drop the course, but he said that he insisted that they stay in the course and put more effort into it.

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