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Mercy me.

No not the group, Mercy Me, who did the incredible "I Can Only Imagine" (fabulous song, btw, do listen if you get the chance), but more of "Mercy! Mercy me!" in a wistful Southern exclamatory manner.

I've just graded my students' first tests.

Now, I've matured quite a bit as a professor. As a fledgling prof, I took a fiendish delight in grading, wielding my red pencil like a scalpel, slashing through ignorant answers and incomplete essays with all the finnesse and fervor of a Crusader.

"wrong, wrong, Wrong!", I'd mutter and shake my head.

Now, I've swung the other way. And I ask myself the tough questions as a teacher. Why are they wrong? Did they not study? Did they not listen? or, and most haunting of all, Did I not teach?

Communication, I instruct my students, is a two way street. Each party is responsible for their portion of giving or receiving a message.

My students did not do well. Not horrible, not a bloodbath, but I know that I'll face widened eyes and pale faces when I hand these tests back. Some of these people are hanging on by a scholarship, or financial aid that depends on their grades. Some protect their GPA's with the viciousness of a mother bear defending her only 4.0 cub.

And, somehow, I'll convince them that all is not lost. It is one grade, one test among several. In covering the next session of material, we'll work harder, we'll work smarter and the tests to come will reflect that.

Looks like I have some communicating to do. And, just to be on the safe side, I'm wearing bear repellant.

Wish me luck.

Comments

Jenny said…
Good luck! I learned one thing in my very very brief tenure teaching. The level of complaining has no relationship to the level of the student or the level of the work. I had a student who got a 92 (that he didn't deserve) complain to the university that I was too harsh. You have more stamina than I.
10:47 AM
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