Monday, March 1, 2010

Microlab Spring 2010

A student set a new high for my classes in the Microlab this semester: 86. Last year one person scored a 78. I've learned that the Writing Center tutors told us the scores average around 52%. Several students told me they thought the failed because they scored under 60% when they were actually above average.

I noticed too many people being really hard on themselves because of the score. It's just one assessment. Don't put too much stock in any one assessment, be it a computer test or a teacher. Listen to what they have to say and figure out what they mean. Pay attention to themes or recurring messages.

OR maybe people beat themselves up excessively in a sort of passive aggressive protest? If so, touche.

Several this time around pointed out issues with the font. That bothered a lot of people. Also that you can't go back and change things. Why might that be intentional?

This is meant to be a snapshot - one imperfect but relatively objective measure.

I wonder if in some ways it is like weighing one's self. Just because you weigh yourself more often doesn't make you lose weight faster. It doesn't work that way for me anyway - I tend to weigh myself multiple times a day. But owning a scale and checking does seem to help.

Can/ should I discuss results (ie performance of NNS/ by race/ gender/ origin?)

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