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Old 07-14-2008, 07:29 PM
 
1,428 posts, read 3,151,983 times
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Hey, I can agree to disagree.
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Old 07-16-2013, 07:57 PM
 
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Because some people have social anxiety and it's hard. You teachers don't understand how hard it can be. Students feel like someone's gonna laugh at them and teachers won't even care if someone makes fun of their answer so why bother? Ugh.
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Old 07-16-2013, 08:17 PM
 
2,612 posts, read 5,566,256 times
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Originally Posted by total_genius View Post
I work as a Teacher and one of my greatest frustrations both with kids and adults (I teach both) is so few will speak up in class. So many students just want to sit there and listen while they keep a close eye on the clock. They believe (falsely) that 95% of classroom success is just showing up and passing the tests.

Sometimes I get frustrated and will call on people. They will not know the answer or give a short two word response. I ask them what if the same question was asked in a job interview?

I try to encourage students by having question and answer, role playing, games, case studies, contests and group activites. Most perfer to just sit there and put in their time.

I try everything to get people to participate and have on occasion even bribed them. Most students just sit there. Any advice?
At one time I actually gave a grade to each student each day for participation. Then factored that into their total grade. Once I instituted that policy, participation improved a lot.

However, that doesn't work for me now because I teach continuing ed, where there really are no grades. It drives me crazy when students don't pay attention. I spent an entire class on a topic the other day - let's the topic was "education." It's an ESL class. Then the next day I asked them to write a paragraph about education as a quiz - they knew they were going to have to write a paragraph about education because I told them that the day before and actually did a practice paragraph with them. Well, one guy raises his hand on quiz day and says, "What does 'education' mean?"

Sometimes it's really hard not to just yell at them.
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Old 07-16-2013, 08:35 PM
 
Location: midwest
1,594 posts, read 1,401,218 times
Reputation: 970
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Originally Posted by total_genius View Post
I work as a Teacher and one of my greatest frustrations both with kids and adults (I teach both) is so few will speak up in class.
But you didn't say what subject you teach.

One thing annoying about teachers is that almost every teacher thinks the students are supposed to be interested in THEIR CLASS. I spoke up when I was interested in the subject, otherwise I sat there.

I only got C's in history while I got A's in math. I wasn't going to read boring inaccurate junk that I mostly regarded as propaganda for a grade. Unless the teacher called on me I didn't say anything.

psik
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Old 07-16-2013, 08:41 PM
 
1,866 posts, read 2,693,351 times
Reputation: 1467
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Originally Posted by Lola19 View Post
Because some people have social anxiety and it's hard. You teachers don't understand how hard it can be. Students feel like someone's gonna laugh at them and teachers won't even care if someone makes fun of their answer so why bother? Ugh.
You teachers dont understand ..blah blah blah, look i had social anxiety and fear, but guess what. I PRACTICED AND GOT OVER IT. Quit being so soft, if you want to change something, then do it, but dont place the blame on others for your faults.
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Old 07-17-2013, 12:38 AM
 
563 posts, read 804,754 times
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Originally Posted by Blackscorpion View Post
You teachers dont understand ..blah blah blah, look i had social anxiety and fear, but guess what. I PRACTICED AND GOT OVER IT. Quit being so soft, if you want to change something, then do it, but dont place the blame on others for your faults.
Is it really necessary to talk like that? Anyways, that person looks like a test poster, if you have not noticed this thread is 5 years old.
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Old 07-17-2013, 02:14 AM
 
6,066 posts, read 14,998,906 times
Reputation: 7188
For me it's more about comfort level. It really depends on the instructor. There are a few instructors I've had that were so full of themselves and just loved to hear themselves talk. They also did this thing (both were male instructors) where they would ask a question, call on someone to answer it, and then argue the answer with the person - even if whatever that person said was correct. Like they (the instructor) just wanted to be right no matter what, and the student was always inferior or wrong somehow.

So, needless to say, I didn't really contribute to the discussion those classes because I didn't like the instructors. I found them rude and annoying and participating would not have been of any benefit to me anyway. A few times I spoke up to defend other students, because the instructor was so totally wrong. No one is perfect, no one is right all the time, it bugged me that these instructors behaved like that, like they were always more right than us (students) simply because they were instructors. Whatevs!

But I've had some other instructors who were really great conversationalists, and the dialogue was more encouraging and curiosity was peaked... I did participate in those class discussions. It felt way more comfortable and inviting. Also, one instructor was just so funny... she was a great storyteller and a very animated speaker... the whole class had a great time and it was a very professional yet relaxed feeling because we were always laughing, but somehow she managed to keep us on topic and on task. Teachers like that really are treasures.
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Old 07-17-2013, 07:42 AM
 
2,612 posts, read 5,566,256 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by InformedConsent View Post
I didn't intend learning from experts (giants) to mean lecture only.



Isn't that what papers are for? Why does so much class time have to be taken up by a room full of novices asserting their own newbie interpretations/positions on topics/concepts/interpretations that are subjective?

Wouldn't it be far more useful to examine the works/ideas/opinions of the various 'giants' in a particular subject area in class, and then have students write papers comparing/contrasting them, defining and defending their own positions after having evaluated the positions/opinions of the reputed experts (giants)?

Individualizing in this manner is far more effective at nurturing the ability to determine what qualifies as high quality input/information, evaluate same, process ideas, and form one's own conclusions - in other words, to think for one's self.

In theory, class discussions would benefit students. In reality, in my years of experience observing such, only a very small percentage are truly beneficial.

Of course, world language classes (we don't say 'foreign language' these days ) do require speaking in class.
I agree with you, and I loathe groupwork. Nothing brings down the quality of work like making people do it in a group. It's particularly ineffective in my classes, where the students are from various foreign countries, some of which have cultures that make any disagreement very impolite and others which railroad everyone with their ideas, bad or good. And yet I do groupwork and partner work all the time. Why? Because we have to, because that's the current definition of good teaching. If you don't do it, you will get bad evaluations. I use it as a kind of break, a little social time. It works in that sense - students get a chance to move around, chat a little - it mixes things up. If done correctly, groupwork can make class more enjoyable because it gives you the chance to get to know your classmates and have a little fun in class. But as for producing good work or helping the learning, I don't think it is effective.

As a student, I would much prefer to speak out alone in class - I love public speaking and will happily monopolize the class for as long as a teacher lets me. It's weird because when I was younger I was very socially anxious and used to drop classes that required participation, and somehow I just grew out of it and became the opposite. I'm fine speaking by myself or even in front of a large group, but I still hate groupwork from a student standpoint, because groups still make me anxious.
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Old 07-17-2013, 08:24 AM
 
13,498 posts, read 18,102,786 times
Reputation: 37885
Quote:
Originally Posted by total_genius View Post
I work as a Teacher and one of my greatest frustrations both with kids and adults (I teach both) is so few will speak up in class. So many students just want to sit there and listen while they keep a close eye on the clock. They believe (falsely) that 95% of classroom success is just showing up and passing the tests.

Sometimes I get frustrated and will call on people. They will not know the answer or give a short two word response. I ask them what if the same question was asked in a job interview?

I try to encourage students by having question and answer, role playing, games, case studies, contests and group activites. Most perfer to just sit there and put in their time.

I try everything to get people to participate and have on occasion even bribed them. Most students just sit there. Any advice?
I have a friend who is a college professor. I have read student critiques of him online, and the negative ones never fail to mention that he tries to involved the students too much and doesn't teach them!
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Old 07-17-2013, 04:51 PM
 
6,066 posts, read 14,998,906 times
Reputation: 7188
Quote:
Originally Posted by marie5v View Post
I agree with you, and I loathe groupwork. Nothing brings down the quality of work like making people do it in a group. It's particularly ineffective in my classes, where the students are from various foreign countries, some of which have cultures that make any disagreement very impolite and others which railroad everyone with their ideas, bad or good. And yet I do groupwork and partner work all the time. Why? Because we have to, because that's the current definition of good teaching. If you don't do it, you will get bad evaluations. I use it as a kind of break, a little social time. It works in that sense - students get a chance to move around, chat a little - it mixes things up. If done correctly, groupwork can make class more enjoyable because it gives you the chance to get to know your classmates and have a little fun in class. But as for producing good work or helping the learning, I don't think it is effective.
I think what is even worse than group work, is when the teacher then asks you to evaluate the people who you worked with in your group. I had to do this recently. The other three people in my group...1) didn't show up at the out-of-class times we had agreed upon to meet up and work on the project (which meant I drove up to the school for no good reason... wasting my gas, time, and money), 2) skipped two of the four in-class meeting times we were given in order to work on the project, and 3) pretended like they didn't know (or maybe they really didn't know) how to create a PowerPoint presentation and didn't want me to show them how to do one - which left me to do all the work for the project. How do you work in a group like that?

So, when the instructor asked us to evaluate the other members of our groups... I spoke with the instructor and asked if it was OK if I abstained from that part of the project based on the fact that I had nothing positive to say. She told me that she knew it was hard to write negative things about classmates, but she wanted the evaluations anyway - nice or not. So I was honest, and she appreciated my honesty. Still - it felt really icky having to evaluate classmates.
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