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Well, I turned in my grades a few days ago. Spring term is over. I only failed two students for plagiarism this time. (sigh...)
I had some top-notch students this term, and I am so grateful for them, because they really kept me from despairing over the bottom-notch ones. I had students who couldn't put a sentence together. I had to spend a whole class period teaching a 200-level class how to write a 5-paragraph essay (and this was at Drury, a private university, not at the community college).
The co-existence of excellent students with abysmal ones tells me that the problem really isn't with the schools. I think it's in the homes. I think that the difference is students who had parents who took an interest in their school work, who read to them, and who communicated with their teachers. And maybe even corrected their grammar from time to time.
I don't know. I know what my kids are learning in elementary and middle school, and there's no reason in the world for them not to be able to write a short essay by their second year in college.
It's very frustrating, because these students are in training to be our teachers, nurses, and businesspeople. Some of them are going to be great, but some of them should worry us. A lot.
Yet through all the gloom I can see the rays of ravishing light and glory. --John Adams
Some good sites
About Me
- Katherine C. Teel
- I am 40, a teacher and a professional writer. I am married to the love of my life and have 3 excellent babies.
3 comments:
I think you're right, and I wonder what I'll be seeing when, God willing, I'm teaching freshman writing at a community college. Meanwhile, I just keep doing all the things you mentioned - reading, supervising, meeting with teachers, and YES, correcting grammar :)
God bless you, Michelle! You are one of the parents who will never have kids in my class, because they'll all be attending the school of their choice on full-ride academic scholarships.
It matters. My mom always had us reading, and my dad corrected our manners and our grammar. I'm grateful they did.
One can only hope, as far as the scholarships.
I used to say in my Chaucer class (as a student, not teaching it, alas): "My four-year-old knows the difference between may and can!"
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