Re: Extra Credit (was Where Have All the Boys Gone?)

[Steven Ratliff <str@NWC.EDU>]

> I agree with Michael Edmiston.

I have found that almost all students already know how to work in groups.  You
don't really have to teach them that.  Also, in order to be a productive member
of a group, you have to have something to contribute.  I prefer to grade
students as much as possible on what they do individually.  The grade on their
transcript belongs to them, not to their group.

Regards,
Steven Ratliff


> From Michael Edmiston's post:

> [.......................]
> Others frequently raise this type of question as well.  Indeed, when we got
> visited by the Chancellor of Education for Ohio a couple years ago he
> stressed the need to evaluate students as team members rather than
> individuals.  After all, working on a team is what they are likely to do
> once they get jobs.
>
> However, I have a difficult time buying that for a couple reasons.
>
> (1) Especially in high school and also the first couple years of college,
> we
> are trying to achieve some sort of "core" training.  It's difficult to be a
> physics team member if you haven't achieved some degree of mastery of
> calculus and basic freshman/sophomore physics.  If we are going to do
> team-work grading in college it ought to be in the senior year, or perhaps
> junior/senior years.
>
> (2) It is very difficult to judge an student's understanding when work is
> not done in an environment in which we know the student worked alone and
> for
> a definite amount of time.  Just think of all the things students do when
> they work on physics problem sets:

[...........................]

Steven Ratliff
Associate Professor of Physics
Northwestern College