Re: extra credit, GPA, etc.

[Rick Tarara <rbtarara@SPRYNET.COM>]

What's wrong with laying out the expectations for the course and then
'requiring' the same work from all students?  I have no problem with using
projects and papers along with the labs, homework, quizzes, and tests; but
if these are really useful, then assign them to everybody.

True extra credit (extra work), used to supplement the educational
experience of the interested and talented students is not the problem--since
these are already the A students.  In my experience however, students see
extra credit as a way to 'fix' their grade after poor performance on the
regularly assigned work.  Used in this mode, extra credit IS, IMO, a real
disservice to the students.

As to the administrative/parental pressures, I would advise that the
national and local teacher unions might make it a priority to campaign
against GRADE INFLATION since it has the net effect of devaluing truly good
work and ultimately the whole educational process.

My $.02

Rick

*************************************************
Richard W. Tarara
Professor of Physics
Saint Mary's College
Notre Dame, IN 46556
219-284-4664
rtarara@saintmarys.edu

FREE PHYSICS INSTRUCTIONAL SOFTWARE
www.saintmarys.edu/~rtarara/software.html
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----- Original Message -----
From: "John Barrer" <forcejb@YAHOO.COM>
To: <PHYS-L@lists.nau.edu>
Sent: Friday, December 21, 2001 8:10 AM
Subject: extra credit, GPA, etc.


> If we lived in a perfect world, students would come to
> HS motivated, well-prepared, wanting to learn for its
> own sake, and free of the grade-grubbing virus. But
> that's simply not the case. Parents and students BOTH
> believe that GPA is extremely important. Furthermore,
> both are typically addicted to extra credit from years
> of abuse. So, I see basically two choices for HS
> physics teachers. Present a "here's the formula, go
> crunch the numbers" course where little thinking and
> real understanding of intro physics is required; such
> an approach will easily produce enough A's & B's so as
> not to cause admin or parent problems. Or, OTOH,
> require students to think and explain how they know
> what they know and to REALLY understand the concepts
> behind the "formulas" (How I hate that word). For
> most, this will be their first such experience in
> school and can be very intimidating. If this
> intellectually-challenging approach does not provide
> "life preservers" to produce the expected number of
> A's & B's, parents and administrators howl and
> students get extremely discouraged. I try to follow
> the second path. I view the use of some "fluff" extra
> credit as the price I have to pay for really
> challenging students. I assume most college
> instructors would prefer these students to those
> coming out of the first approach. True?
>
> If there's another realistic alternative for HS, I'd
> love to hear it. John Barrere  Apex HS   Apex, NC
>
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