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snarkhunter 2010-01-20 01:11 am UTC (link)

If you resent the amount of time required to attend regular classes, perhaps you'd be better off taking online courses. In my classes, attendance is mandatory. And it's mandatory because class discussion is a vital part of the learning process. If my students don't like that, they don't have to take my courses. I've also found that students who choose to judge for themselves how many formal courses they need to pass a unit tend to judge very poorly. Or come to class all of 3 times and still manage to pass the exams by the skin of their teeth, but I fail them anyway for not doing any of the rest of the work. (Angry from the other side of it. It's not like we keep students there because we like to make them suffer.) (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

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snarkhunter 2010-01-20 01:51 am UTC (link)

Wow. Thanks. I'm glad you know me so well. I was being serious about online courses, by the way. They really are great in that they allow people to learn in the ways that are best for them, and they open up educational opportunities to people who might not have been able to pursue them in other ways. That may have come off sounding snarky, but it wasn't mean to be. And if classes with required attendance don't work for people for whatever reason, often online courses are the better option. But the fact is that most offline courses are designed in such a way that class attendance and participation is actually there to help you learn, because pedagogical best practices often involve a great deal of student participation and ownership of the class. So I don't want my students in the class to gratify my ego. Nor to prove to the school that they should keep the heat on in the classrooms (not that mine does anyway). No. I want them there because the stuff that goes on in class is design to help. them. learn. You think I'm smugly arrogant. Mostly, I think I'm trying to do my goddamned job--a job I love, by the way--and it's made surprisingly difficult when I have to cater to the whims of special snowflakes who, if they know the subject matter so well, don't need to come to class and participate in the learning process. It's surprisingly disruptive to constantly have to catch up students who miss work, or who are behind or uninformed because they missed the crucial announcement about the paper due date because they didn't need to be in class the day before, or who don't understand the discussion today because they missed the discussion yesterday, which today's is building upon. It really does look different from the other side. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

nevadafighter 2010-01-20 05:11 am UTC (link)

What did Miss Baleetion say to you? I think her first deleted comment was this one: I would love this option, especially as I have already proven academically that I can study at home. As an adult graduate, I'd like to be given the opportunity to judge for myself how many formal lessons I need in order to pass a unit. /didn't realise until now just how annoyed I am. I didn't reply because really--what can you say to such self-aggrandizement? "OMG I can totally just learn everything at home and don't need some stupid professor who thinks he knows more than me to tell ME what to do!" (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

snarkhunter 2010-01-20 02:06 pm UTC (link)

I was so pissed at that comment--as I said in other comments, I was really cranky last night--that I replied without thinking. (As you said, what can you say?) In response, she said, This sort of smug arrogance is why I don't want to get into teaching. I like the job, but I can't stand working with people like you. Charming, no? She deleted her comments about 5 minutes after I posted the one you're replying too. ::eyeroll:: (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	nevadafighter 2010-01-20 07:11 pm UTC (link)
	I can't stand comment deleters. If you're not going to own up to your words, don't say/type them in the first place and if you say something stupid, use it to learn from. Smug arrogance; those words are not what she thinks they mean. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	nevadafighter 2010-01-20 07:58 pm UTC (link)
	And frankly, where I come from thinking you know material you haven't learned yet well enough to decide how many classes you need to attend is a pretty good example of smug arrogance, so she has that going for her, at least. (Reply to this)(Parent)

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