“When I fail a student, I feel like I’m failing them as a person.”
1. Why is it important to fail students?
2. Why is it hard for teachers to fail students?
3. Group Activity: Case Studies
4. How to Make it Easier for Teachers to Fail Students
Benefit Programs:
· Maintain program standards – important for credibility
· Maintains coherent program levels
Benefits Students:
· Students learn best at appropriate level
· Fear of failure can motivate weak/borderline students
· Passing weak/lazy students demotivates strong students (could encourage others to slack off)
Why it’s hard to fail students
· Why is there social promotion?!
o Lack of clearly articulated pass/fail criteria
o Belief that effort should be rewarded
o Negative view of failure as a punitive and shaming
o Personal teacher/students relationships
o Teacher identification with students’ success/failure
o Teacher desire to be like by every student
· We are accustomed to attending to the affective domain of students, but we may need to look at teacher affective domain
“Feelings are an important part of the process of assessing students. Understanding the reasons why failing is difficult….. reduce the incidence of avoidance of ‘failure to fail.’ (Ilott and Murphy)
GROUP DISCUSSION
Case Study #1
Is it about proficiency? The student should pass because he met minimum requirements? But aren’t we preparing them for study skills? We want to teach them American academic culture… but what about class morale? It could be a placement issue… There’s an attitude of “eh, it’s just ESL.”
Feelings – exhaustion, frustration, anxiety, guilt, anger
Case Study #2
Life happens….
If the work can be made up out of class, maybe give an incomplete? If speaking, then maybe no…
If you have student learning outcomes, you can make the argument that you can’t assess student learning outcomes with the student being out of class.
Feelings – sadness, acceptance, commiseration, empathy
Case Study #3
After 5 semesters, if you fail her, you are failing her personality, not her work… ??
What if it’s a learning issue?
It’s important to identify this kind of student early on…
Was too much emphasis placed on writing? Is it a skill issue?
Maybe this was a program-based problem… oral skills were neglected until the end – feeling of guilt and frustration with the program.
Also, self-doubt, pity – feelings we experience
We don’t sometimes think about the social dimension…
SOLUTIONS
How to make this easier!
TEACHERS CAN:
· Clearly state requirements and standards in syllabus
· Give ongoing progress reports to all students
· Encourage students to monitor their own proficiency and progress
o Engage them in their own assessment
· Avoid punitive and judgmental language “You need more time, you aren’t quite ready, learning a language is a process.”
· Consult with peers and supervisors.
o Separate the subjective and objective
· Be aware of their feelings (separate the facts from the feelings)
PROGRAMS CAN PROVIDE:
· Clear standards
· Accurate initial placements
· Objective outside objective measures (departmental exams, proficiency exams, interviews)
· Administrative input in end term decisions (ex. Coordinators make end-term decisions in some programs)
· Alternatives to pass/fail for hard classes (remediation, tutoring, extra required coursework)
· Early + frequent communication
How to foster and institutional culture in which is it ok to fail:
Clearly communicate rationale for pass/fail standards
Orientations
Syllabus templates
Mid-term and end-term follow-up reports
Create opportunities for dialogue among instructors through
Informal meetings
Workshops
Surveys
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