Day 437 - Quiz #1

I had my first quiz in class tonight. I have a couple students with severe test anxiety. Since I'm a new instructor, they don't have any frame of reference for what my quizzes and tests will be like. I can totally get that. I tried to prepare them last week, but I guess it wasn't quite enough.

Each quiz is just 5% of their total grade. The quiz is 15 points, and there are 30 questions, so each question is just 1/2 of a point. In addition, there's an essay question that is worth 3 points, which can be extra credit to make up for any questions they miss in the first 30. I tried to make it easy enough for everyone to get the full 15 points. I also decided yesterday to make the quiz open book, because after reviewing the questions, I thought the students would do better if they had the book to refer to. (If the course were offered online, and many of our courses are, then there's no way for a closed-book test unless it's proctored, and that's not practical in the California community college system.)

I'm feeling pretty confident that all the students did pretty well. I will be grading the quizzes this weekend, so we'll see.

I really like my students. I want them to succeed. I'm not going to give them all a free pass, but if I can help illuminate a path that they hadn't considered, then I'm all for that.

By the way, I had to stay an extra half hour because my poor test-anxiety student needed the extra time to finish her quiz, after all the students had left. So I'm posting this blog later than usual after getting home around 9:30pm this evening.

Have you gone the extra mile for one of your SparkFriends? That's how I see my students. They might need a little help to be successful, and if I have something to share, then I'm happy to share it! I love my SparkFriends like I love my students. We exchange ideas and secrets to success, and support each other.

I hope you're teaching someone what you know, whether it's a student, a child (or grandchild), or a friend who is willing to learn. Embrace teaching, and embrace learning! We can all grow a little bit, and we can help others to grow too.

Together, we can accomplish great things!

Keep Sparking, dear friends!!!