Why teachers drink

[Overread]

Wait I thought you taught university/college level students?

 

[limr]

“Meaning, make more higher fines. More police alert of who's littering and who's not. Make a bill about it. If not people are just going to keep on doing it. They need to take more action about this trash and littering. They meaning the law, president, police, the house of Rep, the 3 branches, all the above need to take more action and be more serious. If not people will not care nor pay attention and just keep throwing trash and littering everywhere. Something really has to be done soon that is my opinion.”

The current batch of papers in front of me aren't quite this bad, but I still feel the need to pour myself a stiff drink!

You have to assign a grade to this plonk? :shock:

I am so sorry. Honestly. How do you address this? What can you say?

Bottoms up, sister!

That particular bit of plonk (awesome word!) came from a placement essay I read. We're a community college so with no entrance requirements, we have students take a placement exam for math, reading and writing. 60-70% of them need remedial work before taking basic college-level classes. Some of them literally take years to get out of the remedial level.

So thankfully, I didn't have to grade this on a A-F scale. This student clearly got placed in remedial writing - can't remember if we put her in the first level or not. Sadly, she probably went to the second level because, "It didn't suck enough." (It's one of our criteria for placing some of these essays!)

This guy would give your student an A+:
View attachment 69536

Maybe sad Native American dude can get his own twitter, like the Dalai Lama, and team up with the police to get the ball rolling on that whole neighborhood litterer public police alert idea.

The crying Indian! I remember him well. The problem is that he is not the law, president, police, house of Rep, or the 3 branches, so I'm not sure what he can do.

My wife teaches remedial English at the college level. She feels your pain.

"Pain" sort of covers it I've taught the remedial classes for native speakers and it is soul-crushing. I stopped asking for those classes because I just couldn't take it. I've also taught English 101 and it's better, but still not that great. I recently stopped teaching those classes too, but more about political changes in the department that resulted in a lot more micromanaging of the curriculum, and I do NOT get paid enough to deal with that bullsh** so I'm sticking to my ESL remedial writing.

Wait I thought you taught university/college level students?

I do. Isn't it sad?

My own students have tons of issues, but they aren't native speakers so the reasons are understandable and much more easily fixed. Well, most of the time. Unfortunately with some students, being a non-native speaker isn't their only difficulty. They'd probably have just as much issue in their native languages.

Here are a few more I've collected over the years, either from placement essays or from my own students' essays: (from a blog post Where do I even start? | As a Linguist...) (All these were from native speakers.)

1. Facts or logic are optional.

• Animals shouldn’t be used for medical experiments. Although they aren’t real people, it’s morrally wrong.
• Even if it has brought positive and negative effects to our lives it shows that either way it has been bad.
• Not many people go by this trend, but I see it in most people.
• In reality, no one is naturally six feet tall.
• From the age of five, my mother became a single parent.

2. Thank you, Captain Obvious!

• Animals do take a huge part on our menu of choices meat-wise.
• Life is offered to so many people in this world.
• An education can help you with your reading and writing because without it we wouldn’t be able to read or write.
• I now know about global warming from earth science and the different rocks that are important to society. Like who knew rocks would be something major on earth. Did you know?
• Next, knowing what is going on in the world today helps us to be more aware of what is going on out there.

3. WTF?

• I feel you create your own future, so why be mad or evil?
• Life is a grand aspect that every human must attend as they are brought into this world.
• When I was about 16 years old, my mind was childish enough to make the right decisions that won’t affect me or my future.
• Life’s head is the basketball and I’m the basket.
• For example, life is a challenge it shows you how far you can take it beyond life. Just remember, one day you will meet your match you can’t always win.

4. Oh irony, you fickle mistress.

• The purpose of education is to make ourselves smater and skilled.
• Although all course are important. The most one for me was the english course specifically grammar and punctuation.

5. Would you like a dictionary?

• Next, showing someone love helps them build their self of steam up.
• Then it affects everyone because the ultra violent rays can cause skin cancer.
• Africa is probably the most struggling nation country dealing with HIV. (The word 'nation' was crossed out in the student's paper.)

6. Can you repeat that, please?

• My goals in life may sound familiar to most young people who is fledgling at their beginning of educational start.
• But no challenge comes easy, because a challenge is always challenging.
• These elected officials are elected by the people of the state in which these elective officials are elected from the people.

 

[mmaria]

Oh Leonore,

that was BRUTAL!!!!


LMAO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thank you!!!

 

[pgriz]

Ah, come on Leonore! With material like that, you'd be a permanent fixture on the comedy standup circuit!

 

[Braineack]

“Meaning, make more higher fines. More police alert of who's littering and who's not. Make a bill about it. If not people are just going to keep on doing it. They need to take more action about this trash and littering. They meaning the law, president, police, the house of Rep, the 3 branches, all the above need to take more action and be more serious. If not people will not care nor pay attention and just keep throwing trash and littering everywhere. Something really has to be done soon that is my opinion.”

I just want to break this down, in this poorly written essay the author suggests:

1. We need to increase fines for littering.
2. We need to establish a list of litters
3. We need to establish a list of non-litters.
4. We need to draft some sort of Bill about litter.
5. People are going to continue to litter if we haven't done: 1, 2, 3, and 4.
6. The law, the President, the police, the HOR, the three branches (2 are redundant here), AND all of the above (all are redundant) needs to take action of sort, and be more serious about something.
7. People will throw trash EVERYWHERE unless: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 are followed.
8. Something, undefined, really has to be done soon.


I would give a failing grade for this. If this isn't bad, I just hope you're a first grade teacher.


edit: i was going to guess the author was a female. interesting.

 

[runnah]

Y r u soooo meen?

 

[Designer]

I sent a link to your blog to my son who is an aficionado of such.

 

[ratssass]

"...when you are dead,it is only painful for others.It's the same when you are stupid."

 

[limr]

I just want to break this down, in this poorly written essay the author suggests:

1. We need to increase fines for littering.
2. We need to establish a list of litters
3. We need to establish a list of non-litters.
4. We need to draft some sort of Bill about litter.
5. People are going to continue to litter if we haven't done: 1, 2, 3, and 4.
6. The law, the President, the police, the HOR, the three branches (2 are redundant here), AND all of the above (all are redundant) needs to take action of sort, and be more serious about something.
7. People will throw trash EVERYWHERE unless: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 are followed.
8. Something, undefined, really has to be done soon.


I would give a failing grade for this. If this isn't bad, I just hope you're a first grade teacher.


edit: i was going to guess the author was a female. interesting.

If that were an essay that was handed into me for a grade, yes, it would have failed. I am perfectly willing to put a failing grade on work that deserves it. Sadly, I appear to be in the minority of 'tough graders' in the college. :x My school won't even let me give minus grades for the course. I can give minus grades on assignments in my class, but when it comes time for their final grade, if a student's average is B- , I have to decide if it's a B or a C+ and most of the time it ends up as a B. It pisses me off.

Y r u soooo meen?

FAIL!

I saved the best for last. This came from an essay a student wrote for me in an Eng 101 class several years ago. We were practicing categorization essays, so this student chose to write about types of pets and why people choose them. I had to save this essay. It cracks me up. I can't remember if I actually failed it or just asked him to revise it so I could at least give it a passing grade - not because of the grammar, which was fine, but because it was just so...so...well, judge for yourself.

The opening sentence: "Dogs,cats, and owls are three of the most common animals in the animal kingdom today."

Thesis statement: "Pets can behave differently according to how their owners train them, the time of day that they can be allowed to go outside, and the different kinds of foods that they consume every day."

My favorite paragraph: "All three of these common animals have different times of day that they are available to step outside. Dogs are animals that are able to step outside roughly anytime of the day, or in the night. The reasons that they can step outside for exercise is to play with their owners, let their owners take daily and recommended walks with them, and to just play around with themselves. Cats are animals that are roughly the same as dogs, but are probably split in some types of cats that like to step out in the day and who like to step out in the nighttime. Most of the cat family certainly likes to come out in the daytime, but there are some members who like to come out into the nighttime. Black cats, stray street cats and probably jaguars are the most likely of cats that dare the most to come out into the night life. Owls are a completely different story. Owls are the most common of animals to come out only into the nighttime of the world. In the daytime, owls have very bad eyesight and do not even have a clue as to where they are going. They are also the most common of animals for getting the most exercise in the nighttime than any other animal."

Jaguars. Kills me, every time.

It's organized, it's developed, it's grammatical, but...WTF?

I think I was drinking Maker's Mark for this one. He might have been as well. (Actually, he did have some issues, but they were social things, not learning disabilities.)

 

[Designer]

Lowered!

 

[Braineack]

I remember taking two courses at UoPhoenix. We had to do a "group" assignment where basically each person contributed a part of a final paper. One of my member's section was so bad, that after we turned it in, I emailed the "prof" and explained that I shouldn't be expected to have my grade suffer for work of others. I i even researched and wrote her section on my own and submitted it as well. Suffice to say I passed that class and I'm just glad my teammate will never be my doctor.

 

[limr]

I remember taking two courses at UoPhoenix. We had to do a "group" assignment where basically each person contributed a part of a final paper. One of my member's section was so bad, that after we turned it in, I emailed the "prof" and explained that I shouldn't be expected to have my grade suffer for work of others. I i even researched and wrote her section on my own and submitted it as well. Suffice to say I passed that class and I'm just glad my teammate will never be my doctor.

I never gave group grades. When I taught Eng 102 (Intro to Literature), they would have group presentations at the end of the term. Basically, their groups would have to teach a lesson - choose a story, make up exercises, plan a lesson, etc. They'd get an overall grade on how their actual presentation was, but they each had to individually hand in a part of the assignment and be totally responsible for that. The grade was often an average of the two - so it was a way to get the weaker students to push a themselves a little harder to learn more and do better individually to help the group get a better grade, but it wouldn't bring the strong students down because their individual work would bring them up to a grade they deserved.

 

[robbins.photo]

Face it, if the guy had a blog nobody would give a crap what he had to say.

https://twitter.com/DalaiLama
https://www.facebook.com/DalaiLama
http://instagram.com/dalailama
Apparently at least 8.64 million people still care (still a smidgeon below Ludacris, though)

So what your saying here is the Dalai Lama needs to step it up a notch and put more "ho's" in his videos?

Sent from my LG-LG730 using Tapatalk

 

[limr]

Lowered!

You mean lower the grade to C+? It would depend on the average. I teach writing, so of course, their essays and written assignments are the bulk of their course grade. Let's say their writing average was an 81-82, but they weren't a good participator or they missed some things. That grade would get lowered to a C+ once I average in other factors. But if someone has a 78-79 writing average but has been busting their hump to get up to that level and they are really active in class, never miss anything...then that student probably ends up with an 80-81 average and a B. But it's just not fair because really, they're both B- students.

 

[mmaria]

How old are your students?