Final Reflection

When you say that modeling the right academic habits is important for new learners to the college setting, it did not register with me . Not until, anyway, I was sitting in class and one of the students, upon noticing that you were a couple of minutes late, stated "if she wants us to be on time then she should be too." This was when I got what it really means to be consistent in the kind of presentation and expectations that one has for students. If I intend to hold students to standards, it is not right for me to compromise those standards for my own benefit. How can students possibly see me with any credibility or for that matter how can they really buy into the performance I want from them if my suggestions for them are only for them? These students need to understand why it is important to do what I ask of them, and if I don’t follow the same rules, then it is difficult to stress the gravity of my statements.

Though the student was making a jest, it does have truth and when I enter my future classroom, how I present myself and how that matches how I expect them to present themselves will be on my mind.

12th Week

It is very interesting to see the progress that has been made by certain (actually by many) of the students in the class. After the first test, and the failed grades marked in red in the excel sheet which you sent, I thought that we would have many students who would fail the class. Many came into this course not prepared for not just advanced grammar, but for the basics. And I guess from the initial result and from my observation, I assumed the worst for the students. That was a mistake on my part. I would have been more than ready just to continue on with what I was doing and not take a second look at how I was delivering my information. I would have attributed failure to them. Now I see however that we need to adjust and make sure that if we see students struggling, we work to help them both through conferencing but also through adjustment of the lesson plan and of the assessment. This is not to say that we should make the information less comprehensive but that maybe students need more support—more modeling, more explanation—and that is most certainly reasonable. And it has clearly resulted in a very good end to the semester for many of these students.