Quiz (Thursday, 2010 July 29)
Gave a quiz in each of 5e and 3e today. I ran off the copies on the laser printer here, which may not be feasible at post. I also drew up two slightly different tests with slightly different questions, to try to head off cheating a little bit. I also put the first question, question 1, as follows: "Check the checkbox." It’s worth one point. Not every student did so. It wasn’t even a trick, I didn’t put it above the name or buried in the instructions or anything.
One pair of students asked me during the test why their exams were different. I think this demonstrates both the prevalence of cheating which we’ve all heard about here in Cameroon, and also the lack of critical thinking I was writing about earlier.
Another student tried to cheat with a notebook, which she dropped when I noticed she had it. I put a red star on her paper just so I remembered who it was. She didn’t do very well even with the assistance. If you’re going to cheat, at least cheat well!
I have to grade the papers, preferrably tonight, so I can start reviewing stuff tomorrow and next week. I’m pretty far behind on the scheme of work, which is the list of topics I should be covering. My 3e students are stuck in numeric-base-land; I’d like to cover base 16 a little bit differently from base 2, which should be straightforward. After that I’ll talk briefly about ASCII and then I’ll call it a term. 5e still hasn’t grasped the idea of a cursor and it’s hard to get their attention; I’m thinking I’ll try to hammer the point home tomorrow when handing back the exams, and after that, whatever I manage to cover on the subject of Microsoft Word will have to do. And of course there’s the larger lesson, which is that there’s the final next week, so wake up, and any questions you have, now’s the time to ask.
Got a package from Gus today! I received: shoelaces, a collapsible spork, baking soda, a map of the US, ziplock bags, and even chocolate. Good times.