Student Knowledge

Although I have gone through formal education to be a teacher, the one assessment class that I earned my "A" in was a course in alternative assessment. It becomes quite ironic that the grade I earned in this course has nothing to do with what I learned. This brief time that I have been involved with this program and course has shed light on much of the reasons why I continually strive for perfection in my work. Understanding that much of what I went through in my undergraduate days allows me the time to start new with education in my doctoral program and start learning how to learn.

I teach mathematics at the community college level and have done so for about 14 years. It becomes quite easy to teach students that "get it" from the get go, but quite difficult when multiple angles of approach seem to fail the student and thus, the teacher fails? I have had students that will ask me what their grade is and my response is usually a question right back at them...I don't know, how much have you learned? Do you want a grade or knowledge? It's difficult for any student, not excluding myself, to want good grades. However, at the doctoral level of education I am finding that what I am going through now is what I want to learn...to retain for future reference.

So, I am grabbing a hold of what I can with my antiquated mind and am sharing it with my students. I find that when I allow them in on the assessment strategy I am offering, they become engaged. Angelo & Cross (1993) share that letting students know about the results you learned from a classroom assessment technique allows the student to become part of the assessment. I am finding that when my students know I am working my tail off to try and figure out the best way to help them learn to learn mathematics, they work harder at learning it.

I wanted to "blog",...(I'm a blogger, wait til I share this with my students!), this because I have exprienced that other faculty members don't always look at assessment as something that is going to be a good thing. "It might look bad on my evaluation if the results aren't up to par." Well then guess what? Time to find another occupation. If you can't teach, find a truck driving job somewhere or perhaps McDonalds is looking for a Big Mac tester. I don't mean to be heartless, but if we're going to be something, then we'd better try and be the best and if one thing isn't working for the student, then it is high time you reach out and find the right thing that is going to work. Does every minor league baseball player make the majors? Time to go back to your day time job buddy!

So anyway, perhaps education is the best thing to get those "I don't need anther thing to do" teachers on the right track or they better start worrying about their evaluations, because strike three buddy and you're outta there!