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up unprepared more than 3 days. In previous semesters, I would have three to
five students who, across the semester, did not care to do the work, often being
unprepared 6, 8, or even half of the class (12
-
13 days).
Typically, the prep score is shown in the syllabus as 10% of the total grade. Thus,
a student has to actually care enough to
to determine what their
prep score is. If they
do
keep up (only a few students ever do, based on my
observation over the years), they can tell easily. Most have no clue. So these
students could see directly how the prep score helped them.
“
do the math
�
The only evidence that getting to choose their own focus actually made the
course more enjoyable came from student comments. And while that is valuable,
and we need to respect their opinion that they enjoyed the class better and liked
being able to focus more on an area of their choosing, there is
no evidence
that
any of that actually impacted their grade.
—
Lastly, engagement and absences
again, not much of a difference. In my typical
semester, I see 2.63 absent days. This class had 2.3 absent days. Each class had
two to four students who had high absences and so did this class.
So, low absences as with other classes, but much better preparation. Some
student comments about their experience:
n
Choosing my own path of study put flame to the fire in how I viewed
the class. I not only was interested and happy to participate, I was also
excited about the class and doing the classwork. I even started talking in
class, answering questions, which is rare for me.
I didn
t feel like I was rushing through the assignment and chapter of
Rev. War. I like studying specifically my topic and then taking notes on
the other classes.
'
n
I like looking at what interested me. However, some of the points were
far too vague and made it more difficult than it really was.
n
I got to pick a topic of interest to me, so it helped greatly to keep me
interested.
n
It affected my interest because I was able to study what I wanted to
about history.
n
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