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[oseph]

You are going to update with the inevitable whining and gnashing of teeth that occur when Bahama Boy is introduced to the concept of consequences, right?

[anon4now]

You are going to update with the inevitable whining and gnashing of teeth that occur when Bahama Boy is introduced to the concept of consequences, right?

Ooooh yeah---will definitely post updates.  They have a paper due after Thxg, and then the final exam, 2nd week of December. These next few weeks should be interesting for the golden one. Some students who are unable to use/understand the very clear BB site grade pages are now asking "Can I still get a C in this course?" or "How high does my exam have to be to pass if I get a C on the paper?" whereupon they get a math lesson; I'm even hearing our collective forum-favorite here, "I've never gotten below an A in my life; something is wrong with your course!"  But Bahama Boy?  Suntan oil must have leached into his brain, or maybe it's that overdeveloped sense of privilege slowing down the neurons: not a peep about his very consistent Zero grade.

Wonder if there will be helicopter parents, just in from the marina?

[tee_bee]

You are going to update with the inevitable whining and gnashing of teeth that occur when Bahama Boy is introduced to the concept of consequences, right?

Ooooh yeah---will definitely post updates.  They have a paper due after Thxg, and then the final exam, 2nd week of December. These next few weeks should be interesting for the golden one. Some students who are unable to use/understand the very clear BB site grade pages are now asking "Can I still get a C in this course?" or "How high does my exam have to be to pass if I get a C on the paper?" whereupon they get a math lesson; I'm even hearing our collective forum-favorite here, "I've never gotten below an A in my life; something is wrong with your course!"  But Bahama Boy?  Suntan oil must have leached into his brain, or maybe it's that overdeveloped sense of privilege slowing down the neurons: not a peep about his very consistent Zero grade.

Wonder if there will be helicopter parents, just in from the marina?

Oh, yeah, Sense Protection Factor (SPF) 1000. The fumes alter the behavior of those in the vicinity, too, like parents. That sound of choppers? It's either Apocalypse Now, or the helo parents popping in for a visit on the way to their yacht. Just take their pictures them minute you say "eff off," post on failblog.org, done.

[polly_mer]

The set-up:  Student arrives twenty minutes late for a two-hour test and I do not give extensions for lateness.  All the other students, including her friend who also arrived twenty minutes late, have turned in their tests and left.

Polly:  You have five more minutes to finish whatever you are doing and hand me the test.

Student:  But I only have 8 of the ten essays done!

Polly:  Well, since you only had to select five of the essays, then you should spend these last couple of minutes marking which five of the eight you want me to grade.

Student hums happily and marks five essays.

Student:  Do I have to put my name on all pages of the test?

Polly: How much do you trust your staple?  I don't take off points for not putting your name on every page, but if the pages get separated, I don't put a lot of effort into deciding what pages belong to whom.

Student diligently puts name on every side of every page of the test including the formula and physical constants page, but not her essay questions that were done on separate sheets of notepaper.

Student:  So what do I hand in?

Polly:  Put your test on top, then your essays, then the sheet of notes that you had, and staple it all together.

Student:  You want my cheat sheet?

Polly:  Yes, it goes at the end of the rest of your materials.

Student: Where do my essays go?

Polly:  Test, essays, note page, and then staple it together in that order.

Student wrestles with the stapler--the same stapler that has sat at the front of the class all semester--and gets the sheets satisfactorily stapled together on the third try.  She places her test on top of the pile.

Student:  Can I ask you a question about the test?

Polly:  Of course.  What is your question?

Student:  What were we supposed to put for the question about how thunder and lightning work?  I put that lightning travels faster because it is light and thunder travels slower because it is sound and if you can hear thunder, then you can be struck by lightning.

Polly:  That's a good partial answer, but I was also expecting an explanation about why they occur.

Student takes her test back from the top of the pile, flips to the essay section, crosses out that the thunder and lightning essay should be marked, and puts a mark next to another question.

Polly <trying to control her laughter because chances are pretty good that the student changed a 3 out of 5 answer for a 1 or 2 out of 5 essay>:  That's not really kosher.  Are you sure that you want to do that?

Student <ignoring the question>:  Can I ask you another question about the test?

Polly:  Yes, but you cannot change any more answers.  I am happy to discuss anything on the test to help you learn more material, but your grade is whatever it is.

Student:  OK.  On this math question, how were we supposed to do that?

Polly:  See here in the book this big equation marked Coulomb's law?  You were supposed to use that to determine the answer.

Student:  I understand how to plug numbers into that equation, but I don't see how we can answer the question without any numbers.

Polly:  Well, it works just like the law of universal gravitation. 

Student:  I get that and I can do it with numbers, but I don't know how to do it without numbers.

Polly:  Ok, let's do an example <draws two circles on the board labeled q1, q2 and the distance between them is d>  If the charges are d apart, then the force is [Coulomb's equation]. 

Student:  Yeah, I get that but there aren't any numbers.  I can do it with numbers.

Polly:  Bear with me because you have to be able to do it without numbers.  If I move the charges to 2d apart <draws the diagram> and we plug in the variables, we get that that force is 1/4 of its original size.  Can you follow how that happened?  That's what you were supposed to do for that math problem.

Student:  Oh.  I could have done that.

Polly: If I move the charges to 3d apart <draws the diagram> and we plug in the variables...

Student:  It's 1/9.  And four would be 1/16.  I get it!  Now, that makes sense! [editor note:  This is roughly the twentieth time that this student has seen these examples, including two previous tests and multiple homeworks]  Can I ask you another question?

Polly:  Yes.  What is your question?

Student: So this k here in the equation.  What do we do with that?

Polly: That's Coulomb's constant.  Let's do an example with numbers so that you can see how this works.  <does the sample problem from the book on the board>  See, the funny units on k mean that we can multiply Coulombs together divide by meters squared and still get Newtons as our force.

Student:  So is that k always that number with those units?

Polly:  Yes, it's a physical constant.

Student:  I think I get it now.  q is a charge, d is a distance, and k is always that constant so I just have to plug in for those values and get a force.

Polly <thinking "so what was it exactly that you thought could do with this equation prior to this conversation that lead you to state, 'I can do it with numbers'?">  Yes.  That's right.  You need to know that for the final.

Student:  Dr. Mer, I will be so ready for that final that you won't believe it.

Polly:  You have four weeks to study.  Make good use of them.  Do you have any other questions?

Student:  Nope, have a good weekend and a good Thanksgiving.

[galactic_hedgehog]

If the student is really serious about your class, she'll build a dinosaur skeleton out of the turkey bones for extra-credit.

[polly_mer]

If the student is really serious about your class, she'll build a dinosaur skeleton out of the turkey bones for extra-credit.

Mr. Mer mentioned that you were incomplete.  A truly serious student would then put a ball at the top of its arc above the dinosaur with a label that states "The acceleration at the top of the arc is -10 m/s/s".

[galactic_hedgehog]

If the student is really serious about your class, she'll build a dinosaur skeleton out of the turkey bones for extra-credit.

Mr. Mer mentioned that you were incomplete.  A truly serious student would then put a ball at the top of its arc above the dinosaur with a label that states "The acceleration at the top of the arc is -10 m/s/s".

Since it's during Thanksgiving, that should be a sweet potato.  And the student should label it as an asteroid and make a crater out of mashed potatoes.

[llanfair]

If the student is really serious about your class, she'll build a dinosaur skeleton out of the turkey bones for extra-credit.

Mr. Mer mentioned that you were incomplete.  A truly serious student would then put a ball at the top of its arc above the dinosaur with a label that states "The acceleration at the top of the arc is -10 m/s/s".

Since it's during Thanksgiving, that should be a sweet potato.  And the student should label it as an asteroid and make a crater out of mashed potatoes.

That'll be some messy cleanup - an impact crater with mashed-potato rays.

[conjugate]

Student:  What were we supposed to put for the question about how thunder and lightning work?  I put that lightning travels faster because it is light and thunder travels slower because it is sound and if you can hear thunder, then you can be struck by lightning.

Polly:  That's a good partial answer, but I was also expecting an explanation about why they occur.

You might also want to mention that lightning is not actually light (made up of photons) but electricity (a stream of electrons).  However, that is surely quibbling, since the electrons still move much faster than sound if I recall correctly.

Here's a vaguely related question (that probably constitutes a thread hijack): when I walk on carpet, of course there's a static charge built up.  When I get close to a Christmas tree with little threads of aluminum tinsel, the tinsel reaches out for me, attracted by the difference in charge.  One of the threads gets me with an audible (and painful) snap.  Is the flow of electrons going from me to the tree or the other direction?  I know that shuffling my feet on the carpet causes electrons to move one way or the other, but never knew which way they were going (and never stopped to ask them, as they were in a hurry).  The foot-shuffling surely pulls electrons one way or the other, but it isn't clear to me which way.

[barred_owl]

If the student is really serious about your class, she'll build a dinosaur skeleton out of the turkey bones for extra-credit.

Mr. Mer mentioned that you were incomplete.  A truly serious student would then put a ball at the top of its arc above the dinosaur with a label that states "The acceleration at the top of the arc is -10 m/s/s".

Since it's during Thanksgiving, that should be a sweet potato.  And the student should label it as an asteroid and make a crater out of mashed potatoes.

That'll be some messy cleanup - an impact crater with mashed-potato rays.

<makes mental note for future class project purposes...>

FWIW, I actually did use a leftover Thanksgiving turkey skeleton when I taught an ornithology class some years ago.  Yep, boiled off all of the excess flesh and fat, dried out the skeleton, glued the leg and wing bones back in place, and all that.  No skull, and no digits, but the rest was there.  I also discovered that Cornish hens are cheaper (and more pliable) than preserved pigeons for teaching about bird musculature.  I never tried any of that acceleration stuff, though.


Okay, back to conjugate's question...

[concordancia]

Question posed to dual major: How would you compare your English classes with your Spanish classes?

Student: Our English professors don't count grammar as part of the grade at all, while for some of the Spanish professors, grammar seems more important than content.

[gennimom]

Okay. I'm just envisioning this future conversation:

Me: What style of citation have we been covering all semester?

Student: I don't know.

Me: What is the blue book that I've been waving in class all semester called?

Student: Oh, that is the APA manual.

Me: So, tell me again, what style of citation have we been covering all semester?

Student: Oh, I guess the APA?

Me: Yes, and what style did you use in on this last assignment?

Student: Um, the [I have no idea] style.

Me: Does that explain why you received a zero on that last assignment?


Of course, this is the same student who admitted to the program coordinator and I that he never reads the assignments before doing them. Think that might explain it?

[madhatter]

Student: Um, the [I have no idea] style.

That's as good a description of APA 6 as any I've seen.

[galactic_hedgehog]

Here's a vaguely related question (that probably constitutes a thread hijack): when I walk on carpet, of course there's a static charge built up.  When I get close to a Christmas tree with little threads of aluminum tinsel, the tinsel reaches out for me, attracted by the difference in charge.  One of the threads gets me with an audible (and painful) snap.  Is the flow of electrons going from me to the tree or the other direction?  I know that shuffling my feet on the carpet causes electrons to move one way or the other, but never knew which way they were going (and never stopped to ask them, as they were in a hurry).  The foot-shuffling surely pulls electrons one way or the other, but it isn't clear to me which way.

Well, obviously, the tree has been possessed by the Flying Spaghetti Monster, and is trying to reach out and touch you, using the tinsel as a substitute for His Noodly Appendage.

If you are an unbeliever, however, you might consider that if you are building up extra electrons by shuffling your feet on the rug, then you induce a positive charge on the tinsel, attracting it to you.  Initially, the electrons start to move towards the tinsel (a leader), inducing a larger positive charge and creating a leader moving towards you.  When they meet, current flows from you to the tinsel, but then there is a return stroke, from the tinsel to you, which is more powerful and, thus, brighter and louder.  So, to answer your question, yes, it goes both ways.

At least that's what I think would happen if you're playing the role of the cloud and the tree is the tree.

[gennimom]

Student: Um, the [I have no idea] style.

That's as good a description of APA 6 as any I've seen.

Well, I've been using APA in some form or another for nearly 20 years. It hasn't changed that drastically. What he used was NOT APA. This sounds like the poster who complained about the student that declared they would NOT use the assigned style.