The really, really, off-beat comment, is the one that includes the remark that most classes at Western are too easy. Not only am I glad that my class was not an easy one, I am all the more excited that I can continue to be a tough instructor :-)
- Thanks for a fun, interesting, and eye-opening class!
- I wanted to let you know that I have enjoyed taking your class. I have found most classes at Western well frankly too easy. This class was definitely a stretch for me and i feel like i have actually learned something and grown as a student. Thank you for putting forth a challenging class and teaching me!
- I really enjoyed this class. I enjoyed you so much as a professor that I signed up for one of your geography classes next term.
- This has been a good class
- This class has been very interesting to me, I am glad I took it.
Back in California, when I was barely into my second year of teaching, a colleague in the math dept, Lee, who was a full-professor a couple of years away from retirement, walked across to talk with me at the president's reception during the beginning of the academic year. He remarked that I had already gained a reputation among students that I was a tough instructor--my classes were hard, my exams were hard, and my grading standards were way too hard.
So, naturally, I asked if it was a good thing or a bad thing to have such a reputation. I have worked his bottom line ever since; he replied, "it is a bad thing if students don't sign up for your classes, and a good thing if your classes continue to attract students."
I realize that this posting comes across as being, well, rather boastful. But, this is the only way I can lead up to the pedagogical and philosophical issue here: I am always in pursuit of ways in which I can help students raise their own levels of understanding, without them getting frustrated in their attempts. At the end of it all, even if their grade is only a C+, I want them to be encouraged and happy with not their grade as much as a feeling that the ten weeks were not spent in vain. A feeling that the ten weeks of academic interaction with me and fellow students made them more informed and wiser.
Now, does it really matter if this experience was in a regular classroom, or in an online environment? What rationale might we have to force students into an regular classroom schedule, if the ultimate outcome we are interested in is in the value-added to students?
So far, and I am into my seventh year here at WOU, this approach has worked out well. I don't think I have reached the destination--on the other hand, I suppose this will be a journey all the way until my retirement, or my death, or when I am fired from my job!
And, yes, Lee will be happy to know that students continue to enroll in my classes :-)
