The Final Stretch

[stoutfellow]

Tomorrow, I will go to the office and grade finals.

When I'm done with that, I'll grade finals.

Afterwards, I'll grade finals.

I hate grading. I always have that quasi-parental "Where did I go wrong?" feeling. (But I take no responsibility for calculus students who haven't mastered algebra.)

The only thing good about tomorrow is Thursday.

Comments

[allyra.livejournal.com]

Hahaha, I feel your pain. I really do!

So tell me, do you think that grading math exams is worse than grading history? I imagine it's more cerebrally intensive to have to grade math than to read essays...

[stoutfellow.livejournal.com]

That's hard to say. Now, I do, from time to time, teach a course on the history of mathematics, and I find it harder to grade the essay questions and the papers in that class, but part of that may simply be that I wasn't trained as a historian.

What makes grading painful for me, really, is confronting the silly errors that students make - errors that I have explicitly and repeatedly warned them against. (I notice that, when the local paper prints corrections to articles, it gives only the corrected version - it does not identify the previous error. I wonder whether there is some psychological legitimacy to that, and whether pointing out specific possible errors actually implants them in my students' heads.)

[filkferengi]

But, see, it's exactly that ingrown conscience & excessive worry & guilt that makes you such a good teacher. A two-edged gift, granted, but you're enough of a Bujold fan to be used to that sort of thing.

Seriously, though, I really enjoy reading your posts about your classes; you bring such passion to the work. I like to see people enjoying stuff, especially people who can articulate their enthusiasms so eloquently.

Grading sucks, & then it sucks some more. But when it's finally over, you can go all Louis XV ["After me, the deluge"] in a good way--a deluge of good books you can tell us all about in thoughtful, well-reasoned discussion that's fun to read without being as intimidatingly erudite as the learned Mr. B*rb*dg* can sometimes be.

How's that for a plan? :)

[hornedhopper.livejournal.com]

Yes, but SF, the errors *belong* to the student; they really do. Not to you (Don't be so selfish, let the students take some credit here!! (g)). You have carefully shepherded them through the maze, pointed out the hazards, done everything but bell the cat (g) - at finals time, it's their turn to do the work, you've done yours! Not that I don't understand the feeling, since I graded finals for a number of years, too, and agonized over whether I could, perhaps, squeeze an extra point here and there for an especially deserving student (i.e., one who tried like h*ll to get it, worked hir tail off during class...). But I don't think that your having pointed out the hazards made them drive directly through them. Teachers who *truly* care are the best teachers; I think you're being too hard on yourself. (pat, pat)

P.S. Why is the best thing about Wednesday Thursday? Aren't Friday and Saturday equally good? (gg)

[stoutfellow.livejournal.com]

The thing about Thursday is that, when it's Thursday, Wednesday's [I]over[/I]. The claim of other days is rather weaker.