[ale] [OT] Software and file formats for on-line/correspondence chemical education

Mon Jan 23 00:36:12 EST 2012

I high school, I was on the math team as "the flash card guy". A problem
was flashed up on the overhead and i would raise my hand while I wrote down
the answer. I was usually right.

>From a teaching standpoint, my math teachers couldn't stand that. They
wanted to see my thinking process. For the math team stuff, I really
couldn't explain my thinking process as it was mostly a blur.

Once I started teaching, as my students were typically not physics or math
majors, I insisted on them demonstrating their process by showing their
work. If they got the right answer with wrong process, that was very very
bad. If they got the wrong answer with the right process, they had likely
goofed on the calculator. I was careful to explain that their job was to
convince me they knew what they were doing and there was a fine line
between communicating their knowledge and intent and just BS.

A chemistry professor at GaTech would give test that were a single problem.
A single, very long, detailed problem divided into multiple parts. So each
partial answer was a check point for him on our progress. Any mistake early
would compound through and form chaos. This fantastic teacher (Dr.
Eberhardt) would work the rest of a test with the early wrong answer to
make sure the remaining portion was correct. That was amazing!

He was countered by the math grad student who wrote a test in my calculus I
class. It was a single problem that took an entire legal size sheet
(handwritten) to describe and had only a single small line for a numerical
answer. No other paper was accepted. A class size of 200+ was not uncommon
for calc I and this class's test average was a 10 out of 100. So it was
either right or wrong.

In math there are right answers and wrong answers and the latter far out
number the former. In the education environment, what matters is the
process (assuming the instructor is decent). If the instruction included
"show all work", then a solo answer is wrong. If it's just provide answers
then anything is fair game.

I have debated grading and both won and lost as student. As teacher, if the
student makes a credible case that either the question was ambiguous or I
misread their handwriting, then I have always been more than willing to
correct a grade. When the student is trying to get credit for something not
done, or done poorly, they had better have a phenomenal explanation for why
they should get it. Most times, my students have come asking for points
back because they didn't understand the topic well enough to have answered
it fully in the first place. That means I provide a quick one-on-one
student tutoring so they understand it.

So my grading process process developed out of this to be as follows:

I take all the test papers and cover the names with a post-it note and
paper clip it in place (an keep the multi-page from flopping). I then
shuffle the papers and read the first question from my blank copy and write
down my answer. I then read through all the answers for question one. At
this point, I'm looking for a possible trend of an alternate interpretation
of the question. If I don't see it, then I grade each answer for question
one based on completeness. the process is repeated fro the remaining
questions. If there is a common misinterpretation of the question, I
evaluate the answers with the wrong question as the start point and give
credit for work based on correctness to the wrong question. However, if the
question was one that was covered nearly verbatim in class, then I show no
mercy because those questions are fundamental to the subject matter and
covered more than once in lecture.

On Sun, Jan 22, 2012 at 10:48 PM, rhia <rhiannen at atlantacon.org> wrote:

>
>
> (Addendum to previous)
> In other words, again: Just because you have the correct answer doesn't
> mean you understand the problem or the process, it might just mean you
> have keen eyesight.
>
> No doubt the son in question grasped all that, but the reason the prof
> asked for the process was for proof that he grasped it and not that he
> had the answer and then won an argument proving so after the test.
>
> rhia
>
>
> On Sun, 2012-01-22 at 20:51 -0500, Sean Kilpatrick wrote:
> > This reminds me of a fight my son had with a math prof in an advanced
> > calculus class -- diff e if memory serves.  On one test question, my son,
> > Douglas, had simply put down the answer, without showing any work.  He
> was
> > downgraded by the grad. asst. grader for failure to show work. So he
> > complained about the grade to the prof, saying, in effect, "this is a
> math
> > class! All that should count is the correct answer.  If the answer is
> > wrong, then, maybe, I get credit for showing the work.  But the answer
> was
> > obvious. No need to show the work."
> > Prof. agreed and fixed the grade.
> >
> > In mathematics, what counts is the correct answer.  Nobody should care
> how
> > you got the answer -- as long as you didn't cheat.
> >
> > Now unit conversions get ugly in chemistry and physics.  Especially in
> the
> > "good old days" when all we had were slide rules.  How to keep things
> > straight was pounded into us in high school classes -- more than 50 years
> > ago. God knows what students are being taught in high school physics and
> > chemistry classes today.!  At least they do not have to learn how to use
> a
> > slide rule. :) Or an HP programable calculator!
> > Of course, I didn't have to learn about quarks, meons and a bunch of
> other
> > sub-atomic (theoretical) particles in high school either.
> >
> > Sean
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On Sunday, January 22, 2012 05:59:34 pm Ron Frazier wrote:
> > > The point was to teach the students unit conversions, and how to solve
> > > such a problem by completely documenting it and providing appropriate
> > > ratios and conversion factors at each step and writing down each step
> > > so someone else could follow it, or grade it.  So, we convert trips to
> > > miles, miles to feet, feet to inches, inches to bills, etc.  The point
> > > was not to solve the problem in 5 minutes in your head, in which case
> > > they get a zero for the part where they are required to show their
> > > work.
> > >
> > > Ron
> > >
> > > On 1/22/2012 5:40 PM, Drifter wrote:
> > > > You've got to be kidding.  It really took more than 90 seconds to
> > > > solve this problem?
> > > >
> > > > If a dollar bill is 6" long, then 2 to the foot.
> > > > at 5,280 feet to the mile that is 10,650 bills to the mile. (btm)
> > > > tack 5 zeros on to the end gets you to the moon: 1,065,000,000 bills.
> > > > double that to get the round trip total: 2,130,000,000 bills.
> > > >
> > > > My opinion of DeVry students just took a significant hit.
> > > >
> > > > Sean
> > > >
> > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> > > > -------------------------
> > > >
> > > >> On 1/21/12 2:43 PM, Ron Frazier wrote:
> > > >>> I was once teaching a basic math class at DeVry.  I spent most of a
> > > >>> class period and filled up two white boards doing this exact type
> > > >>> of conversions.  My hypothetical question to the class was, how
> > > >>> many dollar bills (assuming 6" long) would it take to reach end to
> > > >>> end to and from the moon if the moon is 100,000 mi. away (I don't
> > > >>> really know how far away the moon is).  It was quite interesting,
> > > >>> and the example, which I made up on the spur of the moment, turned
> > > >>> out to be a bit harder and longer to solve that I thought.
> > > >>> However, I think I made my point of how critical it is to keep
> > > >>> track of all the units at each point and write your ratios in the
> > > >>> right order, so if you need inches / ft., you don't write ft. /
> > > >>> inch.  We finally got the answer, using no automated conversions
> > > >>> on the calculator at all.  I was rather proud of the example, but
> > > >>> I think the students were glad when the bell rang.
> > > >>>
> > > >>> Sincerely,
> > > >>>
> > > >>> Ron
> > > >>>
> > > >>> On 1/21/2012 10:37 AM, Tom Freeman wrote:
> > > >>>
> > > >>> <snip>
> > > >>>
> > > >>>> To continue with a sequence of conversions:
> > > >>>>                        _75.2 in_ = _?_ cm_
> > > >>>>
> > > >>>> convert in ->    cm      1 in       2.54 cm  ===>    191.008 cm
> > > >>>>
> > > >>>>                        _191.008_cm   = _?_m_
> > > >>>>
> > > >>>> convert cm ->    m      100 cm         1 m   ===>    1.91008 m
> > > >>>>
> > > >>>>                        _1.91008_m_  = _?_Km_
> > > >>>>
> > > >>>> convert m ->    Km      1000 m        1 Km   ===>    0.00191008 Km
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-- 
-- 
James P. Kinney III

As long as the general population is passive, apathetic, diverted to
consumerism or hatred of the vulnerable, then the powerful can do as they
please, and those who survive will be left to contemplate the outcome.
- *2011 Noam Chomsky

http://heretothereideas.blogspot.com/
*
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