community college instructor making good

It was 11pm and I still had a dozen essays to grade. Cursing, I set my alarm for 4am and tried to sleep. I kept wondering why I’d promised the graded work back to my students the next day when I’d had so much to grade. 

“This? This is my life?” I thought.

Yes, yes it is. Throughout my career, I’ve noticed that students pretend not to care what I’m doing, but some do notice my actions. And what they notice, they may emulate. 

The first time this struck me in an obvious way was when I first started teaching in “wired” classrooms five or six years ago. I walked in with my attache, noticed the sign that said “no food or beverages,” and tucked my capped water bottle into my bag. When I needed to drink from it, I simply grabbed it, walked outside the computer classroom, had a sip, capped it, walked back in, and stashed it in my bag. That semester, like many I’ve had after, not one student brought a soda or energy drink out and drank from it while in the computer classroom. 

A colleague of mine once complained that his students constantly violated this rule. Not only did they bring in sodas, water bottles, open coffee cups, and energy drink cans, but also pop-tarts, candy, granola bars, and what he described as “a full lunch.” I nodded with empathy, but felt a bit bewildered. When I passed by his classroom the next day, I realized what was going on. On the podium, a styrofoam cup of coffee sat next to his hand. While he lectured, he would reach for it, drink from it, and put it back down. Repeat.

He felt it was alright for him to break the rules of the classroom, but expected his students to heed them. “Good luck with that,” I thought. My life is so much easier when there are guidelines that both my students and I follow.

Of course, it doesn’t work with everything. When I come prepared for class with a marked up textbook, handouts copied and ready, pen and pencils in hand, paper in my bag, and a positive attitude, not all of my students play “copy cat” and come as prepared. Still, being consistent has its rewards. 

I also have strict policies about texting and use of cell phones in class. I don’t have a rule about phones ringing, but if I catch a student texting, viewing a text, taking or making a call, he or she is dismissed without credit that day. During a test, he or she is failed and written up with my administration. Although I personally don’t text or call while in the classroom, I have had a situation where my own cell phone interrupted our classroom learning.

My cell phone was tucked away in my attache during a morning class. It rang. I turned, murmured, “That’s so rude,” picked up my attache, dropped it outside the classroom, shut the door, turned and said, “Sorry for the interruption.” Smiling at my students, I raised one eyebrow and added, “One-hundred percent on everyone’s quiz for today.” They cheered and I moved on with the day’s work. Guess what? I never did it again. My students loved having the perfect score for the day AND they started to see that I’m a fair person. I don’t have one set of rules for them and another for me.

If I’m going to talk about allowing my students to “have a voice” in the classroom and “diffusing the hierarchy” that underlies learning, I don’t want to just parrot the words. 

Here’s another thing. I’m a bear about time. About students being on time and being there until class is dismissed. This can be tough on some students, but it really convinces them that what we do is important — and in the case of my developmental students, helps shape behavior that will make them successful in more challenging courses. One day, I stopped to talk to a colleague in the hallway. I realized the time and literally ran to my classroom. I looked up at the clock and realized I’d made it with 2 seconds to spare. The next time, I was not so lucky. I walked in 4 seconds late. Some good natured ribbing from my students convinced me that I needed to act in such a way as to strengthen our relationship and build trust between us. 

“Hey, I’m sorry I’m late, ” I said, adding, “One hundred percent on everyone’s quiz today.” I handed out the mini-quizzes, and asked them just to write their names on them. That way, I would remember to give them 100% scores on my course management system later.

There was some joking about it and just before the next class period, one student (elected, I’m sure, by her cohorts) called my office line from her cell phone, asking for help with a personal problem. Her voice was tremulous, hiding a laugh, and I realized the joke. “I’d be happy to help you with that as soon as I get to class,” I said. I signed off, hung up, and got to class several minutes early to giggles in the back row. Of course, she shared that they’d put her up to it in hopes of getting another free quiz day. I laughed, too. It’s all good, clean fun.

Underneath it all, there is an understanding that I will not ask my students to do what I’m not willing to do myself. That sets up a dynamic for mentoring that’s more effective than being assigned students with last names A - L in my program. And it’s mentoring that goes beyond the classroom (and beyond the semester). I’ve had students drop by my office semesters later, say “Hello,” and introduce me to their friends. It’s not because I’ve received a red pepper on Rate My Professors or other such deal. It’s because they trust me. When these students develop enough relationships with instructors they trust, that can be the tipping point (in our favor) when they’re thinking of dropping out of college. Just a thought. Hey, I’m not saving the world here. Just not drinking sodas in computer classrooms. Simple, really.

Here’s what’s great about establishing consistency in expectations for both myself and my students:

1. It immediately builds trust. This impacts how much some students are willing to work for me (and for themselves). My students have seen a great deal of “do as I say, not as I do” in their lives. I don’t need to be one of those sideways mentors. 
2. It keeps me from getting lazy and cascading down the slippery slope of coming in late, canceling classes when I’m simply tired or would like to be doing something else, and being unprepared to teach.
3. Students see that they, too, are important. This kind of “even-steven” treatment diffuses the power structure and allows my students to more easily step into the position of “achiever.” After all, I respect them enough to show up on time and be ready to witness their learning. This helps them see that what we’re doing matters and that they matter. 
4. It keeps me from having to argue with students about what’s appropriate. Hey, I’m not doing it either. Doesn’t matter whether “it” is leaving early, disrupting the class, or bringing food into a non-food classroom. I don’t do it, so it’s much easier to enforce the policy with my students.
5. It keeps my mind “clean” of rationalization and constant explanations in my own head about why I’m doing something, why it’s okay for me to do it (but not others), how others are doing it as well, and so on. Hey, my brain is full. I don’t have room for this kind of baloney. 
6. It’s the right thing to do. My college wants students to come out as decent citizens, contributing to our region. I do, too. But I don’t want to stand around and say, “Wait, you go first.” Then wait and stare at them, “No, go ahead. You start.” How mature is that? I’m the educated one. I’ve had enough life experience to be able to discern right from wrong… so yeah, I’ll start. 

Don’t get me wrong — I’m no angel. There’s lots of professional development to be done here. And yes, I have learned to pad deadlines when I promise to return graded material back to my students. Better to be one day earlier and be the hero than to be one class period late and be seen as a liar. But the good news is that I don’t have to worry about “how late is really late” or avoid the scornful gaze of our computer staff as they attempt to remove pop-tart crumbs from the keyboard at the instructor’s podium. Life is simpler this way. 

Everyone I know is concerned that college students aren’t reading. Some of my community college students have shared with me that they’ve NEVER been to a library(!), their parents have never had a book in the home (other than a phone book), and no one read to them as a child. But I’m not bucking for sympathy here. Primary, secondary and post-secondary instructors have been fighting this battle for decades… and with everything available with the flick of a thumb or tap of a screen, I’m not sure that we’ll be seeing the “joy of reading” that I remember as a kid. So let’s get practical.

Several years ago, I talked to a colleague, James D. and asked him how he got his students to read. He told me that he’d gotten a hint from Paula A. about something he called a “mini-quiz” that she might have gotten from some kind of a one-minute professional style book. He showed me how he’d adapted it to his literature and humanities courses. Initially I thought, “Are you kidding? You want me to make, collect, grade and post grades for a quiz every week or several times a week in every class? Holy mackerel. My workload sucks already.” Still, I had to admit that I was looking for a solution and he’d just handed me one.

Although I wasn’t sure this would work in skills-based courses like the courses I often teach, I immediately tried it in my developmental- and transfer-level composition courses. It worked. In fact, it worked so well that I implemented it for EVERY course I taught and still use it now years later. The content comes directly from the textbook. Sometimes when I have a whiny class, I make a key for myself with the page numbers from where I pulled the material. Hey, they’re easy questions. You may even laugh at how easy they are. And they’re multiple choice, so they’re easy to grade. I even (gulp) bought a coffee table with a lip so that I could line them up a dozen across and grade quickly. Later, I started making 2 different quizzes using columns on a standard letter size document, cutting them down, collating them, and distributing them (to discourage cheating). Here’s the funny part—in student surveys, my students constantly mention “daily quizzes” when asked what they HATED THE MOST about my courses. In the same breath, they then answer “daily quizzes” when asked what ENCOURAGED them to do class reading. Heh heh. It’s beautiful. 

Here’s what several of my quizzes look like:

Once I created a simple template, it was super easy to customize them for each course. I chop up required reading and quiz students on every 10 or 20 pages or so. In fact, in every day of my courses, if something is not due at the start of the class period, there is a mini-quiz on the course outline for that class session. If students are late, they don’t get to do a quiz. This means that students are encouraged to be on time AND do the reading. My class discussions, team work, and assignments are so, so, so(!) much better since I implemented this. Although students know that all the quizzes they do all semester only counts for 10% of their final grade, they will break their backs to get these done. It’s interesting. And it really, really works. 

If you’ve got some ideas about how you get your students to read, let me know. It’s a tough nut to crack!

I started using peer review in 2000 while teaching developmental and transfer level English composition at a big CC in San Francisco. After four or five years, I lost faith in peer review. Why?:

• my students couldn’t write a short narrative about WHY someone else’s introduction (or whatever) worked or didn’t work.
• my students couldn’t see the connection to “something that counted” (like the connection to improvement that led to a better grade on a final draft).
• they often saw it as a time waster and rushed through it, writing “okay” in every space. 
• my students didn’t trust each other to do peer review; they saw me as the expert and everyone else as unqualified.

I realized I was approaching paragraph and essay peer review all wrong. I needed to completely revamp and rethink. What I came up with was a “put an X on the sliding scale” style peer review with a particular set of areas that *matched up* with my grading rubric. I also created something that I called a “narc box” that allowed student writers to RATE their reviewers. I used this area to adjust a student peer reviewer’s points up or down. This created accountability. To make this all work:

1. I did a “how to do peer review” session the day before I got in paragraphs or essays. I gave each student a sample paragraph or essay and a form; we “normed” our responses and got ready for the real thing. I indicated that I would be the second peer reviewer and that me and the student would work “blind” — without seeing the other’s form.
2. for essays, I split the actual peer review into 2 sessions. For paragraphs, I got fast enough to do a whole class of 20 or so in 1 session.
3. for the class peer review session, students had to turn in their materials at the time class started. I then distributed peer review forms.
4. students picked up a paragraph (or essay) that wasn’t theirs and started peer review. As soon as they were done, they were told to staple their peer review form at the back of the paragraph or essay and get it back to me. 
5. I was the second peer reviewer, marking the form quickly and returning BOTH peer review forms and the written work to the student during that class session.
6. the student writer then RATED each reviewer using the “narc box” on the side. When these forms were turned in with rough materials (and final draft) later, I was able to “adjust” peer reviewers original credit/no credit to a slightly lower grade if necessary. 

I got better at it as time went on and got quicker at marking the peer review forms. I made sure that students understood that this session was a way to address content and structure; concerns about grammar and mechanics needed to be addressed with me during office hours or with a tutor.

THE SHOCKING RESULTS? Often, the student peer reviewer and I marked an X in almost exactly the same spot. The student writer saw this and started to conclude, “Hey, I guess anybody could see I had no thesis statement…” This increased the authority of student commentary throughout the semester and helped students feel confident about their abilities. It also allowed them to see others’ work in a non-threatening way; for some, this helped them norm “upwards” and increase the number of hours they spent writing an assignment. 

Here’s a sample peer review form for an argument essay in my current textbook:

And the grading rubric I use to grade the final draft later (the areas that are peer reviewed match up to areas on the grading rubric):

I’ve customized one for each paragraph, essay, or other writing assignment in my courses. Let me know your experience with peer review and how you’ve worked out any kinks.