Stephen Wagner
SEED 4555
Interview 4
Motivation and Assessment Practices
Student 1
During the paper I will be referring to student number one as John. John is a young male student around the age of 13. He is currently enrolled in Keyboarding I. John seems to be a very bright student and has good manners in the classroom. His teacher seems to enjoy having him in class. As I have observed him in classroom he has been willing to help other students when asked by the teacher.
John gave interesting answers to the last interview. He had set some excellent goals for himself during school. One of his goals is to make all A=s. Another one is to do the very best that he can at everything he is involved in at school. John believes that his best subject is science. His answer to why it was his best subject was that he liked the teacher and the teacher made it fun. John=s worst subject is math. He says he does not like the teacher and that the course is very hard.
When John makes a AC@ on a test, it tells him that he did not try hard enough and should have studied more. It also told him that he would be in trouble with his parents when they found out. If John made an AA@ on a test, it told him that he had tried very hard and that made him feel good. It also told him that his parents would be very proud of him when they found out.
Finally, when I asked him if he thought grades where an important part of learning, John answered that he did think they were important to learning. He also stated that getting good grades meant that he was getting a good education.
Student 2
During this paper student number two will be referred to as Jane. Jane is a young female student around the age of 13. She is currently enrolled in a seventh grade keyboarding I class. During my observation, I have noticed that she is very attentive in class, is helpful to her neighbors and seems to get along with everyone. I have noticed that maybe she is sometimes to helpful. She does allow others to copy off of her quizzes and notes. One day the teacher gave her and another student a zero for cheating on a quiz. She was letting the other student copy. She knew this was wrong but it was her friend so she let her.
Jane=s only goal while at school was to make good grades on papers that she did. She did not give a specific grade that was satisfactory to her. Her best subject at school was science. When asked why, she said that it was because she liked the teacher. She said he was funny. Her worst subject was math. It was her worst subject because she did not like the teacher at all. He was not nice and did not explain the math problems at all.
When Jane made a AC@ on a test, she felt that she needed to listen to the teacher more and to study harder. If she made an AA@ on the test, it told her that she had listened well, took good notes, and had studied hard. When I asked her if she thought grades were an important part of learning, she said it was. She thought that good grades where the only way to get into college or get a job.
Our education system is based on grades. I do not believe that a grade can tell the whole story about a person=s intelligence. Unfortunately, as was shown in this interview, the students believe that learning is based on what kind of grade they get. It is true that we need some way to show the progress of a student=s work as they journey through school, but we should look at other ways of quantifying the student=s ability and intellect along with grades. As we have learned in our classroom discussions, it was shown that a student can still answer questions without even knowing what they have just read. Learning is more than knowing. It is understanding as well as knowing.
Applications
If I were to base a list of applications just on the answers the students gave in the interview, it might look something like this:
Some more realistic applications might be:
A few applications for my classroom are:
