savageinfidel

I received the following email from Dennis Beresford about my previous blog posting.    In that earlier essay, I had indicated that I expected my students to study before each class as if a quiz were scheduled even though no quiz was going to be given.    I want them to motivate themselves to do the work rather than leaving the motivation up to me as the teacher.    It is their education.    They should care enough to have the discipline needed to do the work. I have long argued that students will always do much better in any class if they feel a sense of urgency.    The only question is whether that urgency needs to be externally driven or whether the students can be expected to create it for themselves.    As many of you will know, Professor Beresford served as the chairman of FASB (Financial Accounting Standards Board) from 1987 until 1997.    Since that time, he has been the Ernst & Young Executive Professor o...

A good friend of mine who teaches at a university in Texas wrote to me a few days ago and posed the following question. My guess is that all college teachers have felt this same way at times over the years. It is very difficult to get students to leap tall buildings with a single bound if you can’t get them to prepare for class. “For the past two semesters I have become so totally frustrated with the students in my classes. They do NOT come to class prepared AT ALL. They don't read the book. Some of them don't even get the book until the 3rd or 4th week of the semester. “Do you have a secret for getting students to read their textbook, especially in Intermediate? Do you threaten them with hanging at dawn? Do you give them a quiz every class? “I really want my fall Intermediate students to develop some better habits, so I'm looking for a way to facilitate that.” Okay, I think the first way to approach this quandary is to consider where most of the students are coming from in...