Yep. I bet that whole name signing expectation is what first kept Einstein out of graduate school. Serves him right.
Right. No matter how stupid or excessive the penalty, we should just accept it as part of the learning experience. Gotcha.
Who said it was ignored? I worked for lots of bosses, some would ream the guy out, others would fire and still others would believe that the “system” was broken. That is if student Jim, didn’t fill in his name, then there’s something wrong with the system.,not student Jim; let’s find a way to reduce the number of student Jims.
There is a difference between a honest mistake and a deliberate flauting of the rules. The test of true leadership is the ability to prevent one and punish the other, not to treat them both indentical.
As noted, when I told my regent exams, each teacher at the begining of the exam, " say you get 10 points just for signing your name, so let’s all do that now…"
There goal, wasn’t to teach “life lessons”, but to make sure that we all signed our forms and make everybody’s life easier.
It’s 10%. What is the terrible deal here? I’ve had teachers with policies ranging from not caring to throwing my paper away.
The latter were douche bags, that’s all. The 10% guys are just farther away from the “total prick” end of the spectrum, but still a little too close, IMO.
How does one forget to write their name on their final? There’s usually a line for it. Right at the top, even. The first thing they teach you in kindergarten is how to write your name.
I really don’t understand what objection anyone could possibly have to this. These are seventh graders, right? More than old enough to remember to write their name on their work, which they’ve been doing for eight years now. Failing to do so is stupid. You do a stupid thing, you pay the 10% stupid fee. Live with it.
So what requirements do you think are appropriate for an A?
One of the things that come up again and again now that I’m an instructor is the issue of grade inflation. Too many students are receiving As that they just do not deserve, for whatever reason. Some of the issues of grading are big…content, structure, the actual argument, the research. Some of the issues taken into consideration are small. Mechanics, name, date, any other thing a teacher deems necessary when deciding a grade. Teachers can ignore some things and emphasize others. Or they can count each and every little thing. Either way, each element does count. If students want that A, or they want into grad school, or they want to graduate top of their class, or whatever else, then they better be prepared, willing, and able to do all the required work, regardless of how arbitrary or unnecessary it seems.
You know, I remember when my classmates didn’t do what they were told, wouldn’t get an A, and then bitch and bitch and bitch about it. I always got As, and I never did anything extra or brilliant, I just did what the teacher asked of me. I’m beginning to understand now that there will always be people who are fully capable of meeting the requirements, but just think they shouldn’t have to if they don’t want to. That’s not the case.
Just FYI, since my comment about putting my name on it and leaving the rest of the assignment blank brought out so many rolleyes, I am very successful both in the real world and academically. Really. But teachers deal with a lot of people less motivated than I am. And petty B.S. like that penalty surely isn’t helping their case to reach those people. Also, smart people like me might realize, even in our early teens, that blowing off 7th grade social studies really isn’t the be-all and end-all. I’m glad I didn’t have that teacher.
There is a difference between consequences and punishment. If a careless error has consequences, then so be it. But punishment for something like that implies a power trip. Haven’t you guys ever dealt with a petty bureaucrat? The difference between the cashier who has you sign your new credit card vs. the one who has you leave $100 worth of groceries in the cart and go elsewhere? The person who enforces a deadline when it is a question of fairness to all, but is flexible with a deadline when it was simply a matter of needing a deadline for procedure’s sake? I know who I’d rather have working for me.
Manda JO, your response indicated you are a REAL TEACHER, and from having read your responses to other threads I know that means a lot to you.
Well, I do believe that mechanics should be an aspect of the grade. Really. I just believe there’s such a thing as proportionately weighing all the elements of the grade. Dinging a grade 10% because of leaving the name out is excessive, IMO. Justifying it by saying it teaches a valuable life lesson is a stretch. It’s not the same as poor punctuation or spelling on a writing assignment, where mechanics are integral to the discipline. In fact, describing “fill in your name” as part of the mechanics expected in a course is, well, silly to me. It is a basic, housekeeping expectation, for sure. It has nothing to do with the content of any course you’ve ever taken.
The penalty should correspond to the “crime,” meaning, if you want to ding me in a World Civilizations final exam, as an example, it should be because I said Rome is the capital city of Albania, not because I put the wrong date on the top of the paper. Reducing my grade for the latter does not in any way make me a better student of world civilizations. Reducing my grade for the former is, well, a self-evident outcome. Saying in advance that there’s a 10% penalty for not writing your name, or for using blue ink, or whatever, doesn’t render it a reasonable rule. People will inadvertently–not deliberately–violate the rule. It’s predictable. And some of those will be hard-working students, who spent hours and hours preparing for the exam. If that’s the lesson the teacher wants to give, I say he has f@#$ed up priorities, that’s all.
Very generous and lenient policy. If I am a teacher, and I did not recieve an assignment with that student’s name on it, for all I know, I did not recieve that student’s work. If nothing else, even if the student’s paper is the only one with no name on it, I would still have to determine who the paper belongs to, via a process of elimination.
If nothing else, you can consider it as forgetting to answer one of the more important questions on the test. Is it fair that I should lose 10 points on a test just for not answering an essay question?
Do you honestly believe they forgot that they needed to fill in their names? Or is it possible they simply overlooked it? Do you really believe that anyone who inadvertently omits something like this has acted stupidly? That’s a pretty large group of stupids. Sheesh.
There is a huge difference between consequence and punishment. The consequence of turning a paper in with no name is that there is no paper or test in the teacher’s possesion identified as yours, and therefore no credit to you. The consequence of having no credit to you would be a zero. I would take the punishment of 10% reduction over no credit anyday. That is, if I was ever stupid enough to not put my name on a test or paper.
The horror.
So, does just filling in one’s name mean only 90 points remain to possibly be reduced for the final grade?
How would that penalty be assessed, then, using your logic? There’s nobody to ding, at least nobody in particular.
Yes, this is the very definition of stupidity, no doubt about it. :rolleyes:
Well, not if you insist on being petulant about it, rather than accepting responsibility for your actions and learning the appropriate lesson.
Again, if she was using this policy on six year olds, that’s unduly harsh. But it’s perfectly appropirate with 12 year olds. If my daughter got 10% off of her grade for forgetting to *write her name * on the test, I wouldn’t blame that on the teacher. Of course, I also wouldn’t have a fit about it. It’s a seventh grade final. The lesson here is “Well, that was a dumb thing to do. Try not to do it again.”
I don’t know where y’all live that a teacher should have time to investigate the origins of unsigned work, but where I live, a seventh grade teacher typically has 5 or six classes of 30-35 kids each. I don’t think that they should be expected to spend their time trying to save kids who are old enough to know better from their own laziness and failure to follow directions.
And on preview:
Yes, I do. There’s a difference between doing a stupid thing, and being stupid. We all do stupid things. And we all pay for them. What I don’t understand is why you think that this particular natural law shouldn’t apply in this case.
I dunno, maybe they’re in the middle of a big string of very important tests, and they’re scared and thinking about the subject matter instead of houskeeping rules.
People aren’t this bitchy and petty at the DMV, that should tell you something.
Which natural law are you referring to? The natural law that says 10% must be deducted for oversights? I missed that one in science class, I guess.
There is an enormous difference, IMO, between a stupid act and an innocent oversight. Obviously YMMV.
I second that. In my ideal universe teachers like Manda Jo would be pulling down 6 figure incomes and the 10%-es would be sentenced to eternity standing in line at the DMV being serviced by their bretheren.
Maybe the freaking DMV in Shangri La. But real-world DMVs usually put this thread to shame.
You’re kidding me, right?
“Oh my goodness, how could you *possibly * expect these kids to remember to *write their names * on their work, like they’ve done on every single worksheet, homework assignment, test, and friggin’ fingerpainting they’ve done for the past eight years?!?!!? Why are you so meeeeeeeeean?!?!?!”
What happens when you forget to put your name at the top of a DMV form? Every place I’ve ever been, they’d ask you to fill your name in, not charge you 10% extra, not send you to the back of the line. Hell, if you filled out the wrong form, they usually give you the right form and tell you to skip the line when you’re done filling it out.
That’s not to say they don’t make tons of mistakes, and send you to the wrong line, and give you the wrong form, but if you make a mistake, they don’t deliberately punish you just for that.