I've decided to choose a day of my school week that includes attending my biology 125 lecture and lab. The lecture's time slot is 7:30am-8:45am and then my lab is later that day from 4:30pm-7:10pm. With that, my first curriculum change comes to mind. I would rather have my lecture begin at 12noon... that is when I am most awake after getting a good night's sleep and waking up with time to get dressed for the day and eat some breakfast. When my day begins with being rushed or feeling overly exhausted, to me, it is just the start of a bad day.
When it comes to lecture style courses, they can go either way. I've found that in my bio class I am constantly on my toes and paying attention because I actually care about the class and it is required for my major (if I'm not falling asleep due to such an early time slot). On the other hand, it pains me to know that I am paying thousands of dollars to attend a psych lecture later that day just so I can facebook/email the whole time. That class does absolutely nothing for me and it doesn't interest me career wise at all. I say that students should not have to take "money-eating" gen. eds. if they know they are not interested in the subject in terms of career goals!
Touching on the subject of projects and assignments, lighten the workload period. Elimate busy work (students downright hate it). With projects, always give students the option to work with a group. If I could, I would do everything independently...I've been saying that since elementary school!
I would also love to see more hands-on interactions in classrooms. That is one thing that I love about my bio lab. I always say that the lab saves my grade in that class because it makes me get it. It's almost a 3 hour class and there's actually time for the teacher to give constructive notes, answer personal questions, do hands-on activities (dissections, experiments, etc.), and even motivate an individual if they really need it (I've almost cried several times because of that class). With that being said, computer technology isn't necessarily on my list of likes, and I feel that a lot of students learn better when they are physically doing a task and have more personal interactions. However, blackboard and email are great for networking purposes.
Therefore, faculty should hear us out! As students, we love sleep, time to let material absorb into our minds, options and opportunities, and chances to prove our unique strengths.
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I actually read an article a year or two ago about circadian rhythms of people between the ages of 16-25. The report was an extensive study into sleep habits of different age groups, and not surprisingly, the researchers found that age groups have different sleep patterns. People in the age group 16-25 slept later into the day and stayed up later at night, BUT, the sleeping habits of people older than that are what people in the 16-25 age group had to adhere to. The researchers suggested that that age group go to work later and have classes later, but of course, because the policy was early classes and early work for hundreds of years, no one paid attention to it.
ReplyDeleteAnyways, that aside. I agree that classes should be later. Let's face it, if people are more productive at different times in the day, they should be producing at those times, not at times when they are less productive generally.
I'm sorry you don't care about some of your classes, but I think they serve a purpose. You dislike your psychology class, but you might really enjoy an anthropology class, or a music class; classes you wouldn't think about taking if you only stuck to biological classes that go directly towards your major. Think of these gen ed classes as a chance for you to expand your mind into other fields.
Hands on interaction in classes is definitely a plus, and most of your later classes, junior and senior level, will be more hands on as the numbers in those classes dwindle from hundreds (in your 100/200 level classes), to 10s in your 300/400 level courses. The professors will still teach, but they won't just lecture. At that level they expect some level of student input into the material.
Fantastic blog article. I really enjoyed reading it.
I agree with many of your ideas here. Even if you try and adjust your schedule to get more sleep before an early morning class, it can be difficult if roommates and floormates are up until much later. It's not good to have people going to classes when they aren't fully awake mentally.
ReplyDeleteYour Psych class sounds a lot like the one I talked about in my blog so I definitely see where you're coming from there. If we're not doing anything in class that we can't do at home then it's not worth taking.
I liked the idea of having a choice to do group work or individual projects. I can understand why teachers might want to give us a certain amount of both, but it can be really tough to work in a group if other people aren't pulling their weight and I agree that it's important that professors recognize that we are not all alike; we have different strengths and weaknesses, and we learn in different ways.