As a teacher, something that I noticed is that at the beginning of the semester, I was highly engaged, pro-active, and went beyond what I needed in terms of reading and preparation. As the semester moved on, and papers-to-grade became my life’s primary burden activity, I did not have the mental freedom to devote the time I did before on unrelated research, and lecture preparation became more hurried.
As I am grading the final essays, I notice that the essays are more mature than they were at the beginning of the semester. The ideas are richer in places. However, they also seem hurried. The students who had been doing well have more grammar mistakes. The students who had highly organized and focused essays for the second paper are looser now. I imagine it is probably a similar mental burden that I faced. As the semester moves on, and as some students become confident, some do not try as hard.
There is also the added challenge that, whereas my other essay assignments are staggered so that they miss the weeks that are usually reserved for mid-term exams, the final essay was probably due on the same day as final exams. I tried to avoid this, but I gave them extensions to give them more time…I think in general, I basically gave them more rope to hang themselves.
Solutions? Next semester, I will be extra viligant in keeping the due date earlier than the last week. Also, I did not give as much guidance for the last paper as I did for the first two, thinking that I was simply going to be repetitive. Well, that guidance may have provided important reminders to some.
I do not want to project, and perhaps this is speaking to my own habits more than my students. And certainly this does not apply to all students.
Natural Causes 