[kim_johnson]

Had a change in lecturer and I'm having a hard time with the new guy. He mostly talks about stuff blah blah blah... But we aren't being assessed on any of that. He might put up the odd 'how you derive this equation'... Where he'll often use derivatives (math that is at too high a level for the majority of us). The actual equations that we need to use to solve just the right level of problems that we will actually have on tests and exams...

It is like he hides that stuff away from us. Makes it next to impossible for us to get. There isn't any point in giving questions without giving (comprehensible!) worked answers - so we see HOW we are supposed to solve problems. And he... Won't. Weirdo. He'll be all reluctant... Like 'have you guys even TRIED' to do them yourselves??? And the answer is OF COURSE YOU FREAK. AND WE HAVE NO ****ING IDEA WHETHER WE CAN DO THEM OR NOT SINCE YOU WON'T MAKE THE ANSWERS AVAILABLE TO US.

I mean... What are we, 5? With the attention span of 5 year olds? That we won't try and do them we'll just look at the answers and think they are done? Does he really think we are that stupid?

Answer: Yes. He has no ****ing idea that the reasons people are in this particular class are two-fold: Firstly, people have holes in their maths / schooling which means they didn't do as well as they need to. Secondly, people need to do well and are highly motivated (hence summer school).

By not making his 'simple maths' transparent (and talking through his substitutions, being clear on what is going on with his units etc) he basically... Fails to teach people what they need. Genius. I swears... He does no worked examples with any actual math in class. Nothing. None of it. Precisely that which we need to know / what we are assessed on.... He will not give us / show us how to do.

Anyway... This makes me feel angry. ANd I just want to throw my hands up in the air and walk away, really. I started feeling like that at the end of my last physics class. Right near the end when the guy thought a great way to teach thermodynamics was to do it in about 4 lectures with about 26 powerpoint slides per lecture.

I need to take some deep breaths and calm down.. It is just hard to deal with people treating you like an idiot... Idiot teachers... Idiot teaching... Just like tech... Just like High School... I swears...

This will be my last class of this. Forever. Just suck it up and don't get too upset about it all... Only a couple weeks to go then one week break and then into things for real...

Maybe I should bail on this... I'd rather not attend class... But he won't give practice problems etc unless you do...

[sideblinded]

Wow this really sounds frustrating. I wouldn't bail as I have bailed for different reasons and I lost a lot of time in school. It does sound like he is not a good teacher at all. I have had bad teachers as well but I decided to get determined and beat them and pass my exams even if I had to ask someone else to help me. Maybe you could buddy up with another classmate and see if that helps. Best wishes.

[kim_johnson]

Thanks. I calmed down a bit and sent him an email about how it would help me to have worked problems and how maybe he shouldn't worry about students who decide not to do their work if he makes answers available for them...

It can be hard as a teacher to know what is going on for students... Especially when they don't communicate with you... I think it is probably most likely to be that. He simply flies through the maths... I think because the maths is easy for him. So he's spending more time on the conceptual stuff because physics people often seem to have this idea that people get through physics from being good at maths without 'really understanding' any of it.

I'm different because I can justify / rationalise pretty much anything. But a 'simple unit conversion' is likely to totally screw me over. Sigh.

[kim_johnson]

Well... He sort of blew me off... And then I complained and I think other people complained, too, and so he gave out numeric answers to the problems he'd set (but still not really any workings).

I emotionally disengaged. I... This is a bad habit kind of thing... But I can't work for someone who... Doesn't respect me. Someone who thinks they can ignore me because I'm talking just to talk. Someone who thinks that I don't know what is best for my learning. Someone who is more interested in being defensive than in helping motivated people learn. Someone who can't focus on what is important and not invest in irrelevant side-issues. Someone who...

I found most of them teaching Secondary School... Some of them in a Community College type of environment... I was shocked to find some of them at University... Mostly teaching the first year science classes... Not the continuing classes (Physics for Physics majors, chemistry for chemistry majors etc) but the classes that are more at High School level... The remedial classes, I guess.

I do get that it can be hard to tease apart issues of cognitive development more generally from ability when they are found together... So... If a 7 year old can do those problems but you need to hide the answers from them because they don't have the impulse control to prevent cheating... But to think this might be true of 18 year olds? Ones who are working their butts off to get into engineering? Don't get me wrong... The history of this program (actually a relatively new program) has a bit of a poor track record of setting people up well for engineering.... And that will be partly because people's backgrounds (their particular holes in their knowledge) are diverse... But it is also partly because the teachers aren't able to focus on getting through the material that IS required in comprehensible ways... Lightening the cognitive load for the students as much as possible so the students can patch up the holes they find along the way... And maybe the students are too lazy / stupid to do that... But if you provide the oppportunity... You have done everything that is your ****ing job to do and you can feel... Content.. With yourself for that. Instead of it being the case that the kids didn't learn stuff because you didn't do your job properly (e.g., you didn't present the material in a learnable fashion).

AAAaaarrgh.

And this, folks, is (a huge part of) why tech didn't work out for me. This is the last class that will be like this... I tell myself.

I have this 'objective' worry... Med school is going to be full of experiences of working under people who... Suck. By all accounts. Thing is... I know I can work under people who are focused on doing their jobs... It is those who are disengaged from their subjects... If they don't care... Why should I? Maybe it is partly biting off ones nose...

I have a test tomorrow. I should be working through problems to prepare... I just... Don't care, anymore. 2 more weeks of it... Break... Then into this year for real. This year is a big deal. They put a lot into their teaching. For the best kids... They wouldn't dare feed them this ****.

[kim_johnson]

And it makes me feel angry / cross.

It upsets me a lot that that world is very nepotistic. That some are born to money and some aren't through no fault of their own. Some kids are picked off to go to private schools with well renumerated carefully selected well educated teachers and others are shipped en masse to public schools who don't have appropriate resources who have overstuffed classrooms...

it makes me angry that all the little 'intelligence tests' and so on along the way... are really part of the whole protecting the elite thing... justifying that these kids deserve better educations because they have more ability but really the ability they have is only because of the early privaledge they had. the situation compounds over the years.. and you end up with colleges full of rich kids... some of them are hardworking, yeah. and some of them are intelligent, yeah. but they aren't at all the 'best' kids... they were the lucky ones. from a nepotistic point of view. picked off early... brave new world, anyone? I am an alpha test tube baby, i am the best kind of baby... i am a beta baby. so happy i'm a beta baby those alpha babies have to work far too hard!

it makes me cross...

and so... the uni where i am at the moment... doesn't have open entry (for anyone who wants to be there)... exactly. but... nearly. not open entry to all the programs (very hard to get into certian programs like med and engineering and nursing and clinical psychology etc etc). but the idea is to let in most poeple.. and then see how they do. that is the idea. level the playing field.

only it is far from level. firstly you have the accommodation problem. you need to be in a residential hall or for your parents to be commuting through to the city every day anyway or something to make it convenient. they schedule lectures for 8am for the course i'm doing this year... if you don't live 5-15 minutes away, you are screwed. they let in a bunch of poorer people who live in the outskirts of the city. they can't afford to pay for parking or public transport... can take several hours to get across the city... they let them in... they set them up to fail... and they... internalise their failure. they had the opportunity. they couldn't do well enouhg. they faile.d but really... the very 'best' kids wouldn't have succeeded if you gave them to some south city 13 person family 3 bedroom house 2 hour commute type situation, either...

then there is the background... it is funny... at the start of the year the kids are all like 'i went to this big important rich high school what school did you go to?' then over time they learn that most people roll their eyes at that. or... if they can't do something most people are all like 'you spent 5 years at the most expensive school in the county and you STILL don't know how to do that???' and that looks heaps worse for them... than if they are all, like, pretending they have never seen any problem anything like that before... but they can do it! easy! omg yuo must be, like, SO SMART! my hero!!'

so people don't see... because people learn to misrepresent. i've heard a few people say 'oh, we did all this in last year chemistry at x school... only it was so much more confusingly explained at uni'. and... it is faintly conspiracy theory... but i think there is a lot of truth... to how there is something intentional about that. the richer schools have better teachers than the prepratory university classes do... the prepratory university classes are supposed to be at the same level... it always was the case that your very last year at high school... could be skipped. you could go straight to university from your second last year... so the university offers a bunch fo maths / science classes that are supposed to get through the high school preparation stuff... for the kids who went to **** schools. who had **** teachers. that is basically what that is about.

only... they give them **** teachers again. not ALL of them... but at least 1 of them in classes that are shared taught. so you miss out on a chunk of content. so... it doesn't prepare you as well. which is.... the whole nepotistic point. so the kids are all 'i did the best i could and i wasn't good enough' but they weren't given comperable opportunity.

i don't know what is wrong with people.... how stupid they can be... that they think nepotism is in anything other than their own very short range interests. it isn't the best thing for this country to have the rich people's kids run the show. some of them are smart and hardworking... but there are plenty of other kids out there who are just as smart and just as hardworking... or who would hve been with the same opportunity... there are plenty of kids out there who are MORE THAN. or who would have been with the same opportunity. it would be in EVERYONES interests for the SMARTEST and MOST HARDWORKING to run teh show. but we can't pick out those poeple if we don't have a leveller playing field to identify the talent. People... pay for their kids to be identified as talent only their kids aren't talented. And society as a whole... Suffers. And you get people doing things that (the smartest amongst them) know full well they aren't most well qualified / positioned / competent to do...

It is ********. For reals.

[kim_johnson]

But, of course, it is easy to ***** and moan and complain about the way things are. So very much harder to suggest concrete and feasible improvements...

There is a quota entry system to try and pick off the 'best' of those south city kids...

Australia did this 'stolen generation' thing... See... After the white settlers came there were babies that were half white and half aboriginal. Some of them looked pretty white. Could 'pass' for white. So they did this 'stolen generation' thing of taking them and raising them as white orphans in cities. They thought (genuinely) that that was giving them a better chance at life.

And we sort of look back, in horror...

Here... There are small boarding school situations for Maaori students... So the best schools in the country (who are the best insofar as they are located in the richest suburban areas and people largely attend their 'local' school)... The best schools in the country... Well... Some of the south city kids are... Taken from their parents... And boarded across the road from the school. Which is, perhaps, a bit stolen generation... But... You can ensure the kids are well fed and are shown how to do their homework (in a quiet setting)... And you can even get them doing sports and culture group and so on... And, I guess, they can go home outside term time.

And it seems to be working. Sort of. Too new to say. Will those kids (for example) go on to become doctors or lawyers or whatever and... Go back to serve the communities they came from? Or will they look at the way some people live in absolute horror and buy themselves a mansion in the rich people area and... Well... That's what the absence of racism and equal opportunity etc etc etc mean. Maaori and Pacific Islanders should have equal opportunity to become part of the elite...

Sigh.

But then, what is to be done?

I like the idea of boarding school for everyone... But I need to remember that is because I needed to get away from my Mother. That isn't the case for most people. Also... While there is some variation, of course, people usually are... Happiest... With similarity... Similar in relevant respects. People get something like that from family stuff..

[shortandcute]

Kim_johnson, not to be weird or anything, but I've noticed that in some of your posts, you keep saying that you're 36; but according to your "about me" bio, you're 58!I know it's none of my business, but I was wondering if there was a reason behind the discrepincy?

[kim_johnson]

Originally Posted by shortandcute

Kim_johnson, not to be weird or anything, but I've noticed that in some of your posts, you keep saying that you're 36; but according to your "about me" bio, you're 58!I know it's none of my business, but I was wondering if there was a reason behind the discrepincy?

I replied to your question on the other thread where you ask the same question.

To save others hunting it down... I filled in my bio with crap information as I have a tendency to do when computers ask me for personal information. Every random website seems to want to know the answer to standard security questions etc! I have since tried to change it because it can be misleading for others, but I can't seem to get it to properly save the changes.

[shortandcute]

Originally Posted by kim_johnson

I replied to your question on the other thread where you ask the same question.

To save others hunting it down... I filled in my bio with crap information as I have a tendency to do when computers ask me for personal information. Every random website seems to want to know the answer to standard security questions etc! I have since tried to change it because it can be misleading for others, but I can't seem to get it to properly save the changes.

oh, ok--I apologize,

[kim_johnson]

It is okay, no apologies necessary. Once I realised that other people sometimes did look at my bio I tried to change it because I never meant to intentionally mislead actual people. If that makes sense. That's probably why I keep saying how old I actually am

[kim_johnson]

Actually... Thanks for posting something to the thread... I feel like I can rant just a little bit more, now :-D

I found a journal... And some articles about studying medicine / student doctors in this country. And... It helped. They talked about their selection criterion and problems with the selection process and so on... And it helped me feel a bit calmer about things.

There is basically a big chunk of discretion. And they don't want to be too transparent about their selection criterion precisely because of that. But it was possible to read between the lines... Stuff about increasing diversity (because of knowing full well that the best of the south city kids are every bit as good as the best of the local kids etc)... And stuff about identifying the people who really wanted to do it. I think, because, a lot of people do apply because of parental pressure and the like. And so people do... Sort of self-stabotage in the interview. Or come across as ambivalent. So it is... An easy way to let them off the hook, if that makes sense.

I actually made it through to interview before... Then right at the end they asked me what I thought was the main thing standing in my way of succeeding as a medical doctor. And I said that I was really bad at math (maybe I had dyscalculia) and that I wasn't sure I would be good enough at the science. Which was all true. Which was all... Me expressing ambivalence. Anyway... I found an article where the person who interviewed me was one of the authors... And she said that there were high drop out rates for students selected in on my criterion who were then made to do first year who... Couldn't do the science. So... They heard my ambivalence and decided for me. Rightly.

And I decided I wanted it enough to... Take a full year to prepare... And... I really do think... That I'll be okay. Some other articles, too... Students relating their experiences with that first year... Take-home is 'it will seem overwhelming. break it down into smaller, simpler, manageable tasks. don't worry about what other people are saying about their grades or whatever because it makes no difference to how well you are doing... stay focused on improving yourself... try and find friends who don't bring social dramas... post-pone starting up a relationship'.

All very sensible. It is just... One year of your life...

A lot of people decide... Arts students... Have more fun. And they... Are more interested in fun. Which is perfectly fine... Really... Though... It makes me angry when they are taking the place (accommodation or otherwise) of another student who does really want to be there / is prepared to put in the work. I guess the trouble is that you can't really decide who's who before things start... Unless you go by past performance... Which only compounds injustice...