well, no, not really. see, once again i was violating one of my cardinal laws and reading crap posted on a video game website. these posts, unedited, come from a thread discussing a mod file for a particular game. how do you mod things? Posted By: pimp-alot on 12/07/2006 at 19:43:56 if you dont tell me then its ok because i will just i will rate it horrible over a thousand times youre choice Posted By: pimp-alot on 12/07/2006 at 19:45:47 ok im starting now Posted By: pimp-alot on 12/07/2006 at 19:46:35 ok then *sigh* too bad for you Posted By: pimp-alot on 12/07/2006 at 19:47:39 note the time stamps on those... i'd LIKE to believe this was some sort of satire, but sure enough, the mod in question has a very low rating...
I moderate a games forum, (well it's more of a comic forum, but whatever), and unfortunately, instances such as this seem to be happening more and more... to the extent that some admins don't actually want to be part of the community anymore.
[quote:8bf8483b17="KaptenKaries"]People seem to confuse forums and chats.[/quote:8bf8483b17]The poor fools... Imagine going to a chat room to post your earnest question, only to watch it drifting off upwards into the ether - never to be seen again.
Well I have had people send emails to me at work, to demand help for a tiny, cheap, easy to use piece of software (and they usually don't even have the real paid for version) like one every 3 minutes late on a saturday night, as if I was supposed to be working at the time guys ? And they moan and complain about not getting an immediate 24/7 answer to their stupid question for a thing they haven't even paid for, and I have to say [i:00f14da1b7]I'm[/i:00f14da1b7] SORRY because [i:00f14da1b7]they [/i:00f14da1b7]are the bloody customers... **end of rant**
[quote:574a75d62b="KaptenKaries"]People seem to confuse forums and chats.[/quote:574a75d62b] Strange as it may seem, people also tend to confuse English essays and chats. As a teacher of English as a foreign language, I have countless times seen people writing things like 'I'm gonna write about a famous sk8er" in HOMEWORK. What's even stranger, they seem very surprised when I complain about it :shock:
A few years ago, my ex was taking a class in university, and in the paperwork the professor gives you on the first day -syllabus and so on - there were instructions on how to write a paper, with a statement that you shouldn't hand in a paper written in chat-speak. I couldn't believe that students actually had to be told that.
[quote:3a6e6abf4e="Candeleena"] Strange as it may seem, people also tend to confuse English essays and chats. As a teacher of English as a foreign language, I have countless times seen people writing things like 'I'm gonna write about a famous sk8er" in HOMEWORK. What's even stranger, they seem very surprised when I complain about it :shock:[/quote:3a6e6abf4e] It stuff like this that made me decide to take AP rather than Prep english. It may be twice as much work, but at least I don't have to deal with idots like that.
[quote:9836b187c6="Garner"]if there's one thing life's taught me, its that students are idiots.[/quote:9836b187c6] Here! Here!
[quote:d9537b0548="Marcia"]I couldn't believe that students actually had to be told that.[/quote:d9537b0548] Blame the teacher's for not instigating this thinking. No! Blame the curriculum teachers have to base their lessons on. Logically, it is nobody's fault, except those who voted in the idiots who proposed the blame free system and promptly disappeared into the political woodwork before any blame could be laid at their door. Now we have a society where the media wield idiocy like a club and then wonder why said club turns around and mugs them. [quote:d9537b0548="Garner"]if there's one thing life's taught me, its that students are idiots.[/quote:d9537b0548] I object to that on the grounds of language there - ignorant, I would be forced to agree with, idiot, no. Idiocy cannot be cured, ignorance can. **Pedant alert**Somewhere in the dim dark recesses of my mind I once tracked down and memorised the five grades of idiocy as used up until the mid 1980's. It went along the lines of simpleton, imbecile, moron, cretin and dunce. I don't recall which age they were each related to. Now most of those terms are taboo thanks to the bureau of political correctness.
Now now Garner, don't be unfair... people are "idiots", students are just people... And not only can't they write properly any more, they can't read either. No matter what you write, if it's intended to be an important notice (like "if you don't enter a valid e-mail this won't work" or "this product is for MacOSX only" or even "do NOT press this big red botton under the panel that says 'end of the world button'") you can be sure that only one person in ten will actually read it, however big or red or bold it is...
[quote:c89bca7748="Katcal"]No matter what you write, if it's intended to be an important notice (like "if you don't enter a valid e-mail this won't work" or "this product is for MacOSX only" or even "do NOT press this big red botton under the panel that says 'end of the world button'") you can be sure that only one person in ten will actually read it, however big or red or bold it is...[/quote:c89bca7748] :lol: :lol: :lol: very very true. When I have to leave my room for a while to go, say to the secretary's office, I always leave a big piece of paper on my door, saying "I am in the secretary's office", and when I come back, my colleagues tell me that students were asking about me everywhere. As Garner says [quote:c89bca7748="Garner"]if there's one thing life's taught me, its that students are idiots.[/quote:c89bca7748] But this is also very human (I think I do such things as well). But the widespread deterioration in the ability to read and write is frightening.
I imagine that, while some students need to be told not to write in chatspeak, there are may who do not. When I was at school, teachers were constantly telling students not to use slang in their essays, but the students often didn't know if a word was slang or not. I don't think students these days are any more or less stupid or ignorant as a group than students (or, indeed, any people) have ever been. We just hear about the stupidest ones and decry them. What about the millions of students worldwide who turn in outstanding essays written in immaculate standard English (or whatever their language happens to be)? What about the examples we have here on this board of students who get high grades and write in excellent English? It's not so long since I was a student myself. Yes, there were people in my classes who were unbelievably stupid and colossally ignorant. There were those whose spelling was bad enough to make their work totally unreadable; there were those who thought it acceptable to write in slang and, yes, chatspeak, or draw little hearts over their i's instead of dots; there were those whose failure even to approach, let alone grasp, the point of an essay or of a text was wholly lamentable. And then there were students like me, who got top marks throughout their school careers, who never made a spelling mistake, who wrote in perfect English, who made points in their essays that caused the teachers to rethink their assumptions. (And, before you say it, I'm [i:e64619dc11]not[/i:e64619dc11] a freak, there are plenty of students who achieve these standards.) It's not fair on the perfectly good students to denounce the whole group just because some, as always, let the standard down. Likewise, just because there are people who need to be warned not to stop chainsaws with their genitals, that does not mean all people are that stupid. So let's stop slagging off students in general, and start slagging off those students in particular. Morons! Chatspeak in an essay? What were they thinking?!
[quote:00acdc77fe="Katcal"]... "do NOT press this big red botton under the panel that says 'end of the world button'") you can be sure that only one person in ten will actually read it, however big or red or bold it is...[/quote:00acdc77fe] Well, what do you expect if you write something in big bold RED lettering on a big RED button? You're just trying to shift the blame for blowing up the world... My father teaches handicrafts (What do you call that? Building things out of wood and metal in class (ranging from boxes to puzzles and birdhouse) Anyway, big sawing machines, sharp tools and such are in the classroom. Basically he just makes sure all his students are always in sight when using the machines. He also, on the first day, gives a demonstration with a piece of meat to show how fast you can saw through your arm if not careful. That usually impresses them enough to remember for the rest of the year.
You forgot to add that you were really modest about your achievements! The freak's right, there's always cases of the good, the bad, the ugly and those in the middle. Even in the grammar school I went to, which was meant to include students only in the top 20-30% in the area, we still got idiots who wouldn't know an essay if you wrapped it round a brick and threw it in their face. I'm getting better though, the brick's a real good teacher.
[quote:6b4c7f9099="Tephlon"] My father teaches handicrafts (What do you call that? Building things out of wood and metal in class (ranging from boxes to puzzles and birdhouse) Anyway, big sawing machines, sharp tools and such are in the classroom. [/quote:6b4c7f9099] We always called that class "shop", either wood or metal.
"When I have to leave my room for a while to go, say to the secretary's office, I always leave a big piece of paper on my door, saying "I am in the secretary's office", and when I come back, my colleagues tell me that students were asking about me everywhere" (Sorry I had to edit this and the quotes didn't work) So you're a lecturer? Based on my experience of lecturers I would say that the reason students go around asking where you are is because lecturers are NEVER where they say they are; they are either skiving (my old lecturer used to freely admit to me that when he posted an "away due to illness" note on his door it meant he couldn't be bothered coming in) or they're in the staff room drinking tea. Thus students have to wander around aimlessly hoping to bump into lecturers. Although seeing as the reasons most students are searching lecturers out are to explain why they haven't attended any lectures all semester, and to request copies of all the hand-outs they've missed oh and incidentally can I have an extension, I don't blame lecturers for hiding. (PS no offence, I want to become a lecturer myself, that's why I'm doing a Masters this year- any job that requires reading, talking to a captive audience and enables you to say "my office hours are Thursday 2-4" sounds perfect to me)
Last year, my teacher gave us all a list of tasks we had to complete. On top of the page was a nitice advising us to read all of the instructions before we begin. Upon seeing this, I immediatly skiped to the last instruction, which read:[quote:6cd4c02584]Do not do any of the above instructions. Either read quietly or just sit there and feel superior to everyone else. [/quote:6cd4c02584] I was one of 4 or 5 in a class of 30 who receive an hour of freetime. Whats scary is that it was an honors class.
That's a fairly common prank teachers can play on students. I had a teacher recount a similar story once. One student in her class began furiously scribbling his answers to the questions on the page, following each instruction line by line. When he reached the bottom and found he'd been hoodwinked, he threw his paper to the floor and stormed out of the classroom!
[quote:cb2f9ec3c7="QuothTheRaven"]Whats scary is that it was an honors class.[/quote:cb2f9ec3c7] Actually, an honors class would be more likely to "fail" the test than an average class. Being competitive, and without much life experience, each student who "failed" probably wanted to finish the test before his classmates, and thought that stopping to read the instructions would waste precious time.
we got that once- question five or seven or something was 'Stand up and tell the teacher he's an idiot". And still, they [i:300aafe9b8]DIDN'T. COP. ON.[/i:300aafe9b8]
[quote:fce645d947="Garner"]well, no, not really. see, once again i was violating one of my cardinal laws and reading crap posted on a video game website. these posts, unedited, come from a thread discussing a mod file for a particular game. how do you mod things? Posted By: pimp-alot on 12/07/2006 at 19:43:56 if you dont tell me then its ok because i will just i will rate it horrible over a thousand times youre choice Posted By: pimp-alot on 12/07/2006 at 19:45:47 ok im starting now Posted By: pimp-alot on 12/07/2006 at 19:46:35 ok then *sigh* too bad for you Posted By: pimp-alot on 12/07/2006 at 19:47:39 note the time stamps on those... i'd LIKE to believe this was some sort of satire, but sure enough, the mod in question has a very low rating...[/quote:fce645d947] Typical.
[quote:c5e073c6f6="Catriona"]So you're a lecturer? Based on my experience of lecturers I would say that the reason students go around asking where you are is because lecturers are NEVER where they say they are; they are either skiving (my old lecturer used to freely admit to me that when he posted an "away due to illness" note on his door it meant he couldn't be bothered coming in) or they're in the staff room drinking tea. Thus students have to wander around aimlessly hoping to bump into lecturers. Although seeing as the reasons most students are searching lecturers out are to explain why they haven't attended any lectures all semester, and to request copies of all the hand-outs they've missed oh and incidentally can I have an extension, I don't blame lecturers for hiding. (PS no offence, I want to become a lecturer myself, that's why I'm doing a Masters this year- any job that requires reading, talking to a captive audience and enables you to say "my office hours are Thursday 2-4" sounds perfect to me)[/quote:c5e073c6f6] I wish I could argue with this but to some extent its true... Although in my defence of the academic fraternity / sorority teaching only makes up about half of our jobs. The other half is research which is where most of the mental effort and time away from the office goes into... And the reason you can't do this in your office is that have you any idea how hard it is to write 100,000 word thesis or test the statistical significant differences in x to y when there's students turning up constantly to ask patently silly questions. Its not all students true. I have some that are fantastic but the bad one take up so much time that the urge to hide in a hole is overwhelming. If they can't find you to answer the silly question for them they may just show some initiative and figure it out for themselves... Or I could continue to believe in the fantasy and know that they are too lazy / dumb / incompetent to figure it out / read the instructions so their assignments will be crap. But there's only so much I can do and then its up to them.
[quote:951c9ea680="Catriona"] So you're a lecturer? Based on my experience of lecturers I would say that the reason students go around asking where you are is because lecturers are NEVER where they say they are[/quote:951c9ea680] That would explain everything! :badgrin: Not EXACTLY a lecturer, only a teacher of English as a foreign language to Univeristy students which isn't the same as I don't do research work like Spiky. Instead I have many more hours, and many more students to expect. I often play the stupid trick with the list of instructions on my first year students and there is often a lot of laugh: I want to show them that language classes are not necessarily very serious and they are welcome to bo be a little noisy and naughty. But I DO feel a bit apprehensive when I see that some ambitious students really try to follow all instructions with deadpan accuracy. Nobody has ever stormed out of my class but one day they might. The trick is a bit annoying.
Oh yeah I know that research is a huge part of a lecturer's job; you think "wow they get three months off for summer" (at Newcastle Uni anyway) and then when you talk to your tutor you realise they had about one weeks holiday and the rest they had to work for. And if you had to be in your office all the time you would get none of that done. I know how annoying students can be, freshers in particular. As soon as I got into second year I was already hating them using all the computers to check their Hotmail account, missing lectures and talking loudly in the library about how drunk they were last night. Very distracting for anyone trying to work.
