Thursday, June 21, 2012

GNIE: Where have the students gone?

I was late for school today. When I entered the classroom, it occurred to me that it seemed rather empty for a class of 35. So for the first time, I counted the students while sitting in class. There were 7 missing, all from the other sub-group -- that is the sub-group that complained against lecturer H. [Click here and here for details.]

I noticed that lecturer H seems less and less interested in teaching us recently. E.g. Yesterday, she simply showed us 2 videos on YouTube to explain the reproductive system and then gave some worksheets for us to discuss in teams. One of the YouTube videos was an Islamic creationist video which interspersed praises for God and the Koran for the perfect design of the sperm, etc, between nuggets of anatomy and physiology facts. [Note: As far as we know, lecturer H isn't a Muslim, so it is safe to assume that she didn't show the video with any religious intent.]
After several rounds of praises for the creationist God and the Koran from the video, I couldn't help but chuckle whenever the praises get repeated. IJ (being Catholic) teased me in mock annoyance, "You pagan!" and I did a mock celebratory twist (while seated on my chair) and joked, "Well, today is a pagan's day - Summer Solstice starts today!"
After school today, I remarked to LP, AP and IT about my observations. All agreed with my observation about the change in lecturer H's attitude. Both LP and IT remarked that lecturer H was so enthusiastic in the beginning (e.g. explaining to us what was important to know for each topic), different from her current attitude. IT added that we are being short-changed of our learning, no thanks to the short-sightedness of the AXE students in the other group, some of whom didn't even bother to attend class now.

It is a pity. Sometimes students forget that they exist as part of a bigger system. When they exert a force in action, there is likely to be some kind of reaction. The type of reaction one gets often co-relates with the type of action one took.

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