So, here's another one to kick around. Let me play devil's advocate for a
minute.....
You're driving over a bridge. It collapses. You find the engineer who
designed it and ask him (from your wheelchair) how he could have made such a
mistake! His reply, "Well, I never did really get any answers right on my
exams.... But I got B's and C's on partial credit! The bridge *did* last for
5 years!"
Or....
After being in that bridge/collapse accident, you wake up on an operating
table. The Dr. who is about to open you up survived college on partial
credit!! Do you want that Dr? "Let's see........ the appendix is on the
left - no, right side!! How many points do I get for that?"
Perhaps these have been exagerations. Perhaps they haven't.
I have been fretting about the whole idea of partial credit. The scariest
part is that I worry that not many students would pass my classes without it!
The course that scares me the most is my Math for Elementary School Teachers
--- A student (who wants to teach *your* children) cannot complete a long
division problem correctly, but asserts that she got it almost right, so I
need to give her more points!
How many of your students have argued with you over the amount of partial
credit that you have deemed appropriate for their partial solution? Or,
better yet, they've somehow gotten the right answer..... but the work breaks
all the rules or doesn't match up and you don't give them full credit! That
brings about even more complaints.
This will probably bother me for the next 27 years of my career........ What
does everyone out there think?
Karen
Orange Coast College
http://members.aol.com/coolmath2/coolmath.htm
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