One of the more challenging aspects of teaching is figuring out the kinds of students that will be placed in our classes. It is always easy to assume one knows enough about the demographics of our student body in order to teach the most effective way possible. But there are many assumptions that teachers may carry that can affect our disposition in the classroom. It’s great once in a while to have different kinds of role-playing games to help us think critically about the various types of students we have. I believe it allows us to make imaginative leaps which could be very useful in the practical aspects of the classroom setting. We know that the bulk of community college students are non-traditional, meaning they will bring a lot of new experiences to the table, and it’s time for teacher to adapt to that. As part of our classmates’ presentation handouts were distributed that outlined a particular profile of a community college student. This was part of the research done for their book The Community College Writer. Here was my group’s student profile:
- Student#3: Wendy
- 40 years old
- Taking English 10: Basic Writing
- Working full-time as a town clerk
- Has a husband (no HS diploma) and 2 sons, supoortive
- Though professor has scaffolding of the essay in syllabus, all assignments were required to be in essay for w/o scaffolding.
- Toward the last third of the semester the focus of feedback was on phrasing and grammar
- Wendy struggles with how to respond to feedback, which takes the enjoyment out of the writing. She begins to e-mail parts of the her paragraphs to the instructor before completing the essays.
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