23 Assigned Readings

When I went to college, the typical syllabus was one or two pages. Some might have topics and have readings arranged organized around the topics. There were no questions. It was up to you to utilize the supplemental workbook. I remember one English teacher frustrated because he felt some of the students had not read the assigned portions of a novel when he wanted to discuss its contents. I remember fellow students choosing classes on which there appeared to be the least amount of required reading. A typical class required substantial reading of any where from 20 to 100 pages a week. I remember one professor who assigned over 15 books which no one protested.

Today, I find students will not even read two pages even when it is given to them, in a timely fashion. Some of my colleagues report even educational students in graduate courses that do not read the textbooks they assign. I had one class of twenty-two students where I would give handouts of one of to six pages for 3ight assignments, had they read a section of one book for 60 pages, and they had to go on the Internet to compare the Biblical creation story with another. This did not improve weven I e-mailed them the info or reminded them. The pattern emerged that one third would be absent so they would not have it, another third would claim to have handed in ahead of time and have it because they arrived late, and about half the remainder had not done it.. A substantial port of those who claimed they have handed it ahead of time simply claim they had never done it. There was one assignment of half a page and a map that only five people out of 22 of which only other two people subsequently did. They were dismayed when I told them I would put it as a question on the final examination. I tell the students that when they hand in the work lit is useless because we have already discussed it. I love it when students hand in all the homework assignments at the end of the semester that never had the time to do during the semester.


I had a colleague who suggested that I assign chapters for the students to summarize. Half the class would do this. A few went on to Internet to summarize the entire book instead of the chapter. Of course, students would come in late or be absent so chapter summaries would not be in order.

Some of the students when called upon would claim they had handed in the assignment when they had really not. I would have students that would claim they handed in various assignments during the course of the semester which they had not. If it was a case of one or two assignments out of many them got the benefit of the doubt. I had one student who I got confused with another. I asked him to bring his assignment which he was reluctant to do. I told him he was responsible adult who surely kept them in his notebook upon his return. He finally produced them. Except for a visit to a museum and a personal biography, I require the students to keep on hand duplicates of what they hand in. I tell them we live in age of Xerox and computer where we can easily keep copies and it would be foolish not to do so. I explain this way we can be friends. Students claim they hand in an entire term’s work when they have never done so. One time I misplaced a folder, told the student I would probably find it, and asked them to reconstruct what they did. When I found the folder the next day, the discrepancies were amazing. Students continue to claim they have handed in work through the e-mail or in physical mail box. I insist they give it to me in class.

This particular class I was lucky that eventually all the students did most of the assignments. I had another class were I assigned two textbooks. Students don’t buy textbooks. Students don’t go to the library to read the textbooks. One was a suggested textbook for which they could choose their own or go on the Internet. Only one student bough the textbook the week after the class came to an end. Only a quarter of the class bought the required assigned readings book of which another quarter xeroxed from them or my copy.