I have 4 semester exams and a comprehensive final. Students may drop their lowest exam but must take all 5 exams to do so. This leads to "A" students who have no incentive to study for the final but must show up and take the final. Not surprisingly they still do very well. I have mixed feelings on dropping exams scores but this system seems to work well in PSYC 101 as it puts the students at ease. The one draw back is that if students don't do well on the first exam they wait until they do poorly on exam 2 before seeking help.
Doug Doug Peterson, PhD Director of University Honors Associate Professor of Psychology The University of South Dakota 414 E. Clark Vermillion SD 57069 e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] phone (Honors): (605) 677-5223 phone (Psychology): (605) 677-5295 ________________________________ From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, May 09, 2007 3:24 PM To: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS) Subject: [tips] Re: Negatively skewed scores on exams, within students My first semester of teaching I tried something similar. I gave four exams with the option of dropping the lowest grade. The problem I ran into was that if the student's received A's on the first three then there is no reason to even attend class anymore since they already have an A average. My institution does not have a firm attendance policy and being that it was my frist semester, I really did not know any better so 1/3 of the class who did well ceased coming to class the last few weeks of the semester. Albert Bramante Department of Psychology/Sociology Union County College ________________________________ See what's free at AOL.com <http://www.aol.com?ncid=AOLAOF00020000000503> . --- To make changes to your subscription go to: http://acsun.frostburg.edu/cgi-bin/lyris.pl?enter=tips&text_mode=0&lang= english --- To make changes to your subscription go to: http://acsun.frostburg.edu/cgi-bin/lyris.pl?enter=tips&text_mode=0&lang=english
