TEACHING CONTENTS:

Teaching Philosophy
Course Rationale
Course Progression
Student Assessment
Sample Paper
Sample Grammar Revision

From My ENG 102 Site:
Course Policies
Daily Assignments
All Major Assignment

Montgomery County Community College
Custom Report for Harold Halbert Teaching English Composition II 102
There were: 174 possible respondents.

While these numbers represent a response rate of 28%, the data indicates that I scored between 0.3% and 0.5% higher on a 4.0 scale than the entire English Department average, the entire Arts and Humanities Division average, and the entire Montco faculty average in all categories.

In addition, the student attitudes about the course workload and reflect the high expectations I have of my students:

Montgomery County Community College
Custom Report for Harold Halbert Teaching English Composition II 102
There were: 174 possible respondents.

That 67% of the students felt that the workload was either "Too Heavy" (12%) or "Heavy" (55%), with the rest of the students describing it as "average" (32), makes sense since the course demands a great deal of effort and commitment to complete.  Students expressing their concerns about the workload stated the following on the evaluation:

• " Very interesting class, but the amount of homework was overwhelming."
• "Granted, it was an english course, but with 4 papers due and at least 3 drafts of each was a lot of work. I killed myself for this A, but I'm glad I did."
• "Everyday an assignment was due. Sometimes you need a break."
• "papers due too quicky, with workloads from other classes it was difficult to get things ready on time, things weren't always my best for the time given."

Given that students often express concern about how one course interferes with other coursework, I am not particularly moved by these comments.  Of greater value to me is that the negative comments about workload often come paired with a positive comment about the course ("Very interesting course") or with a statement of accomplishment ("I killed myself for this A, but I'm glad I did").  Such comments are in keeping with the more positive statements about the workload:

• "Work load is a little bit heavy, not by much. The work load is only heavy due to importance of learning how to cite resources and how to research topics efficiently."
• "it is a decent amount of homework, but if you keep up with it you should get a good grade in the class."
• "The professor syllabus is very clear on the materials that are going to be completed throughout the entire semester. He was willing to help any student who came across any difficult times while trying to accomplish any paper. He was a very helpful professor who was always willing to share his time in helping any of his students."
• "all the homework helped me to stay up with the course and helped me to understand what we were learning about."

From these comments I conclude that students would rather have a heavy workload if that work is useful and leads to better learning and grades.  One of my personal goals is to earn a reputation as a professor who expects a lot from students but is worth taking anyway.  I believe I am well on my way towards that goal.

            One pattern that emerged in the comments indicates that my goal of being approachable and  accessible to students while challenging them to grow intellectually seems to be working:

• "keep doing what he is doing. And that is being different. He was able to do his job as while as keep himself on equal level with his students."
• "I throughly enjoyed this course. He not only challenged and improved my writing skills but also allowed and encourged me to think and evolve as a college student."
• "This was the second time I had to take this class. The first time the work was to complcated to understand the professor did not explain in a way theat you caould understand. This professor dealt with material that related to today's time."
• "Dr. Halbert is a professor who cares about his students and wants to see them succeed. He gives each students individualized meetings with him over our papers and really helps us fixes our writing weakness."
• "Not only is Dr. Halbert a sincere and passionate teacher, but he also cares about his students outside the classroom. He was always willing to talk about other troubles in school and figuring out what I wanted to do with my life, offering me plenty of advice. He gave me confidence in my academic ability, and that encouragement is the reason why I have decided to return to school next semester."
• "Good usage of horror as a topic. This grabs the attention of students much better than a typical English class. He has definitely motivated me to do better and put more effort into my work."
• "Dr. Halbert is a asset to the teaching staff. Do what ever you have to too keep him there."
• "Good balance of lecturing and involvement from students; Dr. Halbert let us think for ourselves while introducing other points of view and possibilities to us. Always encourages the potential in his students. Keeps it real, and the classroom is laid back so students are not afraid to participate. Hold individual conferences with each students to get a one-on-one discussion about the class and our papers."
• "I loved the material that we covered, most 102 teachers don't do what we did in this course, and the fact that it was different and interesting made it a fun class.
• "Everything that we talked about in class was involved in the writing of our papers. This class made me a very strong writer, and taught me much about the correct way in formatting a paper."
• "He used non-traditional topics to get students involved and interested in writing"
• "I liked how he brought himself to the students level, and allowed all of us to speak to eachother equally in whichever jargon we decided to use. Halbert was really into what he was teaching, which made for a more interesting class."

The consistent references to meeting students on their level while pushing them intellectually is exactly the classroom environment I am trying to provide.  These comments also validate my belief that the horror theme intrigues students and motivates hard work.  Finally, that a student retaking English 102 felt more motivated in my section of the course or that a student credits my course with his or her plans to return for another semester instead of dropping out makes me very proud. 

The most significant concern raised by students was the slow return of papers, particularly if a paper was returned after the subsequent paper was due:

• "too much homework, papers were returned very late so the instructors criticisms were not useful"
• "papers returned too late"
• "Try to grade papers on time"
• "Return corrected work sooner build on student weakness"
• "make sure we get our papers back before the next one is due, otherwise how we just make the same mistakes over and over again."

While many positive statements appreciate the quality and depth of the feedback, students have a right to be frustrated when I take longer to provide that feedback.  If they do not have enough time to apply the feedback to an ongoing project, then it becomes frustrating.  While I feel that major paper rewrite option relieves me of some of the urgency for speed, as done my refusal to simply write a grade with just a "good" or "see me" at the top of the paper as some of my colleagues do, I appreciate the hunger for feedback.  To speed up the process, I have modified my grading practices.  While I collect the traditional essay packet (with hardcopies of hand-marked drafts and the final paper), I am also collecting emailed attachments of the MS Word file that I can grade using the comments and mark-up options.  I realized that part of the problem was that I was not using my on-campus free time between meetings to grade, largely because I didn't physically have the papers with me.  Now I can grade a paper or two between meetings, which has greatly sped up my response time.  I don't think I will ever be a person who can get 60+ papers back within a week, particularly since my students are writing longer papers than the department average, but I am improving.