How does a cultural expert (students in our case) decide whether or not to do an assigned reading for class?
The author discovered that cultural experts dont casually or lightly discard assignments, rather, they mentally ask themselves a serias of questoins:
1. "Will there be a test or quiz on the material?"
2. "Is the reading something that i will need in order to be able to do the homework?"
3. "Will we directly discuss this in class in such a way that i am likely to have to personly and publicly respond or otherwise 'perform' in relation to this reading?"
*If the answer to all of these questions is NO, then don't do the reading.
Monday, May 12, 2008
Chapters 1 & 2
Chapters 1 & 2: "Welcome to AnyU" and "Life in the Dorms"
Rebekah Nathan in the author of this story. She is also a succesfull professor at an annonomous University in the United States. She has been teaching for a very long time, and she is increasingly becoming disconnected with her students. She is an anthropologist, and she feels that if she can't connect with the students, they will never benefit from her classs. She decides that the best way to reconnect with the students in the institution, is to know what its like on the other end of the spectrum. She signs up for classes the following semester, only this time, as a student.
She started taking classes in the summer of 2002 with an undeclared major, using only her highschool transcripts as evidence of education. She applied to live in the dorms as well, which we all know is a vital part of the college experience. Her university hosted a freshman orientation, that was open to new students and their parents. This orientation was used to acclimate the new arriving students and help to fill their parents in on what to expect. Nathan decided to attend, but only after removing the staff sticker from her vehicle. At the orientation, she was unfortunate to be mistaken for a parent.
She moved into her dorm in a week before classes that the university labels "Welcome Week". This week is used to get students to connect with others by getting involved in activities, joining clubs, going greek, or other special interest groups. Nathan thought it would be best to fully utilize this week as an important part of her research, needless to say she did all she could. Less then a week had passed before she got a verbal warning. She was enjoying a beer in the common room only to be told that alcohol wasn't alowed.
The second chapter is all about her research in the dorm rooms. She notices how big of a role that technology plays in todays young adults. She jotted down all of the toys and gadgets that once were needless, that have now become nesecities. Another thing she talks about is the door decorations across her dorm hall. She notes that the male students more often then not display funny images, sports teams, or alcohol and college related materials on their doors, while girl students opt for collages of pictures that usually contain their friends and themselves. These decorations, she explains, are used by students to identify with eachother, and are a vital part in connecting with other students in the college atmosphere.
Nathan goes onto attend her classes, stay active in her social groups, and branch out for new friends when she can. Wether it be talking to the kids in the common room playing Dungeons and Dragons, or scoring the winning point in an ultimate frisbee game, Nathan had connected with her students for the first time in two decades. This was only a sign of things to come in the future chapters.
Rebekah Nathan in the author of this story. She is also a succesfull professor at an annonomous University in the United States. She has been teaching for a very long time, and she is increasingly becoming disconnected with her students. She is an anthropologist, and she feels that if she can't connect with the students, they will never benefit from her classs. She decides that the best way to reconnect with the students in the institution, is to know what its like on the other end of the spectrum. She signs up for classes the following semester, only this time, as a student.
She started taking classes in the summer of 2002 with an undeclared major, using only her highschool transcripts as evidence of education. She applied to live in the dorms as well, which we all know is a vital part of the college experience. Her university hosted a freshman orientation, that was open to new students and their parents. This orientation was used to acclimate the new arriving students and help to fill their parents in on what to expect. Nathan decided to attend, but only after removing the staff sticker from her vehicle. At the orientation, she was unfortunate to be mistaken for a parent.
She moved into her dorm in a week before classes that the university labels "Welcome Week". This week is used to get students to connect with others by getting involved in activities, joining clubs, going greek, or other special interest groups. Nathan thought it would be best to fully utilize this week as an important part of her research, needless to say she did all she could. Less then a week had passed before she got a verbal warning. She was enjoying a beer in the common room only to be told that alcohol wasn't alowed.
The second chapter is all about her research in the dorm rooms. She notices how big of a role that technology plays in todays young adults. She jotted down all of the toys and gadgets that once were needless, that have now become nesecities. Another thing she talks about is the door decorations across her dorm hall. She notes that the male students more often then not display funny images, sports teams, or alcohol and college related materials on their doors, while girl students opt for collages of pictures that usually contain their friends and themselves. These decorations, she explains, are used by students to identify with eachother, and are a vital part in connecting with other students in the college atmosphere.
Nathan goes onto attend her classes, stay active in her social groups, and branch out for new friends when she can. Wether it be talking to the kids in the common room playing Dungeons and Dragons, or scoring the winning point in an ultimate frisbee game, Nathan had connected with her students for the first time in two decades. This was only a sign of things to come in the future chapters.
Sunday, May 11, 2008
Chapters 5 & 6
Chapter 5 – Academically Speaking…
In the beginning of this chapter Rebekah discusses an exercise she performs in her anthropology class every year on how accusations can operate a culture. In this exercise, she tells everyone in the classroom that there is a witch in the room and everyone has to write down three possible names of who it could be. After she tallies up the names, she realizes that the names with the most tallies were the ones who participated in class or sat near the front of the room. She didn’t understand these accusations until she was put in the same situation in a class she had taken. She felt uncomfortable sitting near the front and when someone else asked a question she was some what annoyed. Although she thinks a heated class discussion is more appreciated, she would much rather sit back and watch then be a part of it...some times. Curious about what others thought, she decided to ask students on her floor why they don’t participate in class discussion. With examples such as:
-“No one listens to each other anyhow.”
-“Sometimes I don’t talk because I don’t want to appear stupid.”
-“The discussions are too teacher-directed—everyone is just saying what the teacher wants to hear.”
…And so on.
Being a teacher her self, she didn’t know what the students actually talked about before and after class. What she heard other people talking about somewhat astounded her. No one discussed how much they liked a class, the assignment given or the reading criteria for the weekend. She mostly heard complaints about the class or what the assignments were given. Outside of class she realized that mainly what discussions happen in the classroom, stay in the classroom.
To study further, she decided to make a survey for her dorm by posting a question in the women’s bathroom, “What topics do you talk about, late night, with friends?” She received anonymous answers like, “Everything under the sun,” and “What don’t we talk about?” The most frequent tops were relationships, body image, entertainment and drugs and alcohol. She found that less the 5% of topic discussions were about school and career and less then 2% were talked about teachers, but mainly the hot or evil ones. Conclusion: the academic part of college wasn’t all that important. She realized the personal and social world was more interesting to them. College, according to students, is more then how well you do in classes. It’s also about the things you learn along the way. A poll she posted stated 65% of students learned more outside of class then they had in class. According to the girls on her floor, “College is about the fun, friendships, partying, life experiences and late night talks. And the classes are a small price one has to pay.”
Chapter 6 – The Art of College Management
In Chapter 6, Rebekah takes a look back to when college was being first started. In the eighteenth-century college was for more wealthy men. It was more important to have wealthy friends then to be close with teachers because of post-college life. Intelligence was valued but a student was more based on his standards instead of grades. A student would be ridiculed if he would dare speak in class and getting close to a teacher and talking to a professor was frowned upon. When women and people of color started attending college, they see it as more of a precious opportunity and they worked harder then ever in their classes. None of them joined clubs or sports basically because they were rejected. They were also a lot closer with faculty. Looking at student stereotypes today, many different titles come to mind…much more then there were in the eighteenth-century.
Rebekah also discusses time management for the college student. Being a student, she says, was a time management nightmare compared to her life as being a professor. For freshmen orientation the Dean told the students that time management was very important. He said “You could take 15 class hours a week, 30 outside/homework study hours, get a solid 8 hours of sleep a night and still catch a movie that week.” Which to Rebekah, was still a nightmare because you had something different going on with each class & not only did you have to make a schedule for yourself but you also had to schedule around the professors schedule if you wanted to meet with them. So with all this, it made her research further and how to make the perfect schedule. She found 3 key points at a website stating the ‘native rules’ for the perfect class schedule:
1) Don’t take early classes, defined as “anything before 11 A.M.”
2) Don’t take classes on Friday.
3) Don’t take any class with an unknown professor.
Talking with the students on her floor, they gave her advice saying every schedule should have one easy class, or easy A class, just so you don’t get burnt out. Also not to schedule classes that are close together in time but far away from each other on campus. The students gave her tips on the professors as well. As in “talk to your professors, they’re much more understanding then you think.”
In a survey conducted by the university called “how often do you come to class?” was placed in her class, it made her more interested on the national scale. “According to the 2003 National Survey of Student Engagement, a survey of 437 colleges/universities. Only about 13% of full time students spend more then 25 hours a week preparing for class and about 41% spend less then 10 hours a week.” Which brought her to the conclusion of cheating on homework or in class. She found that more 75% of students have admit to cheating either on a test or on homework. And sometimes students don’t realize they’re actually cheating, especially when working in groups. In a survey she posted on “when is it okay to cheat” more of the answers were ‘when it has absolutely nothing to do with your major.’
In the beginning of this chapter Rebekah discusses an exercise she performs in her anthropology class every year on how accusations can operate a culture. In this exercise, she tells everyone in the classroom that there is a witch in the room and everyone has to write down three possible names of who it could be. After she tallies up the names, she realizes that the names with the most tallies were the ones who participated in class or sat near the front of the room. She didn’t understand these accusations until she was put in the same situation in a class she had taken. She felt uncomfortable sitting near the front and when someone else asked a question she was some what annoyed. Although she thinks a heated class discussion is more appreciated, she would much rather sit back and watch then be a part of it...some times. Curious about what others thought, she decided to ask students on her floor why they don’t participate in class discussion. With examples such as:
-“No one listens to each other anyhow.”
-“Sometimes I don’t talk because I don’t want to appear stupid.”
-“The discussions are too teacher-directed—everyone is just saying what the teacher wants to hear.”
…And so on.
Being a teacher her self, she didn’t know what the students actually talked about before and after class. What she heard other people talking about somewhat astounded her. No one discussed how much they liked a class, the assignment given or the reading criteria for the weekend. She mostly heard complaints about the class or what the assignments were given. Outside of class she realized that mainly what discussions happen in the classroom, stay in the classroom.
To study further, she decided to make a survey for her dorm by posting a question in the women’s bathroom, “What topics do you talk about, late night, with friends?” She received anonymous answers like, “Everything under the sun,” and “What don’t we talk about?” The most frequent tops were relationships, body image, entertainment and drugs and alcohol. She found that less the 5% of topic discussions were about school and career and less then 2% were talked about teachers, but mainly the hot or evil ones. Conclusion: the academic part of college wasn’t all that important. She realized the personal and social world was more interesting to them. College, according to students, is more then how well you do in classes. It’s also about the things you learn along the way. A poll she posted stated 65% of students learned more outside of class then they had in class. According to the girls on her floor, “College is about the fun, friendships, partying, life experiences and late night talks. And the classes are a small price one has to pay.”
Chapter 6 – The Art of College Management
In Chapter 6, Rebekah takes a look back to when college was being first started. In the eighteenth-century college was for more wealthy men. It was more important to have wealthy friends then to be close with teachers because of post-college life. Intelligence was valued but a student was more based on his standards instead of grades. A student would be ridiculed if he would dare speak in class and getting close to a teacher and talking to a professor was frowned upon. When women and people of color started attending college, they see it as more of a precious opportunity and they worked harder then ever in their classes. None of them joined clubs or sports basically because they were rejected. They were also a lot closer with faculty. Looking at student stereotypes today, many different titles come to mind…much more then there were in the eighteenth-century.
Rebekah also discusses time management for the college student. Being a student, she says, was a time management nightmare compared to her life as being a professor. For freshmen orientation the Dean told the students that time management was very important. He said “You could take 15 class hours a week, 30 outside/homework study hours, get a solid 8 hours of sleep a night and still catch a movie that week.” Which to Rebekah, was still a nightmare because you had something different going on with each class & not only did you have to make a schedule for yourself but you also had to schedule around the professors schedule if you wanted to meet with them. So with all this, it made her research further and how to make the perfect schedule. She found 3 key points at a website stating the ‘native rules’ for the perfect class schedule:
1) Don’t take early classes, defined as “anything before 11 A.M.”
2) Don’t take classes on Friday.
3) Don’t take any class with an unknown professor.
Talking with the students on her floor, they gave her advice saying every schedule should have one easy class, or easy A class, just so you don’t get burnt out. Also not to schedule classes that are close together in time but far away from each other on campus. The students gave her tips on the professors as well. As in “talk to your professors, they’re much more understanding then you think.”
In a survey conducted by the university called “how often do you come to class?” was placed in her class, it made her more interested on the national scale. “According to the 2003 National Survey of Student Engagement, a survey of 437 colleges/universities. Only about 13% of full time students spend more then 25 hours a week preparing for class and about 41% spend less then 10 hours a week.” Which brought her to the conclusion of cheating on homework or in class. She found that more 75% of students have admit to cheating either on a test or on homework. And sometimes students don’t realize they’re actually cheating, especially when working in groups. In a survey she posted on “when is it okay to cheat” more of the answers were ‘when it has absolutely nothing to do with your major.’
Saturday, May 10, 2008
Chapters 3 & 4
Chapter 3: Community and Diversity
In chapter 3, our author Rebekah Nathan examines the students over the community and diversity at AnyU. At the beginning of the chapter, Rebakah realizes that instead of wanting to be a part of the community, many of the new students want to keep more to themselves and interact with a few select people. She first observed this practice when the RA set up a bi-weekly activity called "Movie Night." Although many students promised to go, only two students showed up for the first movie, and on the second no one showed up. The RA later canceled "Movie Night." Shorty after these events occurred, the RA scheduled another meeting with students and came up with "rules" to encourage interaction between everyone located in the same hall. Some of these "rules" included:
Rebekah also noted that when students selected friends, it was usually by the same ethnicity or gender. Other reasons may have been because of religious views. An important thing to note is that students were more interested in becoming friends with a small group of people, rather than being open to a lot of new people. Many of the students like to be seen as an individual, and not "conform" or be seen as part of a crowd. While sometimes this isn't a bad thing, it leads to some students feeling alienated.
Chapter 4: As Others See Us
In this chapter Rebekah Nathan interviews a lot of foreign students and tries to get their opinions on American schools and compare them to the schools from the country they originated from. She asked about various subject such as making friends, student life, classwork and instructors. Rebekah interacted with a Japanese student named Toshi, whom she got to know within the first few days of school. She explained she was puzzled by American customs when it came to seeing or meeting each other again. For example, many of us will say "See you soon," but do we really have the intention of speaking with some people "soon"? Toshi explains that normally she would swap phone numbers in Japan for future contact, but here in America when we say "see you soon," these words are empty.
A German student reported that once a young woman asked "How are you?" and when the German student replied he wasn't feeling too well, the young girl switched subjects and pretended that he never mentioned he felt ill. The German student went on to say that she was probably trying to be caring, but in Germany that would have been escalated into a conversation. Foreign students also found it difficult to make new friends among American students, and usually turned to other foreigners. Most foreign students found Americans to be very friendly in comparison to other students in their own country, but our relationships don't seem as meaningful.
The classroom is also very different from what foreign students are used to. Almost all of the foreign students noted that it was much easier to pass a class than they were used to. One student mentioned that American students could easily not study for a final and still get a decent grade for it. A middle-eastern student tell Rebekah that he was surprised American students can leave the classroom whenever they wanted to, because he was never allowed to do so at his old school. They also noted that some instructors asked for student's opinions, and some foreign students didn't know what to say, because they were never really asked for their opinion before.
A lot of the foreign students complained we were very ignorant to other cultures. Toward the end of the chapter, Rebekah Nathan listed what some students from a particular country thought about American students. She listed several different countries, but here's a few examples:
In chapter 3, our author Rebekah Nathan examines the students over the community and diversity at AnyU. At the beginning of the chapter, Rebakah realizes that instead of wanting to be a part of the community, many of the new students want to keep more to themselves and interact with a few select people. She first observed this practice when the RA set up a bi-weekly activity called "Movie Night." Although many students promised to go, only two students showed up for the first movie, and on the second no one showed up. The RA later canceled "Movie Night." Shorty after these events occurred, the RA scheduled another meeting with students and came up with "rules" to encourage interaction between everyone located in the same hall. Some of these "rules" included:
- Say "hi" to new people
- Give warning when flushing the toilet while someone is taking a shower
- Keep doors open while you're relaxing
Rebekah also noted that when students selected friends, it was usually by the same ethnicity or gender. Other reasons may have been because of religious views. An important thing to note is that students were more interested in becoming friends with a small group of people, rather than being open to a lot of new people. Many of the students like to be seen as an individual, and not "conform" or be seen as part of a crowd. While sometimes this isn't a bad thing, it leads to some students feeling alienated.
Chapter 4: As Others See Us
In this chapter Rebekah Nathan interviews a lot of foreign students and tries to get their opinions on American schools and compare them to the schools from the country they originated from. She asked about various subject such as making friends, student life, classwork and instructors. Rebekah interacted with a Japanese student named Toshi, whom she got to know within the first few days of school. She explained she was puzzled by American customs when it came to seeing or meeting each other again. For example, many of us will say "See you soon," but do we really have the intention of speaking with some people "soon"? Toshi explains that normally she would swap phone numbers in Japan for future contact, but here in America when we say "see you soon," these words are empty.
A German student reported that once a young woman asked "How are you?" and when the German student replied he wasn't feeling too well, the young girl switched subjects and pretended that he never mentioned he felt ill. The German student went on to say that she was probably trying to be caring, but in Germany that would have been escalated into a conversation. Foreign students also found it difficult to make new friends among American students, and usually turned to other foreigners. Most foreign students found Americans to be very friendly in comparison to other students in their own country, but our relationships don't seem as meaningful.
The classroom is also very different from what foreign students are used to. Almost all of the foreign students noted that it was much easier to pass a class than they were used to. One student mentioned that American students could easily not study for a final and still get a decent grade for it. A middle-eastern student tell Rebekah that he was surprised American students can leave the classroom whenever they wanted to, because he was never allowed to do so at his old school. They also noted that some instructors asked for student's opinions, and some foreign students didn't know what to say, because they were never really asked for their opinion before.
A lot of the foreign students complained we were very ignorant to other cultures. Toward the end of the chapter, Rebekah Nathan listed what some students from a particular country thought about American students. She listed several different countries, but here's a few examples:
- Germany: "American students are much more ignorant of other countries and cultures. I supposed it's because it's so big, and knowing about California for you is like us knowing about France. It's a neighbor. The U.S. is less dependent on other countries, and maybe that's why they need to know less."
- France: "People here don't know where anything is. For WWII, the teacher had ti bring in a map to show where Germany and England are-- it was incredible!"
- Japan: "Really, they don't know very much about other countries, but maybe it's just because a country like Japan is so far away. Japanese probably don't know much about the Middle East. Sometimes, student keep asking me about ninjas."
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
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