University Daily Kansan / Friday, May 5.1989
23
Self-teaching takes motivation
- Continued from p. 15
will be regularly prepared for students' questions.
Cheryl Stallwit, Derby sophomore, is a SIMPL tutor for her second semester. She said the main reason she went to college was a lack of motivation.
"No one is pushing them to 'get things done.' she said. "I think there's a lot of opportunity for stuids to get involved with many resources available to them."
"There's so much help in those classes that it would be easy to get an 'A,'" she said. After students have completed the 12 tests, they can retake any of the tests they passed on time to raise their scores.
Stalvitz said she thought students did not discipline themselves enough to learn the material.
back are two advantages of the SIMPL strategy, Persson said.
"By the standards that we have, if students pass, we feel confident that they have a good grasp of the material." Persson said.
Persson said there was a "pass hard" period. This period allowed students to pass the test one week after their deadline. However, the maximum score awarded to students passing hard is 70 percent.
The idea of the pass hard week is that if students get sick or have to go out of town, they will have the opportunity to take the test after deadline. Person said if students receive a zero, the test deadline, they receive a zero. If students don't pass three tests, their grade is dropped a full letter.
"If they get off to a good start and pass the first two tests on time, the probability of them being successful is very good." Persson said. "But if they procrastinate at the very beginning and get behind from day one, it's difficult for them to pull it back in time." He doesn't experience any success in the course."
Consistency and immediate feed-
Source: KANSAN Report
Persson said that one problem was that many students wanted to take Math 101 when they should have been in Math 902.
"I compare it to someone trying to throw me into a third semester of Russian without having one and two," she said. "It's a no-win situation."
Montgomery said a main concern was the high number of drops and withdrawals from the two courses.
"We have a very high drop rate so by the end of five weeks we have a lot of students who are gone will with come back into the system," he said.
Kim Benson, Syracuse, N.Y., freshman, is one student who dropped the course and will have to return to the system.
Benson said she did not go into the tutoring room often because it was hard to get the amount of assistance she needed from students were also in there for help.
"I didn't like the way it was set up,
because I have a hard time teaching
myself math," she said.
Benson said she did not pass Math 002 in the fall and dropped Math 101 this spring because she was not using the material, thus falling behind.
KANSAN Grant
Enrolled in School 101 next fall, Benson said she was going to hire a tutor because she didn't want to depend on the system to teach her the
Because students have to learn at
the 70 percent level to pass the course. Montgomery said, there was less material students could ignore.
"I think that the students who go through the program and complete the program successfully will come out probably feeling better about
themselfs as far as mathematics is concerned and also being able to do better in succeeding courses," he said.
"There a an enormous number of students who really have this feeling that. If only I had a teacher . . . . .
- Continued from p. 15
SIMPL courses and how they utilize the available learning resources.
Kansan advertising does not cost, it pays
SIMPL's attrition rates causes complex review
Part three will look at the attrition rate in Math 002 and Math 101 and what happens to the students who drop or withdraw. According to the proposal, questions about drops and drops with an existing student are examined students' records.
According to the committee's proposal, "The drops and withdrawals for 101 and 104 (Precalculus Mathematics) will be compared to determine if the high attrition is due to SIU or general to precalculus math."
The fourth part will examine what students like and dislike about the program. In this section, students were interviewed to get their attitudes and opinions. From these interviews, a questionnaire for students currently at the testing center in Strong Hall.
The questionnaire contains 38 class-related questions, which students rank on a scale from one to five. At the end of the questionnaire, students are asked to list three things that would make the course better and what things should be kept the same.
Part five will look at the tutors' and teaching assistants' attitudes about the program. According to the proposal, "Because their attitudes toward SIMPL's procedures and their attitudes toward SIMPL students will inevitably influence their performances, we need to understand what those attitudes are."
Part six will examine how much SIMPL students learn by examining how well they do in Math 115, Calculus I. Students who have completed 115 will be sorted into five groups based on their preceding math course: Math 101, Math 104, community college, high school and
KU students spend over $4 million a month on miscellaneous expenses
other, which will include transfer students.
Charles Himmelberg, chairman of the math department, said students desired a more organized environment.
The proposal stated, "We must make an indirect comparison of the amount of mathematics learned by SIMPL students and the amount learned by traditionally taught students."
The department requested the study to see if the complaints were justifiable and to see if it could justify spending the money.
we can provide students with about everything they get if they were to take a lecture class," Himmelbark said. "The downside is that students want a more structured environment; a situation where they can depend on a teacher to structure the course."
Himmelberg said the SIMPL program was good in that it was less expensive.
"There is a severe budgetary problem," he said. "We really feel like this course should be taught in high school. We're doing the best we can to make up for the deficiency students have when they get here."
Himmelberg said that he had seen statistics that showed the retention rate was about the same with the SIMPL system as it was when the courses were taught in an auditorium setting.
Phil McKnight, committee member and professor of curriculum and instruction, said students have to take the initiative to learn the material under the SIMP1 program. Jennifer Linson, friend of the SIMP1 program, but wished she had the option to attend traditional classes.
"It's so easy to get behind," she said. "I don't think they realize多么 time it takes to learn a test."
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--the KU student population. To that end, he monitors how many papers are picked up from each Kansan drop point every day. On the best days, he finds fewer than 10 papers left from the previous day at each drop point. On the worst, he doesn't find any; that tells Mel that there were students who stopped for a paper and didn't find one.
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"I put on 3500 pounds this morning."
He starts at one end of the campus and works his way to the other. Then he starts all over again to make sure that every Kansan newspaper box stays supplied as long as there's a demand. According to Mel, he's responsible to one boss,'and one boss only;
That's about how many pounds of newspapers Mel Smith loads onto his van every morning in the process of delivering The University Daily Kansan. He hits the ground running shortly after 8 a.m. and in less than 3 hours, he distributes about 15,000 papers.
Mel's job may sound like a lot of driving and heavy lifting to you, but to him it's a commitment. He cares about his job. He cares about the Kansan. And most of all, he cares about doing a good job for you.
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
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