Student Evaluations; Year Two

Today I got the results of my year student evaluations. My regular readers (and people I talk to in real life) should already be aware that I love, love, love my kids, in spite of themselves. But this strong love does not blind me to the fact that the middle school age bracket is, perhaps, not the most ideal age range to request unbiased feedback, particularly in the form of students giving feedback to teachers. Some of them over-estimate my power over them. One or two might consider it an excellent opportunity for pay back against the wrongs I so mercilessly forced upon them throughout the year (the most frequent complaints involved my very strict no-bathroom-breaks-without-an-emergency-pass rule (each students gets 2 emergency passes per semester), my no-food-or-drink-except-water rule, and, of course, homework. But in general, when your students are 13-15, student evaluations do much less in the area of evaluating teaching skills and much more in the area of telling you whether your students like you.

But, be that as it may, I am required to have my kids fill out surveys, and so I do. Actually, it's really fun to read the results. Especially since many of my kids are ESL. So here, for your reading pleasure (and mine), are some of my eval responses:

[note the (sometimes snide) comments from the editor in brackets]

What one thing did you like about this class?

My friend

[ah, yes, the ever-popular, "My friend is in my class! Whee!" response. Very relevant to me improving things for next year; thanks for playing]

Learning how to learn better (2x)

Experimenting the things we learned because it worked.

[now THIS is an encouraging reply; YES! The things I teach you in Study Skills DO actually work! I'm so glad at least ONE student came to this conclusion]

Games for review (3x)

It was fun

Time goes by really fast.

[I think this kid must have that disease where you're sleeping with your eyes open and you just lose chunks of time. I was in this class; time did not go that fast from where I was standing...]

Teacher is funny.

[thanks for noticing]

Some of the assignments were interesting and fun.

[of course, the REST of the assignments...]

Learning the life of Jesus

Games

Review games (2x)

The boards

[no, I am not spanking my students. The boards are personal white boards I had our handy-dandy shop teacher make me; we use them for review games and the kids LOVE them]

Games (4x)

The liberty of where to sit.

When we played games or watched movies

She always helped me when I don’t understand.

[this answer makes my heart happy, as does the next one, although I'm a little bit skeptical of that one. Inspired? Really?]

The class inspired me.

We learn new things.

[apparently simple past tense was not among those new things]

The books (3)

What one thing did you not like about this class?

Some times is boring. [

yah, I can't really disagree with this. Sometimes it was boring, indeed. It's hard to be exciting and fun all the time]

Sometimes hard projects

Memory verses

Plays

[note that later on, we get several positive votes to counter-act this vote against plays (aka, review skits]

The teacher

[must've been a really stupid kid that wrote that]

Quizzes, notes, tests, or homework (14x)

You can’t go to the bathroom unless it’s an emergency, and you need a pass.

[snicker, snicker; this is one of the hills I am ready to die on. Seriously, there's no reason for you have to go to the bathroom during our 45 minute class. I can't tell you HOW many times I've argued this point]

Too much writing

[um, it's a writing class...]

She was a nice teacher.

[I HATE it when my teacher is nice; that's always the one thing I don't like about a class! ??]

Reading

Sometimes hard to understand

What did you like most about the teacher?

Her games (3)

Teacher was funny. (2)

She was fair and explained well.

She taught good. Good teacher

The attitude and the way she teached.

[apparently all this "good teaching" didn't focus enough on grammar]

She is nice.(2)

Kind and very responsible

High sense of humor (2x)

Games

She is always happy.

She gave us the plays.

[sounds like a disease]

Her attitude (3x)

The fun homework

[um, dost mine ears deceive me? A student appreciating homework? Be still, my heart!]

She helps when we need it.

She is always happy.

[this is a blatant lie. but I'm glad someone feels this way]

It is funny. (2x) [are you calling me an it?]

She explained our assignments.

She is nice and funny.

Personality

What did you like least about the teacher?

Projects (2x)

Unfairly mad

She is not strict. She needs to send more homework.

[is anyone else laughing at this one?]

Homework (3x)

That it is funny and makes games (?)

[sometimes students are admitted to the school whose English isn't sufficient. I believe we have found one of those students]

Quizzes

I loved EVERYTHING about her.

[I'm suspicious that this is the same kid that I "inspired" earlier. Cause let's be honest; even I don't love EVERYTHING about me]

She won’t let you drink anything that’s not water.

[gasp! The horror of not being allowed to hype up on Coke during class!! Ee-gads!]

Some days she had a little bit of patience.

[Though I am sad that my students noticed this, I was impressed with the communication of the idea by an ESL kid]

That we had to be silent most of the time.

[This response puzzles me. This is not true in any of my classes. All I can think is that I don't let them chat with each other while I lecture, though other teachers allow this; but lecture is always a small portion of my class...hmm...]

When we wrote journals

Cool teacher

[Again, there seems to have been a lack of comprehension, but I'm glad s/he noticed how cool I am. Maybe it's cause I tell them sometimes in class. ie: "Because I'm SO COOL, I'm not giving you homework this weekend..."]

When she made people participate even though we didn’t know the answer.

What did the teacher do to make the class interesting and relevant?

Made us laugh

She uses examples

Games

Variety of activities

She explained everything to us.

Fun stuff, games (3x)

She explains everything in an understanding way.

The class was decorated.

Sometimes trying to act it

Teach well

It was funny.

A variety of activities to understand

Games (5)

Different homework, projects or games

Reviews, movies (2)

Game about the class

[I wonder how they feel about the games...?]

Projects and review games

Fun assignments

Watching the movie after reading the book.

Ah, yes. Yearly student evals. Thanks for enjoying the responses with me again this year. Over-n-out.