[etni] more about copying....

From: sara g <saragabai@xxxxxxxxx>
To: ETNI list <etni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 15 Jul 2009 23:11:38 +0300
One of the things we, as educators, try to teach our students is to be
responsible for their own work.

I always tell my students, "if you don't know something, but you copy,
how will i (the teacher) know that you don't know it? how will i know
that you need help in understanding the material?"
I think this is what Jennifer told her weak students - that they
needed to get their own grades. and then they would be able to
improve.

BUT - if a student understands this and is still desperate enough to
cheat - we should try to find out why.

three years ago one of my very bright 10th graders handed in a poem
that he copied off the internet. of course he got 0, he got a low
grade in "hitnahagut" that semester, i spoke to his mother ... and
everything else that needed to be done. but at the same time, i
noticed that he was having a lot of problems writing more than a few
sentences in an essay. he was also having problems in other subjects.

to make a long story short, he did an "ivchun", it turned out that he
had a lot of learning disabilities. with the proper accomodations, he
graduated this year as one of the star pupils in his class (in english
and in other subjects).

I have already written on ETNI about how I copied in my bagrut test in
lashon - in the section where we had to put the correct nikud on given
words. (this was over 40 years ago, so i suppose there is a statute of
limitations on revoking my bagrut certificate, right?) this was the
only time in my life that i ever copied. why did i do it? because i
was undiagnosed ADHD and LD, and also what would be called today an
"olah vatika". there was NO WAY i could have passed that test without
copying - or getting some sort of accommodation. how could I ever
remember how to do the nikud - does a word need a kamatz or a patach?
they sound the same, and i couldn't understand and/or memorize the
different rules. i suppose that today i would be given a mutam test in
lashon. or at least the 10 extra points for an olah vatika.

a few points to think about -
1. today, a student who does the mutam lashon can't study translation.
but i teach translation..
2. the boy i copied from in lashon - copied a few things from me in
the english bagrut. he was also undiagnosed LD. he is now very
successful ... but if we hadn't copied, neither of us would have had a
bagrut.
3. not one of our teachers ever thought that either of us had a
problem. we were just considered lazy... i kept getting "not working
to her full potential" on report cards.

i hope and believe that teachers today are more sensitive to these
problems than my teachers were then.

            sara g


-- 
sara g in israel
sarag@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
saragabai@xxxxxxxxx
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[etni] more about copying....

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