Friday, May 2, 2008

Elementary Class of GTS (Survival)

COD Japanese course begins with 4 sections of JAPAN1101, each of which has 25 students max. Some classes may even begin a little over 25 students causing insufficient number of chairs in class! 2 morning classes (9am and 11am in fall 2008) will be on Monday through Thursday and 2 night classes (5pm and 7pm in fall 2008) will be on either Monday/Wednesday or Tuesday/Thursday. Due to the Honor Seminar facilitating schedule for GTS at night on Tuesday and Thursday, one night class (5pm T/Th) will be taken care of by the well-trained part-time instructor (MA in Japanese education in DePaul University).
Morning classes have usually 'traditional' students (18~22years old) and night classes have various kind of students besides 'traditional' students such as, high school students, full-time professionals, retired challengers, etc. GTS's class gives a quiz (sometimes quizzes!) every class! Contents of the quiz is often announced but not always. Because of the nature of the community college, there have been less writing skill training components in COD Japanes programs. (How many students will need Japanese writing skills in future? Probably not too many!) Those who want to transfer to 4-year institutions may need supplementary writing exercises. Most of the time, not necessary.
How many students survive in the first semester Japanese class and go on to the second semester class? Statistically 50~60%! Some transfer to other schools. Some are beamed up to their Spaceship! Some are satisfied with just one course. Some have scheduling conflicts...... 35~40 students (out of original 100+ students) survived at the end of the Elementary Japanese Course. Out of these students, some still fail at the very end! GTS enjoys every class with students but not plays with numbers. GTS, however, strongly believes that there must be the way for every 'diligent' 'studious' student to get a decent grade even if s/he is not a good test taker.
Though GTS does NOT play with numbers, GTS does help students to somehow get their life moving on. SO NOT the end of the World!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

You are going to kill me by the end of this year, sir!