DAJ Survey Part Deux

The week before Spring Break, I asked the students to complete another DAJ survey. I want to write a quick run-down of the results—by no means a scientific analysis. I’m working more with the comments here than the quantitative results.

1. The responses seem to break down to three groups, with the largest being the middle one:

• Those who see the DAJ as practice for critical analysis in general, not just for the class assignments. (4 out of 21)
• Those who see the DAJ as a sometimes useful, though perhaps too demanding of an assignment. (12 out of 21)
• Those who see the DAJ as busy work or the equivalent. (5 out of 21)

2. In the “busywork” responses, two themes emerge, represented by the following quotes:

• “Because they are not graded daily or reviewed enough I do not feel they are beneficial but more of a burden.”
• “I feel the application that is meant to happen in the DAJ happens in class. The DAJ is a good reinforcement, but not necessarily a supplement.”

The first comment seems a direct response to the decision I made not to comment on the DAJ entries in the first collection. I can understand how we could see an assignment that is not responded to as somehow less meaningful than the ones that get comments all over. But that idea suggests that assignments meant to foster invention, understanding, and independence should be submitted to the same assessment lens as those meant to demonstrate learning and mastery.

The second comment, while arguing against itself, represents the theme of students not seeing a pedagogical value to the work. I really don’t know why they don’t see it, and perhaps some have just been frustrated by the assessment measures used in the class in the first place. It seems that if I’m asking students to hone their analytical skills, they have to have a space where they can practice regularly. I guess some might suggest that practice shouldn’t be assessed. But honestly, I think I’ve assessed the journals (and participation) fairly liberally. By that I mean I’ve looked in the journals for completion and attempts at thinking through interesting features of texts. For participation, I’ve taken students own interpretations of each other’s work into consideration and I’ve averaged or cancelled-out the first round of scores. I really do feel like I’ve given the students the benefit of the doubt all the way around.

3. The largest group of responses suggests that students want to be faithful to the assignment, but have too many distractions and obligations to maintain a steady focus on the journals. Most of the respondents say they are caught up but that they do the entries in large chunks (see earlier entry). This group in general says it would benefit from me collecting the journals more often and regularly. I could do that, but it seems doing so would take the journals out of the students’ hands way too much. It could be that I should move the DAJ on-line; not through Blackboard, but on Blogger or myspace or something. I’d like to find a way for students to upload images and texts. I could respond more easily (through the comment sections) and the students would get the sense that I’m watching—which is what many of them seem to want.

I’m feeling at times like a rebel and a hypocrite. While I think I’m offering students a different kind of class, I am policing the students, primarily because I truly believe that what I’m asking them to do will benefit them in the class and beyond. And it’s hard not to have some kind of missionary zeal in what I’m asking them to do. At the same time, this policing only re-establishes my authority in ways I’m not exactly comfortable with. Some students—see some of the comments in the entries below—are pointing out this hypocrisy. Perhaps it’s just a necessary evil—and perhaps we all need to get more comfortable with making the mechanisms of the classroom more overt. I have to admit to being stymied by some of the criticism, a little of which seems like the result of performance anxiety. But other parts of it seem like a real dissatisfaction with the class, and I don’t know how to change that.