I was excited about exit cards today, but the results were not so exciting!

I asked my students to complete exit cards today as a blog comment.  Not really successful.  The exit card was pretty basic as the material was a review.  I guess the fault of the task was through my instructions as students did not understand the importance of completing the assignment before they left the class.

We had spent a good portion of the class reviewing foreshadow and irony through a worksheet.  We used the worksheet as a whole group discussion medium.  There were definitions of the terms to introduce the activity followed by several statements.  Students were to identify whether each section of the text was foreshadowing, irony or both then explain the decision with support from the text.  Neither of these literary terms are new to this group as we have discussed these terms with this text and with others.

Students are encouraged to use pseudonyms when posting a comment as I am aware of who is posting by their email address.  This means that only myself and the writer truly knows who has written each comment.  This group of students has written many blog comments at this time so this process is not new either.

For example: Juana says that Kino may be wrong.  The pearl may have no value.

This statement is both foreshadowing and irony.  The pearl does end up being of no value to Juana and Kino – foreshadow.  It is an example of irony as the pearl was meant to bring positive change to their family but instead stripped them of everything they had. There were several students who shut down their net-books prior to completing the assignment.   When I asked them where the assignment was, they usually shrugged and replied “I didn’t get it done.”      

This poses a few problems.  These students have already logged off the of the net-book, it will now take upwards of 5 minutes to log back on to the device.  Not really an option at this point as everyone has another class to get to.             

Actually reflecting now, I think I should have forced the issue and had everyone complete it before leaving the room.  This might solve some issues some of the students are having right now with not completing assignments.   I have some strong students who have been very tardy and careless lately and then to add the students who are struggling. I did explain at this time that I must not have been clear with my instructions and extended the time frame – they needed to complete the assignment before the end of the day – noon hour or home work.  They could also complete the assignment on paper- which is always an option.          

There were only three students who completed the assignment with the extra time given.  There were eight students who did not complete the assignment at all. Frustrated, I discussed the problem with the group during the following class.  We reviewed the terms and the examples and discussed ways this assignment could have been completed efficiently.     
 
I hope to see improvement with this in the future. The other problem I am faced with at this point is students preparing for their exam.  We have end of semester exams and I like to give students a taste of an exam before the big one in January.  The exam date and outline is always posted one week ahead. Students are expected to review in small pieces before the exam.  I am hoping this inspires some self reflection on the part of the students.  However, I am hesitant as well.  This activity has me questioning a few things going on right now, but will be using this strategy again soon.