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Last Week of Class, Part II
May. 13th, 2011 11:33 amWell, the glow from that didn't last too long because we got our final grade--and I got only an A-. I'm not happy about this, needless to say but there's not much I can do about it. (Or I should say, will do--I despise grade grubbers.) My midterm grade dragged down my average a bit--I got a B/B+ on it (I don't know for sure because the TA made a mistake grading it--he added incorrectly) which definitely had its affect. But my papers were A and A-, and my class participation was A+++. I'm guessing my final was an A- but only just--it had to have been on the A/A- bubble.
What's annoying is how little class participation apparently matters--there were many incidents where I pointed out stuff he'd never considered, and he seemed genuinely impressed/thoughtful. Examples below:
*The first day of class, he was talking about different justifications for battle tactics--sometimes you do the right (or wrong) thing not because you're adhering to the laws/customs of war, or because you're bad, but because it's most expedient. (Example: Richard I slaughters the garrison at Acre. One tactical explanation might be because he's about to march, and he doesn't want to have to feed/guard an extra 300 prisoners.) He talked about the cherem in Deuteronomy, the charge to "kill them all," and we were suggesting various reasons for that. Root out infidels? Protect yourself? And afterward I said to him--what about a genetic/biological urge, like when new head lions kill all the cubs of the former head lion? He said that had never occurred to him.
*When we first started looking at the Bayeux Tapestry, he was comparing the texts (which had Harold as Guy's prisoner) with the imagery on the Tapestry, which shows Harold on a horse, riding with Guy through a crowd. He saw that as a contradiction--then I suggested "perhaps Guy was trying to humiliate Harold?" He literally stopped talking when I said that, to think it over, and then said he'd never thought of that. (What flashed through my mind was the Palm Sunday hym "In lowly pomp, ride on to die" and Aslan's scourging before the Stone Table in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.)
*I even sent him extra stuff he requested! (He'd talked about a WWII incident which brought to mind a Richard III Mad magazine history thing in a book--I mentioned it to him in an email and he said "you must copy that for me." So I brought it back from my visit home Easter break and scanned & emailed the piece to him.)
And the A- for the first paper annoys me, because all he wrote was:
Well done; I learned a lot. You managed to keep this nicely focused on the question of honor/gender. When we get around to chivalry, you will see better how this fits in! - ajk
And the final exam REALLY annoys me, because of how difficult it was to study for. The midterm was the same way--we had to be prepared to identify one obscure passage out of the 1000+ pages of primary sources that we've studied? Are you mad? Let me tell you, after reading six of them in a row, all of those early Christian apologists start to sound alike! The study session for the final--you could feel the fear in the air. NO ONE knew what "reverse identifications" were supposed to mean. You can't just tell your class "go over everything" with a history exam--we studied thousands of pages. My exams for Roman History and Medieval Intellectual Life, though difficult, were approachable.
Grrr...well, I must console myself by saying:
*My average is still a pure 4.0 (because I had an A+ for Roman History).
*I looked up his reviews on Culpa (a Columbia-only Rate Your Professors kind of thing). Apparently he has a rep for being a tough grader--one reviewer said their class average was a C. Yikes!
*Also, I had an illuminating meeting with him during office hours a few weeks ago. More about that later but I know he likes my work.
I'll just have to chalk this up to: difficult grader. The CULPA review said that he was very stingy with full As. I had a professor at Sweet Briar like that, I got a string of A-minuses on paper after paper. Naturally on the one subject that didn't excite me that much (Their Eyes Were Watching God, not one of my favorite books although it is certainly worth reading)), I finally got a full A! (What's even weirder is that I dreamed I would.)
LORD, am I glad this semester is over! Between this class and non-stop drama-queen nonsense during the whole Macbeth debacle (months of months of drama-queen nonsense, though after that was all resolved, the show ultimately turned out very well), I am completely exhausted. Can't wait for a whole summer in which I can just bake in the sun (while perusing primary sources from Columia's delicious libraries) and play softball.
What's annoying is how little class participation apparently matters--there were many incidents where I pointed out stuff he'd never considered, and he seemed genuinely impressed/thoughtful. Examples below:
*The first day of class, he was talking about different justifications for battle tactics--sometimes you do the right (or wrong) thing not because you're adhering to the laws/customs of war, or because you're bad, but because it's most expedient. (Example: Richard I slaughters the garrison at Acre. One tactical explanation might be because he's about to march, and he doesn't want to have to feed/guard an extra 300 prisoners.) He talked about the cherem in Deuteronomy, the charge to "kill them all," and we were suggesting various reasons for that. Root out infidels? Protect yourself? And afterward I said to him--what about a genetic/biological urge, like when new head lions kill all the cubs of the former head lion? He said that had never occurred to him.
*When we first started looking at the Bayeux Tapestry, he was comparing the texts (which had Harold as Guy's prisoner) with the imagery on the Tapestry, which shows Harold on a horse, riding with Guy through a crowd. He saw that as a contradiction--then I suggested "perhaps Guy was trying to humiliate Harold?" He literally stopped talking when I said that, to think it over, and then said he'd never thought of that. (What flashed through my mind was the Palm Sunday hym "In lowly pomp, ride on to die" and Aslan's scourging before the Stone Table in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.)
*I even sent him extra stuff he requested! (He'd talked about a WWII incident which brought to mind a Richard III Mad magazine history thing in a book--I mentioned it to him in an email and he said "you must copy that for me." So I brought it back from my visit home Easter break and scanned & emailed the piece to him.)
And the A- for the first paper annoys me, because all he wrote was:
Well done; I learned a lot. You managed to keep this nicely focused on the question of honor/gender. When we get around to chivalry, you will see better how this fits in! - ajk
And the final exam REALLY annoys me, because of how difficult it was to study for. The midterm was the same way--we had to be prepared to identify one obscure passage out of the 1000+ pages of primary sources that we've studied? Are you mad? Let me tell you, after reading six of them in a row, all of those early Christian apologists start to sound alike! The study session for the final--you could feel the fear in the air. NO ONE knew what "reverse identifications" were supposed to mean. You can't just tell your class "go over everything" with a history exam--we studied thousands of pages. My exams for Roman History and Medieval Intellectual Life, though difficult, were approachable.
Grrr...well, I must console myself by saying:
*My average is still a pure 4.0 (because I had an A+ for Roman History).
*I looked up his reviews on Culpa (a Columbia-only Rate Your Professors kind of thing). Apparently he has a rep for being a tough grader--one reviewer said their class average was a C. Yikes!
*Also, I had an illuminating meeting with him during office hours a few weeks ago. More about that later but I know he likes my work.
I'll just have to chalk this up to: difficult grader. The CULPA review said that he was very stingy with full As. I had a professor at Sweet Briar like that, I got a string of A-minuses on paper after paper. Naturally on the one subject that didn't excite me that much (Their Eyes Were Watching God, not one of my favorite books although it is certainly worth reading)), I finally got a full A! (What's even weirder is that I dreamed I would.)
LORD, am I glad this semester is over! Between this class and non-stop drama-queen nonsense during the whole Macbeth debacle (months of months of drama-queen nonsense, though after that was all resolved, the show ultimately turned out very well), I am completely exhausted. Can't wait for a whole summer in which I can just bake in the sun (while perusing primary sources from Columia's delicious libraries) and play softball.
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