What If? Preparing for Challenging Moments
Students haven’t done the reading. A student is angry about the grade they received. A couple of students cheated on the exam. Now what? This session helps TAs prepare for the unexpected. Participants emerge from the session with strategies for responding constructively to common TA scenarios.
Note:
- Text from all linked material in google docs is also available at the bottom of this page–scroll down to access.
Workshop goals & corresponding materials
1. Identify goals for responding to a challenging moment.
- Read through the “What if scenarios”
- With a colleague, discuss the following questions related to 3-5 of these scenarios:
- What issues are raised in this situation?
- What would you do? Do you have any concerns about this decision?
- How might you prevent this situation?
- Record your responses using the “What if?” response grid.”
2. Develop strategies for meeting those goals.
Read through the following:
With your colleague, reflect on key principles from the “strategies” list that correspond with the scenarios that you & your colleague selected. Consider especially how you will address micro / macroaggressions in your classroom: when a student creates one, and when you create one.
3. Discuss ways to prevent these challenging moments from happening, such as data on why students cheat, and working with your supervising faculty member to establish class norms.
Consider the research on why students cheat.
- Brainstorm ways to work with supervising faculty members to establish classroom norms for discussions of grades, classroom interactions, and academic integrity.
Additional materials (from google docs linked above):
What if? You Can’t Anticipate Everything Classroom Situations: Scenarios for Discussion
1. You are trying to lead a class discussion, but everyone is just sitting there in silence. No one is participating. You tried calling on a student, but he said he hadn’t done the reading.
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2. You are in the middle of a lecture, and most of the students are paying attention. However, there are two students in the back of the room who keep talking to each other and won’t be quiet.
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3. It is the beginning of class, and you have just handed back the first exam. One student raises his hand and argues that the test questions were not like what they did in class. Now the rest of the students are joining in and complaining that the test wasn’t fair, and that you didn’t prepare them well enough.
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4. You are meeting with a student who has missed several classes. You can tell she is very depressed. She explains that she is having problems at home. Furthermore, she says that she is having difficulty adjusting to the university and feels she doesn’t belong here.
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5. It’s a few minutes before class starts and you’re writing on the board, setting up for the first activity. The discussion of a small group of students is loud enough for everyone in the room to hear (other students are waiting quietly for class to start). In their discussion, one student turns to her Asian American peer and says “Wow, your English is so good, you don’t even talk with an accent. Where are you from?” The Asian-American student, looking upset and frustrated, simply says “Maryland” and physically turns away from the group. The other students either don’t understand that she’s upset and disengaged, or look as if they don’t know what to do and pretend it didn’t happen.
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6. During discussion, there is one student who jumps in frequently, talks at length, and ends up dominating the class discussion. While the student does make some valuable points, you have noticed there is little room left for contributions from the rest of the students during discussion.
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7. As you’re grading student participation points for their posts in the course online discussion board, you come across a post from a student ridiculing another student’s answer to the prompt. Since the original post, several students have posted replies – some students have written that the comment was cruel and inappropriate while a few others have written additional insults seemingly intending as jokes.
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8. You are giving an exam. One student whispers to the person next to him, then borrows his calculator. They pass the calculator back and forth. A little later, the student turns around borrows the eraser of the girl behind him. You think he is trying to look at her paper, but you’re not sure.
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9. One of your students tells you that she doesn’t think it’s fair that she has to be in your class. She is paying a lot of money to get an education from a real professor—not a graduate student who has never taught before and doesn’t have a Ph.D.! Moreover, she makes indirect comments about your credibility based on how she perceives your gender, race, religion, nationality, sexuality, or other aspect of your identity.
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10. Write your own difficult situation!
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What if? You Can’t Anticipate Everything Classroom Situations: Response grid
Situation | Issues to Consider | Strategies |
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Strategies for Unexpected and Challenging Situations
Situation #1 | Issues to Consider |
Students don’t participate in class.
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Strategies
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Situation #2 | Issues to Consider |
Disruptive behavior:
Students talking in class, cell phones going off, students watching movies on their laptops, students coming in late. |
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Strategies
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Situation #3 | Issues to Consider |
Students complain that the test or grading practices are unfair. |
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Strategies: (Source: Colorado State University Institute for Learning and Teaching)
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Situation #4 | Issues to Consider |
Student is missing class, potentially has personal issues affecting her ability to succeed |
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Strategies
If you’re the TA, talk with the professor of the course, informing the student you need to do this. Dealing with the student’s emotional needs:
Supporting the student academically:
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Situations #5 & #7 | Issues to Consider |
Student makes provocative or insulting remarks during discussion. (Or class discussion gets heated and unpleasant.) |
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Strategies:
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Situation #6 | Issues to Consider |
One student dominates the discussion. |
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Strategies
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Situation #8 | Issues to Consider |
Suspected cheating. |
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Strategies for prevention
· Include a “statement of ethos” valuing academic honor and scientific integrity in your syllabus (see http://depts.washington.edu/grading/conduct/prevention.html). · Include a handout on cheating and the consequences in your syllabus or course packet. · Discuss academic integrity and the consequences of cheating on the first day of class. · Remind students of your policy on cheating before distributing exams. · If possible, prepare at least two versions of the exam. You can use the same questions, but alter the order. · Walk around the room throughout the exam. Strategies for responding (during class) · Do not assume right away that the student is cheating. Some students may demonstrate nervous behavior during exams. · The student must be allowed to stay and complete the exam. You might continue to observe their behavior; you may also relocate them or the students around them to different areas of the classroom. · Remind all students to keep their eyes on their own paper and refrain from talking. Visit with the student(s) you suspect and quietly remind them individually. Following up · If you are a TA, make sure to talk to your supervising professor. · If you suspect cheating occurred, you may inform the student they are suspected of cheating and provide them with multiple options. · For more guidance, consult:
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Situation #9 | Issues to Consider |
A student challenges your expertise because you’re a grad student; and/or because of your perceived gender, race, ability, sexuality or other social difference.
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Strategies for challenges to your authority as gradate student:
· Try depersonalizing the issue: Explains that it’s normal and very common for graduate students to teach courses here at the UW which is similar to other universities in the U.S. in this regard. Explain why the university considers grad students qualified to teach and what the university believes grad students bring to teaching. You can also briefly share your specific qualifications for teaching the course but you don’t need to justify or explain your ability to teach the course. You’ve been assigned to teach this course based on your qualifications. · Listen to the student and ask probing questions – try to find out if there are underlying issues (upset about grades? Or?) and try to redirect the conversation to that issue (e.g. “Well it seems like your major concern is grading practices, is that right? Well let me explain how I’ve arrived at this grade. If you still have questions about it, you’re welcome to talk to the professor/ my supervisor…” · Share with your students your qualifications to do the teaching you’re doing—the experiences, both academic and life—which contribute to your expertise in the area. Strategies for challenges to your authority based on your perceived identity:(Resource: http://www.crlt.umich.edu/gsis/p4_2%20%20) · Know your own biases and what pushes your buttons. Being self-aware can mitigate the “element of surprise” when challenges occur and might help in the development of constructive strategies in responding. · Be true to yourself and find ways of meeting challenges that reflect your own personal and cultural styles and priorities. For some, that may mean facing challenges directly and pointing out to students the assumptions underlying their responses. For others, this might mean avoiding direct engagement and focusing on other ways (pedagogies) to transform this into a “teachable moment.” (Source: http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/57349/281_ftp.pdf?sequence=1) · If this happens during class, remind people about the ground rules for classroom interaction. Systemic Change Strategies: Attention must be paid to the expectations that students and instructors bring into the diverse classroom. · Advocate for departmental programs for students that help prepare students to anticipate, recognize, and deal with their own and their peers’ often implicit perceptions and biases of instructors of diverse backgrounds. · Advocate for orientation for faculty and TAs that addresses the unique ways in which the social identities of instructors (and students) may play out in the classroom. |
Additional Strategies for situations not included in the handout (if they arise):
Situation | Issues to Consider |
You realize you’ve given wrong information in class. |
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Strategies
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Situation | Issues to Consider |
You can’t get equipment to work properly in class. |
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Strategies
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Situation | Issues to Consider |
A student is upset about his grade and comes to talk to you. You explain that a 2.8 is not a bad grade, but he is convinced that his project deserves at least a 3.5. As you talk, he becomes increasingly agitated and aggressive. |
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Strategies
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Before, During, and After Difficult Classroom Situations
- Make your own expectations clear from the start and lead by example (your syllabus can help with this). It is easier to prevent rather than attempt to correct many potential problems.
- Explain your decision-making processes to the class so they can understand where you are taking them and why.
- Get to know your students (their learning preferences, what they want from your class) and let them help you establish acceptable and unacceptable behaviors in the classroom.
- Don’t lose your cool. Defuse the situation and try to find common ground if you can and lead things back to calmer waters.
- Learn from these situations and try to create/refine appropriate, meaningful responses.
- Ask clarifying questions to have a better understanding of the situation at hand.
What else might you add to this list?
Why Students Cheat—And Why the Reasons Matter
Some instructors assume that students cheat because
- They are bad seeds of low moral character: individual characteristics predict whether students cheat.
- They are fraternity or sorority members, from high-income families, from low-income families, student athletes, or grew up in China: demographics predict whether students cheat.
Yet the research of Donald McCabe & co-authors suggests that contextual factors have a bigger influence on whether students cheat than personal characteristics or demographic information.
Why Students Cheat
Students self-report more cheating …
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In large classes.
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- They feel unseen, unknown. The instructor for a 300-person class doesn’t know their name & can’t pick them out, so they can cheat anonymously.
- They think other students are cheating, & they don’t want to be at a disadvantage. People follow norms, not rules.
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When the stakes are high
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- A test worth 50% of the final grade has a huge impact on the student’s success in the course. The student might not cheat for an assignment worth only 10%.
- The student needs a GPA of 4.0 to—keep her financial aid, get into med school…
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If they think the T.A. isn’t meeting the T.A.’s part of the implied teacher/student contract:
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- When students believe the T.A. is regularly unprepared for class, they may think: why should I do everything right, when he doesn’t bother?
- When the T.A. promises to return papers on Tuesday & doesn’t–& that happens more than once–students may think: she doesn’t meet expectations, I have no obligation to meet mine.
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When they feel they don’t have enough time to do their academic work so have to cut corners.
- Example:: Engineering majors have a lot of requirements and don’t want to cheat in Engineering, but decide that their English or History course matters less.
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When they don’t understand what the big deal is
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- No instructor has ever explained why cheating is an unethical practice.
- What students do on college assignments seems unconnected to their real lives & future professional lives
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Due to situational ethics
- Example:: “I’d never lie or cheat in my personal life, but school & work are different”
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Because of U.S.A. public norms
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- Students see politicians, CEOs, CFOS, & celebrities cheat without consequence & conclude: “that’s the way the world works.”
Why the Reasons Students Cheat Matters
- We can’t prevent or address cheating effectively if we don’t know the context.
- We’re a university: we teach students how and why to practice ethical scholarly practices, rather than reading aloud “that paragraph” from the Student Conduct Code, then threatening reprisals for students who cheat.
What To Do if You Suspect Academic Misconduct
- Who to contact:
http://www.washington.edu/cssc/facultystaff/who-to-contact/ - If the student is in the College of Arts & Sciences, T.A.s can report suspected academic misconduct online: https://www.washington.edu/cssc/facultystaff/report-academic-misconduct/
Sources & Resources
- UW Community Standards & Student Conduct
https://www.washington.edu/cssc/ - McCabe, D.J. 2005. Cheating among college and university students: A North American perspective. International Journal for Educational Integrity. V. 1. N. 1. 1-11.