Lesson Nineteen: Added-Detail and Prepositional Phrase Fragments

I spent about one hour revising today’s slideshow. Previously, I had mixed the main two types of added detail fragments (those containing simple lists, and those containing longer phrases). Separating these examples in the slideshow will provide, I am confident, a much smoother transitions to the quizzes. In the past, students demonstrated some difficulty and confusion in tackling the homework exercises, especially those in the textbook. Once again, I must fault the textbook for incorporating too great a variety of added detail fragments in the entry-level exercise. The book shows no sensitivity to the range of skill levels in the Developmental classroom, nor does it attempt to sequence the exercises from simple to challenging.

Since we have the good fortune of being in the computer lab today, I developed a couple of additional quizzes for the students to take in class. The students enjoy taking the quizzes online as an alternative to writing them by hand (the way we do in the regular classroom). I’ve designed these quizzes to provide a smoother transition from the lecture (theory) to the homework exercises that the students will be required to complete on their own.

I have seen evidence this week (though I knew this in advance) that we will need to build a finer sequence of quizzes on the different types of fragments. You might have noticed some difference in student responses to this week’s quizzes--whose content was of mixed difficulty--as compared to their responses to last week’s carefully sequenced quizzes. The students experienced greatest difficulty managing this week’s quizzes. Still, I suspect they performed better on them this semester than last semester because of my revision of the slideshow; the updated slideshow definitely provided a smoother transition to the homework material.

Please be thinking about specific quizzes that you would like to add to the existing quizzes to provide a better learning experience for the students.