In math, a student asked a question about infinity last week, and so we spent the rest of the class talking about Cantor and his innovative approach to dealing with infinite sets. One student asked whether the information would be on the test. My standard reply is that if it’s worth spending time on, it’s worth actually learning. One student said I shouldn’t test on such “enrichment” material because doing so would discourage students from asking questions.
Later, I made a review+extensions worksheet on the material. A student emailed me,
Remember when we agreed it was to your disadvantage to put cantor on the test, since it would associate a negative consequence with asking questions?
My response: No, I remember when you *asserted* it would be to my disadvantage…. Anyway, you have this awesomely cool opportunity to learn stuff almost no other junior in the country knows, and you complain about it? I’m pretty sure this is one of the advantages of being at St. John’s, amigo….
But do you not agree it would be to your disadvantage?
Me: Not really. I don’t see why asking questions should be discouraged by knowing you’ll need to learn the material you ask about. I don’t see the difference between having to learn material that’s already in a syllabus and learning other material that might be more interesting.
If I could be assured students would bother to learn stuff over which they weren’t tested, I would do very little testing at all. In fact, the course now has more testing and quizzing than when I first started it *at the students’ request.* They discovered that first semester/year that they would not work steadily for a month without intermediate grades before taking a big test.
I don’t think students understand that while making a test is often fun, grading it rarely is, and it would make my life much easier if we had no tests until the AP. However, most of you would probably get 2’s or worse on it if there had been no external incentive to prepare or to listen in class. I regret that such is the way things go, but with rare exceptions, it seems to be so.