The Cover Page

In my Perception class, students are allowed (actually, encouraged) to decorate the cover page of their lab assignments. My TA and I pick out the best two or three, and I hand those back personally in class. (Last term, the class even clapped for the chosen ones.) If your cover is chosen, you won't have to rummage through the piles of labs to find yours--it's hand-delivered to you in your seat. Like you're in a luxury box at Rexall Place or something. Hey, you earned it!

For those that aren't chosen, however, there still can be a benefit. If your cover really stands out, that makes it a lot easier to find among the sea of plain white cover pages. And, as an extra side benefit, this is an application of the visual attentional phenomenon of popout. Eh? Eh? Clever, huh?

I promised my class this term that I'd post some photos of the best cover pages from last term. Some recent covers were so memorable that I took pictures of them with my phone. My dumbphone. Because it's not a smartphone, see? Plus: I'm mad at my dumb dumbphone. I don't have any pictures to show because my 0.3 megapixel dumbphone took the world's worst pictures of cover pages. No, really--some of them were so blurry even I didn't know what some of them were. Me, photoshopped to look like Han Solo? Actual Halloween candies taped to the cover? No, maybe it's a LOLcat. So, sorry about that.

Anyway, here are some dos and don'ts for cover pages:

• origami: it's just going to get squashed and ripped--forget it
• macaroni: frowned upon--what, are you still in grade 2?
• fusilli: ah, now you're talking--can you make a fusilli Jerry? (no bonus marks for that)
  
• glitter: past TAs have nixed glitter and sequins--glitter glue may be okay, but ask first
  
• $5 bills: no, no, no--the university says that money must not be submitted with assignments (just drop it off at the Provost's office)
  
• drawings/sketches: if you have the time, patience, and ability to actually draw something, well, I've got a soft spot for that

Why aren't you studying?

What I Did on my Christmas holiday

It was, as usual, a busy time these past couple of weeks. At the end of December, I tried to blitz through my marking as quickly as I could, to get final grades submitted before everything shut down for the holidays. Then there was Christmas: made a turkey, the kids went crazy ripping their presents open, and my wife still hasn't opened the iPad I got her (it...scares her).

Then there were a bunch of furlough days, when I was not supposed to be working. So, on my furlough days, I did some work. Waitwaitwait--nothing related to the University (of course), but my contract work for Nelson Education. I'm a consultant for their higher education division, working on the websites for their Canadian (or "Canadianized") psychology textbooks. (Full disclosure: yes, I do get paid for this. And yes, I do use Nelson textbooks in two of my classes But I do not get a single cent in kickbacks for choosing their textbooks. And the textbooks I've chosen are not Canadian ones, so my consulting work has nothing to do with those books.)

In between furlough days, I also started planning out a research study. Because of my good relationship with Nelson, I got a very nice offer from them. Susan, the publisher's local representative (we call 'em "book reps"), and her manager offered to give students in my perception course free access to their integrated online etextbook/study guide/online lab called CengageNOW. It's a bit surprising to hear about publishers giving anything away...it seems to good to be true. There is one catch: they're not doing this to show that they really are a sweet, generous, kitten-loving company; they're doing this to get some direct feedback from students on CengageNOW. And there's another catch: they only had 60 free access codes to give away. We decided that the fairest way to distribute them in my class of 214 students was random selection. Those are pretty good odds: a 28% chance of getting a free textbook. You're welcome! Oh, and my research part? I don't want to say too much, so let me just say that I want to see how well students do. That's all for now.

I also let myself have a little fun. A favourite activity that my girls like to do is bake pretzels from scratch. Because they're only 6 and 2 years old, that means I have to do most of the work, while they just try to roll out a few balls of dough and sprinkle way too much salt on them. But that's OK--I don't mind eating these misshapen, overly salted pretzels because they're made with love (sniff). Um, also, the pretzels taste really good after you've been outside shoveling a mountain of snow for (I kid you not) three hours. Oh, I had help--from a 6-year-old and a 2-year-old armed with a princess snow shovel and a Dora snow shovel, respectively. (As you can see from the picture above, I'm rockin' the snowblower while my crew takes yet another coffee break.)

Please tell me your holiday was more exciting than this. Please!

Why aren't you studying?

The Furlough Days

Today is the first of a bunch of "furlough days" at the UofA. So I will be trying really hard to not do any work, to show solidarity with my colleagues. Um, even though I already checked (and answered) email. And then I, er, started writing this blog entry. But from this point on, I will not be doing any course prep for next term, or answering email, or even--

Wait, scratch that. This isn't about having "days off" without pay. I can't just just take six days off and do no prep work at all--there's no way I'd be ready for the first day of class. It's about taking a pay cut, to help bail the University out of the great big, deep hole the administration dug, getting caught with their pants down with bad investments in the Great Recession. (Sorry about the mixed metaphor. Meh, I don't care--who's reading this anyway? Besides my mom.)

Anyway, I'll just pretend that I'm not doing any work. If you don't get an answer to your email, here are some classic posts that answer some FAQs:

• Need some help getting into my classes, which are all currently full? I've got an answer for you.
  
• Do you want to get your final grade "bumped up"? Just read this post from last year.

Why aren't you studying? (Like, for next term...)

The Eggnog Latte

Ah, a nonfat eggnog latte. It's a small indulgence that I allow myself every December after classes end. The caffeine keeps me going, because my kids are still conspiring to deprive me of sleep. The latte also helps get me into the holiday frame of mind--which is difficult, because I'm surrounded by so many term papers.

Don't get me wrong, I like these term papers. They're pretty interesting. But marking them takes up a huge lot of time. I do my best to prepare as much as I can beforehand: final exams ready to go, syllabi for next term completed, Christmas shopping done. I don't check my personal email, I don't read the newspaper, I don't watch TV. About the only thing that gets in my way is: snow. It does have to be shoveled. (Of course, it's snowed now for 5 days in a row, grr!)

What I'm trying to avoid is procrastination. I remember being a student and, after classes ended, getting the sudden and overwhelming urge to arrange all my CDs in alphabetical order. It's got to be done, right? Might as well do it now. Psychology Today has a list of 10 things to know about procrastination that you might want to check out--after you're done studying.

Why aren't you studying?
(I know, I know, you're going to ask "why aren't you marking?" Right? Someone else beat you to it. I beat you to it, too. It is OK to take a break--just as long as it doesn't last all day.)

The Copyright

You've heard about the expiration of the UofA's Access Copyright licence, right? It's been on ExpressNews and The Gateway, ya know. OK, here's the upshot, in bullet points (just like in class!)

• new copyright law in the works (Bill C-32: The Copyright Modernization Act)
• new Access Copyright licence: would require UofA to pay $45/student
• likely to be passed on to students
• current licence expires 12/31/2010what happens 1/1/2011?

There are a couple of important implications of all this. One affects coursepacks. As an instructor, I am not allowed to create a coursepack unless the UofA has a licence. (I could track down each copyright holder and negotiate with each directly, but, yeah, that's not going to happen. It's enough hassle to fill out the Access Copyright Log every term.) In January, I teach two classes that don't have textbooks--just coursepacks. So how will that work? In a clever bit of trickery, the coursepacks will actually be printed/published/assembled in 2010, so they are covered under the about-to-expire licence. Ha-HA! Take that, Access Copyright.

The second change is that required textbooks will not be available on reserve. A couple of key words in that last sentence are "required" and "reserve." Any recommended textbooks can remain on reserve. But if a textbook is required, it has to go on the regular shelves (or it will be sent back to whomever lent it to the library in the first place), so you can't take it out for an hour at a time to photocopy it, you naughty students! You can, however, er, take it out for three weeks and photocopy it. I mean, read it. In a typical 14-week class, though, only five students would be able to borrow the book. If students are fast "readers," more students could have access to the book, but even if it takes one day to "read" the book, only about 100 students could take it out. And my class is bigger than that.

Due to popular demand, I've put copies of textbooks for my courses on reserve. This term, it's been especially important for my perception course (PSYCO 267). I've assigned "Virtual Labs" that run off a CD-ROM that comes with every copy of the textbook. But if you bought the book used, it is probably missing the CD--and you can't buy the CD by itself. (You could buy the eTextbook which has access to the labs online, but that still costs about $70.)

In a stroke of good luck, however, I am onto a special opportunity provided by Nelson Education, the Canadian publisher of that book. An opportunity that could potentially save 60 PSYCO 267 students in my class next term quite a bit of money. And I might get the opportunity to do a study I've wanted to do for a long time, but on a much bigger scale than I ever hoped. But, I've probably said too much already...

Why aren't you studying?

The Gay Bisanz Memorial Turkey Drive

Dr Gay Bisanz taught me developmental psychology as an undergraduate. It wasn't a required course, but I took it anyway--I wanted to take as many psych courses as I could. It was a good choice. Sure, she taught me specific things about how people grow and develop, and general general things about science, psychology, critical thinking--but she also showed me the importance of giving back to your community. Sadly, Gay Bisanz died of cancer on June 1, 2005.

Gay started the Department of Psychology's now-famous Turkey Drive. People in the Department--academic staff, support staff, post-docs, students, and more--give money that is directed to CBC Edmonton's Turkey Drive for the Food Bank. But beyond that, some people bake cookies for sale, make jewelry, and donate items for raffle--there are a lot of very creative ways to part people with their money. Some instructors have volunteered to catch a pie with their face if their class contributes more money than any other class.

Last year, a total of $6,531.91 was collected. This year, the Turkey Drive goes from November 24 to December 8. Stop by the Psychology General Office (BS P-217) and buy a cookie, or a raffle ticket for one of the really nice gift baskets up for grabs. (The 2-for-$1 white chocolate and macadamia nut cookies are my personal weakness.)

Why aren't you studying?

The Exam Statistics: The Q Score

This is my final post on the topic of exam statistics. Previously, I described my use of the mean, difficulty scores, and point-biserial correlation. This time: the dreaded Q score. (Just to clarify: I'm not describing the other "Q Score", which represents the public's familiarity with--and appeal of--a person, product, company, or television show. That's not dreaded at all.)

The dreaded Q score is not a statistic that I regularly receive with all my other exam stats. I have to put in a special request. It's extra work for the people over at TS&QS, which means there's an additional cost that must be paid by the Department of Psychology. TS&QS has to go into their database of exam results for my class and perform a statistical comparison between two (or more) given exams.

Here's where the dread comes in: Why would I want to statistically compare two (or more) students' exams? If I suspect them of cheating, that's why. Sometimes, the cheating is blatantly obvious. The cameras in the classrooms (you know about those, right?) may clearly show one person peering over at the exam of another. Other times, it's not so obvious. Why is that guy jittering in his seat, looking everywhere except at his exam? Maybe he's nervous, or has exam anxiety. Why is that girl acting squirrelly, shifting her eyes back and forth? Maybe she drank too much coffee, has caffeine overload, and now really, really has to pee. Whatever the case, the exam proctors will not interrupt any student taking the exam. Nope. We'll just let you do what you do. If that's cheating, so be it.

However, at the end of the exam, the answer sheets from any suspicious students are set aside. (Think you can fool us by not leaving at the same time, or handing in your exams to different proctors? Tsk. You don't know how many eyes are watching, do you?) Those answer sheets will be analyzed, and I will get the dreaded Q score. I don't want to say too much about how it works, so suffice it to say that it gives a probability that cheating has occurred, compared to chance. Maybe I'll write more about how I have to deal with cheating in another post, but for now, let's just say it involves a lot of dread.

Although I have caught several cheaters over the years, I'm glad I've never had to deal with anything like what happened in Professor Richard Quinn's class recently. Yeesh.

(Cartoon by Frank Cammuso. It's important to give credit where credit is due. Otherwise, it's like, um...cheating.)

Why aren't you studying?

The Mouse

That's right, a mouse. I've got a mouse in my office. Well, it's probably not here full-time, but it does drop in and visit. Speaking of dropping, that's what's in the photo: droppings. See the two little black sesame-seed looking things? Mouse poop. On my desk. (Describing it with a food metaphor is kinda making me queasy. Bleah.)

A couple of weeks ago, there was a knock at my door. A couple of jolly fellows were putting mouse traps in everyone's offices in the Psychology wing. I told them I hadn't seen any mice, but they were quick to point out two little black grains of rice (bleah) on the floor. They didn't clean up the poop.

At this point, the lightbulb went off in my head. Oh, yeah. The chocolate bar that I left on my side table the other day. I came in to find it half eaten. I wasn't pleased as I threw the remainder away (Swiss dark chocolate!)--I figured the cleaning staff had seen it an gotten a bit hungry. Nope. Those must've been mouse teeth marks.

OK, so now: mouse trap. The problem is that it hasn't been working. I come into my office in the morning and regularly find more poops. On my desk. Of course you know, this means war! I don't want to get hantavirus. So yesterday I went out and got a couple of better mousetraps, put some cheese in them (this is what cartoons have taught me: mice love cheese), turned out the lights and left for the day. Heh-heh-heh, I laughed menacingly.

Today I opened the door to my office hesitantly. What would I find? Answer: nothing. OK, not exactly nothing. No mouse. No cheese. Yup, the l'il sucker ripped off my cheese. But at least the mouse traps were still there. This means I'm now helpfully feeding the mouse that's running around on the second floor. Dr Snyder, whose office is just down the hall, recently saw it looking at him from his bookshelf, but he wasn't able to catch it. In my office, however, the mouse prefers my desk. Evidence? Another poop. Probably left right after polishing off those two bits of cheese. Can a mouse be impertinent?

I suppose there's some joke in here somewhere about a psychologist and a mouse, but I'm drawing a blank. Do you know any good ones?

Why aren't you studying?

The Exam Statistics: The Point Biserial Correlation

I'm continuing my explanation of the reams of statistics I get about multiple choice exams. Last time, I explained exam item difficulty scores. (Fascinating, no?) This time: point biserial correlation coefficient, or "rpb". That is, "r" for the correlation coefficient (why, oh why is it the letter r?) and "pb" to specify that it's the point biserial and not some other kind of correlation. Like, um, some other kind.

If I've constructed a good exam item, it should be neither too hard nor too easy. It should also differentiate among students. But I can't tell how well it does that just by looking at the difficulty score. Instead, there's a more complex measure, the rpb. In general, I need a correlation index for a categorical variable with a continuous variable. More specifically, I want to correlate the categorical variable of a test item (i.e., whether a student answered the test item correctly or incorrectly), with the continuous variable of the student's percent score on the examination. Got that? I didn't think so.

Let me try again. Student A did well on the exam, getting 90% correct. Student B did not do so well, getting only 50%. If I look at any given exam question, in general, student A should be more likely to answer it correctly than student B. This is not the same as difficulty, because I'm not simply looking at what proportion of the class answered the question correctly. I'm correlating each student's score with their performance on each question. The key to all this is the word "should" in the sentence above.

If an exam item is poorly constructed for whatever reason, good students may do worse on it than students who did worse on the exam. That is, the better you are overall, the less likely you are to answer it correctly. That is not supposed to happen. The rpb gives me this information for each question on the exam. Experts in exam construction recommend that the rpb should range from 0.30 to 1.00. Anything question getting a rpb lower than 0.30 means that I will take a look at it and try to figure out why that's happening.

And if the rpb is negative, well...it's a negative correlation. That's the worst case I described: better students are doing worse answering this question; and poorer students are doing well. I won't use any questions getting a negative rpb again unless I can figure out why it's happening. Maybe I can tweak the question, maybe I have to rewrite it to ask about the same knowledge in a different way. Or maybe I'll just give up entirely, go and get a coffee, and check out some LOLcats.

Why aren't you studying?

The Exam Statistics: The Difficulty

In my last post, I discussed how I analyze the mean in my (multiple choice) exams. This time, I'm going to look at difficulty. This is not directly related to the mean. Huh? Isn't it the case that, the more difficult the exam, the lower the mean? Well, yes. But that's not the "difficulty" I'm writing about.

Among all the pages and pages of results I get from Test Scoring & Questionnaire Services is the "DIF" score or difficulty of each question. It's actually the proportion of the class who answered that question correctly. DIF=1.000 means that everyone got it right, but DIF=0.250 means that only 25% of the class did. But it's not really "difficulty," is it? If a question is really difficult, fewer people will answer it correctly and the number should decrease. So, really, it shouldn't be called difficulty, it should be called easiness. But, look, it's just called "difficulty," OK?

You might be thinking that I want everyone to answer every question correctly, right? Um, sorry to rain on your ice cream, but...no. It's really, really unlikely that everyone was able to learn absolutely everything in the course, and was also able to remember and apply that knowledge on an exam perfectly correctly for every question. What an exam should do is assess each student's learning of the material, and provide some way of differentiating among all students. If all questions are answered correctly, the exam itself has failed.

I went to a seminar last year at which a renowned expert in testing and exam question construction gave a talk. After it was over, I talked to him about DIF scores--specifically, what should they be? The general rule is that an exam question is doing a good job of differentiating among students if it's at least 0.300. That is, at least 30% of the class should be getting each question correct. There is no guideline for the upper end, but at another seminar, I heard an instructor say that she liked to put at least one DIF=1.000 question on each exam as a confidence booster. Yup, a gimme. I thought that was a pretty nice thing to do, so I try to include at least one high DIF question on every one of my exams, too.

So difficulty is related to the mean in that, the higher the DIF, the higher the mean on the exam overall. The mean is good for evaluating the overall performance of the class. But I also need to evaluate the questions on my exams, so I get the DIF score for each one. If the DIF is too low, the question either gets killed (*snff*), or rewritten to clarify it. Oh, and if I ever get DIF=0.000, it means I've keyed in an incorrect answer. Ooops.

Why aren't you studying?

The Exam Statistics: The Mean

With the first round of (multiple-choice) midterms over, I'm now swimming in data. I want to tell you about some of the stats I go through to assess and improve my exams. Unfortunately, I'm too late to celebrate (the first) World Statistics Day. But I don't feel too bad. At least statistics has a day. It's not like there's a "Psychology Month" or anything. Oh, look--yes there is. And I'm late for that, too. Moving on...

This installment is about the (arithmetic) mean, or, if you insist, the "average." I post the class mean of every exam because you demanded it! Really, though--what use is it to you? For classes that don't grade on the curve, you don't need to know the mean (or standard deviation) to determine your absolute standing in the class. Just take your percentage correct, and see what grade that corresponds to in the syllabus. Right?

Yes, that's important. But don't you want to know how everyone else did, too? Sure you do. "Did everyone think that exam was a killer, or just me?" We want to compare ourselves to other people. Some students even want to know what the top score was. "Did anyone get 100%?" "Am I the best in the class?"

The mean also serves another purpose, when there are multiple forms of an exam. In larger classes, multiple forms of an exam are used to discourage cheating (or at least, to make it more difficult). Typically, there is one form that has the questions arranged in order of topics (e.g., questions based on the first lecture and textbook chapter first, followed by questions on the second lecture and chapter, etc.). The other forms will have the questions in a random order. Are students who get the scrambled forms at a disadvantage? Or, put another way, is there a benefit to answering questions in a sequence that reflects the arrangement of the learning materials? If so, that wouldn't be fair, would it?

The data from every exam includes the means from each form. They are usually a little bit different. But is that difference a fluke, or is it due to the ordering of questions? Hmm, sound like a job for...statistics! The data also includes the results of an ANOVA (analysis of variance) that compares the means to each other. That is, are any differences statistically significant? The answer: No. I've never had a difference at p < 0.01 or even p < 0.05. That means any differences are small; they are due to chance.

The bottom line: It doesn't matter which form you get. Isn't science cool?

Why aren't you studying?

The Coffee

When I went to high school, it wasn't cool to drink coffee. Coffee was dark, scary, and bitter. Sure, my family would have Kaffeezeit ("coffee time") on the weekends, but I was just in it for the Kuchen.

When I started university, I drank a cup of tea with milk and sugar every single morning. Even though I had a lot of 8:00 classes (because they were good classes only offered at that time, that's why), one cup of English breakfast tea was all the caffeine I needed. Some of my friends became desperate around exam time, and dipped into the go-juice. It was hilarious to watch as the normally non-caffeine consumers' eyes got really big after having a big cuppa joe. Then, they'd study like the dickens. This proved that coffee was a dangerous, dangerous substance.

Then, I started graduate school. Sure, getting a graduate degree is pretty demanding. Maybe I'd have an extra cup of tea once in a while. But the sheer, stark terror of almost having to go into the Real World was enough stimulus for me--no coffee, thanks. Maybe just a bit more sugar.

Then, one term I was Dr. Dawson's teaching assistant. He made me come to the class (I dunno, to learn something I guess); because he was on my supervisory committee, it's not like I could say no or anything. The first day of class, I met him at his office and we went to the class together. But not before he poured himself a cup of freshly made French-pressed coffee. And then he insisted on giving me a cup. It's not like I could say no or anything. The worst thing was that the coffee was: black. As black as night. No milk, and certainly no sugar (isn't that freebasing?). After that, I brought my own mug and poured sugar into it first--milk was too conspicuous.

Now, I'm neither a connoisseur (yes, I drink instant--please forgive me), nor a coffee-hound. Usually, I get by with only one cup of coffee. But if I've had a bad sleep (which does happen), you'll see me toting a cup from one of the fine local purveyors. Not my usual mug-o-water; not tea; not vodka. I have gone over to the dark side. With lots of milk and sugar.

Why aren't you studying?

The Comics

Hey, who doesn't love comics? Not me! No, I don't not love comics. Um. Here are some of my favourite web comics.

PhD Comics is about grad.students who seem to have a problem finishing their theses. (Want to know how to drive a grad.student insane? Ask her if she's finished her thesis yet. Hee!) Even if you're not a grad.student, it's still pretty funny, poking fun at all kinds of academic matters. (This one made me LOL.) There are 3 comics per week (Mon/Wed/Fri).

xkcd isn't an abbreviation or acronym--it's just the title of a webcomic, aimed at people who have the ability to think. This rules out a lot of people who just won't "get it." Some gags require knowledge of science. Gasp! Conveniently comes out 2 times per week (Tues/Thurs).

Lab Bratz isn't just for lab ratz (er, rats). Has gags on academia, but doesn't require a degree to get the joke. Only 1 per month.

Do you have any favourite web comics? (To A.K.: Yes, I know about Salad Fingers, which is technically a cartoon. And yes, I read your blog!)

Why aren't you studying?

What I Did on my Summer Vacation (2010 version)

Went to Sylvan Lake, like last year. (Well, like every year, really.) Pros: No vehicle breakdowns this time. Cons: Smoke. *cough cough* The smoke drifting in from the forest fires in BC was so bad, it actually turned a sunny day into a cloudy one.

Next: Calgary. Yes, an Edmontonian can go to Calgary without being afraid to admit it. It's just important to leave Calgary again. The trip to the zoo was especially for my youngest daughter, so she could see real “tigas,” “elfints” and “zeebas”. Her big sister liked the playground best--no manure smell. As for me, well, I just went for the food.

I had my 25th high school reunion. It was a mindbending blast from the past, catching up with people I haven’t seen since high school. Others (like Eric in the picture), I lost touch with in the middle of undergrad years at university. Unfortunately, some old friends couldn’t make it to the get-togethers, but I was able to get in touch with them again via Facebook. (Yay, Facebook! Have you heard about it yet?)

Took my wife to the Lady Gaga concert. Had pretty lousy seats, but they were better than the ones that Calgary got. Bazinga! (Her tour didn't,um, stop in Calgary.) If you look really closely at the crappy photo I took using my crappy cell phone, you can see two blobs. One is Gaga, the other is the beautiful tongue of fire rising from her piano as she sang Speechless. Yes, I need a new cell phone.

Do I have to list all the Edmonton festivals I went to? Nah. You know all about those, right?

Beyond that, hmm, let's see: the usual collection of birthday parties, days in the park, BBQs with friends. Got an MRI on my knee. Woot! Sadly, it didn't leave me with any super powers.

And work, of course. There's always work (so, it wasn't completely a summer vacation, was it?). Instead of writing new lectures, I decided to improve the ones I've got. Although--I did come up with a new mini-lecture, by special request and...well, that's another blog entry.

Now, I've got a couple of questions: What did you do on your summer vacation?

Why aren't you studying?

The Awards: 3

The Department of Psychology's Teaching Honour Roll just came out for Winter, 2010. I'm happy to say that I (*modestly*) was placed on the Honour Roll with Distinction for all three of my courses. Woot! I also have to mention that 75% of instructors who taught in that term also got on the Honour Roll. Nice going, Department of Psychology colleagues! (But why the pic of the FIFA World Cup Trophy? Because...well, because. The World Cup is on right now. That's why.)

I also had the honour of winning two (!) of the inaugural Tolman Undergraduate Teaching Awards, or TUTAs. (Just say that out loud: toot-ahs, toot-ahs. Fun!) The two I won were:

• “The adoption of fake accents for educational purposes” (blimey!) and
  
• “Assignment most likely to results in a missing-persons report” (because of this assignment--but I've never lost a student...yet)
  

Why are they named for Tolman? He never studied/taught/researched at the UofA. It was the choice of the Associate Chair of the Department--she's got this quote in her email sig:

"Since all the sciences, and especially psychology, are still immersed in such tremendous realms of the uncertain and the unknown, the best that any individual scientist, especially any psychologist, can do seems to be to follow his own gleam and his own bent, however inadequate they may be. In the end, the only sure criterion is to have fun." (E. C. Tolman, 1959)

So, yeah, the "TUTAs" are tongue-in-cheek awards. But I'm still gonna frame them and hang them up somewhere. Maybe in my Awards Room. That's a good place for them. As soon as I get an Awards Room.

Finally, by popular demand, here are some selected comments from my courses in the Winter, 2010 term, followed up by the every-popular snarky responses:

Intro psych:

"[I] pay to be taught, not to read a textbook"
"Textbook reading should NOT be mandatory for exams"

(Why no love for the textbook? You rated it 4.1/5, which is not spectacular, but not bad either. Like it or not, you're going to have to read in university.)

"exam...focuses too much on [lecture] notes"
"Exam questions need to be better constructed & peer-reviewed"

(OK, I admit I do have to work on my exam questions. But peer-review? And usually, I get criticized for having too few exam questions from my lectures.)

"notes are too straight forward, you can't understand"

(Er, what? I should make them less straightforward...so they are more understandable?)

Perception:

"not very helpful out of class"

(That's right: I'm not going to explain some theory when you run into me at West Edmonton Mall.)

"Your blog was very interesting & insightful"

(Thank you. That's a very interesting and insightful comment.)

"I missed a day and could not get the notes from the missed class"

(Did you ask me? All you have to do is ask me.)

"kept the class interested and attentive"
"tedious...class was very boring"
"repetitive...maybe try new ways of presenting information"

(What if you three were all trapped in an elevator for 41 hours?)

"I had no time to read [the textbook] since other psych courses also require textbook readings"

(OK, so it's the fault of those other courses. Those darn profs, making you read textbooks. Egad.)

Advanced Perception:

"would be nice to have a real textbook"
"readings were well chosen and definitely preferable to a textbook"

(There are no appropriate textbooks for a 300-level perception course. But that's OK, because you like the readings I chose.)

"quizzes were annoying...but in the end, I was thankful for them--it engages me & forced me to read [the assigned readings]"
"[quizzes] helped solidify my understanding of the main topics &...ensured I stayed up to date with the readings! It also taught me a useful study habit."

(See? Toldja.)

"I often left the class feeling as though he was talking down to us"
"was difficult to approach and was very short with me. I find him extremely snobby and condescending"

(I don't know how I screwed that up. I apologize, and I will honestly try to adjust my tone in the future.)

"forced me to work harder and think longer about the subjects covered" [in a positive context]

(Yeah, sorry about all that work and thinking.)

Why aren't you studying?

Where are they now?

For students who have completed their degrees, it's a time of endings--and of new beginnings. It makes me think of former students who've entered the "real world". I don't hear from many, but I have kept in touch with a few. Here's what's going on with them...

Colin got his Master's degree in counseling psychology and is working toward his official accreditation (you have to do a few hundred hours of work under the supervision of an accredited counseling psychologist, then pass some tests--piece of cake, eh? :-). He didn't go into graduate school right after his undergrad, but ventured into the real world first. It can be tough to go back to school after being away, but Colin showed that it is possible. The picture here was taken at a psychology conference last year. (Yup, he's standing next to esteemed psychologist Philip Zimbardo. How cool is that?) I wrote Colin a letter of reference for graduate school. He seems to think that helped him get in, but really, it was his own abilities that did it. (I have a parallel--a person who was a graduate student at the time asked me to write some software to help her with her research. That led me into doing research as an undergraduate. Without that experience, I wouldn't have gotten into graduate school and I wouldn't be where I am today. Thanks again, Linda!)

I also keep in touch with Sherry. She was a student in the first course I taught all by myself. Despite that experience (ha!) she took more of my courses and even was even my teaching assistant for a few courses. I encouraged her to go to grad.school, and she did. She's got a Master's degree, during which she got to work with actual astronauts. Again: astronauts. How cool is that? Now she manages grants for a research group here at the UofA. She deals with budgets in the millions of dollars.

Stephanie was a standout student, from the first course of mine she suffered through (ha!). She then signed up to suffer through a few more, totally shredding the courses, and getting the top grade. (Doing that definitely gets my attention and helps me to remember you.) Later, she also worked as my TA a few times--one of the best ever! I was happy to write her a reference letter for graduate school. She also took counseling psychology--one of the most difficult academic programs to get into, period. After working outside the city for a while, she's back in Edmonton again. She gets to apply her knowledge of psychology to help actual people. How cool is that?

I hope you get to use your psychology education out in the real world someday, too. If you do, drop me a line!

Why aren't you studying?

Update 8/19/2010: Marc Roy, a former TA in Advanced Perception in the mid-90s, dropped me a line. I wrote him a letter of reference, too. He entered the Clinical Neuroscience program at Simon Fraser University, earning a Master's degree. He eventually returned to Alberta to work at the Halvar Johnson Centre for Brain Injury in Ponoka, and has recently started a private practice in Red Deer. He also taught an Environmental Psychology course at Canadian University College, which is spitting distance from where I used to live (Lacombe, Alberta). And he's got two kids. Wow, great, Marc!

The Moratorium

Perception (PSYCO 267) was the first course I ever taught all by myself. That was in Spring, 1995. I went back and dug up my lecture notes from that first course. (Word processor used: Ami Pro. Operating system used: Windows 3.1. I'm gettin' all teary-eyed. >snff<) Then I compared those numbers to the current version of my lecture notes for that course (Word processor used: Word 2007. Operating system used: Windows XP. Not teary-eyed there at all.)

Number of assigned readings:

• 1995: 12 chapters
• 2010: 14 chapters + 1 appendix

Number of words in lecture notes:

• 1995: 11,958
• 2010: 28,580

It's not easy to do a direct comparison between these numbers. For example, I'm using a different textbook now than I was back in '95. In fact, my current textbook has 459 pages, the old one had 747. But look at the difference in the amount of lecture material: it's more than doubled. How (and why) can that possibly be?

First, back in 1995, I presented my notes using an overhead projector. I remember fumbling a lot with transparencies, switching lecture notes with colour pictures and figures on separate sheets. Now, almost everything is contained in PowerPoint. That's the second reason. Using PowerPoint allows me to go a lot faster through material, partly because there's no more fumbling, just clicking. But there are two further reasons underlying my increase in speed. 1. The Internet. I distinctly remember having to pause frequently to allow students to write down my long, wordy, overly long, dense explanations and definitions--and everything else. I didn't start putting my lecture notes online until the next year. In 1995, few students had Internet access. (I also don't remember getting a single email from a student.)

2. I'm better now. Um, I mean I'm a better instructor now than I was back then--a grad.student teaching only my second course ever. I'm sure my explanations were relatively poor, and I do remember having to answer quite a few questions from students in class. I like to think that now--knowing what concepts are difficult to understand--I can provide much better and more efficient explanations.

Still, the bottom line is: There is more in my course now than ever before. You might think this is unfair, especially compared to those students who had less to learn in the 90s. Or, you might be happy that you're getting as much as possible out of a course that is loaded with lots of relevant, contemporary research and theory. I like to think it's the latter case.

There are hundreds (thousands?) of papers, posters, articles, and books published and presented on topics in psychology every year. (A $2 reward to the first person to give me a reliable estimate of how many articles were published on psychological topics in 2009). I would not be doing the best possible job if I didn't stay current in the areas I teach: human factors & ergonomics, perception, cognition, and, well, introductory psychology. Which, er, means almost all of psychology, except for personality/abnormal/clinical psychology. (I'm proud that I even have two sources from 2010 in my perception course. That's about as current as I can get.)

But here's the problem: More isn't better. I can't just keep adding and adding to each course every year. I'll just have to go keep going faster and faster to cover it all. That's not doing the best possible job either. It's stupid to include a cutting-edge study at the expense of spending time explaining some concept that is core to the course. That's why I've decided to impose a moratorium on myself. I want to improve what I've got, to make sure that what I'm trying to explain comes across clearly, to smoothly transition between topics, to simplify overly complex things and add complexity back to things I've oversimplified. I've already started doing it. If you've noticed me scribbling on my notes during class, I've discovered something that I could present better...

Why aren't you studying?

The Best Job in the World

Or: The Best Jobs in America. This CNN.com/US Bureau of Labor Statistics info (via this lifehacker.com post) lists the top 37 jobs in America. At the top is systems engineer. But let's look a bit below that...

Coming in at number 3: college professor. Median salary: $US70,400; top pay: $US115,000. Hmm, I don't work at a college, and I'm not a professor. In the US, "college" means "university." In Canada, "college" generally means either a post-secondary diploma-granting institution, or a bachelor's degree-only community college. But still, it does specify "professor." I guess there's a lot of good that comes with tenure.

In the number 23 spot is clinical psychologist (and 24 is psychiatrist). Ooh, close, but that's not me, either. Clinical psychologists are the ones who see patients (whoops, I mean "clients") and help them with psychological disorders, as do psychiatrists. Interestingly, this listing is not for professional psychologists, which in addition to clinical psychologists also includes counseling psychologists. Anyway, let's check out the pay. Median salary: $US81,100; top pay: $US172,000. Wow, that looks pretty good! (Naturally, psychiatrists make even more--remember, they can make $500 per session in private practice.) I've heard that clinical and professional psychology programs are now the hardest to get in to--even harder than medical school. If you're planning on this as a career, you better have straight As, research experience, and probably some volunteer experience, too.

While I'm rattling off stats, here are some more psychology numbers, from an APS Observer article:

• 6% of the 1.5 million bachelor's degrees earned by students in 2006-2007 were awarded in psychology
• psychology bachelor degrees awarded rose 17.3% from 2001 to 2007
• in the academic year 2006-2007, over 90,000 bachelor's degrees were awarded in psychology
• 21,000 master's degrees were awarded in psychology
• and just over 5,000 doctoral degrees were awarded in psychology
  

(Did I mention that I love my job? I really do. I think I do have the best job in the world. It sure beats working retail.)

Why aren't you studying?