I've got some SPOT catching up to do. Let's hit the sweet spot. (Ugh. Sorry.) These SPOT things are very different from the previous forms, which only had one open-ended question. So there's a lot more information to go through. It takes an enormous amount of willpower to go through 12 pages of comments. Who wants to hear how bad a job they're doing? (Yes, the negative comments loom large over all of the positive ones.)
These are from Winter, 2024 term. Let's go to PSYCH 282 Behaviour Modification first! (Trigger warning: there may be sarcasm ahead. You have been warned!)
"Did not appreciate the fill in the blank slides."
vs.
"I like the fill-in the blank notes that he provides for us."
"The way that the notes are structured SUCKS"
vs.
"Enjoyed the blank spaces in the lecture notes, kept me engaged."
(Seriously, am I being punk'd?)
"I like the self-management project that we had to do because it did help me understand what I was learning on a deeper more personal level."
"The self-management project is designed in an excellent way. I tend to procrastinate with large assignments, so if that was done in just one part I would not have done nearly as well. Each part was due at a time where learning that concept was relevant to material being covered in class. The entire course had a structure that was very easy to follow."
(Thanks for noting that. This is how I try to design it!)
"Textbook often had a lot of concepts not mentioned in lectures that also weren't covered in exams, even though it was reiterated that everything in textbook was fair game. I feel like it was slightly misleading as I would focus a lot of the 'textbook only' content which ended up never showing up on exams."
(I disagree with "a lot". There's an enormous amount of lecture/textbook overlap in this course. As for textbook content, I can't test on everything; I have to take a (non-random) sample. And I've gotten consistent complaints about too much exam material being based on the textbook.)
"I greatly appreciated that this prof took the time to provide additional resources and handouts in order to help students reach success as i have yet to have another prof freely do that on their own accord."
(Thanks for the feedback. It's good to know the time and effort I put into those are worth it!)
"I wish the note templates had an easier option to be downloaded onto my ipad. I had to use my laptop to take notes due to the formatting of the templates. I understand the reasoning behind them, I just wonder if there's a solution that would allow students to use their ipad to take notes as well."
(Yes; I'm working on an alternative to that. It's just taking a huge amount of time. I need to test it on multiple platforms to make sure it works, and to verify that there are no accessibility issues.)
"I would have liked if other than the original class notes were received, access to fill in the blank PowerPoint slides were received. The original class notes given were colourless, dull and lacked pictures. As a visual learner this was a bit frustrating especially since the presentation of the notes was different from the actual slides used to learn during class. Having the option to also download the fill in the blank PowerPoints used in class would have been greatly appreciated."
(There is no evidence to support "learning styles"--see Pashler et al., 2009. The notes are intentionally kept free of distractions. My PowerPoints have images and colour, though. I don't supply my PowerPoints for reasons I've explained repeatedly over the years. Mostly, they have poor accessibility.)
"The assignment project was unclear and there was no elaboration of what needed to be done"
(It was...unclear? But I gave you specific questions to answer. It's up to you to come up with the answers. Maybe you're trying to say that it was...challenging? But I've never gotten feedback that the assignment itself is "unclear".)
"the exam questions were so overly complicated, and were designed to trick you which is so horrible."
"I found a good portion of the exam questions to be unfair, and oftentimes up for interpretation. Sneaky technicalities, more trick questions than expected, and multiple answers for one multiple-choice question that could be argued either way. In other words, there was very little gap between the 'best' possible answer compared to the second best."
"Many questions on the exam were designed to stump students and confuse them. This can be terrible if student is second guessing due to repeating questions/questions with similar wording. This form of examination is not fair as it does not actually question what a student knows but instead if they are and overthinker or not."
(I know it's hard to believe, but I don't have evil intent and I'm not actually trying to trick anyone. Yup, some of the material is inherently complex and potentially confusing. You're giving me far too much credit in my nefarious ability to conceive of tricky questions. A question is unfair if, say, I test on something that was not in the course. That is unfair. Otherwise, test questions may be difficult. That is not the same thing as "unfair". Yes, you are supposed to choose the "best" answer. Or, you know, the "correct" answer.)
"Midterms informed me I don't do well on application questions so providing resources to practice that would help"
(So, something beyond the ePoll questions, the worksheets, the online practice questions on eClass, and the practice tests in the textbook itself?)
"It was hard to read the notes and the textbook. The emphasis on reading the textbook was to much when doing a full course load and I feel the exams should be solely focused on the notes"
(No offense, but...welcome to university. It's not high school anymore. Yes: it's hard. I know that very few first-year classes have a required textbook, but this is a second-year course. I chose the textbook very carefully as a resource to support your learning. There is almost complete overlap between the textbook and lectures. Reading a textbook is nothing new: I took a full course load of five courses per term and every single course had a required textbook.)
"I would appreciate if you included research focus examples that are more recent (most seem to be outdated and from the 80s), because modern science keep developing for the better so it is important to include example that are more relevant (especially to see if anything has changed in the recent years in the b-mod field)"
(It would change the course not at all if I included research examples from the past, say, five years. Yes, things have changed: no one is doing foundational research on whether extinction works. Because that research has already been done, like, in the 80s. No need to repeat it.)
"In the first classes he made fun of past students' work. He also made fun of current students for answering with what he thought were stupid responses. He was rude but improved. It felt unnecessary and disrespectful"
(One time, I showed a butt-ugly (and incorrect) graph made by a former student, to show you what not to do. You're welcome. I did NOT ridicule anyone's "stupid responses". I did not do that; I do not do that; I would never do that. You are mistaken.)
"When people would raise hands to ask questions, often they would either not be seen or ignored"
(I don't ignore anyone; it's just hard to see hands in a dark room full of people at the best of times. Sorry. I hope they came up at the end and asked me their question. I would stay and answer questions after every class until everyone's questions were answered.)
"Appreciated the YouTube videos and case studies included during the presentation"
"Dr Loepelman is one of the greatest professors I have ever had. Truly a great teacher, has a really nice way of explaining and reexplaining when necessary, respectful and honest critiques, and maintains a fun and engaging environment for learning as a collective."
"He's amazing! I can't believe I almost didn't take 282 with him, but every class I'm so grateful I did! he has every trait you'd want in a prof- hilarious, knowledgeable, fun to listen to, i could go on. it's clear he put's a whole lot of effort into each class, and cares very much about making this class the best experience ever! Well, he was definitely successful! At times he totally blew my expectations away. He's genuinely such a great guy and i will definitely be taking more classes with him"
(Thank you. Now, we'll turn to feedback from PSYCH 403: Advanced Perception.)
"First part of the semester was a little hard to follow along because I suck at Gaussian functions but honestly, it was not that bad. People give this class too hard of a wrap."
(Yeah, stop dissing this course, people!)
"The style of notes that is given is completely unproductive and honestly somewhat insulting. I understand that attending classes is important, but forcing us to fill blanks makes it hard to focus on the class while I am there. The class now feels pointless. I cannot focus beyond filling the blanks"
"The blanks make it easy to follow along and understand the lectures"
"I enjoyed the skeleton notes as it gave me the class time to thoughtfully listen and take in the information."
(Comment #1 is somewhat insulting. You didn't like the style of notes. It didn't work for you. You don't have to use them. You are free to take down all notes from the PowerPoint slides yourself. Maybe that works better for you.)
"I found the readings to just repeat the main concepts from the course and did not add a ton of information"
(Yup, that's my goal. I get sooooo many complaints about lectures not being an exact duplicate of the textbook/readings.)
"writing essays and short answers for the exams makes you know your stuff, but having so little time to complete them makes it unbelievably stressful. The final should be slightly better, but the amount of content we must put forth, in my opinion, should be reduced."
(I have already. Now, you have to write three short-answer questions, from a set of eight. I used to require 10 out of 12.)
"Questionable choice teaching 'The Psychology of Food and Eating' during Ramadan - really testing the Muslim members of the class."
(Hmm, maybe it's just another test of your faith, brother. Inshallah!)
"Including two midterms as well as the final allows us as students to adapt to what the exams will be like (especially since we did not have a practice exam to go off of to prepare us for what the exam would be like (this can even be online))."
(Making it online does not reduce the marking load. You did not have practice exams, but there were 10 low-stakes quizzes that were the same exact format as the short-answer exam questions.)
"The examples in class are why i continue to take this instructors courses. He goes above and beyond to provide great content"
"A phenomenal usage of examples and illustrations to help explain points. Thank you very much for those!"
"Loved the documentaries and the ted talks that he provided, it was fun and helped illustrate it better."
"Overall, greatly enjoyed the course!! Had you for 282 & 367, and this course more than met my expectations. It's clear that you care a lot about not just doing your job as a professor, but teaching well, and that's unfortunately rare! Keep up the awesome work, and thank you for taking the time to go out of your way to be as amazing a prof as you are!!"
(Thank you. Now it's time for feedback from PSYCH 494: Human Factors & Ergonomics.)
"Boldface terms were indicated to be part of the exams but it was unclear which boldface terms took more importance over others. For instance, titles and subheadings were also bolded, and some terms were italicized, so there was confusion to this."
(It would be ironic if my design were causing problems. I've checked and I cannot find any short-answer questions on the exams that are based on italicized--not bolded--terms.)
"It would be helpful to provide practice tests and an answer key to be able to get used to the exams on the day of, as well as study tips for these specific exams."
(I gave sample questions--and answers, for the short-answer questions. I also gave tips for the exams in the class before the midterm, and posted that on eClass for you as well. Sorry if you missed that.)
"Older documentary videos were quite boring, so it would be nice to have updated videos to bring in more engagement in class."
(I'm always looking for updated materials. Always. I guess it's good that there haven't been a lot more nuclear disasters more recently tho.)
"professor was critical of receiving feedback in person. He also sadly tends to taunt feedback on his personal blog without taking into account the sincerity of the feedback and being open to change."
(Nope. I take feedback gladly--especially in person. I have never shut anyone down for doing that. I'm sorry if that's the impression you got. Also, I don't "taunt" feedback. Maybe..."mock" is the word you're looking for? LOL. Okay, seriously now: I value the feedback I get. I post it on my personal blog so that you can see the frequently contradictory nature of this feedback. Are my fill-in-the-blank notes good or bad? It depends on the person. I have learned that I cannot please everyone--it's literally impossible. So what I do is apply evidence-based best practices of pedagogy. That includes things like active learning. Students h-a-t-e that, because it means more work. But I do it because it enhances learning. And, respectfully, you have no idea how open to change I am (or not). You have not seen how many changes I have made to my courses over the past 30 years in response to student comments. You don't know how many profs NEVER LOOK at the feedback they get. Posting your comments is proof, at least, that I do read these comments.)
"Although the term paper was quite challenging, it really helped me gain important knowledge and skill on how to write academic papers. The APA preparation lecture was also very helpful."
"This is truly one of the classes I have enjoyed the most during my time at the UofA. Loppelman is a genuinely kind and personable teacher who offers interesting and captivating lectures that he is passionate and knowledgeable about. His lecture style kept my attention and his lecture notes and course website are the most well thought out course materials I've had from a prof. He really did not need to put that much effort in, which shows how he goes above and beyond. He obviously works very hard and puts a ton of effort into his courses and it was very appreciated."
"He is phenomenal, definitely one of my favourite professors."
"Dr. Loepelmann has a very inviting, fun, and kind personality that is very apparent from the way he acts in class. He actively encourages participation and answers all questions sincerely. I have never felt more comfortable speaking up in a classroom environment than in his class."
"He was super lovely and kind. Also very funny which made learning easier"
(Thank you for the kind words.)
Why aren't you studying?
