Finals
It is that time during finals week where some students seem to stop caring. I think I may be at that point...Take one look at my tiny bedroom and you will soon see that I have lost it! Your brain can't seem to hold any more information no matter how hard you try and papers never seem to turn out the way you want them to. I have completed three of my five classes. Now I'm on the home stretch with one more paper and one exam. What I love most about my majors of Political Science and Gender,Women, and Sexuality Studies is that most do not have exams or tests, just papers, which I love. I think it is much easier to complete a paper than it is to study for an exam. I can make a paper good or bad depending on how much time I spend on it or how hard I try. With an exam, you never know what grade you are going to get or what the exam is going to look like.
Finals come down to testing one's knowledge. I think that papers test ones knowledge of a text or concept much better than an exam. For example, in my American Political Thought class, we have had two papers due and now we have an exam on wednesday. In preparation for the test, I was given a sheet with about 80 terms on it. I am to learn all of these terms and be able to Define, Interpret, Explain, and Give the Significance of. The test will only have 15 terms on it and I am to choose 10 to write on. What frustrates me the most is that I will have to learn everything in the course over again only to be tested on 1/8th of it. It is a race to memorize everything you can and you will probably forget it ten minutes after you are done with the exam. I do not believe that ten terms consisting of quotes or rediculous concepts summarizes or appropriately tests my knowledge. Rather, I think it is a waste of my time and energy. I would much rather be assigned a text or concept and assigned a 5 page paper.
Once again, instead of studying, I am writing this silly blog. Off I go.