Chemistry Class

A quick step from the science realm this week and a leap into a personal story for my blog this week:
Unfortunately, Advance Placement (AP®) Chemistry class has not been doing as well as I would wish. A “B- grade maybe is not too bad, but not the results I want to see on my grade report. I understand that committing to an AP® class requires one to study and learn concepts at an exceptionally rapid pace. I know I do not want to withdraw from the class – yet somehow I must be able to absorb the advanced curriculum. I now ponder my future of AP® class, all the advanced curricula in several subjects. Conversely, maybe it is the actual chemistry class that may be difficult. I understand that AP® Chemistry classes are one of the most difficult of the variety of AP®. Nevertheless, I will continue to study in the class with Mr. Hardin and, hopefully with enough dedication to the class, receive an “A” grade. Science is one of my strong subjects in school – alongside with mathematics.

Today (and yesterday) most students received their test-corrections from our previous test. In Mr. Hardin’s class, test corrections are used to redeem up to one-half point for every test question (or laboratory-report response question) marked as an incorrect response. All but two or three students were marked down by at least one point on a test. Of the majority that did test corrections, many of us did not receive the one-half point. Test corrections require (a) the original question, (b) the correct answer option, (c) a written explanation of the general process used to solve the problem, and (d) a detailed list of the mathematical processes and operations needed with written explanations specific to the question to receive the full one-half point. Supposedly, a good correction should be one page in length for one problem (that is one side of the paper). All this work (possibly up to five pages of corrections) for a test…however, if you consider that each test has a raw score of less than 20 points, one-half point holds a lot of value.

I feel horrible that I did not talk about science (well I guess I did…just not in that way), but I need this weekend to start off relaxed – to be able to complete this long weekend of re-test-corrections.