Ohlone College: Summer Experience

Going to Ohlone college this summer is one of the most interesting experiences of my scholar career. The level of knowledge was extremely valuable and it was fun to learn at this level. The English Composition classes included many wonderful classroom discussions, and the Geometry course was well described despite antagonistic descriptions towards the course. Of course, for every moment of pleasure, there is an equal moment of pain. The geometry and English courses were extraordinarily time consuming from the amount of material to be covered in a mere six weeks.

In Geometry-196, the textbook "Elementary Geometry for College Students", was excellent despite all of the negative reviews it received. With the dual effect of a well-taught lecture and a working book, the class was much easier to complete. The textbook was a proof-based book, focusing on theorems, postulates, and constructions. But many students find proofs hard, and what is geometry without proofs? Later in the semester, the book began to go into greater detail on the formulas in geometry such as Heron's. The class, mostly composed of high-schoolers retaking or taking the course for the first time, reacted to this change in pace suddenly. As many of the students scored well from the beginning of the course, they started dropping like flies from the pace of the course and the intensity of the textbook. Chapter 6 was the beginning of the fall, mainly because that chapter was largely based on circles and chords. But there was always one more proof to do in that textbook. The recipe for success was to memorize every postulate and theorem described in each section. Our teacher commented that students could memorize every proof in the book, but it is almost impossible to memorize 8 lines of proof.

The tests were deadly. Each chapter test was composed of twenty multiple choice questions, two proofs, and maybe one construction. The trick was that the multiple choice questions were each worth 4%. Three multiple choice questions wrong could mean the difference between an A and a B+. This tripped many students up, since many thought the multiple choice would be easy and the proofs would be hard. That turned out to be a wrong assumption till the later chapters that focussed on the longer proofs. Since the class took place in the summer semester, there was only six weeks to cover the material before the test. Our teacher preferred to go ove3r this first chapters in great detail, and go extremely fast at the later chapters. The number of 100% scorers dropped at chapter 6. This was the case because many of the students could not take the work as fast as the summer semester mandated, and many were taking a lower division english course (below English-101A.)

To the chagrin of many students, the final was just as, if not more, vexing as the tests. The majority of it was comprised of true/false questions that could trick even the most studious of students. Since many students finished the final early, it is my conclusion that they most likely thought the true/false was easy. That may have been the major downfall on the test since the true/false questions amount to 78 questions out of 100. It was the sheer amount of true/false that could drag a test score to the grave. The chord and circle questions were much more difficult than the true/false, since they required knowledge that was skimped on by the teacher in the later chapters of the book. Their difficulty also served a different purpose. The problems seemed like a red-herring for an average student's opinion of the final. Despite the tricks in the rest of the final, the additional proofs were simple, since they were from the earlier chapters that were well covered.The average idealization of the different types of problems from most effective to least effective would be circle chord problems, proofs, true/false. I stayed throughout the final, but I felt confident the entire final.

English 101A was a lot more demanding, with the definite emphasis on a lot. The course started out with a two-page letter of introduction and ended with an eight page research paper. In the beginning, the class started with exercises from the Allen & Bacon Guide (for writing and discussion, brief writing projects.) Then the class started into the writing projects, a series of essays meant to build from open-prose writing to close-prose writing. The first project seemed easy, but the assignment was to perceive the environment in a positive way or a negative way through writing. It could be deadly to the grade if one perspective mistake was made. The second assignment was an informative and maybe slightly controversial essay, 4 pages long. In this essay, parentheticals and maintaining a constant thesis was neccesityp9. Finally, the research paper. There was only three days to research a controversial topic and compose a first draft arguing for a side without seeming too oppressive. The key was all in the book: find flaws in an opponent's work, and using that as a "this is not logical" argument. Personally, this was a paper that asked for constant attention. Even refusal of dinner was required for a constant focus. An eight-page research paper that needed to be finished by morning could keep one up till 4:00 AM.

The books were excellent. Although reviews described the Allen & Bacon Guide as "too liberal," it was perfect for the work assigned. The "liberal slant" was actually the analysis of the Cheney speeches for oil, etc. Those examples illustrated many political methods of bypassing the point in speeches or documents to the American public, and good strategies for reading and writing. The Life of Pi, the class' other required book, was an excellent choice for literature. A good message of religion, anthropomorphism, and also an excellent analysis of the human mind. The final was based on a set of questions that all involved the theme from the book.

In my spare time between classes, the pond behind the cafe was an excellent place to relax and study. There is a population of Koi fish, turtles, and ducks that always welcome free food.