5 – Difficulty Level

When I was a college student I told my friends, “Oh you don’t want to have that teacher, they are way too hard. Take the class with this person, they’re a lot easier.” Now as a college teacher, I wonder what students are saying about my class. Should I pay attention to these comments or should I just brush them off as “student issues”? I think a balance between the two works best. Listening to a student speak about why a class is difficult provides wonderful insight, while at the same time their input can simply be a form of venting. Plus, I want my class to be challenging but not impossible. When I write challenging, I mean that my class offers countless opportunities for a student to challenge themselves towards the growth of their understanding. But how challenging does my class have to be before it is impossible? The boundary between challenge and impossible is cloudy and different for all. For some students, the first hint of difficulty means impossible and for others impossible is not in their dictionary because they keep trying and trying again until they understand it. With the difficulty level of a class being so complex I will only focus on assessment and personal intentions in this reflection.

If a student performs poorly on an assessment they are quick to say that it was too difficult and then my candid teacher response would be that the assessment was only difficult because they did not study enough. These statements hold validity however there tends be much more behind the scenes that rarely gets discussed. First, the assessment needs to properly represent how the material is taught in the classroom. For instance, is it appropriate to have True and False questions on an assessment if the students are never given that style of questioning in the classroom? This is not saying that the questions have to be word for word but I think the format should be consistent. Second, is the assessment asking clear questions that communicates exactly what is to be answered. I know that some times I read the most of the wall answers only to go back to how I worded the question and see that their answer makes sense. I think that this is related to another area, which is the expansion of the questions. I think that a test should measure how a student is able to expand their understanding along with how well the know the main ideas. I can see how a student could be these three areas as challenging and I am comfortable with that. The key for me is that I make sure that the challenging aspect of my class is not filled with surprises because if it does then this is when the material become inappropriately difficult for my students..

Some times I think that difficulty can get confused with changing the way of thinking about a problem. By changing the way a student thinks about a problem, it allows them to expand their understanding from an area they are already familiar. I guess what I am talking about is taking the mechanics of a problem and then looking at the concepts. This involves taking another step towards having a deeper understanding of the problem. But does this really make the problem more difficult or is this showing a fine line between difficulty and challenging. It seems like a teacher can challenge a student to expand their belief of what is difficult for them. I have students that passionately say math is difficult for them and it has always been that way. Yet, at times they seem to contradict themselves as they excel in certain areas. This suggest that the math is not difficult for them but it is their approach of giving up once they are at math wall of their understanding. Then the blame is projected on the math wall instead of recognizing and accepting that they have a difficulty in moving past areas that really challenge them. How does this come about for a student? I think that for some students they rarely have their thinking challenged. In other words, math is always easy for them and they happily move along. Years go by and they are hardly ever challenged to really think about the math that they are learning. Then the come to a class where the material is certainly in their grasp, but it also challenges they way they think. When this happens, I hear the phrase “Math used to be my strong subject. I always got A’s and B’s in math. But not anymore. It must be the teachers fault then.” If a scenario such as this occurs then how does a teacher help the student realized that they are not a victim of the math gauntlet? Just another task for me as a teacher to be aware of.

So what makes a class difficult? Is it based on on hard it is to get an A in the class, or the material, or the teacher or a combination of these? My GPA in my education classes are significantly higher than in my math course. Does this mean that math classes are more challenging the education classes or is it that learning math is more difficult than education classes? How does the cognitive process of a student change in a math classroom? How does my class challenge a student compared to their other classes? How attainable should my class be to earn an A? All of these questions help me process the true difficulty of my class. Going deeper into the issue, I further inquire. Do I want my students to succeed? What does succeeding as student mean for my class? Why do I choose to keep challenging my students and push them to a higher level of understanding? Is their a part of me that always wants to be one step ahead of the student, so that I am the one who always has the answer? Answering honestly to these personal questions will help me understand the root of my beliefs in what is difficult and what is challenging. As a result, my students will be able to have their math understanding appropriately challenged and an awareness of the difficulties they have as a learner and in academics.