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I love how much of the education method of most anglo schools/universities is just shit to weed out neurodivergents and poors. (hexbear.net)

submitted 19 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago) by Dirt_Owl@hexbear.net to c/chapotraphouse@hexbear.net

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"I decided we would do an oral exam* because it's a great way to see if people have actually learned anything from my course and aren't just parroting notes. Because I can ask them to elaborate on their answers."

Yeah and it's also a great way to get otherwise good students to go blank because it isn't possible to absorb every bit of complex information you spent 12 weeks rushing through, Barbara.

This "gotcha" style teaching fucking pisses me off. There is no time in the real world people are not going to be able to look up their notes. Fuck, half the time I'll ask a professor something and they'll be like "I'll have to look that up later and get back to you." Why? BECAUSE THEY'RE HUMAN AND THATS HOW BRAINS ARE.

This type of teaching only favours students that already had experience with the subject beforehand and freaks with amazing memories. This kind of understanding of the material only comes from experience and repetition, something that the traditional 12 weeks of rushed lectures/labs that discard each topic quickly to fit all of them in don't do.

I fucking hate how much I am going into debt to be taught only the vaguest concepts but doing most of the teaching myself in my own time. Education under capitalism is a joke.

*An oral exam is an exam where instead of answering questions in a quiet room on paper, you have to answer questions on a live video call with your instructor.

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[-] cerealkiller@hexbear.net 30 points 17 hours ago

In college right now for an animation course in engineering.

We were literally thaught how to make AI slop (deepfakes, AI generated images) by the professors assistant since the professor refused to show up. He went on how this "won't replace us" and how It was "revolutionary" even though It looked like shit. Mind you he's the same guy who told us "Don't pirate Windows, buy It for 5€.".

Sometimes I think of dropping out and going freelance as an artist even though I'm only a month into my first year. Though I'm very afraid how and where to promote my stuff

[-] Dirt_Owl@hexbear.net 25 points 17 hours ago

It's very scary how "flying by the seat of their pants" and low quality higher education seems to be. We really are having a capitalist education crisis.

[-] Xiisadaddy@lemmygrad.ml 12 points 17 hours ago

Honestly as a self acclaimed AI hater i feel like Animation is one actual decent use case for generative AI. Like you make the art like normal and then have the AI generate extra frames for you that are just slightly edited. Like moving an arm or whatever. But ya just fully generating something is stupid. Hope the animation thing goes well for you whatever you decide to do.

[-] gay_king_prince_charles@hexbear.net 2 points 10 hours ago

I don't think LMMs have a large enough context window to do that well

[-] blobjim@hexbear.net 19 points 17 hours ago

That's already how animation works, except it uses normal math and algorithms to interpolate and generate frames. Frame generation using machine learning is good for generating frames for old film from when really low framerates where the only thing possible.

[-] cerealkiller@hexbear.net 11 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago)

Pretty much, there's a good video from a year or so ago on why frame generation for animation doesn't work:

https://youtu.be/_KRb_qV9P4g

[-] HexReplyBot@hexbear.net 1 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago)

I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:

[-] peppersky@hexbear.net 4 points 14 hours ago

Frame generation using machine learning is good for generating frames for old film from when really low framerates where the only thing possible.

No.

[-] Daemnyz@lemmy.ml 16 points 16 hours ago

To bei honest, I highly favour oral exams. This semester I had to chose between a 20 page termpaper or a 20 minute oral exam, which was a no-brainer to me. Writing a termpaper clashes with my ADHD. I have to keep tabs on like 15 books and the according notes and work on the project virtually uninterrupted for ~1 month without any kind of feedback until I hand it in? Thats a nightmare... Oral exams on the other hand are awesome. I can read like 2 books in the matter in around a week (because I don't need to take notes) for preparation and can just geek out with my professor about the topic. I think I just favour the conversation style of the exam, when my prof reacts to my answer I can infer if it was right or if I should come back to it. I don't think your opinion is wrong or something, but different flavours of neurodivergency have different needs. I really like that more offen than not I can choose the category of my exam :)

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[-] dinklesplein@hexbear.net 28 points 17 hours ago

i'm not sure that i agree that oral exams are inherently bad, i just think they need to be taken with the instructor having a spirit of charitability and recognising that students can't remember every little detail. evidently this wasn't the case with you but the typical exam paper format isn't very good for neurodivergent students either in a very different way, like i'd always do awfully in exams by my standards so obviously i'd be more inclined to think that format is worse than oral.

[-] Dirt_Owl@hexbear.net 14 points 17 hours ago

It really depends for me. I like practical exams, but it's the interview type set up that's giving me anxiety. I suck at written exams too, but les than when I'm being stared at and judged ohnoes

[-] redtea@lemmygrad.ml 8 points 14 hours ago

To make things worse, all my oral exams were recorded. So you had the camera glaring at you as well. And you had to sign a form to say whether you consented to using the recording to show the next year's class. Fuck no but now I'm thinking about feeling bad rather than reciting my answers.

[-] dinklesplein@hexbear.net 5 points 14 hours ago

yeah, i mean if it makes you anxious then it clearly is worse for you! i don't want to come off as minimising your struggles, just that examination methods should probably be more flexible in general.

[-] mathemachristian@hexbear.net 11 points 17 hours ago

Absolutely! My prof said it's a bit tricky because he needs to feel for gaps if he wants to give a high mark but he will look for what's actually known to give a passing grade. So he tries to steer the conversation according to clues you might drop in your answers, but can't overlook mistakes or should-be-known.

I really like oral exams more than written because of ADD, but if we think outside that dichotomy than having the students write something they taught themselves would be much better. But that requires a lot of educators in even a mid-sized class.

[-] REgon@hexbear.net 20 points 17 hours ago* (last edited 17 hours ago)

On the other hand as a person with adhd I love oral exams because then I don't really have to pay attention in class. I can bullshit my way to a B-A+ with the bare minimum of academic effort. I'll be able to yap so much they can't ask any questions and then they'll bemoan the fact we don't have more time because I seem to have a wealth of knowledge hehehe.

Written exams though? Hello executive dysfunction

[-] Dirt_Owl@hexbear.net 14 points 17 hours ago

Ha, that rules (the being able to talk part, not the written exam dysfunction part. I feel you pain).

I guess our ADHD manifests in different ways, I get overwhelmed in interview type situations and end up forgetting which words I want to use "Uhh... I mean...nuh what's the word for that again?"

[-] REgon@hexbear.net 10 points 16 hours ago

Another thing I do is tell them that I am nervous! It has only yielded positive results so far

[-] Dirt_Owl@hexbear.net 8 points 16 hours ago

Thanks for the advice

[-] Hexboare@hexbear.net 8 points 16 hours ago

I think it also depends on the course content and the level of technical knowledge.

Plus the oral exam set up, i.e. if you don't hit all the required points by not effectively using your time to regurgitate the course content you fail.

[-] REgon@hexbear.net 8 points 17 hours ago

That sucks! That happens to me too, but I try to yap thru it or jump to a different association. "I don't recall the specific technical term at the moment, so let me instead describe the practice" (-3 minutes of interview time spent on something that is trivial to discuss) then I often end up doing something like "now when I describe it like this, it of course sounds quite similar to this, but they differ in key ways, which are..." Yapyapyap "oh you have a question professor?"

[-] Gorb@hexbear.net 13 points 16 hours ago

Paper exams are bad enough fuck oral exams. Last one i did was oral German exam ages ago and I had rehearsed what I was going to say properly but the second i sat down my brain just went "nah" and i couldn't remember a fucking thing.

What kind of exam method is that?????

[-] CarmineCatboy2@hexbear.net 9 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 5 hours ago)

We don't have oral exams, at least not in my area. And if anything the dynamic here is the reverse. When you're permitted to look over your notes, then I'm not only looking at how much data you can bring to the fore but also how well you can utilize it in your essay. The standards rise with being able to look over notes.

[-] DavidGarcia@feddit.nl 15 points 18 hours ago

The only thing that school taught me is how to withstand constant immense suffering. Most of anything useful, I learned on my own terms.

Work on the other hand is pretty easy, mainly because no matter how shit the workday is:

I get to go home and not care about it at all
I get something in return for my suffering
I know what I am doing is not completely pointless, because someone has decided to pay me for it

So I guess thank you school, for making the most shit material conditions seem like a blessing in comparison.

[-] Dirt_Owl@hexbear.net 14 points 18 hours ago

Under capitalism, education, particularly elementary, middle and highschool, are mostly set up to teach you how to be a good little obedient worker accept your exploitation under capitalism. It also makes people associate learning or doing anything outside their "place" with horrible times. Works a treat.

[-] TankieTanuki@hexbear.net 5 points 17 hours ago

Did you not get to go home after school?

[-] robot_dog_with_gun@hexbear.net 14 points 16 hours ago

homework

[-] lil_tank@hexbear.net 17 points 17 hours ago* (last edited 17 hours ago)

In my experience a lot of people find work liberating compared to school because the school kept them stressed out all the time after class is over. You're supposed to do work on your own and prepare to perform well, you can't forget about school after you're out of school. This can indeed happen with work but it is more widely recognised as abusive, while it is absolutely normalized with school

Edit : network problem, posted it twice

[-] lil_tank@hexbear.net 1 points 17 hours ago

[-] livestreamedcollapse@lemmy.ml 15 points 18 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago)

I'd like to consider myself a freak with an amazing memory but, yeah, that on the spot pressure/call-outs were especially rough in graduate-level sciences. I get the whole in-situ "determine the limits of your knowledge on the subject" but damn if it didn't feel like the primary investigator of the lab I was in just saw me as a lab rat to poke and prod for his curiosity when I was presenting research updates.

Also not fun to learn I probably had test anxiety for my entire scholastic career & never had accomodations suggested to me until I was nearly done with my coursework :/