What to do when receiving a bad grade on assignment

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Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around the experience of receiving a disappointing grade on an assignment, exploring feelings of frustration, strategies for improvement, and concerns about grading accuracy. Participants share their personal experiences and approaches to handling similar situations, focusing on both immediate responses and long-term strategies.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Debate/contested
  • Homework-related
  • Technical explanation

Main Points Raised

  • One participant expresses surprise and displeasure at receiving a 12/24 grade, questioning whether they did not allocate enough time to the assignment and seeking advice on next steps and long-term changes.
  • Another participant suggests that bad grades are common and recommends reviewing material to improve for future assessments, such as the final exam.
  • A different participant outlines a personal strategy for dealing with bad grades, which includes reviewing the assignment, consulting with instructors or tutors, and avoiding past mistakes related to time management and study habits.
  • Concerns are raised about grading practices, with one participant noting that the marker did not provide feedback on specific mistakes, leading to confusion about how to improve.
  • Another participant proposes a change in homework strategy, emphasizing the importance of taking breaks and allowing ideas to develop over time, particularly for difficult assignments.
  • One participant shares a specific example of losing marks for minor details, such as not including absolute values or failing to explicitly check solutions, highlighting the need for attention to detail in assignments.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants express a range of views on how to respond to receiving a bad grade, with some advocating for immediate review and consultation, while others suggest broader changes in study strategies. There is no consensus on the best approach, and concerns about grading accuracy remain unresolved.

Contextual Notes

Participants mention various assumptions about grading practices and the clarity of feedback provided, indicating a potential limitation in understanding how to improve based on the received grades.

find_the_fun
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I got 12/24 on my assignment. I am surprised and displeased as I thought I did a good job and I felt I understood the material. I will not give up! I believe this is a sign something needs to changed. I had put a lot of time into the assignment and I don't believe it is feasible to put double the amount of time into get 24/24, my other commitments can't afford that. Is it the correct way to look at it that I didn't put enough time into it? What should my next step be? What should a long term change be? I'm going to look over the answer key and see where I went wrong.

Also I think my paper may have been graded incorrectly. I find it hard to follow, as the marker used checks, x's, and +some-number. But I think at least the marks were summed incorrectly at the end.
 
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find_the_fun said:
Also I think my paper may have been graded incorrectly. I find it hard to follow, as the marker used checks, x's, and +some-number. But I think at least the marks were summed incorrectly at the end.

Well, surely you know how to count, so you can at least verify that!

Bad grades happen, just review the material you didn't do well on, and you'll do better next time (likely the final exam for instance) :)
 
when i get a bad grade on an assignment, first i die, second i go over the assignment and see what i did wrong, third i go over those questions with the instructor or a tutor to see why i did them wrong or to make sure it was graded correctly, fourth i make sure i don't do what i did last time whether it was wasting time or doing the assignment too fast or not studying before hand.

the same thing happened to me the other day on my programming assignment but only because it think it was graded incorrectly.
 
Another possibility is to change your homework strategy. This may or may not be relevant - it's better advice for extremely difficult homework than for homework you can just sit down and do all at once without pausing, and I don't know how hard the homework is for you.

For very difficult homework, I have found that it's not the sheer amount of time you spend on it that will get it done - it's the number of fresh starts. So if you find yourself banging your head against a wall, then just stop that homework and move on to another class. Repeat this process. Of course, this presupposes that you start working on a homework set as soon as you get it! You can't wait around. It's especially valuable if you can sleep on it a few times. Your brain can sometimes solve problems in your sleep.

It's also more valuable simply to have these ideas ruminating in your head over a longer period of time. It will help with comprehension.

I agree with you: never give up!
 
The problem is the marker only put a number and didn't indicate where mistakes were made. I went to talk to the prof but he told me the answer key was online with mark breakdown and didn't even look at the assignment. I looked at the answer key, and it did show certain steps with their marks, but I'm still unclear as to where I went wrong. For example one question I got the right answer and showed work, but only got 1/5.

It seems I lost LOTS of marks to little details, such as leaving out the absolute value when integrating 1/x or no explicitly writing that I checked the trivial solution to the differential equation, and it is not a solution.
 

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