Years ago, as an online student, I used to write down all the excuses students gave when not completing their homework. When I graduated, I always joked I had enough to embroider me a bath towel.
Now, as an online instructor I sometimes feel like Colonel Blake on MASH dealing with all of Clinger’s excuses and deaths in his family. I used to keep track of all the excuses students gave me, and try to follow up. This quickly became an impossible task. However, there has to be a best practice for dealing with the multiple excuse students give for not submitting their homework.
The best one I ever received for a student not submitting her online assignment, “my dog ate my homeworkâ€. When I reminded the student she should use her back up plan, then she could have still submitted her work, she laughed at me as said, that was my back up plan. My puppy ate my Flash Drive and I keep all my homework on that flash drive. I had to then remind her to never store her work in just one location. The back-up plan is to prevent late assignments, and when you don’t have double locations, you don’t have a back-up plan.
By the way, my excuse towel could easily be an excuse California King Blanket.
What suggestions, thoughts or ideas can you share on student excuses for not doing their work?
