More on Free Points

Just finished grading my third set of finals.  This one also had the dimension of getting out of questions by posting comments during the week.  Posting 5 comments got you out of the 10 Newspage questions on the final.

But once again even if you comment out, you can still answer the questions.  That's an opportunity for 10 free points.  10 points on an exam with 100 points to begin with - that's a full letter grade improvement.

Pardon my bolding.

Since the test was comprehensive over the content of the entire semester the newspage questions were word for word questions which had been on the weekly quizzes over the length of the semester.  Weekly quizzes which we go over and discuss in class.

But wait, there's more.  For the first final that was the end of the story.  This final has another facet.  This final was a take home, open note final.

Not only are they free points, not only are they questions they've already seen, but here they ought to have the key sitting in their notes.

10 points for comments and 10 points for repeat quiz questions.  20 total points; two letter grades.

In the end several, but not nearly all of the students got the 10 comment points.  The most points from answering Newspage questions was 6, with most getting only 2 or 3.

Not one person in the class attempted all 10 questions.