(no subject)
Feb. 16th, 2006 04:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sebastienneto those of you more academically-minded than me:
"is the vocabulary spurt a significant event in lexical development?"
why is it "a gross mis-reading of the question" to discuss lexical development in its entirety and then evaluate whether or not the vocabulary spurt is a significant event within it? why should i have taken the question to mean "discuss the vocabulary spurt, and different theories for its etiology" ? she actually said to me, "what you seem to have done is discuss whether or not the vocabulary spurt is particularly noteworthy". am i making some elementary error in my understanding of the english language, here?
5th week. FIFTH WEEK. my first language and cognition tutorial, and my essay is pointless and off-topic, a 2.2-. my tute partners give presentations i do not understand. it feels like i'm being pointedly misunderstood when i try to explain things - have i lost the ability to communicate? i wonder, typing here now, do these words say what i mean them to?
this is the first tute i've had since getting back to oxford, although it's the third i've turned up to (one was postponed a week, and nobody told me, the other is because i can't tell the difference between "5" and "7")... something isn't right, and i'm starting to think it's inside my own head.
ETA: clouds, sivler linings, and so on: i just got to use the vaguely wildean phrase, "no, i'm not in college. i'm in the department, and tears" (cf "she left in floods of tears and a sedan chair." was that wilde? i cannot think why he'd be talking about sedan chairs, but my head is telling me it was - oh god i can't even adequately place wilde any more, there is something wrong in my head)
"is the vocabulary spurt a significant event in lexical development?"
why is it "a gross mis-reading of the question" to discuss lexical development in its entirety and then evaluate whether or not the vocabulary spurt is a significant event within it? why should i have taken the question to mean "discuss the vocabulary spurt, and different theories for its etiology" ? she actually said to me, "what you seem to have done is discuss whether or not the vocabulary spurt is particularly noteworthy". am i making some elementary error in my understanding of the english language, here?
5th week. FIFTH WEEK. my first language and cognition tutorial, and my essay is pointless and off-topic, a 2.2-. my tute partners give presentations i do not understand. it feels like i'm being pointedly misunderstood when i try to explain things - have i lost the ability to communicate? i wonder, typing here now, do these words say what i mean them to?
this is the first tute i've had since getting back to oxford, although it's the third i've turned up to (one was postponed a week, and nobody told me, the other is because i can't tell the difference between "5" and "7")... something isn't right, and i'm starting to think it's inside my own head.
ETA: clouds, sivler linings, and so on: i just got to use the vaguely wildean phrase, "no, i'm not in college. i'm in the department, and tears" (cf "she left in floods of tears and a sedan chair." was that wilde? i cannot think why he'd be talking about sedan chairs, but my head is telling me it was - oh god i can't even adequately place wilde any more, there is something wrong in my head)
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no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 04:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 04:25 pm (UTC)in short, no, i think your understanding of english is fine, and also, it's a bit of a silly question, isn't it?
no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 04:28 pm (UTC)You are doing very well. You are brilliant, and intelligent, and you've every right to be studying the course you are, where you are; you've just been ill, and are operating under par, and you must, must be understanding with yourself for that.
I love you and am here for hugs and general academic whingings. You know where I live...
no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 04:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 04:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 04:43 pm (UTC)i wonder if i could respond to everyone's "what can i do to help?" with "give me an evening away from oxford and lethargy with helen and jessie and katy and amy and ashley and james and everyone else i love" ?
no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 04:56 pm (UTC)"is the vocabulary spurt a significant event in lexical development?"
1.) What is the vocab spurt? Evidence for/against its existence.
2.) General sketch of lexical development. What factors influence it? Brief evaluation of them. How important is vocab spurt among them? Is there any evidence about what has the most impact?
Conclusion: Vocab spurt is a good/bad concept because of this evidence/lack of evidence. It is clearly important/insignificant in lexical development because it is better/worse than all these other factors.
Just looked back at your original post, and having thought out what I would put, I agree that I can't see that you wrote the wrong thing. I mean, even if you didn't have enough about the vocab spurt itself, I don't see how you could leave out a broader look at lexical dev.
It does sound like that was what the question was asking, but since it clearly wasn't what the tutor wanted, I would suggest a.) asking your tute partners for copies of their essays and b.) emailing the tutor and asking her to clarify the question. Don't be shy, you deserve teaching and she ought to be more helpful than she has been.
Quite frankly, m'dear, you've got glandular fever. You're doing bloody marvellously under the circumstances. You don't need idiot tutors making life harder than it already is.
Helen x
no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 06:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 07:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 08:53 pm (UTC)You cannot possibly answer that question without defining 'B' and then defining 'A' in the context of 'B'. If 'B' was not ment to be discussed, it should not have been mentioned in the question.
no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 11:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-16 11:56 pm (UTC)However you now have a comprehensive essay on approaches to lexical development, the work for which is sure to serve you well on a variety of exam questions. Once you get the essay/s off your tute partner/s you will have that specific focus as well.
And I imagine that they got together in a huddle and unpicked the meaning of the question together, whereas you have been isolated by illness, cut off from lectures that may have informed your interpretation and generally had to struggle with much more than they. I think you have done rather well this week.
no subject
Date: 2006-02-17 01:25 am (UTC)b) Your tutor is a shit.
c) There're worse things in the world than 2.2s from Oxford.
d) The work will be useful even if the tutor thought the essay was shit.
e) Yes, honey, yes there is something wrong, it's called glandular fever, and it means that things will be off for a while. It makes the work harder and it makes the setbacks seem harder. You know this. Don't beat yourself up over it. You're doing fine.
f)*big squishy hugs* and wishes of nasty plagues for your tute partners and tutor.
no subject
Date: 2006-02-19 01:05 am (UTC)However, in an exam, either approach is acceptable if you have something interesting to say.
*disclaimer, I got a 2.1 not a first*
no subject
Date: 2006-02-19 03:43 pm (UTC)just thought it might help to let you know that exactly the same thing happened to me this week in l & c. did you have that complete bitch of a grad student who replaced plunket??
she also gave me a 2.2, complained that I hadn't given examples and then went very quiet when i showed her where in my essay they were, she was also nasty to my tute partners giving the presentation which I didn't understand either and then came out of the tutorial and started crying too which also meant i screwed up the philosophy tute i had afterwards. it was honestly the worst tutorial i have ever had here. i hate hating psychology cos normally i love it. so just to let you know that you're not alone!
i agree with everyone above. I think you're doing amazingly to still be coping with term and having glandular fever and you still manage to go to more lectures than me! don't let 1 tutor get you down - if i've learnt anything from being here it's that essays just don't matter and they are not worth being miserable for, although it can be hard to see it that way sometimes
anyway, i hope you feel better soon \
xxxx
no subject
Date: 2006-02-19 04:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-19 11:54 pm (UTC)and yes, super-bitch of the psychology dept!
think i was bound to dislike l & c either way - i'm still really bitter that i can't do psych disorders and still get bps and now for letting my tutor convince me to do bps! i'm planning to do as much hardcore neuroscience as poss next year and avoid cognitive like the plague!!!
see you in lecture,
xxx