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Sometimes the hardest part about writing a paper is understanding the assignment. You may not understand what you’re being asked to write or how you’re supposed to write about it. But don’t worry: although the prompt may seem confusing at first, there are strategies you can use to understand your assignment.

First, try taking a break from the assignment.

Take a walk, clean your room, get coffee with a friend. Then come back and read the prompt again, keeping any of your instructor’s in-class comments in mind. Looking at your assignment with fresh eyes will often help you either finally understand the assignment or identify what specifically is confusing to you.

If your assignment still seems unclear, ask yourself the following questions:

What is the purpose of your assignment? (What are you being asked to do?)

To understand what the assignment is asking you to do, pay special attention to the verbs that your instructor used. These verbs often function as keywords that signal the purpose of an assignment. Argue, summarize, and compare/contrast are just a few keywords to look for. These verbs can tell you whether you are developing your own argument, describing a plot, or analyzing the similarities or differences between artifacts. Visit our blog or take a look at this handout to find a list of more keywords and their meanings.

Another way to understand the assignment is to see if your instructor has asked you to follow a specific format. Is there a length requirement? Are there a certain number of sources required? Shorter papers are often a thesis-driven analysis with fewer sources. A longer paper with more sources may signal a research assignment. Again, pay attention to any verbs you see; these verbs will often tell you how to approach writing your assignment.

Who is your audience?

Part of the context of any writing situation will include your audience, or who you’re writing to. Since your audience includes your instructor, keep in mind any expectations she or he may have. What concepts have been emphasized in class? You may find these same concepts in your prompt. How is the assignment structured? Understanding the structure may help you decipher how you are being asked to approach the prompt.

Your instructor may not be the only audience member to consider. Are you being asked to communicate with a general audience (who can follow a logical argument but doesn’t know anything about your chosen topic) or an informed one (an audience familiar with the material, but not your chosen angle)? Knowing who your audience is will help you decipher what kind of information will best support your thesis. If you have any questions about who your audience should be, ask your instructor for clarification.

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Understanding the type of evidence your instructor requires may help you work backwards to determine the format and, ultimately, the purpose of your assignment. Remember: evidence will be presented differently depending on your audience and purpose, so again, look for keywords to help.

If you still find that you don’t fully understand the assignment, don’t panic: you aren’t required to tackle the prompt alone.

Email your instructor and explain your confusion.

Try to be as specific as possible. Are you confused about what you are being asked to do? Is it unclear how you are being asked to structure your paper? Or what kind of evidence you’re supposed to use? Ask them, even if you can’t be specific. They want to help.

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I was assigned a task I think doesn't make sense. Should I approach my boss about it?

I am building the frontend for our latest application, along with 2 other developers. With the application approaching 99% completion and ready to be shipped, I was asked to write unit tests.

I am a new programmer with 1 year of experience, so when I looked up unit testing online I found that unit tests should be written before or in parallel with whatever it is that is being developed, and not afterwards.

I feel like the task assigned to me is wrong, however I am not sure if I should approach my boss about it. I've tried talking to my teammates about this, but they don't seem to understand me.

Should I approach my boss about a task assigned to me which I do not think makes sense? And if so, how?

communication

8 I can't imagine the expectations of your unit tests are very high. They're ready to ship and gave the task to someone with no experience or knowledge. Exactly how critical can this be? Just make sure your tests don't break the build. – user8365 Commented Feb 26, 2014 at 14:39
2 Hi @hermann, I've made an edit to your question which I think brings it on-topic with the site's scope, while still getting you the answer you seem to be seeking. If I've missed anything you think is important with my edit, please feel free to edit it further, or roll back the changes. Thanks! – Rachel Commented Feb 27, 2014 at 16:33
3 Also my short answer to your question is you should approach your boss about it. Explain your concerns, and if he/she wants you to do the unit testing anyways, you should do it. Sometimes tasks which don't make sense to you are done for other reasons, such as gaining experience or to comply with internal audits. At the very least, you'll be able to add "Unit Testing" to your list of skills on your resume, and have gained experience for next time you're asked to write unit tests :) – Rachel Commented Feb 27, 2014 at 16:35
6 Yeah, unit tests should have been written at the time, but late is better than never. He's likely to explain this to you and send you back. (It's also a good way for you to learn the codebase without making more dangerous changes, so may be being performed strictly as a teaching tool.) – mxyzplk Commented Mar 5, 2014 at 15:03
4 General life tip: if you have to google the thing you've been asked to do and other people on the team have a bunch of experience doing the thing you've been asked to do, then you're probably not likely to be correctly second guessing your manager. – Stella Biderman Commented Oct 2, 2017 at 0:34

8 Answers 8

In general it is better if unit tests are written before or with the code under development. But that doesn't mean unit tests written afterwards are useless - and they are certainly better than no unit tests at all.

Unit testing written after the code can accomplish two things:

You might find circumstances you weren't aware of before where the code fails. This is useful to know, and means you can fix it before the code ships.
Good unit tests can be executed repeatedly after every change to the code, to check that the changes haven't broken anything. This is called 'regression testing'.

While your boss might (might!) have made a less than ideal decision earlier, he is now making the right decision.

So go ahead and write the unit tests you have been assigned. When you start the next project, suggest to your boss that you start by writing the tests. And read up on "Test Driven Development", which is what that becomes when you do it properly.

3 There is a third thing that might be relevant: If the product scope changed, and now an official validation is needed (for example, to get an FDA approval), unit tests could become a must. I had such a situation once, where the original software was designed for lab research only, but when they wanted to use the software in the production line of medical devices, the stakes were much higher suddenly. – Thern Commented Oct 2, 2017 at 8:50
+1 for @Nebr comment, but +1 for Michael's answer, too. Your answer explains why testing after the fact is as pointless as the OP thought, but the meat of the question is should I talk with Mgr about a task I don't see the value of , to which the answer is yes . – rath Commented Oct 2, 2017 at 9:31
1 @rath I think you missed a 'not' out of your comment. – DJClayworth Commented Oct 2, 2017 at 12:50

I think the real question here is in the last line:

The answer is a resounding YES , you should approach your boss. One of several things could be going on:

You have mis-understood the boss entirely and think she wants you to do something other than what she actually wants. If you don't ask, you'll waste a bunch of time doing the wrong thing.
You don't know the reasons for the request. In the real world we sometimes do stupid stuff to fulfill a requirement that makes no real sense. This comes up frequently when dealing with certifications - it may be that you know some step is useless, but you can't change the process right now for various reasons.
You perhaps don't have enough experience to understand why this should be done at this point. The boss can explain it and you'll learn something.
You've actually found a problem with what the boss wants. The boss now has a chance to change direction before wasting a bunch of your man-hours on useless work.

No matter which one it is, talking to the boss will get you the information you need to proceed.

I'd go with something like

Umm, Boss, this doesn't seem to make any sense to me. It looks like this work is useless or even counterproductive, so I think I've misunderstood something.

That puts you in the position of asking for help, not telling your boss she's wrong. It starts a conversation, not an argument, and gets you the information you need.

9 I would seriously not recommend telling the boss "it looks like this work is useless". I think you're wrong when you say that it isn't "not telling your boss she's wrong"; I'm fairly certain if one of my team members came up to me and told me "I think the work you gave me to do is useless", I'd be rather offended. – Adam V Commented Feb 28, 2014 at 14:46
1 @AdamV: It may be a cultural difference, but now you make it sound like you would be offended if a team member indicates he might have misunderstood a piece of work. – Bart van Ingen Schenau Commented Feb 28, 2014 at 15:12
6 @BartvanIngenSchenau - I'd be offended if he approached his misunderstanding by using the word "useless" or "counterproductive". If you come to me and say "I'm not sure I understand why we did things in this order", I'd be able to answer that without taking offense. After I give my answer, I'd be more willing to accept criticism like "shouldn't we have done this sooner?", but when you immediately jump to "useless" before understanding the reasons, then I feel you're putting your boss / team lead on the defensive, and they won't respond as well. – Adam V Commented Feb 28, 2014 at 16:47
I agree with most of the answer, I think the actual approach to your boss could be better though. Something like "Could I get some guidance about exactly what my role in unit testing is?" – kleineg Commented Apr 11, 2014 at 17:42
There's a range in "I don't understand why we did this" that ranges from "Explain O Enlightened One" to "I might be missing something, but I don't think so" and then all the way over to "I understand you can't pour piss out of your boots with the instructions printed on the heel, what I don't understand is how even you can believe anyone thinks you know what you are talking about". Describing it as useless is a bit past "I might be wrong", particularly when, as in this case, he should be a lot closer to asking for elightment not criticizing. – jmoreno Commented Oct 2, 2017 at 23:56

One key point here that I think it’s worth addressing is this:

I feel like the task assigned to me is wrong.

In my opinion, it’s worth taking some time and adjust your perspective on the work before doing the actual work.

So, if I got it right, you find writing unit tests after the code is wrong because “the book” says that they should be written first. As in any other set-in-stone rule, it’s good to understand what stands behind it. In this case, one of the benefits of having tests written first is that it guides you to build your module/class/function in a way that is easy and intuitive to use for its client code: code that will use it. In fact tests are your code’s first client.

What I’m getting at is that even if the code was not written test-first, it will still benefit you to write tests: if it’ll happen that the code is hard to test or awkward to use, you’ll never need another theoretical by-the-book explanation of why it’s good to have tests written first.

I mean writing tests now, will give you the opportunity to evaluate your code and find ways to improve it. And even if you won’t be able to jump in and immediately improve it this time, you will next time: because you already know why.

So, what I would do is this: I’d just give it a try. Just as an experiment, just as a fun code-kata-like exercise. Be prepared to ask for a little help if it’s hard to start. But you can be sure that this will help you understand your code in new ways, and I bet that writing tests—no matter before or after— will turn out to be a trick that you’ll want to keep close to you.

2 Unit tests are also an excellent safeguard against regressions, if them failing breaks the build - the developer trying to 'optimize' the function will instantly know that their code is wrong . – Riking Commented Feb 28, 2014 at 6:51

It is true that unit testing up front has many advantages. However, the realities of software development will often include things that are less than ideal.

First, you are working with people and people make mistakes. Sometimes less than ideal decisions are made, and sometimes tests are forgotten.

Second, there are competing priorities for any project. Time available to build the product: quality of the product (and therefore testing of the product), resources available to build the product, and features required for the product. The code you're supposed to test could have been written when there was insufficient time to get in all the features perfectly, so they were done with lower quality.

Third, that may simply not be the process at your company. Your company's version of the software development lifecycle may specifically put all testing at the end of the project.

Most importantly, you have only been at your job for 1 year. You need to work with your mentor, team lead, and supervisor to learn how things are done there. If you come up with questions like, 'why wasn't this done during development?' then you should ask someone at your company to help you better understand the development process. We, on the internet, cannot tell you why a decision was made at your company.

The OP didn't say he was doing TDD. – DJClayworth Commented Feb 28, 2014 at 2:27
@DJClayworth Actually, he did say that he looked up TDD and that's where he learned that you should build your tests during development. Then he edited his question, and Workplace does not announce when a question you've answered has been edited, as your answer may no longer be accurate to the question, and I didn't come back to read what I didn't see any updates for ;-). I'll try to remember to update my answer based on the edited question. – atk Commented Feb 28, 2014 at 2:34
Sorry, didn't look at past versions. – DJClayworth Commented Feb 28, 2014 at 3:41
consider edit ing your answer to account for changes made in the question. The way it is written now looks confusing for readers – gnat Commented Feb 28, 2014 at 7:08
@DJClayworth, nor would I have expected you to ;) – atk Commented Feb 28, 2014 at 12:54

The simple answer is that although it is very late in the process to be thinking about tests, you should do them if you have the time, as they are a benefit to your development.

As regards bugs, you should also be creating/adding tests as part of the process. This also ensures that later work doesn't regress the fixes.

Anytime you are unclear about a task or why it needs to be done, then you need to discuss with your boss. However, what you don't want to do is ask undiplomatically. So don't say why I am I asked to write these useless tests. Say that you are not clear on the assignment by all means. Saying the assignment appears ridiculous to you never is. One of the critical skills to learn is how to ask leading questions to get a boss to understand that you have concerns about an issue without coming out and saying you think the boss is stupid.

Ask what exactly he wants from these tests at this point in development. Ask what he wants you to do if some of the tests fail. Ask which kinds of failures would cause the product to need to be delayed and which would need to be documented as bugs that needs fixing later. Ask if this is something you should be doing going forward as part of all development. Ask if there are sample tests from some other project. Ask what areas you should prioritize if you can't cover the whole codebase in the allotted time. Better to have 5 good tests that cover the most critical part and complex part of the application than 100 tests covering the noncritical but easy to understand things.

After writing the tests, you can suggest that doing test driven development might have been a better idea especially if you find significant problems with the code at this point in time.

Now I can think of several reasons for doing this at this point. Perhaps someone was supposed to write the tests and didn't and they need them for legal reasons. Perhaps there wasn't time to write the test earlier, but the boss wants you to get more familiar with the code, so he asked you to do this as a training exercise. Perhaps he doesn't have a critical dev task for you to do and writing tests is a way of getting productive work from you.

First paragraph is the only workplace related answer here at all, and exactly right. The rest belongs to software development. – gnasher729 Commented Oct 3, 2017 at 19:59

In theory, writing test cases in parallel to development allows you to write better code. But in many cases, this might not work out (mostly due to time bandwidth).

So, first things first, writing unit test cases (even if it is after development), is not a useless activity. Please don't communicate the same to your manager and develop a wrong impression of yourself on him/her. Understand that unit test cases are helpful not just for you but for others who might work on the same module in future. Following are the reasons to write a test case:

Well written test cases act as guardians of code. i.e, assume you have a specific if-else clause written to handle a corner scenario. Tomorrow if someone new comes in and decides that this if-else clause is useless and needs to be done away with (maybe he doesn't know the corner scenario). How do you protect that code? Write a test case to capture the scenario. That way, when he runs the test case, it'll fail and give an indication towards the reason for the code.
Test cases allow you to monitor different scenarios which might not be caught during manual testing. Test cases allow a huge bandwidth in terms of the data that you can pass and the output you can expect. That way, you as a developer can capture wide variety of scenarios which will give you more confidence on your code.
Running test cases after each and every change of code allows for regression bugs to be caught (Many a times, your own fix would cause your own code to break!).

All said and done, it depends on how religiously the developers follow test case runs and how efficiently is the test case written. But please don't undermine the task of test case writing.

On new projects, is common for more tests to be written later than in parallel with development, for a variety of reasons:

1)If its a large product, you generally want to make progress on the hard architecture pieces early. Lets say it take 1 month to write module A, 1 to write module B, and 2 weeks for each module to write tests. Then you tie it all together. If you wait to do the tests first, you can't find those problems until 3 months in. If you do fewer tests in parallel and front load the development, you can find the design problems (which cost the most to fix) a month earlier.

2)Business realities rarely allow you to actually write all the tests you eventually need in parallel.

3)If the project is non-trivial, you probably don't know exactly how you'll do everything. Pieces will be written, then reworked or even replaced. (I'm on a 9 month new project now, we've already replaced the db. I just rewrote the image cache completely because the way the networking library handled threading caused too many passes to the UI thread causing perf issues. All tests on both of those would have needed to be rewritten from scratch). Spending a lot of tie test writing will require you to spend a lot of time test rewriting and test fixing. It makes no sense to write tests until things are at least semi-stable.

4)Even if you do write things in parallel, you'll miss things. Unit tests are never finished, they evolve with your app. You add more as you find corner cases you missed (which is also why unit tests don't prove your code is right- they can at most prove they aren't wrong in a way you've thought to test). You always add more tests after development as you find these.

5)Unit tests are useful over the life of the project. Even if it would have been better to have them earlier- it will still help moving forward. Writing them now is better than nothing.

This seems to answer the question's specifics more than the actual question (which is about whether to tell the boss, not about whether the asker is correct in their assessment) – Erik Commented Oct 2, 2017 at 8:15
Of the two, that's the now interesting. The actual question was something a 2 year old should have known the answer to. – Gabe Sechan Commented Oct 2, 2017 at 12:36
Please be nice to those asking questions. Just because you feel people should know, doesn't mean they do, and we're here because we want to help them with answers. – Erik Commented Oct 2, 2017 at 12:41

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Re-reading is inefficient. Here are 8 tips for studying smarter.

by Joseph Stromberg

The way most students study makes no sense.

That’s the conclusion of Washington University in St. Louis psychologists Henry Roediger and Mark McDaniel — who’ve spent a combined 80 years studying learning and memory, and recently distilled their findings with novelist Peter Brown in the book Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning .

using active learning strategies is most effective

The majority of students study by re-reading notes and textbooks — but the psychologists’ research, both in lab experiments and of actual students in classes, shows this is a terrible way to learn material. Using active learning strategies — like flashcards, diagramming, and quizzing yourself — is much more effective, as is spacing out studying over time and mixing different topics together.

McDaniel spoke with me about the eight key tips he’d share with students and teachers from his body of research.

1) Don’t just re-read your notes and readings

Photofusion/UIG via Getty Images

”We know from surveys that a majority of students, when they study, they typically re-read assignments and notes. Most students say this is their number one go-to strategy.

when students re-read a textbook chapter, they show no improvement in learning

”We know, however, from a lot of research, that this kind of repetitive recycling of information is not an especially good way to learn or create more permanent memories. Our studies of Washington University students, for instance, show that when they re-read a textbook chapter, they have absolutely no improvement in learning over those who just read it once.

“On your first reading of something, you extract a lot of understanding. But when you do the second reading, you read with a sense of ‘I know this, I know this.’ So basically, you’re not processing it deeply, or picking more out of it. Often, the re-reading is cursory — and it’s insidious, because this gives you the illusion that you know the material very well, when in fact there are gaps.”

2) Ask yourself lots of questions

Aram Boghosian for The Boston Globe via Getty Images

”One good technique to use instead is to read once, then quiz yourself, either using questions at the back of a textbook chapter, or making up your own questions. Retrieving that information is what actually produces more robust learning and memory.

retrieving information is what produces more robust learning and memory

”And even when you can’t retrieve it — when you get the questions wrong — it gives you an accurate diagnostic on what you don’t know, and this tells you what you should go back and study. This helps guide your studying more effectively.

”Asking questions also helps you understand more deeply. Say you’re learning about world history, and how ancient Rome and Greece were trading partners. Stop and ask yourself why they became trading partners. Why did they become shipbuilders, and learn to navigate the seas? It doesn’t always have to be why — you can ask how, or what.

“In asking these questions, you’re trying to explain, and in doing this, you create a better understanding, which leads to better memory and learning. So instead of just reading and skimming, stop and ask yourself things to make yourself understand the material.”

3) Connect new information to something you already know

”Another strategy is, during a second reading, to try relating the principles in the text to something you already know about. Relate new information to prior information for better learning.

”One example is if you were learning about how the neuron transmits electricity. One of the things we know if that if you have a fatty sheath surround the neuron, called a myelin sheath , it helps the neuron transmit electricity more quickly.

“So you could liken this, say, to water running through a hose. The water runs quickly through it, but if you puncture the hose, it’s going to leak, and you won’t get the same flow. And that’s essentially what happens when we age — the myelin sheaths break down, and transmissions become slower.”

( Quasar/Wikimedia Commons )

4) Draw out the information in a visual form

”A great strategy is making diagrams, or visual models, or flowcharts. In a beginning psychology course, you could diagram the flow of classical conditioning . Sure, you can read about classical conditioning, but to truly understand it and be able to write down and describe the different aspects of it on a test later on — condition, stimulus, and so on — it’s a good idea to see if you can put it in a flowchart.

“Anything that creates active learning — generating understanding on your own — is very effective in retention. It basically means the learner needs to become more involved and more engaged, and less passive.”

5) Use flashcards

”Flashcards are another good way of doing this. And one key to using them is actually re-testing yourself on the ones you got right.

keeping a correct card in the deck and encountering it again is more useful

”A lot of students will answer the question on a flashcard, and take it out of the deck if they get it right. But it turns out this isn’t a good idea — repeating the act of memory retrieval is important. Studies show that keeping the correct item in the deck and encountering it again is useful. You might want to practice the incorrect items a little more, but repeated exposure to the ones you get right is important too.

“It’s not that repetition as a whole is bad. It’s that mindless repetition is bad.”

6) Don’t cram — space out your studying

Johannes Simon/Getty Images

”A lot of students cram — they wait until the last minute, then in one evening, they repeat the information again and again. But research shows this isn’t good for long term memory. It may allow you to do okay on that test the next day, but then on the final, you won’t retain as much information, and then the next year, when you need the information for the next level course, it won’t be there.

practice a little bit one day, then two days later

”This often happens in statistics. Students come back for the next year, and it seems like they’ve forgotten everything, because they crammed for their tests.

“The better idea is to space repetition. Practice a little bit one day, then put your flashcards away, then take them out the next day, then two days later. Study after study shows that spacing is really important.”

7) Teachers should space out and mix up their lessons too

Andy Cross/The Denver Post via Getty Images

”Our book also has information for teachers. And our educational system tends to promote massed presentation of information as well.

”In a typical college course, you cover one topic one day, then on the second day, another topic, then on the third day, another topic. This is massed presentation. You never go back and recycle or reconsider the material.

”But the key, for teachers, is to put the material back in front of a student days or weeks later. There are several ways they can do this. Here at Washington University, there are some instructors who give weekly quizzes, and used to just put material from that week’s classes on the quiz. Now, they’re bringing back more material from two to three weeks ago. One psychology lecturer explicitly takes time, during each lecture, to bring back material from days or weeks beforehand.

the key, for teachers, is to put the material back in front of a student days or weeks later

”This can be done in homework too. It’s typical, in statistics courses, to give homework in which all of the problems are all in the same category. After correlations are taught, a student’s homework, say, is problem after problem on correlation. Then the next week, T tests are taught, and all the problems are on T tests. But we’ve found that sprinkling in questions on stuff that was covered two or three weeks ago is really good for retention.

”And this can be built into the content of lessons themselves. Let’s say you’re taking an art history class. When I took it, I learned about Gauguin, then I saw lots of his paintings, then I moved on to Matisse, and saw lots of paintings by him. Students and instructors both think that this is a good way of learning the painting styles of these different artists.

”But experimental studies show that’s not the case at all. It’s better to give students an example of one artist, then move to another, then another, then recycle back around. That interspersing, or mixing, produces much better learning that can be transferred to paintings you haven’t seen — letting students accurately identify the creators of paintings, say, on a test.

“And this works for all sorts of problems. Let’s go back to statistics. In upper level classes, and the real world, you’re not going to be told what sort of statistical problem you’re encountering — you’re going to have to figure out the method you need to use. And you can’t learn how to do that unless you have experience dealing with a mix of different types of problems, and diagnosing which requires which type of approach.”

8) There’s no such thing as a “math person”

Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

”There’s some really interesting work by Carol Dweck , at Stanford. She’s shown that students tend to have one of two mindsets about learning.

it turns out that mindsets predict how well students end up doing

”One is a fixed learning model. It says, ‘I have a certain amount of talent for this topic — say, chemistry or physics — and I’ll do well until I hit that limit. Past that, it’s too hard for me, and I’m not going to do well.’ The other mindset is a growth mindset. It says that learning involves using effective strategies, putting aside time to do the work, and engaging in the process, all of which help you gradually increase your capacity for a topic.

”It turns out that the mindsets predict how well students end up doing. Students with growth mindsets tend to stick with it, tend to persevere in the face of difficulty, and tend to be successful in challenging classes. Students with the fixed mindset tend not to.

“So for teachers, the lesson is that if you can talk to students and suggest that a growth mindset really is the more accurate model — and it is — then students tend to be more open to trying new strategies, and sticking with the course, and working in ways that are going to promote learning. Ability, intelligence, and learning have to do with how you approach it — working smarter, we like to say.”

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

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Worst Assignment Ever

Should students be forced to share personal loss on a poster.

Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. In addition to our traditional advice, every Thursday we feature an assortment of teachers from across the country answering your education questions. Have a question for our teachers? Email [email protected] or post it in the Slate Parenting Facebook group .

This week’s Ask a Teacher panel: Carrie Bauer , middle and high school, New York Amy Scott, eighth grade, North Carolina Brandon Hersey, second grade, Washington Cassy Sarnell, preschool special education, New York

My daughter is a freshman in high school, and she recently got an assignment in life sciences that seems inappropriate. I’m wondering whether I should intervene with the teacher or leave it alone. The assignment is for the kids to identify someone in their family who died of cancer, and then students are supposed to research that kind of cancer. They’re supposed to create a poster presentation to display for the entire school.

The teacher also told them that the assignment requires them to use the story of their relative’s death as the “attention-grabbing” part of the poster and presentation. This means sharing details of how cancer affected their relative and how the person died. The goals of the project are to learn about cancer and to advocate for more research funding to fight cancer.

It seems inappropriate to me to ask kids to share memories (some very recent) of their relatives’ deaths with the entire school, and to grade them on how well they do it. My daughter told the teacher she thought this wasn’t a great assignment, especially since two classmates lost a close relative to cancer earlier in the school year and are still grieving. The teacher’s response was to tell the kids that the best way to do the assignment was to use a relative’s story but that she would permit the kids to use a celebrity’s story if they didn’t want to use a personal story. Given that my child has already attempted to resolve this herself, I’m wondering if I should step in or if my sense that this is inappropriate is off-base. Thanks.

—Wanting Some Boundaries

Dear Wanting,

Oh, LORD! I gasped aloud! The goals of this project are reasonable enough (although “learn about cancer” is such a broad objective that even a student teacher could see it needs refinement), but the execution is absurdly tone-deaf at best and cruel at worst. I guess I can sympathize with what I surmise is the teacher’s desire to make her curriculum feel visceral and relevant, but “Building Engagement by Retraumatizing Grieving Adolescents” is not a professional development workshop anyone is going to deliver on staff development day.

Normally, I’d advise you to start with the teacher, but as you said, your daughter has already advocated to the teacher once. My prediction is that going to her again won’t yield much of a result—I think she’ll likely say she has already accommodated the concern by offering the celebrity alternative. Technically, that’s true, but in my opinion, it’s not a great workaround when the overall project has such clear potential to be hurtful. In this case, I might start by emailing the guidance counselor and cc-ing the principal. If your daughter has a copy of the directions for the project, I’d quote the language directly from that, then spell out your concerns as clearly and neutrally as you have here. I wouldn’t frame the issue around the two classmates who have suffered a loss; because you aren’t their parent, it’s a bit of an overstep to advocate on their behalf. You can just as compellingly express that the general task seems insensitive and ill-considered. I certainly hope they’ll press the teacher to adjust the assignment. (Also, I have so many lingering questions! Has the teacher ever assigned this project before? If so, how is it possible that no one has complained previously?! Please feel free to write back and give me the full run-down and an update!) Good luck.

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My kiddo is a very bright third grader who loves to read. If the book involves unicorns or rainbows, she will not stop talking! Getting her to put those ideas in writing is a different struggle, however. It often results in tears, tantrums, and, yesterday, torn assignment pages. I’ve thought about asking my child’s teacher for strategies to encourage her to put her thoughts together coherently. What do you think of that? Is there anything else I could do at home to help reinforce the concepts of, say, expository writing and narrative writing? I don’t need her to be doing five-paragraph essays or anything, but I do want to help coach her through these tantrums.

—Turn a Reader Into a Writer?

Dear TRIW ,

Your letter is music to an English teacher’s ears! Any time I hear a student loves to read, I bloom.

Frankly, I don’t think you should worry too much about the other part right now. Generating ideas is a huge part of writing, and from what you’ve said, she’s got that part down. While it’s true that many third graders can physically write stories, letters, and reports, for others it takes longer, and the best thing you can do is not push too hard .

Let me draw a parallel. I’m a member of several online parent groups, and at least once a week, a parent will post: How should I potty-train my 20-month-old? The seasoned parents will reply, practically in chorus: don’t. Wait until the kid is ready. Because the fact is, while some 2-year-olds will want to use the toilet that early, many just can’t do it at that age. And while you can train some who don’t want to, it’ll probably involve tears from both parties.

I’m not saying your daughter can’t do it, but it doesn’t seem like she wants to right now. The worst thing that could happen is that your daughter could decide now that she “doesn’t like writing” or she’s “bad at writing.” So let her do what she’s comfortable doing, what she likes, what she’s good at. If that’s talking, let her talk. Help her develop her ideas by asking clarifying questions. Restate what she says in a more organized way: “Let me see if I understand. You’re saying … ” Praise her creativity or whatever part of idea generation she is doing well.

One question: Does she give you any indication that the physical part of writing is a chore? Some kids at that age still have fine motor challenges, which can manifest as resistance to writing. If that’s the case, there are a few things you can do. First, she could try dictation software. Second, you could ask to scribe for her (then let her reread and edit the piece). Last, see if she’s ready to learn to type. There are a bunch of online typing programs that kids love.

And to answer your question, yes, definitely consult with her teacher. They will know your daughter as a reader, a writer, and a whole person, so their feedback will be the most valuable.

My son is in his first year of kindergarten. While his year has generally been fine, I’ve been disappointed with the setup of his class. He has two teachers who job-share the single position (i.e., one works Monday and Wednesday and Friday, while the other is in class on Tuesday and Thursday), and from what I see, this setup hasn’t provided the consistency and stability needed by kindergartners starting out in school. In particular, it seems like it has contributed to some ongoing behavioral problems in the classroom. Moreover, the class is very boy-heavy (something like 75 percent of the students are boys), which I assume further complicated this classroom setup.

I want to contact the principal regarding my dissatisfaction, but I’m not sure if this is appropriate on my part. I don’t necessarily have an issue with job-sharing in general, but I think it should be restricted to older students who are already accustomed to the social and behavioral demands of school. Is this worth contacting the principal over, even though my son made it through relatively unscathed, or do I leave that to parents of classmates with more significant problems? I’m certain he would have had a better year with a more consistent environment, like his older sister had when she was in kindergarten.

—Not Usually a Complainer

Dear Not Usually a Complainer,

I generally give the advice to parents that you shouldn’t complain to principals (because they should talk to their teachers first), but I think this circumstance is rather unique. I’ve never been to a school where kindergarten teachers job-shared for exactly the reasons you mention. It creates inconsistency at an age when kids thrive off consistency and familiarity. It seems like a strange policy to me, not to mention bad for the teachers. Furthermore, you’re not complaining in a school district where job-sharing in kindergarten has been the norm, since the older sister had a more consistent environment.

There’s nothing the school can do about the gender ratio, unfortunately, but you can certainly mention to an administrator that you have concerns. I wouldn’t storm the principal’s office, guns blazing, and start demanding a single kindergarten teacher, but if the principal is someone you know, and you happen to see them at a school event, I don’t see the harm in mentioning this to them. As with all situations where you’re telling someone you would like them to do their job differently, a big part about whether you should say anything is in how you say it. Like you said, your son is relatively unscathed, and there are parents with worse problems. But if the principal asks, “How was this year for your son?” there’s nothing wrong with responding, “It was OK, but I think having one consistent teacher, like his sister did, would have made XYZ easier.”

It’s entirely possible that the school was trialing the job-sharing and secretly hoping for feedback from the parents on how well it went. It’s also entirely possible they’re trying job-sharing out for budget reasons. (Hiring a bunch of people part time is cheaper than hiring a few people full time—a workaround that I don’t like because it tends to take advantage of teachers.) Whatever the case, the school administration should probably be informed if it isn’t working well, and as long as you present it as feedback rather than as a demand or complaint, I think it’s fine to speak up and advocate for your son and any kiddos whose parents aren’t able to do so.

—Ms. Sarnell

My family and I are American expats in an Anglophone country, and our daughter is almost 3. It’s really hard to find good preschools where we are, and my daughter has ended up in a bilingual class at the German international school. We love it and she loves it, so all is great currently.

The challenge comes in planning for the future. I have the sort of job where we have to move every few years, and we expect our next move to be when my daughter is 6. I have no idea where we’ll end up going and won’t know for several years.

The American International School here starts at 4 years old, and we were initially planning to move her over there then, as the German school doesn’t start really focusing on academics until about 7 years old. We also figure that she’ll move to an American or British school when we move (and she’s 6), so the American International School would help keep her from being behind her peers when that move happens.

But now the German school is asking if we want to put her in the full German class starting next term, or if we want to keep her in the bilingual program. I am a big believer in the benefits of knowing other languages. My daughter has this great opportunity to master German, but she probably won’t have much chance to use German past the age of 6.

Do we keep her in the bilingual program and then switch her to the American school at 4? Put her in the full German class and keep her there until she’s 6, when we’ll move again? Put her in the bilingual class but keep her at the school ’til she’s 6? Put her in the full German class but move her to the American school when she’s 4?

Or am I overthinking this and any option will be fine since she’s so young and a quick learner?

— Deutsch Lernen Oder Nicht ?

Hey there, Deutsch!

What an amazing opportunity for your daughter and family! I don’t think you’re overthinking it. Decisions like these can be tricky, and approaching them thoughtfully is important. Kids at this age are quite resilient, so let me start by saying that I believe whatever you choose will benefit your daughter greatly.

That said, my recommendation is that you place her in the full German class next term and consider moving her when she’s 4. At your daughter’s age, school is less about teaching content and more about learning skills. Placing your daughter in a linguistically challenging learning environment, even if the content isn’t academically rigorous, will give her skills like problem-solving, reasoning, and making connections. These skills will serve her well during any transition your family makes. Also, it’s important to keep in mind that most American children don’t begin school ’til age 5, so I wouldn’t worry much about her falling behind her peers.

After one year in the full German class, you’ll be able to see how she likes it, and reassess. If she really enjoys it, you could consider keeping her there ’til your move, and if not, the American school will still be there. I hope this helps. Viel Glück !

—Mr. Hersey

Our Mission

Why I Stopped Giving Zeros

Giving a zero for missed work can make it mathematically impossible for students to recover their grade; here’s what one teacher is doing instead.

Photo of teacher grading papers in classroom

On finals day, one of my students flew down the hall to tell my assistant principal that he had passed my psychology class with a C. He was a student who really struggled with how to “do school.” Because he had been convinced that he would fail from the beginning, his excitement over passing my class at the end of the school year was palpable. This transformation was due to one simple change to my grading practices: I stopped giving zeros for missing work as part of a larger commitment to adopting equitable grading practices.

What Are Equitable Grading Practices?

As part of a larger focus on equity, leaders in my district have started the process of evaluating grading practices. Two years ago, as part of serving on my high school’s leadership team, we read Joe Feldman’s book Grading for Equity . Last year, with the support of the administration, I took a hard look at my grading practices. That experience transformed my thinking about how and what I grade.

Equitable grading practices separate the behavior from the assessment of knowledge. These practices emphasize the belief that all students can learn and meet learning targets. According to experts, traditional grading with the well-known bell curve and 100-point scale is inherently inequitable. In a 100 point scale, the first 40 percentage points are divided equally: A is 90–100 percent, B is 89–80 percent, down to a D at 69–60 percent. When students get a zero, it’s not a similar 10-percent reduction but a 60-percent reduction. Students who receive a zero are often mathematically unable to recover their grade. Students are rewarded or punished for their compliance and behavior, instead of assessed on the acquisition of knowledge.

Revising My Grading Practices

Understanding the problems of traditional grading practices is one thing; making the changes to more equitable grading is quite another. I had long given up awarding extra credit or docking students for turning in work late, practices that Feldman argues are inequitable. I have always allowed retakes on assessments. But I did give credit for assignments that Feldman would call “practice,” and I did give zeros for missing work. When I saw his mathematical explanation against the traditional grading scale, I knew I needed to make some changes .

As part of this process, I switched to not giving a zero for missing assignments. I was up front with my students and parents from the start. I explained in my syllabus, at Parent Night, and at conferences what it meant mathematically to give a zero and exactly why I would not be doing that.

Getting the message out was challenging. It was immediately clear that I was fighting against our student information system (SIS), which uses a 100-point scale. This meant changing my lowest grade to 50 percent instead of a zero. But to students, parents, and anyone looking at the SIS, it appeared as though the student had turned in the assignment and scored 50 percent on it. This led to repeated conversations about missing assignments.

As the year progressed, I saw a noticeable change in my lowest-performing students. As other teachers were seeing their students quit trying, mine were seeing the results of their efforts as their grades went from 50 percent to 60 percent and then from 60 percent to 70 percent. Students who had struggled early on thanked me for helping them to pass my class.

My biggest change this year is to go to 100 percent summative grading and give no credit for practice. I am working hard to get my students to pull their attention away from how many points an assignment is worth and toward what learning is expected and why they need it. Students can retake any summative assessment, and the score earned is the most recent attempt.

Practice, participation, and formative behavior are still important concepts in my class, but tracking them is outside of the grade. These concepts are assessed as skills using rubrics and tracked at 0 percent in the SIS. Retakes are dependent on students doing the practice first. Students should reflect on their behavior and practice and self-assess to see the connection between the practice and their performance.

A Slow Process: Districts across the country are finding that changing to grading for equity is a process that is not easily done overnight. Teachers feel a strong sense of ownership in their grading practices. They have a lot of autonomy in the process, and that is a difficult thing to give up. This school year, professional development at the high school level is centered on equitable grading. For the first professional development of the year, teachers read articles written by Feldman and others about equitable grading practices. As the year progresses, staff will have choices about which topics to learn more about and are encouraged to make one change in their grading practices over the course of the year.

Key Takeaways: Encourage staff to make small changes. Choosing one change from this list is a good place to start. Then, track the results, not just in grades but in student behavior, mental health, and absenteeism.

Stop giving a zero for missing work.
Consider using rubrics and a four-point system instead of the 100-point scale.
Stop giving points for practice.
Allow retakes.
Separate behavior from the assessment of knowledge in the grading system.
Use self-assessment and peer assessment.

I still fight the perception from stakeholders that I am giving students something for nothing when I “award” 50 percent for missing work. But in my experience, this criticism is unfounded. I didn’t see a large increase in students getting As and Bs. I did see a number of students who would have failed instead persevere and pass with Ds and Cs. For me and those students, that one change made all the difference.

Guskey, T. (2020). Get Set, Go: Creating Successful Grading and Reporting Systems .

Guskey, T. (2014). On Your Mark: Challenging the Conventions of Grading and Reporting .

Guskey, T., & Bookhart, S. (2019). What We Know About Grading: What Works, What Doesn’t, and What’s Next .

Articles

Beasley, M., et al. (2021). Graduation must depend on learning, not time. EducationWeek.

Burke, M. (2022). Letter grades on way out? Why some University of California departments may use alternatives. EdSource.

Torres, C. (2022). No points off for late work. Edutopia .

Zalaznick, M. (2022). Why 2 districts say moving to equitable grading gives students more hope. District Administration.

Presentation

Grading for Equity ISTE Conference Summer 2022 presentation

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Home > I need Help, Now > I don’t understand my assignment and it’s due tomorrow! What should I do?

I don’t understand my assignment and it’s due tomorrow! What should I do?

Check quercus., contact your instructor..

For feedback about this website, email: [email protected] .

Howard Aldrich

Kenan professor of sociology, dept of sociology @ unc chapel hill.

Assignments: better late than never?

A few days ago, a colleague came to me for teaching advice. On his syllabus, he had written that he did not accept late assignments. One of the students, a young woman who was struggling in the class, had turned in a paper that was woefully incomplete and he told her that it did not meet the assignment requirements. However, rather than rejecting it outright, he took account of her struggles and accepted that she hadn’t decided to order essay online cheap to get it finished, telling her that if she turned in a finished version by the end of the week that completely met the basic requirements of the assignment, he would give her partial credit. At the end of the week, she turned the paper in again, but it was still well short of what he would accept as meeting minimal requirements.

Get that assignment in on time or else!

He asked what I thought he should do. He told me that the assignment counted 15% of her grade, and thus giving her a zero on the assignment would immediately knock her down at least a grade and a half, before taking account of her other less-than-stellar work in the course. But, because he had announced that he didn’t accept late papers and then had recanted on that rule by inviting her to submit a revised version, he felt he had to give her some credit.

After suggesting that yes, it made sense to give her some credit, under the circumstances, I went on to make a more general point about putting strict rules and regulations in a syllabus. At least this way, it would be printed for all the world to see, and nothing beats having it in a hard copy when you want to make a point. An old colleague of mine, who loved using a syllabus for his classes, told me that I should consider using a printing service like Printivity to display all of the information when it came to the year and what the students would be expecting. It’s one of the only ways to make sure that they have been sent a clear message. So, I should definitely consider putting rules and regulations in this type of format. I reminded him that in my syllabi, I never say that I will not accept late assignments. I have no list of punishments or points that will be taken off if assignments are turned in late. My friend, Joe Lowman, and I have had many conversations about this & I’ve benefited greatly from his wisdom. Indeed, when it comes to such matters, I usually find myself asking, “what would Joe do?”

On the first day of class, students often ask me, what are your penalties for late assignments? I tell them I don’t expect late assignments, as all the due dates for assignments are in the syllabus they’ve just been handed. In that case, why would any assignments be late? I find this logic impeccable, but some aren’t satisfied with this answer and persist in questioning me. All I will say is that if they find themselves having difficulty, prior to an assignment being due, they need to talk with me and I will try to help them. I never speculate about what I might do with the late assignment, preferring to deal with each of them on its own merits.

I do this to avoid being put in the situation of my colleague: announcing a hard and fast rule which extenuating circumstances may well require me to break. Over my 45 years of teaching, I have heard about plenty of emergencies, some of which were devastating to the students involved. What would I do if a student told me about a family emergency which gave them no choice but to rush home? I would feel really heartless in telling a student that I was very sorry about the accident and I hoped the victims would recover, but I stood firmly by my policy.

My colleagues are typically astonished when I tell them about this policy. Typically, they raise two objections. First, won’t I get a lot of late assignments? Second, if I do accept late assignments, isn’t that unfair to the students who turn their assignments on time? My answer is “no” to both objections, as I will explain.

First , in my syllabus and on my webpage, every assignment is clearly described with its due date. I use Sakai, which sends out automated notices, reminding students of due dates. The assignment is also noted on the website’s course calendar. For larger assignments, such as term papers, I have multiple milestones that students must meet: reporting their chosen topic, submitting a one paragraph description of their theme, a preliminary listing of references, a rough draft, and so forth. These milestones give me many opportunities to intervene when students show signs of falling behind. I also take a very active role in keeping track of how students are doing, sending emails to students who miss class and asking students to come in and talk with me about assignments, if they have difficulties.

When students approach me about the possibility of a late assignment, and what I would do, the first thing I always say is, “What is interfering with your turning in an assignment on time?” I don’t say, “Remember the penalties.” If, after working with them, it is clear that they will not get the assignment in on time, the next conversation I have with them goes something like this:

Student: “okay, when can I turn the paper in?”

Me: “when do you think you will have it finished?”

Student: “well, will I be penalized?”

Me: “you realize that the reason I ask for assignments to be turned in on time is so I have enough time to read them properly, so I can be sure that I will give each assignment its proper due. Late assignments make that more difficult. However, I will grade it as fairly as I can.”

Student: “okay, I’ll turn it in on Monday.” [ Students almost always pick a date earlier than I would have chosen, if I had picked the date! ]

Cooperative learning means you’re always coming up roses!

One of the consequences of this approach is that I almost never get late assignments! And, my syllabus is not cluttered up with pointless draconian rules that I have no intention of enforcing.

Second , what about the “fairness” issue? Isn’t it unfair to the conscientious students, who get their work in on time, to allow some students to turn assignments in late? I have three responses to this alleged violation of some perceived moral principle. (In what philosophical system is taking account of extenuating circumstances equivalent to a moral failure?)

(1) for students having problems getting assignments in on time, extra time almost never makes a difference in the quality of what they do. The best students in a class are not the ones asking for extensions.

(2) students who get assignments in on time can put that assignment behind them and get on with their lives. By contrast, students who are struggling to complete a late assignment will find they have to forgo other things that they would’ve enjoyed doing, with their assignment-free peers, but instead they are stuck indoors, completing an assignment. Being allowed to turn something in late is no free pass to scholastic heaven. It is a burden.

(3) my goal in assessing my student’s work is to try to figure out what they have learned in my class, and knocking off points from a student’s score because a paper was a day or two late completely muddies the meaning of a grade. I’m not teaching “discipline,” I’m teaching sociology. I want to give students every opportunity to show me what they’ve learned, and if this requires me, every few semesters, to accept a late assignment, I’m quite willing to do so.

Interested in learning more about what to do about late assignments? See this post.

10 Details in Friends That Don't Make Sense

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Friends is arguably the most iconic sitcom in history. Over the years, it reached outstanding levels of popularity, and it has managed to positively impact several generations. The show lasted an entire decade and hosted dozens of celebrity guests. People still rewatch the comedy series constantly.

However, as people watch the show time and time again, they may start noticing some inconsistencies. Of course, while the show was aired weekly, it was unlikely fans would notice these weird details. But now, with streaming and binging, small mistakes have become increasingly obvious.

10 Some of Monica's Actions Don't Go with Her Clean Personality

Monica Geller reads in Central Perk in Friends.

Courteney Cox, the actress who plays Monica, was originally going to appear as Rachel in Friends. However, she liked Monica's character better because she understood her better.

The fact she's extremely clean is one of Monica's most recognizable traits . She's often fighting with Rachel because Rachel doesn't pick up after herself. Monica also enjoys cleaning, organizing, and putting things exactly how she wants them. For example, when her boyfriend Richard tries to make the bed, she has many complaints.

However, many fans have noticed that in certain episodes, simply for comedic reasons or for lack of attention to detail, the writers ignored this aspect of Monica. For example, it doesn't make much sense that she allows her friends to put their feet on the coffee table, as that's not very hygienic. What's more, in Season 3, Episode 5, "The One with Frank Jr.," Joey points out that the tiles below her hamper are another color. It's absurd that Monica hasn't moved the hamper for years to clean. It might not be the most noticeable problematic detail in Friends, but it does break the illusion for hardcore fans.

9 The Gang Has Pretty Unrealistic Work Standards & Living Situations

Joey, Phoebe, Rachel, Ross, Chandler, and Monica hug in "The Last One: Part 2" finale of Friends.

According to fans on the internet, Joey owes Chandler around 120,000 dollars.

Friends: Every Main Character's Age At The Start Of The Series

Friends' main characters grow so much over the show's ten seasons, which makes sense considering how young everyone is at the start.

Sitcoms are supposed to be easy to digest and funny. Because of this, characters have a pretty good life, or at least, everything ends up well for them most of the time. However, Friends takes this premise to the limit. At least at the beginning of the series, none of the characters had well-paid jobs, except for Ross. All the others had average jobs or even terrible jobs, in Rachel's case. However, all of them lived in the city in pretty decent apartments.

Chandler pays for Joey's entire cost of living (which is already a weird detail), so he pays all the rent, services, and food on his own, with a common office job. Monica's apartment is explained by rent control, but Chandler and Joey live in a two-bedroom apartment in Manhattan with just one regular salary .

8 The Characters Rarely See Their Families

None of Phoebe's relatives go to her wedding with Mike. Lots of them appear in the series, like Ursula, her twin sister, or Frank Jr., her brother, and her kid nieces and nephew (who she birthed), but no one appears on such an important date.

This is not so unrealistic, but people find it strange that none of the characters seem to spend much time with their families. In fact, they even spend most major holidays together instead of going to their respective homes . Sometimes, this is justified, but as the series progresses, it seems to matter less and less.

Joey has plenty of sisters and a very large family and Monica and Ross are close to their parents (or at least Ross is). Rachel has two sisters, but they only appear in a few episodes and her sisters never appear at the same time. Chandler and Phoebe have problematic relationships with their families , so it makes more sense for them to not see them. But in others' cases, it's a bit odd. This could be attributed, though, to the TV show economy, as the series can't show every facet of the characters in just 20 minutes.

7 They Were the Sole Owners of the Orange Couch at Central Perk

Chandler, Monica, Rachel and Joey get coffee at Central Perk in Friends.

If people pay attention to the background of Central Perk, they will realize most of the art pieces change every three episodes.

People who have a favorite coffee place can probably agree that it's hard to always get your favorite seat. This is bound to be the case in such a big and populated city as New York. It would be magical for these characters to almost always find the most comfortable seat in the house each time they visit — which is all the time.

There is, however, one little joke making fun of this fact in Season 3, Episode 1, "The One with the Princess Leia Fantasy." In the cold open, the characters leave Central Perk annoyed because their orange couch is already occupied. Perhaps this happens a lot to the gang, but the audience doesn't get to see it.

6 They Visited Each Other at Random Times

Rachel eventually lives in all the apartments in the series: Monica's, Joey and Chandler's, Phoebe's, and Ross's.

Monica smiling, Ross hugging a blanket and Joey and Rachel hugging in Friends

10 Weirdest Friends Storylines, Ranked

Friends is a series that many fans have a soft spot for. But that hasn't saved it from having some of the strangest storylines on television.

While people understand that the characters on Friends are close, it makes no sense for them to spend such amounts of time in Monica and Rachel's apartments. The characters, for example, visit each other at random times of the day, such as breakfast. Fans can't understand how Ross gets up ridiculously early to go to his sister's place before going to work, especially taking into account that they are living in New York City, a place where getting from one place to another isn't exactly easy.

In the case of Chandler and Joey, it's not as weird, because they're their front-door neighbors. Also, Joey is unemployed most of the time. However, the fact that Monica can afford to give meals to her brother and all three of her friends (assuming Rachel contributes to groceries) is odd.

5 The Shark Porn Episode Is Extremely Ridiculous

In Friends, Monica tries to turn Chandler on in The One With The Sharks.

The writers didn't plan for Chandler and Monica's relationship. They were supposed to only have a one-night stand. However, the audience loved it so much, they incorporated the couple into the series.

In Season 9, Episode 4, "The One with the Sharks," Monica thinks she caught Chandler masturbating to sharks. In reality, he was watching regular porn and immediately changed the channel when Monica surprised him. However, instead of assuming the obvious, Monica believes that Chandler's kink is sharks , and things get very weird.

It's Season 9 and maybe the writers were already running out of ideas, but the whole situation is absurd. Most people in Monica's situation would have simply assumed Chandler either changed the channel or wasn't watching TV. The whole arc is kind of cringey because no one can truly relate.

4 Rachel Getting the Trifle Wrong Doesn't Make Sense

Rachel cooks a trifle in Monica's apartment in Friends.

Rachel's full name in the series is Rachel Karen Green.

Friends Thanksgiving episodes are basically a landmark of the show. Most people even go back to these amazing moments during the holidays simply to get into the right vibe. In one of the most iconic episodes of the show, Season 6, Episode 9, "The One Where Ross Got High," Rachel accidentally mixes the recipe of a trifle and shepherd's pie, which sort of ruins Thanksgiving dinner for the gang.

However, it's unbelievable to think that Rachel, as ditsy as she may be, added meat to a dessert . Not only that, but Monica, being a chef and having such control issues, would surely have noticed that something was amiss with the dish. It's an incredibly iconic and hilarious episode, but it's still a detail that makes absolutely no sense.

3 Rachel Miraculously Survives Falling off Her Balcony

Throughout the ten seasons, eventually, every character lives in Monica's apartment. Ross never lived there officially, but he stayed there when his grandmother was alive. He also used to sleep over when he was dating Rachel.

Split image of Rachel, Chandler in a bunny suit, Joey eating pizza inFriends.

10 Darkest Friends Jokes, Ranked

Friends is one of the most iconic sitcoms of all time, but the comedy show can sometimes hide dark truths in plain jokes about Monica, Phoebe & co.

Season 1, Episode 16, "The One with Two Parts, Part 1," sees Rachel and Monica fighting over the overdue Christmas lights. Finally, Rachel decides to take them down during a snowstorm. She falls off the balcony and the Christmas lights tangle around her leg, saving her from a pretty nasty fall.

This is a cartoonish moment. There is simply no way to explain how the Christmas lights saved Rachel's fall like that. She even looks into Mr. Heckler's window while hanging. At least the show was coherent enough to make Rachel go to the hospital after that ludicrous scene.

2 Everything About Phoebe's Pregnancy Is Odd

Lisa Kudrow, who plays Phoebe in Friends, was also pregnant in real life. However, she wasn't as big as her character, so she also wore padding to look like someone carrying triplets.

Phoebe is a strange character. Her family situation, her childhood, and some of her stories don't add up. However, people let it slide because Phoebe is... well... Phoebe. But her pregnancy is the one thing that is inexcusable. Her brother marrying a woman three times his age is weird, and Phoebe carrying their child is a tad odd too, but her pregnancy experience was simply wrong.

Phoebe realizes she's pregnant basically one day after the embryo transfer, which is obviously impossible. She then carries triplets and gives natural birth to the three of them with one single doctor in the room, having the most uncomplicated pregnancy in history. Later on, fans also complained about Rachel's one-year pregnancy and Monica and Chandler taking their twins home immediately after birth.

1 No One in Friends Really Works

All the main characters in Friends are fired from their jobs at some point or another, except for Chandler, who eventually quits to pursue his passion.

The amount of free time the characters from Friends have is highly unrealistic. It's almost like they have no jobs. Fans find it laughable, for example, that during all the births of the show, the characters can simply skip their jobs and spend absurd amounts of time at the hospital.

People especially complain about this when it comes to Monica and Ross. Monica, as the head chef of a fancy restaurant, had to work a lot of weird hours , making it almost impossible for her to spend time with Chandler. In Ross's case, it makes no sense that he got tenure at NYU because academics take a lot of time to research and write essays on top of their ordinary classes. Of course, it's a sitcom, and it's not supposed to be realistic, but it truly makes no sense.

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Follows Chandler, Joey, Monica, Phoebe, Rachel and Ross, friends who live in the Manhattan borough of New York City.

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The new UI of the Assignment Inbox makes no sense!

Khánh Nguyễn Bảo
Khanh_Nguyn_Bo
$0 " data-fmt="MMM d, yyyy · h:mm a" data-tip-class="infodate">5 mths ago
Jenn Payson $0 " data-fmt="MMM d, yyyy · h:mm a" data-tip-class="infodate">5 mths ago

I'm an instructor who has been Turnitin for some time now and the new changes to the way the website works do not make much sense to me.

First, yesterday I noticed the same issue Gomer had posted in this topic: https://turnitin.forumbee.com/t/q6y37d2/tii-now-unusable . The process of assignment submission done by instructors has become a lot more time-consuming.

Today, I found out that after you finish this tedious process, you're greeted with this assignment inbox:

Why there would be a need for a tiny scroll box inside the already scrollable webpage, I have no clue. As of now, this change affects the usability of the Assignment Inbox badly.

It's frankly quite frustrating to use Turnitin with these new changes.

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Karen Smith
Senior Teaching & Learning Innovations Specialist
Karen_Smith
Reported - view

Hi Khánh Nguyễn Bảo What browser and device are you using? I've shared your concerns with product marketing and they were unable to replicate this problem, nor has this happened in my test account. Even when I reduced the size of the window, I had the scroll bar on the side. Have you tried a different browser? I am using Chrome. And I assume that there's no way to adjust that bottom bar to allow for better viewing? Sorry for all the questions; hopefully we can help you figure this out.

Karen Smith Hi, I've been browsing Turnitin on my laptop running Windows 10, using Chrome too. Just now, I tried logging in on Microsoft Edge, and got the same scroll box issue. The problem persists on Chrome today still. And no, I am unable to extend the bottom bar, as expected.

Hopefully you guys can figure out why this is happening soon. I appreciate your effort of reaching out.

Brian O'Neill
Brian_ONeill

Karen Smith

I am also seeing the same problem. It is not a fluke. Somethign is wrong with the UI

Jenn Payson
Jenn_Payson

This is absolutely adding more time to my grading. I cannot get a larger window and it moves past names far too fast, so I'm left clicking little moves to work through 90+ students. I also can't see a large swath of class any longer. I use the visual of where I'm at out of the 25 students per page as motivation to keep going.

Content aside

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"[T]he assignment statement $X=X+1$ makes no sense [...] in mathematics." Why not?

Taken from Programming Languages and Principles , Chapter 1, by Tucker and Noonan:

... the assignment statement $X = X + 1$ makes no sense either in functional programming or in mathematics.

Why does it make no sense in mathematics?

formal-languages
programming

3 $\begingroup$ because assignment and comparison are different concepts. This is the reason the programming languages use two different symbols (= and == usually). In mathematics, = is comparison, while usually in programming = is assignment $\endgroup$ – Exodd Commented May 2, 2021 at 15:58
1 $\begingroup$ In Pascal, assignment was written x:=x+1 . You’ll see that notation sometimes used in math. In math, $X=X+1$ is like the programming Boolean statement, X == X+1 , which can be said to make sense - it is a valid statement - but in almost all contexts is false. (You need work hard to manufacture a context where it is true - say, in C++ where X is an object and + is (re-)defined.) $\endgroup$ – Thomas Andrews Commented May 2, 2021 at 16:06
$\begingroup$ Not so much work. You only need a value which represents numerical infinity. Standard (IEEE 754) floating-point arithmetic contains such values, and many other languages have integral types with infinite values. (For example, in Python from math import inf; inf == inf + 1 is true.) $\endgroup$ – MJD Commented May 2, 2021 at 17:04

2 Answers 2

Context matters.

In the context of mathematics, the equation " $X=X+1$ " means " $X$ equals $X+1$ ", which is false (for example, substitution of $X=0$ gives $0=1$ ; substitution of $X=1$ gives $1=2$ ; and that's more than enough to see the falsity with crystal clarity).

In the context of programming languages, the assignment operator " $X=X+1$ " means "take the numerical value stored in the memory position tagged $X$ , copy that value into the arithmetic processor, add $1$ to the value in the arithmetic processor, and then copy the value in the arithmetic processor back into the memory position tagged $X$ ".

As you can see, these are incompatible meanings.

$\begingroup$ So we need two operators, one for assignment and one for the test for equality? $\endgroup$ – nicomp Commented May 2, 2021 at 16:01
$\begingroup$ Yes, as mentioned in the comment of @Exodd. $\endgroup$ – Lee Mosher Commented May 2, 2021 at 16:02

I wouldn't say that such a statement makes no sense in mathematics. If $X$ is finite, it is a bit more justifiable. However, in the setting of (transfinite) cardinal arithmetic, if we have $X=\aleph_0$ , then $X=X+1$ is certainly true. In fact, more than that is true: $$\aleph_\alpha + \aleph_\beta = \max(\aleph_\alpha,\aleph_\beta) \text{ for } \alpha,\beta\in\mathrm{Ord},$$ where $\mathrm{Ord}$ denotes the class of all ordinals.

Such a statement is true, in a sense, in (transfinite) ordinal arithmetic. For example, $\alpha + 1 \neq \alpha$ for $\alpha\in\mathrm{Ord}$ . However, some care is still needed as $1 + \omega = \omega$ .

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$assignment makes no sense$

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Grammar check | Essay checker | Writing checker

May 16, 2018

Make no sense or have no sense?

by Nicholas Walker , under Grammar

Philip Mercier (circa 1689-1760) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

When can I say have no sense and make no sense ? Is have no sense ever correct?

One of my students wrote this sentence in a narrative writing assignment:

I tried to explain to him that this situation just have no sense.

Can you see what the problem is? In fact, he has made two errors in one. The first is a verb agreement error, and the second is a word choice error. The subject this situation is singular, and so any verb that follows it should take an -s at the end in order to make it agree. We call this kind of error a third person singular agreement error. Here is the correction for this kind of error.

I tried to explain to him that this situation just has no sense.

The second problem is a little harder for learners to fix on their own. The reason is that you need a wide exposure to English or a corpus to work out the rule.

Can you say have no sense ?

Yes, you can say have no sense but not in the way my student has used it. If you check a corpus for no sense , you get this:

As you can see, there is one example of have no sense in the phrase have no sense of shame . It is less common than make/makes/made no sense, but it is definitely possible.

In developing error detection rules for the Virtual Writing Tutor (the ESL grammar checker) anytime a learner submits have no sense or has no sense , the system will alert the learner to the word choice error and suggest “make” or “makes,” except when followed by the word of.

Check English Grammar with the Virtual Writing Tutor

Try it yourself. Copy and paste any one of the following sentences and paste it into the text area of the Virtual Writing Tutor to see what it says.

I tried to explain to him that these situations really have no sense. I tried to explain to him that this situation really has no sense. I tried to explain to him that this situation just have no sense. I tried to explain to him that this situation just has no sense.

Or one of these:

I tried to explain to her that he have no sense of shame. I tried to explain to her that he make no sense of shame.

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New York Yankees News

The Yankees’ handling of Jasson Dominguez makes no sense

The New York Yankees have a Jasson Dominguez–sized hole in left field. Current left fielder Alex Verdugo is feebly slashing .234/.294/.361, while Dominguez is mashing .309/.368/.485 in the minors. But the Bombers won’t commit to filling their Verdugo hole in with the young phenom, even after scoring only nine runs in three games against the lowly Washington Nationals — and with rosters conveniently expanding on Sunday. According to The Athletic’s Chris Kirschner , reporters pressed Yankees manager Aaron Boone to reveal his plans for the Martian. Boone responded, “I don’t know. We’ll see. We haven’t made that decision, so I don’t know.”

Aaron Boone when directly asked if Jasson Domínguez will get called up on Sunday: “I don’t know. We’ll see. We haven’t made that decision, so I don’t know.” — Chris Kirschner (@ChrisKirschner) August 30, 2024

The possible reason they haven’t called Dominguez up yet may drive Bombers fans crazy. Per MLB reporter Bryan Hoch , they could be trying to turn Dominguez into an extra draft pick.

“Jasson Dominguez will retain his rookie status for 2025 provided he does not exceed 130 career at-bats (he has 35 right now),” Hoch explained on X. “Keeping his rookie status for '25 allows the Yankees to receive a draft pick after the first round in 2026 if Dominguez wins the 2025 AL Rookie of the Year Award.”

The Yankees' front-office decision-making is nonsensical. They accumulate superstars in Aaron Judge, Juan Soto and Gerrit Cole, and then bring in Verdugo, who’s been steadily declining since 2020 . They plug holes with bargains like out-of-position Jazz Chisholm Jr.

Even when they have a perfectly viable resource in Dominguez available, the Yankees appear to be choosing the penny-pinching route. Essentially, they’re trying to fix a Lamborghini with duct tape.

That duct tape should hold long enough to get them into the playoffs —maybe even with a first-round bye. But expect the wheels to fall off rather quickly when they try to get going against high-quality postseason opponents.

More must-reads:

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Word Blanks assignment makes no sense to me

Tell us what’s happening:

I have been trying for almost an hour to get this to work. The way this exercise is explained and the method how its implemented (using a function without having covered the function argument) makes no sense to me.

How do i do this? I mean, are the variables between acolades in the function argument parameters? How are those assigned a value? is that using the variable name at teh very last line where it says to test the code?

Your code so far

Your browser information:

User Agent is: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/67.0.3396.87 Safari/537.36 .

Link to the challenge: https://learn.freecodecamp.org/javascript-algorithms-and-data-structures/basic-javascript/word-blanks/

@eialici Read through the fCC Guide for Word Blanks and see if that answers your questions.

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Screening candidates with assignments makes no sense

Companies are loosing in good candidates by giving them assignments as a first round, these assignments take about 2-3 days, very few people will be willing to invest that kind of effort for a potential technical round. Also assessing assignments is going to be very subjective.

Hiring devs is simple, one on one conversation for a couple of hours will tell you everything you need to know about the candidate, companies are too lazy for this ?

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COMMENTS

Assignment makes no sense
Assignment makes no sense; Watch. 6 months ago. Assignment makes no sense. denismith. 5. My teacher has put brief, marking criteria and a structure plan But he has also put an example, they example is complete different then everything els I'm so confused. 0 Report. Reply. Reply 1. 6 months ago. gjd800. 20. Ask them for clarification. 0 ...
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Come to the Writing Center! Talk to a friend or someone you know from class. Being able to talk to someone about your assignment may help you finally decode the prompt. What can the Writing Center do to help? Some questions about the assignment can only be answered by instructors, so you should be prepared to discuss the assignment with them.
My professors grading system makes no sense : r/college
Worth 3% of our final grade. To top it off our homework's and quizzes are worth the same grade. Makes no sense lmao. One of those is a freebie in lieu of any other kind of extra credit to raise your grade. So that most people could do it and get a decent grade on it. It is a gift.
communication
Saying the assignment appears ridiculous to you never is. One of the critical skills to learn is how to ask leading questions to get a boss to understand that you have concerns about an issue without coming out and saying you think the boss is stupid. ... It makes no sense to write tests until things are at least semi-stable. 4)Even if you do ...
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What to do when a teacher makes an atrocious assignment.
If that's the case, there are a few things you can do. First, she could try dictation software. Second, you could ask to scribe for her (then let her reread and edit the piece). Last, see if she ...
Why I Stopped Giving Zeros
According to experts, traditional grading with the well-known bell curve and 100-point scale is inherently inequitable. In a 100 point scale, the first 40 percentage points are divided equally: A is 90-100 percent, B is 89-80 percent, down to a D at 69-60 percent. When students get a zero, it's not a similar 10-percent reduction but a ...
I don't understand my assignment and it's due tomorrow! What should I
Sometimes you need to accept that your mark may not be what you want. Turn this negative energy around by looking ahead and planning out the next assignment so you can boost your mark. For feedback about this website, email: [email protected]. If you are struggling with an assignment the night before it is due, you can try getting help ...
Free Essay Checker
Check Your Essay for Free. Turn in work that makes the grade. Grammarly's free essay-checking tool reviews your papers for grammatical mistakes, unclear sentences, and misused words. Step 1: Add your text, and Grammarly will underline any issues. Step 2: Hover over the underlines to see suggestions. Step 3: Click a suggestion to accept it ...
Assignments: better late than never?
Late assignments make that more difficult. However, I will grade it as fairly as I can." ... Makes no sense! John March 17, 2021 at 3:54 pm. More accurately, it's like not having my bronzino served after waiting at the table for an hour, at which point I would leave, taking my appetite and my money to another restaurant. After enough tardy ...
10 Details in Friends That Don't Make Sense
It's an incredibly iconic and hilarious episode, but it's still a detail that makes absolutely no sense. 3 Rachel Miraculously Survives Falling off Her Balcony Throughout the ten seasons, eventually, every character lives in Monica's apartment. Ross never lived there officially, but he stayed there when his grandmother was alive.
How to deal with unwanted teaching assignment? : r/academia
Explain the situation to your chair. That you've come up with a solution to get through the semester but would appreciate a different assignment the next term. Plus I'd imagine that few folks only get to teach the courses that they like/love. Deal with it and keep it moving. 6.
Getting the use of Flip in a way that actually makes sense for an
Create Flip Assignments: In the Teams channel, go to the Assignments tab. Click on Create > New assignment. Under the instructions text box, click on Apps and search for Flip to create a video assignment. Use Flip for Video Discussions: Encourage students to use the Flip tab within Teams to record and share their reflections and responses.
The new UI of the Assignment Inbox makes no sense!
The process of assignment submission done by instructors has become a lot more time-consuming. Today, I found out that after you finish this tedious process, you're greeted with this assignment inbox: Why there would be a need for a tiny scroll box inside the already scrollable webpage, I have no clue.
Programming Assignment Makes No Sense : r/MathHelp
Programming Assignment Makes No Sense My assignment is to write a program that calculates the tip amount of a bill from a restaurant. We have to use only the total bill (including tax) and the tax rate to calculate the amount before tax.
formal languages
Such a statement is true, in a sense, in (transfinite) ordinal arithmetic. For example, $\alpha + 1 \neq \alpha$ for $\alpha\in\mathrm{Ord}$ . However, some care is still needed as $1 + \omega = \omega$ .
Writing essays that make no sense
Im currently in the middle of a stupid modernity assignment due for Tuesday and it makes no sense whatsoever. Not only that I actually don't understand what im writing about; just copying from books, changing words as I go along and hoping for the best. Yep, it happens to me sometimes! I gives me a really bad headache.
Make no sense or have no sense?
Can you say have no sense? Yes, you can say have no sense but not in the way my student has used it. If you check a corpus for no sense, you get this: As you can see, there is one example of have no sense in the phrase have no sense of shame. It is less common than make/makes/made no sense, but it is definitely possible.
When the Assignment Makes No Sense
Laugh along with hilarious uni moments when assignments are confusing, and teachers won't explain! Watch for a good chuckle! #unilife #onlineschool #funnymoments Keywords: confusing assignment uni, funny university moments, teacher won't explain, hilarious uni memes, college struggles, uni life humor, online school laughs, relatable student ...
Might not pass my class because submitting assignments makes no sense
So basically, a couple assignments and about half my labs are missing because I have no way to turn them in. I tried giving them to the teacher but she said they need to be turned in online. I'm rocking a nice 50% grade now and not sure how I'm going to be able to bring that up. My only hope is to get a perfect grade in the final exam now.
The Yankees' handling of Jasson Dominguez makes no sense
The New York Yankees have a Jasson Dominguez-sized hole in left field. Current left fielder Alex Verdugo is feebly slashing .234/.294/.361, while Dominguez is mashing .309/.368/.485 in the ...
Word Blanks assignment makes no sense to me
Tell us what's happening: I have been trying for almost an hour to get this to work. The way this exercise is explained and the method how its implemented (using a function without having covered the function argument) makes no sense to me. How do i do this? I mean, are the variables between acolades in the function argument parameters? How are those assigned a value? is that using the ...
Screening candidates with assignments makes no sense
Screening candidates with assignments makes no sense . General Companies are loosing in good candidates by giving them assignments as a first round, these assignments take about 2-3 days, very few people will be willing to invest that kind of effort for a potential technical round. Also assessing assignments is going to be very subjective.

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I was assigned a task I think doesn't make sense. Should I approach my boss about it?

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Re-reading is inefficient. Here are 8 tips for studying smarter.

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Assignments: better late than never?

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10 Details in Friends That Don't Make Sense

10 Some of Monica's Actions Don't Go with Her Clean Personality

9 The Gang Has Pretty Unrealistic Work Standards & Living Situations

Friends: Every Main Character's Age At The Start Of The Series

8 The Characters Rarely See Their Families

7 They Were the Sole Owners of the Orange Couch at Central Perk

6 They Visited Each Other at Random Times

10 Weirdest Friends Storylines, Ranked

5 The Shark Porn Episode Is Extremely Ridiculous

4 Rachel Getting the Trifle Wrong Doesn't Make Sense

3 Rachel Miraculously Survives Falling off Her Balcony

10 Darkest Friends Jokes, Ranked

2 Everything About Phoebe's Pregnancy Is Odd

1 No One in Friends Really Works

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The new UI of the Assignment Inbox makes no sense!

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"[T]he assignment statement $X=X+1$ makes no sense [...] in mathematics." Why not?

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