Some of the answers I received to the question “What is the name of the group of languages Spanish belongs to?” included:
1. Nahuatl
2. Indigenous
3. Arabic
4. Visigothian
5. Christian
6. Latino/a
To be fair, 12 out of 20 students in this course got 100% for the mini-quiz. So things are not as dire as they might seem.
May I say something without offending you, Clarissa? Your posts about your students’ amusing answers often confuses me — are these your college students? If they are, then why on earth do you set them middle-school level multiple choice or fill-in-the-blanks questions? Or is it because it is a foreign language course, and you can’t use normal college standards?
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I have never in my life used a multiple choice test in my life. Or fill-in-the-blanks either. Usually, I give them essay-type questions where they have to provide a paragraph or two on the subject.
The Romance languages question is part of the mini-quiz where the students had to trace the development of the Spanish language.
I even published a post on the general evilness of multiple-choice format a while ago. 🙂
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Must’ve missed it. Sorry. The excerpts made me imagine they were whole answers 🙂
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I am impressed that someone in your class could spell Nahuatl and Visigothian and yet get the answer wrong. They must have something going for them because they know of the words Nahuatl and Visigoth. That is a lot more knowledge than the typical incoming freshman in western Colorado!
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Nahuatl and Visigoth are the words that I taught them, so let’s give credit where credit is due. 🙂
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A conservative literary critic and college professor
Clarissa's Blog 
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