Jayna

Jayna is a good student in this class in terms of her excellent class participation, leadership skills, and her classwork and homework. From the beginning, Jayna has been an eager, motivated, and bright individual who actively volunteers for tasks, raises her hand, contributes good comments and questions, and adds energy to the class to help make teaching easier. Her thoughts and opinions are often stated very articulately and her questions are very helpful in clarifying concepts or explaining details. Whether in a large group or small group discussion, Jayna contributes her leadership to help the group get engaged, started and working towards the goal efficiently and effectively. In projects such as the opportunity costs group project, she demonstrated her ability to be a creative problem solver and a dynamic presenter. Furthermore, her classwork and homework demonstrate that she is an intelligent and hard-working student who is able to complete assignments with higher level thinking skills, attention to details, and good writing. Her essay on the war in Iraq demonstrates much potential in her writing abilities as she has great focus, organization, and an ability to express her ideas effectively. Though she is absent a lot, she is very good at handing in assignments and keeping up with the class.

In terms of things she could improve, Jayna needs to improve her attendance and her performance on tests. Oftentimes (at least ten days), Jayna is absent or quite tardy to class which in some ways negatively affects her academic performance and her classroom participation. In many cases, she has missed important activities and assignments which are hard to make up and not helpful to her peers or group members. Because her homework shows a high level of understanding, her below average test score on the first chapter test demonstrates to me a lack of preparation rather than a lack of knowledge. In addition, Jayna could improve her behavior in class by lessening the number of side conversations with her friends which could be a factor for her poor test performance. In conclusion, I would like to see Jayna improve her daily attendance which I think will inevitably improve the potential, the quality and the consistency of the learning she receives and of the class participation she offers/contributes to the class. I also hope to continue to see her challenge herself as a learner and as a leader.