I took my Enlgish midterm yesterday. The professor told us to plan on about two hours to take the test. She said some students in the past had taken up to four hours, but that was not typical. So, being something of a worrier and an overplanner but not wanting to go to full on panic mode, I aimed for the middle and gave myself three hours. My class starts at 3pm, so I entered the testing center at 11:45. Yes, you'll notice I even gave myself an extra 15 minutes to grab a snack before class. Yeah, that worked out for me. In reality I found myself fleeing the testing center at 2:56, running across campus in a skirt and flip-flops, just managing to collapse in my desk at 3:01. When the kid next to me asked what was up, (I'm guessing he noticed my tardiness and my panting) I told him I had just taken the midterm and it took longer that I thought. He asked how long it took me and I told him over three hours. Then the professor stood up and began class with a lecture about how we should not be discussing the test with one another until the testing period is over on Friday. Since Tom and I sit in the front row in a small room, I can only assume her comments were directed our way. Really, do you think I offered terribly pertinent information by revealing to the world that I took forever to complete her exam? If I'd come in and announced in a loud voice: "The large essay question at the end asks you to compare and contrast a Renaissance text with a Post-Modern text as they relate to either religious or governmental established power," well, that would have been something worth chastising. Tomorrow in class I'll probably get a lecture about giving away the final essay question to my mother on my blog because clearly mom is going to track down Tom from Enlgish 291 section 2 and tell all.
So I am left worrying that not only does my professor think I have the judgement of a green pea, but that she will be unable to read the last page of my essay. Not only was I rushing like a mad woman by then, but for some inexplicable reason, my hand was cramping so fiercely I actually found myself wondering how fast a cortisone injection could work. Wait. Maybe it's not inexplicable, maybe it was the writing for three solid hours that did it. Could be. I don't mean to whine about my professor by the way. The test itself, although challenging, was very fair. It had things on it that I expected and that were right in line with her study guide, so I appreciated that. You have to love a professor who offers test questions that have no relation to what has been covered in class or the text. Perhaps a slightly shorter exam would be worth considering however. As it was the test went like this:
10 multiple choice questions on English history
(not so bad)
4 short answer questions on poetry conventions
(Describe the various sonnet styles, their rhyme patterns and meter etc., again not so bad, each took about 1/2 page to answer)
12 quotations identifications
(Killer. Each quotation could be from anything we've read so far in the semester. We had to identify the author, the work, the context of the passage and how it was significant to the work as a whole. Each took between 1/2-1 page.)
1 large essay question, at least 4 pages in length
(Killer. The question wasn't really that hard if you've been paying attention, but the fact that my hand was about to fall off by then and my brain was fried can't have helped me out here. I'm just hoping she's not looking for the same level of polish as in our class papers where I stress and rewrite for days on end.)
So there it is. My first big essay test in 19 years. I have to go now. Another awaits me this weekend in philosophy. Once that is over, I'll finally have time to rest. Wait, what am I thinking? No time to rest, what I actually meant was mop the floor. A word to the wise, don't come to my house in bare feet until Monday.
