Exterior photo of Smathers Library (formerly Library East) at the University of Florida, photo from the University of Florida Digital Collections

Teaching Portfolio

Main Teaching Portfolio List

Spring 2002 :: ENG 1131, Section 1787:: All student comments

Questions

1. What personal qualities or teaching skills of the instructor contributed to the success of the course?
2. Did any qualities or teaching practices of the instructor hinder the success of the course?
3. What is your opinion of the course, including printed materials?
4. Add any other comments.

Student 1

1. [No comments entered]

Student 2

1. Class discussions - she listens and has topics everyone enjoys and can relate to.
3. Excellent

Student 3

1. She was very enthusiastic about the class. Always happy and helpful, Optimistic about everything and very down to Earth.
2. N/A
3. Good use of books. I thought the Writing Space book worked effectively (although boring at times). Sin CIty should be used again.

Student 4

1. Happy, cool, easy going - flexible
2. The only I chose 4 and not 5 on #1 is the assignments are very open - I like that but it makes it very hard to tell exactly what you want.
3. Tried to pacj too much in - spent too little time on Patchwork Girl focused on System Shock too much - liked Baraka and Perfect Blue didn't care for the rest, esp. Requiem for a Dream. Writing Space wasn't all that great - didn't hate it, but didn't like it either.
4. You have quit bouncing and being all nervous - when you talk in front of class (seem to be) more comfortable teaching. Thanks!

Student 5

1. Energy and ability to relate to
   Did not take yourself to seriously
2. Maybe you allowed the students to get away with not doing the reading assignments too much.
3. Sin City was really cool, watching movies was awesome.
4. Incorporate the use of texts that we are required to buy more. Including Sin City and Patchwork Girl.

Student 6

1. Laurie was very enthusiastic about all of the material she spoke about and had use watch. I really enjoyed the variety of movies that she showed us on Tuesday nights. Baraka was my least favorite but there were interesting parts.
2. I think that there may not have been enough time to cover all of the course material; ex: Patchwork Girl but I did enjoy how indepth we taloked about the coursework we did cover.
3. I loved this course and I recommend it with Laurie Taylor to anyone who needs an English.
4. I enjoyed creating the variety fo web pages that we did especially once we had the leeway to personalize them more as opposed to a strict guideline. They were actually fun to make.

Student 7

1. Laurie was passionate about the subject matter of this course and was eager to open our minds up to new things. She was understanding and very in tune with the needs and concerns of the students.
2. No.
3. This was an excellent course that I enjoyed very much. A few of the internet articles and the book Writing Space were boring and hard to follow. Sin City was awesome.

Student 8

1. The instructor made the class very interactive. The projects that were done in class made you think about different aspects of media.

Student 9

1. She was very creative which helped me to asle be creative and think more freely.
2. Kind of vague on assignments, but that did help make the class more fun.
3. Writing Space textbook wasn't good. The comic Sin City was really interesting. Class was fun. Teacher was great.
4. I enjoyed your class.

Student 10

1. She was very helpful in explaining everything that she taught. Laurie is very intelligent and this comes out in her teaching skills.
2. No - I loved her! She was one of my favorite teachers so far.
3. I did watching movies every Tuesday. However, the movies were not always my favorite. I absolutely hated Writing Space. I wish we would've spent more time on Patchwork Girl and less on System Shock 2. The website design was my favority part and I feel that I learned a lot about HTML (especially from knowing nothing at all). This was a great class and I enjoyed it very much!

Student 11

1. She's fun and exciting, She tried to show people interesting things and allowed everyone to speak freely.
2. Sometimes she went off on tangents but I didn't really mind because it was still interesting.
3. Don't make us read Writing Spaces. Everything else was great. I feel more well rounded after taking this class.

Student 12

1. Treated us like equals which made learning easier.
2. No.
3. The books were kind of boring, did not feel like they helped the course ( except I liked Sin City).
4. Amazing teacher and attitude.

Student 13

1. Her open-mindedness and her knowledge on many different ideas.
3. I think that Writing Space isn't a helpful resource at all.
4. I think that you should have questions following the movie so that more people participate.

Student 14

1. Laurie is an extremely outgoing, charismatic, enthusiastic, instructor. Her uniqueness made this course extremely interesting.
2. Sometimes she goes off on tangents... but they are always interesting!
3. Liked the comic, hated the textbook.

Student 15

1. Very concerned for students' well being. Extremely flexible with course material.
3. Writing Space sucked! Do not use it again. Sin City was a great choice for course material, I enjoyed this course and learned many valuable lessons.
4. Again, never ever use Writing Space as course material. The class structure was perfect except I would eliminate the final project.

Student 16

1. She was very enthusiastic about the course which in turn made me want to learn more. Having never done anything with website design or HTML code, she was always available, either office hours, class time, or email, to help with my craziest questions or problems.
2. I didn't find any of Laurie's qualities to hinder my success in the course, In fact, I felt she did everything she could to make the entire class excel.
3. I really, really liked this ckass and have learned so much. I have always wanted to learn website deisgn and now I have a basic knowledge which can be added to in the future, I didn't really like Writing Space or several of the movies, but System Shock and Sin Citu weren't bad at all. In fact, having a video game as a text was great.
4. Overall, I would recommend this class, or any other that Laurie teaches, to anyone. She is always willing to gelp and I have never seen her upset about anything. We did write the 6,000 words required for the course, but this is the only Gordon RUle class I've taken that I didn't struggle to fulfill the requirement. I loved that the projects were so open b/c it allowed each of our individual personalities to come through in our work.

Student 17

1. The instructor us extremely willing to work with students and provides a wonderful environment for learning . Her great attitude really lead to my success in the course.
2. No! She has been one of the most understanding instructors I have ever dealt with at this University. She realted extremely welll to all the students.
3. I think articles off the internet were more effective than the books. Writing Space was too involved for average reading, though I do not believe we should be reading at an average level, I do feel the technology discussed in the book was not well explained.
4. I would take any other course offered by this professor solely based on how well she teaches. I have truly walked away with something special from this course.

Student 18

1. You don't write on the board too much.
2. Projects were somewhat vague - bands - I get my roommate to look over things.
3. Good topics (comic / video game). Writing Space - too boring, repetitive.
   Sin City - good, should use the others or compare to another style
   SS2 - didn't play it much - too hard
4. Didn't buy or see Patchwork Girl. Liked online comics and animation movies, Movies all right - Chinese on in beginning - blah- Hitchcock - good
   I still have Cyberreader! Ahhh

Student 19

1. Very enthusiastic and knowledgeable about what she is teaching. Very helpful teacher.
2. No.
3. Not pleased with Writing Space. Very boring to read. Sin City was a good comic book selection.System Shock 2 wasn't fun to play, It was graphically inferior to what is out there now and boring.
4. I liked the idea of creating a webpage as the main assignments of the class. The attendance policy is a little too strict. Dropping an entire letter grade for missing only four classes is unfair to someone who still worked hard on the Projects and got A's.

Student 20

1. Very enthusiastic; enjoys the subject at hand. Also can look at the assignments from a students point of view, being a student herself.
2. Relaxed attitude in calss is fun, perhaps more could have been accomplished if things were more structured or dirven, but I liked things as rget were being serious might ruin everything.
3. Great Material. Writing Space isn't all that bad, It simply isn't as fun as the other material but it contains good ideas and proves you can intellectualize anything.
4. Very good class. Full of insights and ideas that never would have been presented anywhere else.

Student 21

1. She knows so much about so many different topics. She was very enthusiastic about topics of discussion and about what she taught, If the class didn't like something, she would change the schedule. No one was ever bored.
2. None at all, this is probably the only course I've taken in college that I didn't want to miss.
3. Awesome! Sin City was great and the movies were even better. Using Snatch to compare comics to movies was great. Writing Space was a little boring, The MOO is pretty good and I loved Requiem for a Dream.
4. I learned so much about Web design. She made me look differently at a lot of different things. Probably the best and most interesting instructor I had.

Student 22

1. Laurie was very personal with all of us. She ahs a true passion for what she teaches and it shows, She was always willing to stay and help.
2. No.
3. Very good. The course was extremely diverse. All aspects of media were studied from film to web.
4. I would recommend this class to anyone who is interested in media or not. Laurie made the learning experience enjoyable.

Student 23

1. A drammatic flair and total enthusiasm for teaching this class, In-depth knowledge of everything we talked about.
2. No.
3. Writing Space sucked. Everything else was cool. I liked all the comic books the teacher brought in to share.
4. Keep the online journals, furthermore increase the total number to turn in, Theya re relatively easy to write and add up quickly. They also contribute (or should) a lot to the final grade. Thanks.

Student 24

1. She made the course very interesting and motivated us to participate, She never saw our faults as bad, just a place for improvement.
2. No.
3. I think this is a very enjoyable course, especially with Laurie as theinstructor. I liked most of the movies.
4. I went to commend Laurie on her excellent teaching abilities and hope the best for her. The only thing I wish is that we used the stuff we had to buy a bit more, so it would have not been a waste of money.

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