Page:Discipline and the Derelict (1921).pdf/150

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proud of the fact that they have cribbed successfully under a man who is always watching for cribbers."

The following quotations, also, were interesting: "Cribbing will be carried on more under an instructor who does not get into personal touch with his students. The instructor who is human will have little trouble with cribbing." "I have heard it said that the sarcastic instructor who by his manner virtually says to his students, 'cheat if you dare, I bet I catch you,' is the one the student delights in beating at his own game." "Cribbing is most common under a very strict or a very lenient instructor." "Any instructor who is specially sarcastic or who does not deal with his students in an open and friendly way is sure to have those in his classes who will try to get through in any conceivable manner."

In reply to the question, as to the form of cribbing most common there was little agreement, the consulting of notes carried to class, looking on another student's paper, and verbal communication between students sitting crowded together being thought most common.

More than thirty per cent. of those who replied to the questionnaire held that the main excuse offered for cribbing lay in the fact that the specific examination in question was unfair and that examinations in general are in no sense an adequate test of a student's knowledge. If the instructor knows in the main what the individual student will be likely to know before he gives him the test, why, the student asks, should he give him the test at all; but in asking this question he fails to realize that unless the examination were given the student will not make the mental