[mesmark]

I had an exam where students where supposed to describe what they saw in a picture. They were pictures from the textbook. I specifically wrote, in Japanese, that they were to write about the picture, about what they see.

20% of the class gave me the dialogue from that page!

I'm not sure more explicit directions always work

[HUE]

I've noticed that people (myself included) often don't read the directions, at least until I'm completely stumped and don't know what to do! That's why I always walk my students orally through the directions of an activity or worksheet, confirm, go through an example with the class, etc. Will someone still get confused? Probably, but it also means that I won't have to stop an activity because so many students are doing it wrong. I also won't have to worry so much about jumping from group to group in the beginning because half the class is doing something entirely different.

I won't bother commenting on when students do an activity differently, and it ends up being a greater success...!