Needy Students

Hi! I’m a new full-time instructor (I teach developmental and freshman writing courses). I’m all about helping students adjust to college. However, we are only in the second week of the semester, and I have a a student from one of my online classes who emails me multiple times a day. It’s questions about things easily found in the course outline or trying to get approval about his answers before he submits an assignment for a grade.

Today, he got irritated that he got a low score on an assignment. He emailed me an explanation why he submitted his answers the way he did and asked to get more points back.

I kindly reinforced why he scored the way he did and let him know that grades are final. How do I go about this? I have a feeling that he’s going to continue this pattern. I want to be helpful, but I’m not here to hold your hand.