Deidre Baker - University of Toronto - St. George Campus, Toronto, ON

Professor: Deidre Baker

Department: English

College: University of Toronto - St. George Campus, Toronto, ON

Rating # 1

Overview:

• Course: ENG234H
• Grade Received: A
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 2.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Prof Baker's classes consist mostly of disjointed slideshows. She has great difficulty structuring her lecture in a logical manner and it mostly was random points. Despite the large book list, she often spent far too long analyzing a single picture book. Constantly pointing out when people were leaving the class which was super distracting.

Rating # 2

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 5.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Avoid this course if you want to save your GPA. Very long lectures that will make you forget you're taking a course on children's literature. Incredibly disappointing overall.

Rating # 3

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.5
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: Yes
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Good prof. She explains clearly and her assignments are always very clear in regards to what is expected. There's a lot of reading but the content is very interesting!

Rating # 4

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: WD
• Overall Rating: 3.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Not Mandatory

Comment:

While she is a very nice professor, for course on children's lit, it was way too involved. Multiple group projects, weekly assignments, mandatory emailing of a question, plus the usual tests and essays. On top of all of this, the lecture was incredibly boring due to her monotone and lacked any visual aid. Do not recommend.

Rating # 5

Overview:

• Course: ENG234H
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 3.5
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

I found the lectures to be quite boring and disorganized at times, but she's quite helpful if you meet with her one-on-one.

Rating # 6

Overview:

• Course: ENG345H1
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.5
• Course Difficulty: 1.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Professor Baker is the most helpful of all professors at UofT. She may not have the "showmanship" of other professors, but she knows her subject matter really well and makes herself available for EVERY SINGLE STUDENT. -- you can count on her at anytime. She will meet with every single student if necessary, give feedback and help. Very dedicated

Rating # 7

Overview:

• Course: ENG234H
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.5
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Prof Baker is a smart and engaging lecturer. There was a lot of reading, but it's kids lit, so it wasn't too heavy. I like that she assigned both classics and lesser-known works. She encourages discussion in class, but is able to keep it focused.

Rating # 8

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.5
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

She's boring and provides poor readings of texts. She doesn't mention anything about literary terms. You leave the class having learned absolutely nothing.

Rating # 9

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 3.5
• Course Difficulty: 2.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Deirdre is a wonderful prof. Full of interesting insights and always lends an hour to engage with students. The syllabus is much too heavy for a half credit though - the burden of the reading takes away from the joy of interpretation. Overall, an engaging prof and a highly recommended class. She also writes an interesting column for The Star!

Rating # 10

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.5
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

To many books, completely boring prof.

Rating # 11

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 3.5
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

The only thing I liked about this course was the assignments. While I found the marking to be very fair, the reading list was challenging to keep up with for a full-time student, and her weekly lectures lacked organization and ability to keep my attention. She expects students to memorize all the dates for the final, which I think is unnecessary.

Rating # 12

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Baker is by far the worst professor I ever had. As a lecturer, you can tell that she knows what she talks about and is interested in it; however, her ability to interest the class, her POOR public speaking skills, and her absolute monotonous voice makes it impossible to pay attention or maintain any ounce of passion in the subject she teaches.

Rating # 13

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

I took HUM199 (09-10) and ENG234 (fall 2010) and loved both classes! She is a tough marker but still REALLY nice, always granted extensions and willing to discuss books/essays etc with students. ENG234 reading list is too long and the class discussion doesn't always work but I appreciate that she doesn't lecture for 3 hours straight.

Rating # 14

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.5
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Disappointing !! She clearly has passion for the subject but I took this as a half year course and the reading list was IMPOSSIBLE to keep up with on as a full-time student. There were about 25 novels costing over 200 $ to purchase and you were expected to read two books a week and for the exam to memorize the authors/dates of ALL! NOT worth it!!!!

Rating # 15

Overview:

• Course: ENG234H
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Focused a lot on the history and encouraged student participation. I didn't do too well on her essays but aced her exam since so much of it was based on pure memorization (ie. dates+authors). The material was interesting overall. I found her very approachable and nice.

Rating # 16

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

i was soo excited for this course, but Prof Baker completely ruined it for me. Honestly she is full of herself and demands respect without earning it. I only attended one class and that was enough to make me run for hills! She is overly demanding and unstudied. do NOT take her class.

Rating # 17

Overview:

• Course: PHL234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Her exam was totally unreasonable, she made us memorize dates of approx. 25 authors. When teaching, it sounded like she was reading the textbook! Read from notes, doesn't teach much. Hard to keep up with all the readings!

Rating # 18

Overview:

• Course: HUM199
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 3.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: N/A
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Prof Baker is a nice lady- but she tends to go off her lecture notes and get sidetracked. She really loves her stuff, and knows what she is talking about...however the classes were boring and she's somewhat disorganized with handing things back. The books were easy and enjoyable reading!

Rating # 19

Overview:

• Course: ENG234
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: N/A
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Nice woman. But I didn't enjoy the course. marking is fair, pretty good. lectures were boring. Not what I expected children's lit to be. she is anal about attendence. b/c half the class would leave on break. not the greatest class.

Rating # 20

Overview:

• Course: ENG233
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.5
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: N/A
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Prof Baker IS a hard marker, but she's fair and consistent. Her lectures are very much based on student participation, but I found that this made the class better because you were forced to become engaged in the class material. Very approachable and understanding about due dates. I don't understand all the negative comments about her.