Introducing the case: Another matter of teaching

Welcome, everybody. My name is Juan. I come from Columbia. And I’m currently doing a master’s degree in Social Psychology. I have been working as a student assistant for a bit more than two years already. And I have taught several first and second year courses of the psychology bachelor.

I’m going to talk to you about a situation that happened to me when I was teaching a small group teaching sessions of a course. Namely, one of my students who constantly show up late to classes. It was really puzzling for me because although he didn’t come across as being extraordinarily interested in the class, he always tried his best in class activities. Besides from his tardiness, he wasn’t really respectful and he didn’t disrupt in class in any other way. During the few occasions that I spoke with him informally, he seemed like a nice person. He was the only one of the group who ever arrived late. So the problem couldn’t have been due to overlapping in class schedules.

The situation goes as follows: on the very first session, he doesn’t show up at all. On the second session, he arrives 15 minutes late. I simply interpreted this as he had trouble finding his way around the building. On the third session, he arrived 10 minutes late. I was already suspecting that punctuality was going to be a frequent issue, but I had to give him the benefit of the doubt. And I didn’t bring it up. On the fourth session, he arrived 15 minutes late once more. And I just knew it had to stop right there. What do you think is the wisest thing to do in this situation? Please share your thoughts.