Geek teacher frustrations

"Women's Computer Days" in our local people's university. Four women teachers; we each have our special areas of computer knowledge. Mine's the Internet.

Since these are introductory classes - the students of all ages can have a look at the teachers, and get a small inkling of what the real classes are about - we get a fair mix of "know-nothings" who are usually very eager to learn as much as possible, "know-a-bits" who are looking for tips and tricks, and "know-it-alls" who don't, really.

Of the latter ones, I had one in my class on freeware (what it is, how to find, download, install programs, what kind of freeware things there are, etc). She at first appeared to have a good grasp of both the computer and the Internet, but as the class progressed I realized this was not the case. She kept confusing terms, didn't really understand the difference between a setup file and the installed program, seemlingly couldn't grasp the fact that you are allowed to use other browsers than IE (the concept of "browser" wasn't easy to explain to her either; by this time the other people in class were rolling their eyes). Her continued problem with computer terminology was frustrating to me - not because she didn't know, but because it made it very difficult for me to explain things so that she'd understand them. And I tried.

When the class was almost over, and I called for last questions, she asked something that I had explained an hour before, how and where to save a downloaded file. She said, "So, do I save a file on my harddisk or the desktop?" Um. What do you answer to a question like this? So I said, "What exactly do you mean?" Her reply was, "I mean, do I have to save the program on my harddisk?" I admit that, confused as I was, I asked her where else she would try and save something. "A folder?" she says.

Maybe I should have suggested to her gently, after class, to sign up in one of our beginner's computer classes.
Or well... Maybe what she knows about computers is enough for her, I don't know... but I still felt frustrated that I didn't have the time and opportunity to explain to her what "folder", "desktop", "harddisk" and various other terms meant.