This is apparently the week when 9/10ths of my students suddenly fall apart and stop handing things in. I am chasing after them in e-mails and Slack messages, begging them to give me something that I can grade, please, because even a C- is better than a 0 for your GPA, I promise you. (And […]
That feeling when you read a story by one of your advanced fiction students and it is so unnerving that you have to force yourself to finish reading it and afterwards, you want to take a warm bath and maybe knit for a few hours to recover. I mean, she did a really good job
Unnerving and Effective Read More »
For no good reason, I was having a really hard time convincing myself to get out of bed to go teach this morning, but at 9:50 a.m. I finally rolled out of bed, brushed my hair, made myself coffee, took my meds, and was sitting in my office with my Zoom window open at 10
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I normally try to keep my lit lectures short, in the 5-15 minutes range, because all the research I’ve seen indicates that students mostly stop watching video lectures that go on longer, but I just COULDN’T do: • Marxism • overview of communism / democratic socialism / American ideas about taxes / group coverage of
I Tried My Best, People Read More »
“Why does Karl Marx hate Early Grey?” “Because all proper tea is theft.” ***** I know, groan. I couldn’t resist! I’m prepping this week’s lit theory lecture / reading, on Marxist thought…
I made my fiction writing students read their work out loud to each other today. Some of them were so scared. I am a big meanie. But on the plus side, I let them do it in small groups in breakout rooms, so they didn’t have to read to ME yet. That day will come,
Played CodeNames with my ENG 240 class, and it did provide some great opportunities to talk about semiotics, symbolism, cultural references & competency, etc. Pleased — will do so again if I teach this class. Also was a good early-semester bonding activity, getting more of them to talk then previously and getting to know each
Codenames With My Eng 240 Class Read More »
Reading through my students’ journal responses for the week, and I’m reminded once again that it’s a real privilege to get to be the one to hand them Le Guin’s “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” for the first time. Sometimes I really love this job.
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I just realized that playing Code Names will be totally relevant to teaching my students how to do symbolic analysis in English classes, demonstrating very clearly how different people can have different associations with words, so we’re going to have an optional gaming session next week, whee!
Sometimes I make myself a goofy example for my students. It generally makes them laugh, which is one of my main teaching goals, especially in this stressful pandemic time. This morning, I wanted my lit crit students to practice semiotic analysis, so I asked them to try to identify as many symbols (and their meanings)
