Egregious student behavior from the last week of class:
1. Complaining about a B+ on a portfolio because friends, fiancee, parents, etc. had read the writing and thought it was great.
2. Asking what materials/ ideas should be included in the presentations that are just about to start.
3. Protesting an F for an assignment which included large chunks of plagiarized material and not seeming to understand that using exact wording without quotation or citation is a problem.
Just needed to vent. Thanks for listening.
Tuesday, April 25, 2006
Saturday, April 22, 2006
slippery memories
Recently, I feel like I'm losing my memory. I have parts of memories, but I can't reconstruct the details. The parts of the memories I do recall are vivid, which convinces me that they are based on real experiences, but I doubt their veracity because I can't connect them to any specific times or individuals.
For instance, the other night, I woke up noticing a very distinct smell (whether it was a smell in my house or a smell from my dreaming, I can't be sure). The smell was sweet and familiar and attached to a very specific memory. The only problem was I couldn't identify the smell or attach it to any specific event.
And another: In the middle of the day, for no reason, I remembered some road trip I took with some guy (I'm assuming an ex-boyfriend) where we stopped at a gas station for road snacks. The some guy was delighted when he saw the shop had Idaho Spud bars. He told me how much he had loved them when he was a kid and how he hadn't had one in years. He bought two and ate both of them on the way home. I told him about how my aunt had sent us a box of Idaho Spud bars for Christmas one year. I vividly remember driving in the car with this mystery guy and I can remember tasting a piece of his candy bar. All of it is perfectly vivid (the tastes, the smells, the sounds) but I can't remember (even though I have racked my brain and even asked the most recent ex) who the guy was. So, did this event not really happen? Did I just dream it? It's so trivial and ultimately doesn't matter but it makes memory seems so unreliable, so useless.
For instance, the other night, I woke up noticing a very distinct smell (whether it was a smell in my house or a smell from my dreaming, I can't be sure). The smell was sweet and familiar and attached to a very specific memory. The only problem was I couldn't identify the smell or attach it to any specific event.
And another: In the middle of the day, for no reason, I remembered some road trip I took with some guy (I'm assuming an ex-boyfriend) where we stopped at a gas station for road snacks. The some guy was delighted when he saw the shop had Idaho Spud bars. He told me how much he had loved them when he was a kid and how he hadn't had one in years. He bought two and ate both of them on the way home. I told him about how my aunt had sent us a box of Idaho Spud bars for Christmas one year. I vividly remember driving in the car with this mystery guy and I can remember tasting a piece of his candy bar. All of it is perfectly vivid (the tastes, the smells, the sounds) but I can't remember (even though I have racked my brain and even asked the most recent ex) who the guy was. So, did this event not really happen? Did I just dream it? It's so trivial and ultimately doesn't matter but it makes memory seems so unreliable, so useless.
Monday, April 17, 2006
Thursday, April 13, 2006
slogging through
It's always this way at the end. I just don't care. I keep forgetting things. I babble on about nothing in class, while thinking about what I should have discussed if I would have made an effort to plan and prepare. And they don't care. I know they don't. They just find me tedious and the work tedious and wish that I would stop talking and that they could stop writing. It's always this way and I always manage and the semester usually ends well and they feel good about what they've learned and accomplished and I feel good about what I've taught them and I know that I will miss them all, just a little. It's always this way, so why does it feel so much worse this time around?
Maybe it's because, as Lynn pointed out the other day, I have been teach for five semesters straight. But this makes me feel like a boob because other people work year-round without 3-month breaks and they seem to manage. But yes, I have been overworked this year--overworked and underappreciated, I tell you. And there are the break-ups and new relationships and the family matters and not enough time to go running. There are reasons.
But the reasons don't matter. What matters is that there are only two more weeks of class left and I can hardly stand it. I want to cancel the rest of my classes and tell my students to go home, to not worry about thinking and rewriting anymore. I want to tell them that it's hopeless, that clearly I can't teach them anything. Last night, I had to have a serious wrestle with myself in order to find some sort of motivation for class today, some reason to keep trying, to believe that I might actually be able to teach them something and that they might actually care. Today, after receiving my feedback on his draft, a student asked if I didn't like him very much. No, I protested. You just don't know how to make an argument. And he doesn't. But maybe it's true that I don't like him very much. Or any of them.
But I dislike that I dislike them all. It makes me feel like a horrible teacher. And usually I like my students very much. I usually find them clever and interesting and a pleasure to work with. So all I want is for the semester to end with me holding on to some bit of faith in my students and my own efforts. Wish me luck.
Maybe it's because, as Lynn pointed out the other day, I have been teach for five semesters straight. But this makes me feel like a boob because other people work year-round without 3-month breaks and they seem to manage. But yes, I have been overworked this year--overworked and underappreciated, I tell you. And there are the break-ups and new relationships and the family matters and not enough time to go running. There are reasons.
But the reasons don't matter. What matters is that there are only two more weeks of class left and I can hardly stand it. I want to cancel the rest of my classes and tell my students to go home, to not worry about thinking and rewriting anymore. I want to tell them that it's hopeless, that clearly I can't teach them anything. Last night, I had to have a serious wrestle with myself in order to find some sort of motivation for class today, some reason to keep trying, to believe that I might actually be able to teach them something and that they might actually care. Today, after receiving my feedback on his draft, a student asked if I didn't like him very much. No, I protested. You just don't know how to make an argument. And he doesn't. But maybe it's true that I don't like him very much. Or any of them.
But I dislike that I dislike them all. It makes me feel like a horrible teacher. And usually I like my students very much. I usually find them clever and interesting and a pleasure to work with. So all I want is for the semester to end with me holding on to some bit of faith in my students and my own efforts. Wish me luck.
Saturday, April 08, 2006
Thursday, April 06, 2006
please don't pray for me.
Last night, as I fell asleep, I was absentmindedly saying a prayer. This is something I often do, largely I suppose out of habit. But as I was thinking my trivial prayer (something about wanting good weather for an early drive to the airport), I started analyzing the efficacy of the praying. (and for whatever it's worth, while the weather today is horrible, it did not start snowing until after I returned from the airport).
Once upon a time when I was a devoted Mormon, I believed that even if my praying didn't get results, at least someone was listening. Now that I am not a devoted Mormon, I never know whether to think A) that someone is listening, and occasionally answering; B) that no one is listening or C) that someone is listening, but not answering me because I am no longer a devoted Mormon (and thus no longer in on the deal).
Because I have this complicated relationship with prayer (and with religion in general), I've been fascinated with the recent release of the big prayer study, wherein it was revealed that intercessory prayer provided by religious strangers has a slightly negative to no effect on post-surgery complications for cardiac patients. The problematic commentary following this study provides ample evidence, I think, to convince my students that addressing religious issues with empirical means really doesn't work (but that's another story altogether). Various articles have asserted that it's not prayer that's at issue, but the study itself: (on Yahoo: "Scientists fail to show. . ."). If those silly scientists would just do things right.
I loved this article in today's Slate where William Saletan details what we can learn about god from this study.
Once upon a time when I was a devoted Mormon, I believed that even if my praying didn't get results, at least someone was listening. Now that I am not a devoted Mormon, I never know whether to think A) that someone is listening, and occasionally answering; B) that no one is listening or C) that someone is listening, but not answering me because I am no longer a devoted Mormon (and thus no longer in on the deal).
Because I have this complicated relationship with prayer (and with religion in general), I've been fascinated with the recent release of the big prayer study, wherein it was revealed that intercessory prayer provided by religious strangers has a slightly negative to no effect on post-surgery complications for cardiac patients. The problematic commentary following this study provides ample evidence, I think, to convince my students that addressing religious issues with empirical means really doesn't work (but that's another story altogether). Various articles have asserted that it's not prayer that's at issue, but the study itself: (on Yahoo: "Scientists fail to show. . ."). If those silly scientists would just do things right.
I loved this article in today's Slate where William Saletan details what we can learn about god from this study.
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