nickxsavestheday

How to Have a Heroic Mind (a eulogy for Dr. Mike Mehlman)

2010-07-28T18:12:00.000-07:00

In his essay “The American Scholar,” Ralph Waldo Emerson says that “there can be no scholar without the heroic mind. The preamble of thought, the transition through which it passes from the unconscious to the conscious, is action.” To be a scholar is to be a type of hero. And heroes are people of action. However, those who use their minds to create action are exempted from that moniker. But like time and space, true thought cannot be separated from action. But what exactly is the action? I believe it to be the bestowing of your thoughts. For what good are thoughts if they cannot be shared?

So if thought equals action, then imparting those must also be a heroic deed. Dr. Mike Mehlman was that type of man, that type of hero. To teach is to train other young scholars, which is no mean feat. And Dr. Mehlman would agree with Emerson and say that mere thinking is not enough, for “the true scholar grudges every opportunity of action past by, as a loss of power.” Your thoughts must produce action. And for Mike, he chose the classroom (or the hallway or the parking lot) to act, to teach, to tell stories.

And for a man who loved stories and loved history’s quirks, he would no doubt chuckle at my use of “American Scholar’ to eulogize him. I’d first received the idea of teaching Emerson’s essay only after skimming through an American Studies book that he’d lent me. He’d also find an odd measure of humor in the melancholy coincidence that when I heard about his death, I was preparing to teach the essay for the first time. It was as if Mike was combining his love of history and teaching and irony even after his death.

Those ingredients were what made him so great at what he did: he looked at history as one great big story made up of many little ones. And he taught the subject as such. The ironic facts, the odd coincidences—those are what he relayed to his classes; those are what he relayed to his colleagues. And he didn’t tell history’s stories simply for the sake of telling them. No. He told us so that our thoughts could become actions, so that we could find our own stories, or better yet—make are own.

It’s at this point where the conscientious reader points out that the “American Scholar” talks of history as being “laborious reading.” Emerson does say this. But we can’t hold it against him; he never knew Mike Mehlman.

How to Educate a King

2010-06-27T20:45:00.000-07:00

“I will come. But in the future you will have to go by yourself. Education is experience and the essence of experience is self-reliance.”
--Merlyn to Arthur

The tutor-student dynamic interests me greatly b/c it varies slightly from the teacher-student relationship. Either way, Book 1 of T.H. White's The Once and Future King chronicles how Merlyn the magicians teaches the future King Arthur how to think differently in order to change the inequities of feudalism. Merlyn does this in part by turning Arthur into a various animals and having him experience different worlds or, rather, the same world from different points of view. Merlyn's methods are the essence of a humanities education: give the pupil new experiences so that the world becomes larger, too large to contain their prejudices and misconceptions.

To use an historical example, after dining with President Taft, Fredrick Douglass talked about how he didn’t believe he could possess skin prejudice because the man had “read too many good books, traveled too widely.” Whether Douglass’ reasoning was sound, the point is that the more expansive the world is to you, the more willing you are to view a situation from multiple viewpoints, the more likely you are to see life as a prism rather than a mirror. This is hugely important for Arthur who will one day become king. A ruler must consider the seen as well as the unseen, the obvious and the clandestine.

And ruling a kingdom is vastly different from ruling a business or a household. But the same principles apply. You must be able to evaluate people and situations and then think through several different outcomes. The humanities are about understanding and responding to a given course of events. One must invoke their intellect without dismissing their emotions. The humanities are about simply understanding how to be a better human.

And since Merlyn has lived his life backwards, having seen the future he is able to teach Arthur as someone whose knowledge supersedes the confines of feudal Europe. As a teacher, knowing more than your students is not enough; you must occupy a different world than them and be able to draw them into your world. To do so requires more than mere intelligence; you must able to anticipate one’s expectations and then circumvent them so that what you teach them outflanks the walls of resistance people naturally build to situations and concepts that will challenge and make them think.

Benjamin Franklin and the Basketball Playing Linguist

2010-06-22T13:57:00.000-07:00

Neologism (nee-ol-uh-jiz-uhm): n. 1. a new word or phrase. 2. the introduction of new words or meanings of words

Benjamin Franklin once said of neologisms that “I cannot but wish the usage of our tongue permitted making new words.” The interesting thing about living languages, is the manner in which they get updated-sometimes purposely, other times accidentally, often times incidentally. One addition English has enjoyed is the slang phrase, “my bad,” a small, two word apology for a slight mistake.

That phrase was coined by former NBA defensive player of the year Manut Bol who died this past Saturday of acute kidney failure. The wording originated from his broken English and, like many trends in history, caught on unexpectedly-even inexplicably. The 7'7” Sudanese center was famous for a myriad of things: a distinguished if not peculiar basketball career, killing a lion with a spear while working as a cowherder, and perhaps most importantly, his selfless charity work towards the end of his life. But his diminutive contribution to our language, a two word phrase, assures him a special place in the hall of fame for sports-loving philologists like myself. I can't help but think that perhaps somewhere in heaven Dr. Franklin, the original American polymath, is meeting a new Scrabble partner.

Committee Meetings Can Make You Feel Like a Kid Again (In a Good Way…Seriously)

2010-05-31T20:39:00.001-07:00

I had my first faculty meeting the other week. It was longer than I expected, but it didn’t feel drawn out. I remember attending meeting in college and thinking that, for the most part, they were empty exercises in procedure meant to give college students practice for when they were real adults. And I dreaded revisiting that feeling, especially since now there’s not much to practice for.

We did talk about student retention and student performance, many of the same subjects I discussed 10 years ago as a student senator. But as a professor, I feel as if I can better turn talk into action. Also, my ability to focus (or maybe I simply have fewer distractions) allowed me to zone into the topics and big picture behind those topics. Either way, time marched more than trudged, and I’m looking forward to more progress at our next get together.

Also, Robert’s Rules of Order—the absence of them—made communication less complicated. No doubt Robert’s plans have their place, but not in meetings where I’m present. I guess my presence brings a sense of order in itself, and anything else is mere superfluity.

Was Picking the Smartest Man in the NFL a Dumb Idea?

2010-05-26T22:22:00.000-07:00

"Like a smart jock, right?...Now ain't that an oxymoron?"
--from the movie Renaissance Man

"Can't read defenses? He's a Rhodes Scholar. He can read 'em in Latin."
--from the HBO show Arliss

With the 207th pick in the 2010 draft, the Tennessee Titans picked Myron Rolle out of Florida State, a Rhodes Scholar & future MD. More significantly for the Titans, he’s a safety and should provide depth to their underachieving secondary.

A lot of speculation as to whether his scholarly interests will detract from his football responsibilities. I know this is where I’m supposed to defend him for being a renaissance man and a true student athlete. And no doubt he deserves praise from me and everyone else who’s heaped him w/ adoration. But any wariness an NFL team had of him concerning his non-football goals are actually legitimate.

When a teach drafts a player, they are making an investment. And if they have reason to believe that player won’t develop for some reason (injury prone, lack of talent, other interests, etc), then that team should be cautious. Granted, being afraid a player will retire early or be distracted because of an interest in the medical profession, is definitely different from most NFL red flags (and is much better than some recent former Titans players’ off the field activities), but it must be taken serious.

For example, if you’re hiring someone for a job, and that person is overqualified, then you would be right to hesitate because the person may be gone soon. Now, Rolle isn’t quite overqualified in the usual sense, but he definitely has qualities that make him less likely to drape his life in football, which is really what a player needs to do in order to succeed in the NFL, especially someone with the talent of a 6th round draft pick.

This is not to say I was upset the Titans drafted him. In fact, I remember sitting in front of my tv pumping my fist profusely when his name scrolled across the screen. But I do side with NFL execs whose jobs lie with not only whom they pick but whom they do not pick. And the more players you pick who don’t work out, the greater your chance of being out of a job.

All this said, does anyone have Myron Rolle’s contact info? I’d like for him to guest lecture one of my sports & lit classes.

Quote of the Week: Alcohol & College Students

2010-03-04T14:35:00.001-08:00

The following quote is the first sentence from a student essay about a Jose Cuervo ad. We talk about grabbing a reader's attention at the beginning. Well, it's hard to overlook the following sentence:

"When you drink alcohol, the panties are going to fall."

Ten Year Sleep: Re-reading Rip van Winkle

2010-02-17T17:52:00.000-08:00

"Every change of season, every change of weather, indeed, every hour of the day, produces some change in the magical hues." --Washington Irving, "Rip van Winkle"

I remember reading Rip van Winkle as an undergrad. I remember liking it well enough. My mind still possesses the ethereal remnants of our in-class discussion about it. I also remember being underwhelmed. That's why I never thought to teach it in my own American Lit classes. Thinking back 10 yrs, I thought the story long and unwieldy. As a hinterland, preternatural tale, I preferred its younger cousin "Young Goodman Brown."

But after rereading Rip Van Winkle for my American Lit class, I admit I overlooked or disregarded its humor and depth. It's only taken 10 years for me to wake up to its greatness. One of my mentors told me that teaching literature is a good way to supplement my literature education. Luckily, it's not just for stories I haven't read, but those I've read and slept on.

The New College Dating Culture

2010-02-08T20:23:00.000-08:00

"Yes, everything on earth, the race of man and beast, / Fish of the sea, and flocks, and gaily painted birds, / Rush into passionate flame." --Virgil

Here's an interesting New York Times article on the current dating culture at many 4 year colleges.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/07/fashion/07campus.html?pagewanted=1&em

Quote of the Weekend: School is the New Chocolate

2010-02-07T22:12:00.001-08:00

"Nick, I'm not a party girl. I don't spend a lot of money. I just want to go to school. That's my one guilty pleasure!"

A friend of mine said the preceding statement while asking my advice about getting her PhD. Very true....And I support her.

Does Dating Make You Weaker?

2010-02-05T13:02:00.000-08:00

"Let attention be paid not to the matter, but to the shape I give it."
--Michel de Montaigne

This particular post has nothing to do with teaching.

The things that give you energy are astounding. in an attempt to reduce stress, I recently decided to take a hiatus from dating and women. And not only has life become simpler, I have more energy. I feel like George Costanza in the episode where his girlfriend quit having sex with him and he became smarter.

Suddenly, the mental energy I spent trying to impress girls is being saved or redistributed elsewhere. I've never been hooked to a B12 IV in my sleep, but apparently someone somewhere is doing that to me. Five Hour Energy promises "no crash," but they can't promise "mo' cash." Since my break, I've saved not just on going out but also on energy producers such as Zen tea and sweetened coffee.

The trouble, of course, is that girls have become more aggressive. Once I crossed the mental Rubicon of not dating, I suddenly had several girls wanting to hang out. Others have this experience, too. I'm no different. But the daily energy bar, that's different. Not everyone can claim that. I'm considering riding out this datelessness until Easter.

What to Do with 'Who Dat': the Economics of Language

2010-02-02T20:12:00.000-08:00

"I'm glad the NFL finally realized that, even though it's the biggest animal in the jungle, it doesn't have to eat every other animal in the jungle."
--Michael Wilbon, ESPN's PTI

As you wash down the last bit of your cajun gumbo with your third beer of the night, you pump your fist and yell "who dat?" in a blend of syncopated rhythm as off beat yet musical as the language spoken in Louisiana's bayous. But as you celebrate your New Orleans Saints' trip to their first Super Bowl with the 2 word cheer that is part question, part phrase, another question is being formulated in the minds of men thousands of miles away: "can someone own a chant?"

The notion that one can copyright words, phrases, even whole sentences is not very foreign. And, to a certain degree, that makes sense. If a company produces a slogan that generates profits, it is unfair for another company to pirate that slogan for its profits. But how far does branding words for one's own use go?

Today the NFL agreed that they would allow vendors at the Super Bowl to sell products that have the New Orleans Saints' "Who dat?" slogan. How nice of the NFL to do that. My problem with them trying to prevent that at all is that the phrase did not come from NFL marketing execs brainstorming on how to increase profits. Nor did it originate with Saints management. The words came organically from the New Orleans fans.

In essence, groups of people started it, the phrase then gathered momentum, and it is now a marketable tool. And since it is used to market both the NFL and the Saints, I have no problem with either one making money from it. I take offense to the thought that only they should be able to do so. A vendor whose returns on his homemade t-shirts or mugs will be much less than anything the NFL produces should be able to use a phrase that, quite honestly, originated with a group of people who are much more like him both culturally and economically as opposed to the group of lawyers and execs who are much more likely to say "who dat?" in reference to the phrase itself than in reference to the team it was originally meant to support.

So as you celebrate this weekend with your crab legs and crawfish, french fries and fish, remember that winning is important. And making money is good. But the creativity of a community's collective comradery can be better.

The Strange World of Student Evaluations

2010-01-31T21:31:00.000-08:00

"We are now the children of Beckett more than the children of Proust." --Charles Baxter

Just received last semester's student evaluations. I received what I expected. After a whole semester with a class, it would be hard for an evaluation to catch me off guard. However in one of my writing classes, under "would you recommend this teacher to someone else," the student marked N/A. Odd, huh? How would it not be applicable? Even if you were moving out of the country, the question is really asking whether or not the professor would be good for other people, not just you. And that's something worth answering. It doesn't bother me, especially since I received no low marks from that class. But I just found it rather strange, like Lady Gaga's wardrobe...or a Samuel Beckett play.

Two Key Rules of a Photographic Memory

2010-01-24T21:42:00.000-08:00

"Imagination is the intermediary between perception and thought." --Frances A. Yates, The Art of Memory

During antiquity, the art of memory was a vital part of the education process. In a world with limited writing resources, one had to rely more strictly upon their mind to record information. From the Greek philosopher, to the West African griot mnemonics was as indispensable as the tongue for the public speaker or entertainer.

The trained memory fascinates me. Whether it’s Harry Lorayne memorizing several hundred names on The Tonight Show or the poker player memorizing percentages & cards played, the uses of mnemonics makes me want to learn how to strengthen my mind.

And in a world where iPhones & Blackberrys can substitute for brain activity, I believe mnemonics still has a place and not just for party tricks. An organized mind is the key to a trained memory. But few of us have ever been shown how to organize it. Organizing one’s mind & cataloguing information that you want to store, is a challenging, interesting exercise which can make learning new things…well…challenging and interesting.

The aspect of memory I’m working to master is the craft of association. This is the foundation upon which all memory is built, trained or untrained. We associate naturally, so it’s easy to do. But some associations are more apparent than others. For example, if someone with a thick beard and flowing hair, introduces himself as Harry, you’ll probably remember without trying. But if his name is Vladimir, it could be tougher.

And this is where the game comes in. You may have a place in your mind to put Vladimir’s face & features. So the organization is there, but if you don’t have a way to make the hair and name “stick” to one another, you are more likely to forget. Yet the ways we make our associations work is curious.

Obviously, things linked to our hobbies and interests can most easily be made into associations. But what about after that? Can one get good enough to make every Vladimir into a Harry? I believe so. But it takes work. The key, as in most learning, is to ask why. When you forget something, ask yourself why the association failed when the one right before it succeeded. By answering that question, you can better learn how best to stimulate your recall capabilities.

The Business of Book Picking

2010-01-18T19:51:00.000-08:00

"For what is the use of a golden key if it cannot open what we want it to?" --St. Augustine, "On Christian Doctrine"

Getting students who are not intellectually curious (at least not when it comes to school) to read and write about books is difficult, especially when your goal is to not just give them reading and writing material but to also get them to appreciate the literature. You must give them a book that won’t provide them a reason to not do it.

When I taught A Christmas Carol, I was surprised at the number of students who used the language as an excuse to not work hard. I think it was that particular class more than the book itself, but that semester taught me a lesson about students: any excuse not to read allows them to justify their laziness. If a book has obtuse language, a quirky narrative, or an intimidating length (even if the print is big and the chapters short), students will find a way to talk themselves out of doing the work.

Of Mice and Men has worked well for me. It has around 100 pages, accessible language, straightforward narrative, and easy to follow themes. The story does not rely upon a great deal of historical context. Because of all this, students generally enjoy it. I would love to find several novels that adhere to those standards.

A great source is high school booklists, but even some of those don’t fit the criteria I’ve set up. If I’m going to teach literature in a writing class, I don’t want to spend a lot of class time providing context. I want to jump into the text and simply provide the necessary background as we encounter it within the story.

Of course, I must still teach it well. I just want the teaching to be as downhill as possible. I’ve recently read Remains of the Day and Slaughterhouse Five. The former may be too psychological to keep most students’ interest, and the latter has an obtuse narrative. I’m also considering Heart of Darkness, The King and I, The Importance of Being Earnest, and Wit.

Quote of the Day: Dylan Thomas, Steve McNair, & Non Sequiturs

2009-12-05T19:14:00.000-08:00

ME: Okay, turn to "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night." Dylan Thomas wrote this in honor of his dying father. It's a poem about valuing light--I mean life--in the wake of death. Just sit while I read it & then we'll disc--
STUDENT (we'll call her "Melissa"): Speaking of death, you know the girl that killed Steve McNair? I used to work w/ her, and she gave me a lap dance at a Christmas party. She really is crazy.
*Awkward class silence*
ME: "Do not go gentle into that good night / Old age should burn and rave at close of day; / Rage, rage against the dying of the light..."

Quote of the Day

2009-11-30T10:27:00.000-08:00

ME: Alright, today we're gonna examine Thomas Carlyle's political philosophy.
STUDENT: Carlisle? I love Carlisle!
ME: Oh, really? Nice. Would you say his views of government mirror your own?
STUDENT: What?...Sorry. I thought we were discussing Twilight.

Word of the Day

2009-11-30T09:44:00.000-08:00

A student used the word "haughty" today. I haven't heard that word in a while. It made me smile.

How to Use Wit as Classroom Discipline

2009-10-16T11:56:00.000-07:00

[Man pushes the handicap button on a door]
GIRLFRIEND: What'd you do that for?
MAN: For you! You're handicapped mentally AND physically.

The above conversation happened while I was at the local library. The location is not what makes this post academic (although, I suppose one could compose a clever enough argument). The boyfriend's quip makes it so.

A quick tongue is one of the best ways to keep classroom order. This is good advice for secondary teachers as well. Students often test authority by making borderline comments that aren't necessarily insubordinate yet aren't necessarily deferential. In these moments an instructor can cement his or her control. Instead of letting a student smudge the line of classroom discipline, a teacher's well-placed remark can quell an avalanche of future borderline comments. The question then is how do you know what to say in a given situation? Follow these 3 easy steps, and you won't have problem.

1. Remember that speed is more important than quality. Responding quickly, even if it's mediocre, has a great deal of impact. Even if your quip is generic, the faster you say something, the more confident it sounds, and the more people are likely to buy it. You're a teacher, not a stand up comic. Any well-timed line that comes out of your mouth will be greeted w/ a positive response. In the world of comebacks, timing trumps quality.

2. Sun Tzu says, "if you know what your opponent is going to do before he does it, you can defeat him." Prepare ahead of time. Whether it's in-class comments or typed essays, students generally say the same things. This means you can anticipate what's going to be said, and provide an adequate defense. This is especially useful for females. Male students tend to make sexist--even sexual--comments. You can deflect those and in the process, get some of the female students on your side by rolling your eyes, looking at a few other ladies, and saying something like, "We all know what to expect when a guy talks like that."

3. Know your audience. Comebacks are about subtly defending yourself. So you never want to use them as offense. Smart aleck teachers are a turn off. But quick-witted ones who can keep trouble makers in check are enjoyable. But you must be aware of what you can say. You don't want to be offensive (At the secondary level, it will definitely get you in trouble). And you don't want to be incindiary (At the post-secondary level, that could lead to more, not fewer verbal battles).

Ultimately, the key is to needle them to the degree to which they needle you. Not more. It's not about out macho-ing someone else. It's about reducing distractions, so you can focus on what's important. That's why I like to chuckle, make my comment, and then continue with what I'm discussing almost as if what the student said was as harmless and unthreatening as a lady bug crawling across the floor.

Hope this helps!

The Mind of Samuel Johnson

2009-10-12T13:18:00.000-07:00

[I]t is the mind which knows the power of its own potentially disruptive propensities that needs and demands to be disciplined."
--Donald Davie

"If we owe regard to the memory of the dead, there is yet more respect to be paid to knowledge, to virtue, and to truth."
--Samuel Johnson, "On Biography"

I first became interested in Samuel Johnson while reading Simon Winchester's excellent The Professor and the Madman,an insightful book that traces "a tale murder, insanity, and the making of the Oxford English Dictionary." Winchester discusses Johnson as a preeminent academic, a scholar whose research, poetry, and criticism shaped the English language and epitomized 18th century thought. This portrait piqued an interest that grows yearly.

Johnson's commentaries on form and style are built upon an adherence to classic Greek and Roman literature and how those literatures have affected classic British literature. This observance of form and and conformity to established modes, attract me. I'm not sure why; I enjoy writers who use old methods to approach new things. Literary antitheses--both in authors and their works--add complexity to that which may already be fascinating.

In The Life of Samuel Johnson, James Boswell describes Johnson as "sufficiently uncouth," but his disheveled appearance belied his strict attention to intellectual and scholarly order. In fact, Boswell remarks that all of his" slovenly particularities were forgotten the moment that he began to talk." This contrast between a messy, disarranged exterior and an orderly, encyclopedic intellect reflects the complexities of a man born to write poetry but who lived in an age of prose.

I just hope the next time I get to teach his life and works, I will pass on to my students the fascination I have with the "glittering eminence" of Dr. Johnson.

Quote of the Day: Sex & Poetry--A Love Story

2009-10-08T15:29:00.001-07:00

"Ya know, when I first read the poem, I kept thinking of the male body part. But then I said, 'Nah, that's not right. People don't write poems about sex. When did they start doing that?'"
--One of my students after reading, "Down, Wanton Down"

The misconceptions about language, literature, and writing can provide some of the best discussion fodder. I've copied and pasted the poem in question below. If you don't know what "wanton" means, go to dictionary.com for clarification.

Down, Wanton, Down by Robert Graves

Down, wanton, down! Have you no shame
That at the whisper of Love's name,
Or Beauty's, presto! up you raise
Your angry head and stand at gaze?

Poor bombard-captain, sworn to reach
The ravelin and effect a breach--
Indifferent what you storm or why,
So be that in the breach you die!

Love may be blind, but Love at least
Knows what is man and what mere beast;
Or Beauty wayward, but requires
More delicacy from her squires.

Tell me, my witless, whose one boast
Could be your staunchness at the post,
When were you made a man of parts
To think fine and profess the arts?

Will many-gifted Beauty come
Bowing to your bald rule of thumb,
Or Love swear loyalty to your crown?
Be gone, have done! Down, wanton, down!

Why Can't I Teach British Literature When I Love It So Much?

2009-10-04T19:32:00.000-07:00

"Placed at the door of learning, youth to guide,
We never suffer it to stand too wide.
To ask, to guess, to know, as they commence,
As fancy opens the quick springs of sense"
--Alexander Pope, "The Dunciad"

As a 2nd semester freshman, I sat in Dr. Duke Pesta's British Lit class, mesmerized by the way he imbued with life Donne's amorous flea, Jonson's deceased son, and Shakespeare's dark-haired lady. I would sit in my desk, bubbling w/ impatience so that I could get back to the dorm and read the next class' assignment. I waited for the delicious opportunity to teach my own literature class so that I, too, could bring contemporary color to what college students thought was outdated, insipid language.

This semester I was excited to finally teach British Literature, the class that jumpstarted my imagination and revealed what a good teacher could do with a good text. However, this semester, I've feel as though my lectures "blind [the] rebel wit" and "confine the thought[s]" of my students. Now, in brief snatches, I can feel the interest of the class rise as I connect a particular analogy or bring forth a particular point. But often, the room is filled with a muted silence. I speak but my words are arid, they write but their notes are dead.

I am rarely able to create or sustain the exuberance produced in my undergrad Brit Lit classes. I can with American Lit; I love assigning works like Walden Pond, works students find perplexing or irrelevant, only to show them the depth of thought and the relevance of subject matter presented. But I've been unable to reproduce that effect with works like Aeropagitica. Oddly enough, the lit class that students respond most enthusiastically to is Experiencing Lit, my least favorite and the one I feel least confident teaching.

I know one day I, too, will "speak out loud and bold" like Chapman translating Homer, but it may take a bit longer than I anticipated. Of course, I believe I can get things moving northward by Fall Break. Perhaps my optimism springs from all those Romantic poems I gotta teach.

To the Teachers, don't Make Too Much Time

2009-10-02T12:02:00.000-07:00

"Then be not coy, but use your time, / And while ye may, go marry;"
--Robert Herrick, "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time"

When I first began teaching, I tried desperately to stay 2 weeks ahead of my classes. But no matter how I hard I worked to keep my planning and heading on that time curb, it never happened. I always found myself scrambling to get lectures and class activities together the day of or (even worse) while in class.

Now that I have a better sense of a semester's rhthym, I am much better prepared. But I'm still not quite 2 weeks ahead. Sometimes, it's a week; sometimes, it's a few hours. But that's okay. In fact, I think it's best. Two weeks ahead may be too much. If my preparation is too far removed from the day it is intended for, the timing of my ideas can ebb. My intimacy with a text--even one I've taught many times--isn't as personal as I'd like, which effects the syncronicity of my performance.

The energy, even urgency, created by the close proximity of class preparation and in-class appearance may help bring forth a sense of immediacy, an immediacy perhaps lost when the lecture's been prepared weeks ahead of schedule.

The Beauty of Detail: Style, Grammar, & Essays

2009-09-28T08:46:00.000-07:00

"In small proportions, we just beauties see; / And in short measures, life may perfect be."
--Ben Jonson, "To the Immortal Memory and Friendship of that Noble Pair"

This semester, I've tried to teach grammar on the days where students bring in their rough drafts. So far, those classes have gone well. They turn in their papers this week, and so I'll be able to measure their application of the principles.

In the past, I've tried to mark style and grammar errors on papers, believing that by revising, they will understand their errors. Only the exceptional students are able to learn this way. The rest just rewrite the sentences. Like a blindfolded dart thrower, they hope that their newest attempt will yield success, but they don't know until they see the results. I want them to know. Unlike satire, style and grammar are not "myster[ies] of the noble trade" that "no master can teach to his apprentice."

So hopefully, in class instruction coupled with out of class direction will make more effectual their capacity for understanding the labyrinth of English style and grammar.

Teaching (British) Lives

2009-09-26T23:25:00.000-07:00

"Poets are made of poems and other literary works from a past that especially engages them and of works by near antecedents and contemporaries that embed themselves in whole or in part in their imaginations."
--Michael Schmidt, Lives of the Poets

This semester I've been teaching Brit Lit. I was excited to do so because I knew this course would give me a chance to supplement my literary background by reading works I either haven't read or haven't read since undergrad. The details of Beowuf, M'orte D'Arthur, and A Modest Proposal had faded from memory. Now their best passages dance nimbly on the tongue's tip.

Yet beyond the texts, outside reading such as Michael Schmidt's Lives of the Poets have given my lectures (and my knowledge) a background that has made literature newer, exciting, and more complex. My interest in writers' biographies continues to evolve. As Schmidt says, "as speakers, each of us is an inadvertent anthologist." Hopefully, I will be able to incorporate my growing interests into more than just my lectures.

John Wooden, Marianne Moore, and the Tradition of Learned Reading

2009-09-22T19:07:00.000-07:00

The legendary college basketball coach John Wooden began everyone of his basketball seasons the same way: by teaching his players the most elementary of functions--putting on their shoes and socks. He did it slowly, punctiliously describing his movements. Why take the time to go over this simple action? I imagine that the attention to detail included in it a lesson that went beyond merely how to put on one's clothes.

On Saturday, a former student informed me that my literature classes has helped her greatly since she's transferred to Vanderbilt. She said that my lectures on how to read and how to take notes while reading has helped prepare her for a more rigorous reading schedule (apparently Vanderbilt pushes you harder than community colleges do). She also said that my daily quizzes got her used to reading and looking for details. (My favorite reading quiz question of all-time remains "What was Marianne Moore's favorite baseball team?") The answer requires the student to not just read the assigned poems but to have the discipline to read the biography section on the writer. (The answer is the Brooklyn Dodgers.)

I enjoy the quizzes because they show students that reading can be a leisure activity, but when doing it for school, a focus and seriousness should accompany it. Earlier this semester, my Experiencing Lit class read "Teenage Wasteland." One of the questions was "a version of the song 'Teenage Wasteland' is the theme song for what tv show." A student wrote on his paper, "that was not in the reading." I marked the answer wrong and wrote back, "it was in the footnotes." Detail. Fastidiousness. Focus.

Now, I'm no Vivian Bearing (look her up), but I do want to push my students, not for the sake of simply being hard and definitely not to give myself more work to grade but to show them that meticulous work brings forth its own rewards, whether in a work setting, on a quiz, or at Vanderbilt. Good luck, Jess!

Learning Who I Am in a 10 x 12 Room

2009-09-21T07:48:00.000-07:00

"But today I realize I've never really known what it means to be Chinese. I am thirty-six years old. My mother is dead and I am on a train, carrying with me her dreams of coming home. I am going to China [...] I look at their faces again and I see no trace of my mother in them. Yet they still look familiar. And now I also see what part of me is Chinese. It is so obvious. It is my family. It is in our blood. After all these years, it can finally be let go."
--Amy Tan, "A Pair of Tickets"

The excerpt above is from Amy Tan's short story, "A Pair of Tickets," which discusses, among other things, the importance of setting, how you are and how you think can be changed, influenced, or defined by where you are.

As a first time, full-time professor, I know what Tan is referring to (to a certain degree). This may be a small thing to some, but this is my first semester where I have my own office. I do share it with an office mate, but I don't have an adjunct office that I share with a host of other people (and apparently, their students). I have my computer, my phone, and my desk.

I have a home base. And to my surprise, I am a more efficient teacher. The day is much more controlled; I rush less. And I get more work done sooner. I cannot completely attribute this to an office: I have fewer classes (but oddly enough am paid more)and am more experienced. But having somewhere to keep my stuff and somewhere to go before and after class makes teaching easier.

So, although I'm not Chinese and my office is not the city of Guangzhou, and more efficient teaching does not compare to uncovering part of my heritage, I'd like to think that what I'm learning this semester is helping me discover at least part of the identity that will allow me to become the great teacher I know I can be.

You Wrote This Because You Hate Me or Grading the Research Essays of College Freshmen

2009-04-13T14:05:00.000-07:00

“Words are something; but to be exposed to an endless battery of mere sounds to be long dying; to lie stretched upon a rack of roses; to keep up langour by unintermitted effort…these are faint shadows of what I have undergone.”
--Charles Lamb, “A Chapter on Ears”

Ask any teacher. Grading is the most frustrating aspect of the art. Rarely is it a satisfying symphony of what they’ve learned but a mettlesome reminder of what they haven’t. This past week I’ve graded a heap of poorly written, half-plagiarized research essays. And never have I been more burdened by the process of marking up papers.

I can’t understand how things I tested them on less than 2 months ago cannot be transferred to writing. I know I’m not teaching English majors or even English enthusiasts, and I understand that they aren’t going to approach essay writing with much gusto. But I can attribute so many of their problems to lack of effort or careless attention to detail. Those things have little to do with writing talent or high school teaching.

I’m starting to realize that what I do for an expository writing class I’m going to have to do for a research one. That means I’m going to provide them with a very rigid structure and very specific rules. I won’t be able to control their languid research, which is where most of their problems arise, but I will be at least be able to take out some of the overwhelming aspects of it by giving them a very clear vision of what I want their papers to look like. That should help a little bit.

Unfortunately, I can't supervise how much work they’re going to put into their research. No matter what rules I put in place, they always find a way to circumvent them and avoid accomplishing what the rules were intended to help them achieve. I can put restrictions on the types of sources they can use (no websites, nothing that doesn’t have an author, etc.), which can force them to do more work than they normally do. But even that won’t combat completely what I’m trying to eliminate: laziness and apathy.

Hmmm…Maybe I should institute an annotated bibliography.

The Raw Material in All Its Rawness: Lectures on Frost & Eliot's Poetry

2009-04-13T13:43:00.000-07:00

"Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?"
--T.S. Eliot, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"

"Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference"
--Robert Frost, "The Road Not Taken"

There’s something funny about literature classes. I know the modus operandi for most professors is to induce discussion through though-provoking questions. But all my best professors were lecturers who spoke much and asked little. So that’s what I do. Sometimes class discussions spill forth naturally like a beer stein that’s been filled without regard to the ubiquitous foam. I enjoy the talking and the questioning.

I’ve just learned best from lectures, and I do believe that well done lecturing can be just as effective as any other classroom format. It depends mostly on the talents of the given teacher.

Well, last week I taught Robert Frost in my American Lit class. And I was amazed at how many students felt compelled to offer explanations for what he said and theories to what he meant. With the exception of a brave few, they are content to let me speak. But something about Frost invites them to speak out. His open-ended poems, his colloquialisms, his disarming use of meter encourages students to see his work less as a verbal labyrinth and more as an invitation to talk.

Obviously, part of his appeal is that, like certain epics, we feel as if we’ve somehow heard them before even if we haven’t. “Fire and Ice,” “The Road Not Taken,” “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening” seem to inject into students a measure of loquaciousness often reserved for post-class chatter w/ their friends. For students, Frost’s contemporary T.S. Eliot does not receive the same level of enthusiasm. Though I find Eliot’s anthologized work more fun to dig through, I’m careful not to mistake accessibility with simplicity.

I’ve read more of Eliot, enjoy him more, and am tempted to pronounce him the superior poet. But I must be fair to Frost, and I must remember both sat down with different objectives in mind. Simply saying one is better than the other would be like saying that group discussions are better teaching methods than lectures. Both are potentially effective means of teaching, but so much depends on the teacher’s abilities and the students’ sensibilities. Declaring one to be clearly better than the other is to wrongly characterize an objective standard. Comparing the two is like comparing the drawings of an engineer and an architect.

Perhaps Frost v. Eliot isn’t the best way to discuss them, perhaps the best way is to juxtapose them and let the similarities and differences fall where they may. Maybe poetry, like teaching methods, are best when you have them working in the hands of respective masters, not comparing them in a conversation that isn’t really about what you’re discussing in the first place.

A Teacher's Field Trip

2009-03-29T21:12:00.000-07:00

“I wouldn’t let Pete Rose use my bathroom or anything, but I think he should be in the Hall of Fame.”
--Sarah Bunting, Baseball & Lit Conference

This week’s classes were cut short by a Friday conference on Baseball and Literature. Since I wrote my Master’s thesis on several baseball novels where I examined the ways in which the baseball star is presented as an archetypal hero mirroring ancient champions like Achilles and King Arthur, I feel it’d be irresponsible and lazy of me not to present at this conference. Also, the conference is at one of the schools I teach at. And my thesis directors are the organizers. I don’t mean to sound like my participation is forced. It isn’t. It’s just implicit that I will produce something to present, an act I am very proud to perform.

Ah, the academic conference. A reunion of sorts where like-minded men and women gather to discuss, sometimes debate matters that deal specifically with their fields of interest. Conferences are a good excuse to travel and socialize. The culture of the conference often mirrors the content, which in turn, mirrors the people drawn to the particular content. For example, a Virginia Wolf conference is (from secondhand accounts, not firsthand experience) a bit stuffy and slightly snobbish. Questions after a presentation resemble declarations of what the presenter got wrong. Consequently, a pop culture conference is a little more convivial. Questions are, in fact questions, and post-presentation discussions are rarely intended to be an informal game of Trivial Pursuit.

I loved Mrs. Dalloway, by the way.

So as it has been for the past 3 years I’ve been involved with it, the conference went well. The keynote speaker was Dr. Harriet Hamilton, a professor at Alabama A & M whose father played in the Negro Leagues. The main speaker was “Mudcat” Grant, a former 20 game winner for the Cleveland Indians who roomed with important figures like Larry Doby and Curt Flood. Grant spoke about his experiences playing during segregation and about learning how to pitch.

My paper was not as interesting. That said, it was on the 20th century shift from the boxer to the baseball player as the preeminent American sports hero worked well. Only about a page of it came from my thesis. The rest was new material where I discussed Harry Stein’s Hoopla, which I mentioned only briefly in my thesis’ conclusion.

Conferences are the key to establishing and maintaining contacts. They also allow us to stay current on the latest ideas in our field. This Friday, I was able to hear some new takes on baseball’s usage in academia. And I was informed of a position opening at a school in Alabama (and encouraged to apply).

My Argument is Your Opinion

2009-03-23T08:02:00.000-07:00

"The gap between what someone tells you and what you know [to be] true--that's where the jokes are."
--Bill Maher, "Religulous"

The beauty of words is that, if arranged correctly, they can convey thoughts and moods from one person to another. The challenge comes in making the listener’s ears and mind hear and understand what you’re trying to convey. I find this to be especially true with students. This week, I’ve been meeting one-on-one with my students about their research argumentative essays. I was amazed at the number of them who, instead of presenting arguments on a specific issue, wrote reports on their topics. For example, if they wanted to write about abortion, they were to pick a side and argue that side, not merely tell me what it is and the many ways it can be done.

When I mentioned this to them, they said, “oh, so you want me to write my opinion?” That one word opinion conveyed to them what we’d spent the whole first part of the semester talking and testing about. I kept wondering to myself, “what did they think I meant by persuasion and argumentation?” What did they think I meant by “argumentative essay?” What did they think I meant by “take a side on a particular issue?” I think part of the communication gap stemmed from 2 words, one I used and one I didn’t.

The first was “research.” No matter what I said leading up to or after it, their idea of a research paper did not extend beyond being an informative essay. The second word was “opinion.” For some reason, “argumentative,” “persuasion,” or “rhetorical” does not resonate with students like the word “opinion.” From now on, when I teach argumentative essays (especially research ones), argument and opinion will be ubiquitous. I want the words to be inseperable in their minds.

Relearning connotations takes time. A word like “rhetoric” sounds so ancient and foreign that they’ve probably never really bothered to think much about its meaning, and “argument” is connected so deeply with verbal fighting that shaking loose these mindsets can’t be easily done in a semester. Likewise, the word opinion is so closely associated with being a position that another person can legitimately disagree with that introducing them to another word that’s already linked to a related, yet altogether different concept is no mean task. My comfort comes in that, eventually, they will get it, that I don’t have to teach them everything. Other professors in other classes are fighting the same battles, and at some point, intellectual development will occur.

What College Professors Do on Spring Break

2009-03-13T19:42:00.000-07:00

“I remember my father saying that early in his teaching career he would ask himself at the beginning of each term, ‘Have I read enough to be a good teacher?’ And he would have to answer, ‘No, not yet.’”
--Kim Stafford, The Muses Among Us

The week of spring break, for the professor, is punctuated with very little of the merriment that their students associate with it. We still enjoy the time away from classes and students and, if we’re lucky, the campus. But it’s still filled with work; the luxury is that you get to pick the time and place to do it. This is more of a treat than it sounds.

I spent several Sbux hours grading midterms...many, many midterms. The freedom to work several straight hours on so single minded a task is not often afforded during the active parts of the semester. Strangely, I enjoyed the freedom I dedicated towards my slavish workload. I still have about 15 lit papers to grade, though.

But I didn’t just work. I visited an art gallery. I went to a bar/club (Don’t ask. Even I’m not sure why I went). I read Kim Stafford’s excellent letter/poem/essay/book on writing and creativity, "The Muses Among Us." I spent a day at the hospital supporting my father while he received a pacemaker. I wrote in my notebook. I accidentally ran over a kitten. I went to dinner w/ friends. I watched Bill Maher’s entertaining and thought provoking (yet rhetorically flawed) documentary "Religulous." I basked in one of my childhood pastimes by watching my favorite 90s action star’s latest movie: "JCVD." I participated in some beer brewing at a friend’s cookout. I ran. I watched a sextuple overtime college basketball game until 12:30 am w/ my dad. I recommended several books. I loaned a book. I went book shopping. I borrowed a book. And I answered emails from students who spent more of their Spring Break in the library than on the beach.

Midterm Curve

2009-03-09T20:44:00.000-07:00

“As it was, I had to find some way to pass the time and trick my students into believing that they were getting an education.”
--David Sedaris, from “The Learning Curve”

As I kid, when teachers said that they learn from us, I was always a little confused because I didn’t understand how something we could say could enlighten them. But the more I teach, the more I think the teachers were referring to what they learned about teaching, not about the particular subject being discussed.

So this past week, I assigned midterms. I don’t often assign exams in writing classes, but tests, like papers, give me a clear idea of what students are and are not learning. Besides the obvious lessening of the grading load, I really get a sense of who’s paying attention and taking detailed notes.

With papers, it’s a bit easier to hide behind good word choice and solid syntax like a child with a lisp who learns to avoid “s” words. But with tests, even essay tests, I get a clearer sense of what students are actually learning, what concepts they can actually discuss intelligently.

In both my writing and lit classes, I’ve been pleased with my students’ ability to memorize and regurgitate information. Since tests (even essay tests) are less abstract than essays, students better prepare themselves for the day or reckoning, whereas with papers, they seem to prime themselves with about as much urgency as an overworked server getting the final refill on the final table of a 14 hour double shift.

Bringing the focus back to me, students generally miss the same answers on tests and generally make the same mistakes on papers as their classmates, which can highlight my errors just as much as theirs. And because of that possibility of our own failure, don’t we all grade on a curve, even if we don’t tell them?

College Folk Hero...Well Sort Of

2009-02-28T22:26:00.000-08:00

“[S]he seemed to follow the rules and customs of some exotic, faraway nation where the citizens drilled the ground for oil paint and picked pastels from the branches of stunted trees. Without copying anyone else, she had invented her own curious personality, which I envied even more than her artistic ability.”
--David Sedaris, from “Twelve Moments in the Life of the Artist”

Last week Adrian, one of my freshmen writing students told me that, to his friends I’m like some sort of folk hero. Apparently, he is roommates with another one of my students from another writing class, and they sometimes sit around and tell Professor Bush stories. Adrian told me how his girlfriend, his other roommate, and the people in his band aren’t sure if I really exist.

Another writing student in a 3rd class, told me something similar. She said that I reminded her of her boyfriend and that when she tells him stories about me he says, “that’s something I would say! I wanna meet this guy!” When she told me that, I commented that if I started a fan club, he’d be my choice for president. She just shook her head and said, “No. You two must never be allowed to meet…Although, he probably would take you up on the offer.”

The funny thing about these comments is that I want to be a campus character. One of the attractive aspects of being a college professor is that you can develop a reputation (and later a legend) based on outrageous things you’ve said and funny things you’ve done.

To a certain degree, isn’t that what all of us want, to be recognized and appreciated by the community of which we’re a part? Whether it’s the Hollywood community that the whole world sees or part of an obscure Guinea tribe known only be specialists of that region, don’t we all want an identity that we can point to and take pride in?

But I have to admit: something Adrian said validated his “folk hero” comment. Before leaving the empty classroom, he turned around and said, “and besides all the memorable moments, you’re also a great teacher. That’s what makes it so fun.”

Parking Tickets & All That Jazz: The First Week of Classes

2008-09-01T09:29:00.000-07:00

"I cannot but wish I were better qualified." --John Adams to Abigail Adams after hearing that he was elected President

Teaching is like jazz: if you can't improvise, you're in the wrong line of work. I've just completed my first week of classes of my 7th semester of teaching (if you include my TA work). And no matter how much I prepare, no matter how much experience I have, classes always have a way of ambushing and tying me down with dozens of unaccounted for logistical issues.

For example, on the first day of classes I arrived on campus and cannot find a parking spot. I drove around for an hour trying to find somewhere to put my car while I discussed 6 pages of syllabi to students old enough to be able to read it for themselves. Since this was my first semester since being hired as an adjunct that I did not have an 8:00 class, I'd forgotten how hectic campus became early in the semester during mid-morning.

Impatient and a little nervous about being late, I made my own parking spot behind the Industrial Studies building. I knew I'd get a ticket b/c I saw a car parked earlier that morning in the same spot with a ticket in its windshield. So while I lifting the handle on the parking brake, I mentally subtracted $10 from my checking account...

...Between the 6 classes at my 2 colleges, this group of students promises to be my best so far. Of course, college is like NFL football: everyone's good up until week 3. So we'll see if this lasts, but based on my previous experiences, my students seem much more receptive and motivated as a whole than in previous years.

That said, Eng 1020, research and argumentative writing, still provides a tincture of confusion for me. I can never find a way to comfortably approach that class. I always stumble through it like a parent trying to walk through a toy-cluttered living room in the middle of the night. This past spring semester was better, but even then, the first 2 essays I had them write on (advertisements & film) seemed more like 1010 work. So I'm borrowing assignments from my friend Bob who seems to specialize in 1020 classes. Hopefully, by copying him, I can find a way to file away some of the rough spots.

Yet by borrowing from him, I'm running into a few slight inconveniences that I didn't really anticipate. How do I tailor his writing assignment to my day-to-day assignments? And how many trees must I personally kill in order to print and run off the essays he has his students read and write about? Though I have other classes and other small problems, my two 1020 courses at my community college are what make me occasionally question my competence as a professor. But I think as long as I stay flexible--like a saxophonist changing his riff to suit the mood of the crowd--I should be okay.

...So after my last class on Monday, I walked out to my car and the first thing I did was think about what I could do with an extra $10 in my bank account. No ticket was on the car. Perhaps this semester will be more fun than I thought.

Predicting the Future

2008-08-20T19:20:00.000-07:00

“In this world, there are two times. There is mechanical time and there is body time. The first is as rigid and metallic as a massive pendulum of iron that swings back and forth. The second squirms and wriggles like a bluefish in a bay The first is unyielding, predetermined. The second makes up its mind as it goes along.”
--Alan Lightman, Einstein’s Dreams

Last week, I finished constructing my syllabi for the fall semester. I put these things together for my writing classes knowing they’re going to change. Technically, the syllabus doesn’t (or shouldn’t) change; it’s the schedule that accompanies them that does. However, predicting what I’m going to do or how the class is going to unfold has yet to get easier. Sure, splattering dates & assignments on several sheets of paper gets easier, but spacing out due dates and anticipating the necessary mid-semester work remains tricky.

Even though an experienced teacher can reasonably anticipate the ability level of their students, writing classes run so fluidly that when you put together a syllabus, you really only assemble a semester outline. You’re not really dictating the daily course of the class. To some degree, this is true with any class, but I feel I can much more accurately chart a literature section.

When you put together a syllabus, you really are predicting the future, and in some ways you’re controlling it. I decide what papers students get to write, what assignments they get to read, and what tests they take. Though I feel neither Napoleonic nor prescient, I enjoy my roll as syllabus-maker. Putting them together allows me to get into school mode. The only real problem I have is that I know I’ll have to change them. Of course, a sense of freedom comes with knowing I can change them. Since the course material that makes up the class subject matter is not fixed, I don’t feel chained to a specific curriculum like I would if I taught high school. Even the developmental classes provide a surprising amount of freedom.

One of many good things about being a professor is that in a world that is so beyond our control, you do have a modicum of power over what you want to spend your semester thinking about, talking about, and reading about. With breakthroughs in every field of study, even the past is in flux. Knowing this provides a small measure of comfort when you sit down and think about how you can, in your small sliver of the universe, predict your future.

Why Am I Complaining Again?

2008-05-30T12:59:00.000-07:00

“The heart knoweth his own bitterness; and a stranger doth not intermeddle with his joy.”
--Proverbs 14:10

So last week I got the call that I wouldn’t be teaching any summer classes. Not enough students signed up, making this the second summer in a row that this happened. Now, I’m not mad; I just now know that I have to get a real job. I’ve resigned myself to the fact. Ya know, summer work isn’t something they sell you on when they talk about being a teacher. In fact, no one really talks about it, but I don’t know too many of us who aren’t engaged in some form of it. Either you’re teaching summer classes, doing administrative work, or employed by someone else (I’m choosing to omit those lucky bastards who receive grants to travel, sleep in ‘til noon, and then produce scholarship that they could’ve written while working part-time at a local fast-food restaurant). Are there any teachers who spend their summers golfing? The word of the day is “bitterness.”

With that in mind, I’m looking forward to hiking up to a temp agency, and getting a job that involves putting together and packaging cell phones for $12.13/hour as well as taking orders from someone who skipped college and went to work right after high school. Amertume.

Honestly, I don’t mind doing something unrelated to teaching. I spent the past 2 semesters teaching a total of 12 classes as well as tutoring in a writing lab. The two semesters before that I spent my days teaching and my nights researching and writing my masters thesis. A break should do me good. Getting away from classes, students, and grading should make me happy for a while, but I don’t wanna be happy. I wanna be teaching. I especially would’ve liked to try out some new ideas for writing assignments without the frenetic pace created by 5 other classes.

Now, the good part about not being in teaching is that my range of experience will be broadened, which I’ll be able to bring to the classroom in the form of stories and examples. Also, a job in any field outside of education lends credibility in the students’ eyes. When I recount a story from when I used to work at a Dell factory or a DK Publishing warehouse, I’m no longer some pampered intellectual, but I’m one of them, a hardworking everyman who actually lived a life before getting sucked into the soul-numbing vortex of a career that involves never—ever—getting promoted out of school. Hmmm…Come to think of it, why I am complaining again?

Show Me What You Got: My First Eval as an Adjunct

2007-12-13T13:31:00.000-08:00

Evaluations are scarry. Well...at least they can be. Two weeks ago, Dr. Johnson sat in on my 11:30 class. Rare are the times when I'm nervous. But in the days leading up to the evaluation, I was jittery about Dr. Johnson's impressions, I was apprehensive about teaching material, and I was unsure about how my class would respond. My fears proved unfounded. In preparation for the work we'd be doing next semester (it's a 2 semester English course), I taught Aristotle' logic. The material went over well, the students were engaging, and Dr. Johnson enjoyed the period.

A few days later, she and I met to discuss her notes. She told me again how much she enjoyed the class and how she found it informative and interesting. She pointed out that I, at times, talked a little too fast, making it difficult to understand me. Evaluators have brought up my wordspeed before. I have a tendency to speak too rapidly, but I like that Dr. Johnson pointed out that my chatter corresponded with my excitement over the material, as opposed to a pure lack of speaking discipline.

Towards the end of our conversation, she said the words that mean so much to me: you're a good teacher. I remember the first time I heard it. At the end of the '06 fall semester, Dr. Jackson said it to me over the phone after reading the final essays from my developmental writing students. Some words make us glow. I like hearing students tell me they enjoy the class or that I teach well, but they're more likely to have a limited scope upon which to base their evaluations. Hearing colleagues say it warms me.

Evaluations have a nerve-racking quality to them; the sheer idea that someone is watching--judging you while you work makes you a little more self-conscious. I don't care if you're chopping wood, cleaning toilets, or teaching English classes, having someone loom over you and evaluate the quality and methods of your work has an NFL Combine feel to it (That's when college football players who are about to be drafted strip down to their underwear so that coaches, scouts, and team doctors can measure and poke virtually every inch of their bodies) Anyway, I'm glad this semester's eval went well. They usually do. I know that, most of the time, I do a good job. Of course, being good is not the same as being good enough.

Sexual Language, Cleavage, and the Last Week of the Semester

2007-12-03T14:03:00.000-08:00

Okay, so this is my first blog entry about my teaching experience. I'm an adjunct English professor at Middle Tennessee State University and Motlow Community College. This is my 3rd semester as an adjunct and my 5th overall with a class (I taught for 2 semesters as a TA when I was receiving my Masters). This is the final week of the semester, and I've done some sporadic journaling about my experiences, but nothing consistent. I hope to change this beginning--now.

I'm looking to blog on a weekly to bi-weekly basis, discussing anything story-worthy or helpful to myself or others.

Last week, classes became slightly relaxed, especially at Motlow. The semester will soon end, and the students have turned in their 4th set of essays. Since my writing classes center around those 4 papers, once we finish the last one, we don't have much to do. The students know this, and become lazy. I know it and become lazy as well. Even for the smartest, best educated students, a college semester can be grueling. And since I don't give finals in writing classes, most students curb both their work ethic and interest.

Last Tuesday's Eng 1020 class reflected this apathy. We had a revision workshop that day, and I told the students who did not have a draft to leave. They had no reason to stay. A stream of conscious class discussion took place where students (mostly non-traditional ones) began making a host of sexual jokes while discussing their essays. The class was half full, and had this outburst happened at any other time of the semester, I would've ended it immediately. But it was fun (and funny). I avoided adding my own comments, but when I did say something, I didn't actually discourage the conversations. I usually joked about the literal words and ignored the subtext. As the youngest person in class that day, it was up to me to be mature. That said, Tuesday's class convinced me that I needed to start back recording my teaching days.

Thursday's class was less haphazard. We had more students, so everyone who was here on Tuesday was more subdued. I divided the class into pairs and went to every group to discuss their essay. We still had a little giddiness from Tuesday carryover. But the interesting part of class was how I related to one student.

Michelle's an attractive girl who not only dresses up for class but often displays her cleavage. She draws further attention to herself by being flirty with me.

Well, when I got to her group, I went out of my way to not seem overly attentive to her. But the more non-chalant I tried to act, the more attention I drew to myself. I sat beside her, but the angle I was at gave me a clear sightline into her shirt. So I tried to quietly switch seats. That only caused her partner to have to move, which drew a great deal of attention. To top it off, she had less written than anyone else. So I spent more time with her than with everyone else (I know what you're thinking, and I will fail her if she doesn't get the paper done). While she sat there nodding attentively and running her fingers through her hair, I realized that the precarious position I was in needed recording. Further confirmation that I needed to write. Anyway, no one seems to mind if my eyes occasionally slip into her direction, but I am often embarrassed when I see a student's eyes follow my eyes into her direction, as if my quick glance were an astronomer's gaze. It's purely accidental. Purely.

Tomorrow's the last day. Stay tuned...