Sunday Before Monday (NaSchoWriMo/NaBloPoMo 8)
It's Sunday again, and I'm not entirely ready for tomorrow. This has been the story of my semester. I know what I'm teaching. But I don't feel on top of things, and really, my prep is relying more on experience than on immediate prep. I hate that. Part of this is the way I teach. I really do focus a lot on that active learning thing, so I don't lecture much. But the past three weeks have been absolute torture. The students haven't really been prepped, and this means that time I've planned on doing one thing is often spent just trying to get them up to speed while not annoying the hell out of the few students who are prepared.
Overall, I have some very bright students, and many of them are doing the work, but aren't really getting it. I have to say that, despite the quiet in the room, more of them are taking notes than is typical for SLAC students, and most of them are really using the discussion boards well. It just never feels like we're as together as I'd like. And tomorrow I need to backtrack a little, because I noticed on the discussion boards for one class that they really want to talk about a particular topic.
That is one of the nice things about World History, at least -- I can move things around a little. Still, next semester, I am going to try much harder to create mini-lecture podcasts with maps and all for my classes. In my spare time. :-)
2 comments:
Hang in there, ADM. This can be the roughest part of the semester for all of us - esp. when our students are not where we want them to be.
This chimes very loud just now, I was having major misgivings about the field yesterday. Reflecting on one's career and then writing a lecture while ill will do that for a boy, I guess. But I guess we all get this way at this sort of time. I would have liked to spend less of reading week ill though, that might have helped. WE WILL ALL TRIUMPH because we ALWAYS DO. That's the main thing.
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