New year, new semester. I have decided to continue writing here every Friday or so, because I found it interesting to read what I had written here last semester. I knew that things had changed over time between me and my students, but reading about my feelings and reactions to what was going on in class made me realize the mistakes that I make over and over and the little distance I am able to take when a problem hits me--I always react so quickly and with strong measures! I need to detach myself a little more, to feel less threatened when something doesn't work as well as I had expected.
I have also decided that I was going to have only one blog for my new students: a feedback blog, where they will be asked to write about once a week about their feelings about our class. For the rest, I will simply ask the regular assignments to be written on paper. The advantage of this? Not sure yet, but at least the students won't see the "blog" assignments as extra work. The disadvantages? The students won't be able to read each other's entries, I will carry more stuff around (with the risk of losing it), and we won't save trees. I'll try it this way now and if I find that it worked better before, I'll go back to my usual ways next fall.
Other than that, I am using the same exact format as last semester for my class website. I spent a lot of time trying to make a new and creative website and managed to do something quite decent, but in the end, I found it too complex to change everything and redo all the work I had already done once for my first 106i section, and since this first website was working perfectly well, I decided to use it again! A few things have changed though: the blog page, as explained above, and the project pages too, especially their order, format, and little pictures I drew on every project page. Last semester was a big mess with the projects, because I added some and deleted some too, changed the order of the others, and didn't like their format. Hopefully, this semester will be a little better planned. I also know much better how much time I have to do what I want to do with this five-days-a-week class organization. Last semester, I had tried to combine both my previous English 101 and English 102 into one semester of 106i, and it didn't work very well, but this semester I know what I really want to do, what the students really need, and how much time everything takes.
Some things that will be different this semester:
- the blogs, as explained above
- the movie night, as explained below
- the first week: getting to know each others better and in smaller groups
- the projects: a separate "summary" project
- peer reviewing: more time will be spent on "teaching" how to do it well and why
- and I'm sure a lot of other things!
I think everything is ready for tomorrow, first day! I checked my class roster and can't pronounce the names on the list, but that's normal. The first week will be dedicated to getting to know each others better, and we will also start this new idea of mine: a movie night, every Thursday evening. This week will not be optional, since it is the first one and I want everyone to see what it will be, and I have also decided to take this opportunity to have a little birthday party with some friends and ex-students. When I think of last year, same time, I realize how many things have changed: I am much more confident, I don't fear having to face 50 students, I know I love to teach what I will teach, and I know (well, very much hope) that I will love my students ...and I haven't lost my voice! This is exciting!
