-
Archives
- May 2013
- October 2012
- March 2012
- December 2011
- November 2011
- August 2011
- January 2011
- September 2009
- August 2009
- July 2009
- June 2009
- May 2009
- April 2009
- March 2009
- February 2009
- January 2009
- December 2008
- November 2008
- October 2008
- September 2008
- August 2008
- July 2008
- June 2008
- May 2008
- April 2008
- March 2008
- February 2008
- January 2008
- December 2007
- November 2007
- October 2007
- September 2007
- August 2007
- July 2007
- June 2007
-
Meta
Category Archives: teaching
Modernists think they’re so great
The 2nd-most irritating thing* about being a Victorianist is having to deal with our modernist colleagues who appear to believe that modernist claims about Victorian culture were simply true, and not at all artifacts of generational conflict or artistic brand-building.  … Continue reading
A miracle of the Force
I was gobsmacked on Friday when something happened for the first time in 10+ years of teaching: A student produced a reasonable definition of the word canonical. It was a first-year student, in a composition class. And how did the … Continue reading
Posted in family, higher education, star wars, teaching
1 Comment
Should MLA members be experts in electronic environments?
Alex Reid has a typically thoughtful post this morning on the MLA’s recent white paper on the undergraduate major in language and literature. There is something a bit embarrassing about the MLA’s assertion that competencies in reading and writing translate … Continue reading
Posted in education, English major, higher education, mla, teaching
Comments Off on Should MLA members be experts in electronic environments?
Teaching as a professor
Dr. Crazy has a great post this week about the intensity of an assistant professor’s workload, and how that’s different from graduate school. I also teach at a “regional comprehensive” university, and so have a roughly similar mix of teaching, … Continue reading
Yet another reason not to like RateMyProfessors.com
Today I found out that my parents check up on A’s and my teaching by reading RateMyProfessors.com regularly. Awesome.
Posted in family, teaching, things that should stop
Comments Off on Yet another reason not to like RateMyProfessors.com
Students’ research and writing process
This month’s issue of Macworld imagines a typical student’s writing process, and it isn’t pretty: If you’re using Safari to do so some heavy-duty browsing, you’ve probably got multiple windows and multiple tabs open at once. For instance, when doing … Continue reading
For future students: How to ask to be let into a course
One of my best things is not taking things personally. Almost nothing has anything to do with me. –Robert Lopez, A Part of the World Unlike Robert Lopez’s narrator, “not taking things personally” is one of my worst things. … Continue reading
Posted in higher education, teaching
3 Comments
On grades and anxiety
I’m grateful to Chuck and Alex for their encouraging comments about my plan to make my grade distributions public, and it still seems like a good idea to me. However–and maybe this is just me–it is slightly anxiety-provoking. Last night, … Continue reading
Summer’s finally here
My two summer classes end today! July and August will be the first two months I’ve gone without teaching since 2003. I scarcely know what to do . . . (Well, Alton Locke is due to Broadview in August, and … Continue reading
Posted in higher education, teaching
2 Comments
What’s an assignment for?
This year I’ve been experimenting with a variety of digital replacements for my conventional “3 explication papers + one short paper + one medium-length paper” assignment set; for the purposes of this experiment, I’m not requiring formal papers at all. … Continue reading
Posted in assessment, higher education, teaching
Comments Off on What’s an assignment for?