Tonight, for the first time, I see someone's posted a link to my blog from their site. You know who you are. After a day I feel more disconnected from my department & myself than ever, it's encouraging to think someone cares what I might have to say.... at least to the extent that that caring might be measured in the time required to post a link to this page. I'm terrible with html code. Everytime I type in a new link I get something wrong, have to go back and fix it again and again. html is so unforgiving. You, fellow blogger, are generous. Now if only I could start writing something worth reading.
This is my first year out of grad school. I'm one of the lucky ones who landed a job my first time out... but it's a 4-4 load with 3 preps. Last semester was tough... I spent a lot of time just trying to keep my head above water. I came from a Research I state school to a small liberal arts college, the kind of place I've been wanting to teach since I began graduate school years ago. But the students I have here are so different from what I was expecting... the writing classes last semester were a definite shock... but so are these problems I'm finding in some of my upper levels, where the students (majors!, many of them) just aren't reading. These students are needier, and, horrible as this sounds, sometimes they seem to have such a sense of entitlement. I had this romantic notion liberal arts students would want to learn, not just get a degree, but that's just not the case for the majority of them... State U. kids were much more independent, and a lot less whiny. I thought once I started teaching courses in my major field, things would be exciting. I do have good days, when I come out of the classroom feeling invigorated, but I'm having more disappointing days than I'd like. In short, I'm having a very hard time doing my job when the students aren't doing theirs. And some of my anxieties about this situation and teaching in general are waking me up in the night. What's wrong with me?
3 comments:
I know exactly what you mean about the liberal arts students compared to the State U students - I think you *can* get that great engagement with liberal arts students, but it's not automatic.
Have you thought about requiring students to bring in some kind of written response to the reading? If they share them with the class, you don't really have to grade them, but it's something that forces them to do the reading. (Unfortunately they often do need to be forced.)
Anyway, FWIW, the shift from grad school to a 4-4 load is a HUGE change - I promise you that it will get better!
I do assign weekly responses, but the class meets 3 times a week, and many of the responses engage with the text only minimally. I'm planning to have a long chat with them tomorrow, tell them that I want to help them develop interpretive skills, not simply pass on information... and to learn those skills (which they'll be tested on in their papers and on exams), they need to get in the habit of trying out their ideas in class. 10% of their grade is participation... reminding them of that fact might help a little, too. I think I'm going to require them to start bringing notecards with their possible contribution to class written down on them-- a smart question, their thoughts about a passage, a connection they've made to the contextual material we've been discussing or to previous works we've talked about. This gives me an excuse to call on people at random. Last semester I gave pop quizzes-- the students were terrified of me for a while, but they were reading the material! And by the end of the semester, they were doing top-notch work.
I'm young, short, and generally non-intimidating... I think this semester's crew has started to get the impression I'm laid-back enough that they can do little work without being held accountable. That's going to change. I just have to raise the bar.
Thanks for the reassurance... some weeks the 4-4 feels impossible, but some weeks it's not such a big deal. I'll hang in there.
The 4/4 is hard at first until you've got the preps. Now I find myself adding new books, or doing different texts in different sections of the same class, just to keep myself fresh.
I use daily responses. Full/partial and no credit, can't turn them in late, 10 or 20% of the unit grade so it doesn't make or break, but not likely to get better than a B unless pretty much doing the reading and writing.
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