Saturday, September 10, 2016
Sep. 10th, 2016 08:38 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bearshortyThursday was my first day of classes. Since I'm staying at my parents' this week, my Dad drove me to work on his way to work. We had to leave early so I was there by 7am. The offices don't usually open until 8:30am but there are comfortable couches on the second floor by the offices, so I sat there, ate my bagel with cream cheese, drank my tea, and read my book. Grace, one of the secretaries, actually came in early by 8am, so she opened all the offices and, most importantly the printer/copier room. And since it was the first day of class for me, there was a lot of printing (which is one of the reasons Grace came early - there is usually lots of teachers who need to print a lot. I was first and got it all done fast.)
After printing and photocopying everything I needed - syllabi, my semester class breakdown schedule, first day writing sample, reading guide, reading homework for Monday - I also printed two potential essays to choose from to teach as the second essay in a few weeks. Our textbook is being updated next year and the department wants us to pilot a few readings to see how they work and what readings to keep in the old textbook, since after essay 2 the students need to connect two different essays.
The theme of the first half of the semester (first 3 readings) is activism. I'm starting with the intro to Kristof and WuDunn's book Half the Sky about how essential it is to help women all over the world and how that help will elevate not just women but the countries and whole of society. There are a lot of heartbreaking and inspiring stories of women in this book. I love that book; I read it in 2009, and I've taught this intro before. I usually try to introduce the concept of "agency" to my students with this essay. And for the 3rd essay I'm teaching Malcolm Gladwell's New Yorker article "Small Change: Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted". . He raises concerns with the long term impact of social media "weak tie" activism and questions the ability of this kind of activism to actually change policy. It's a great article to argue with and will lead to second half of the semester about the impact of social media and tech on individuals and the impact of the new communication style.
What I needed is the bridge between these two essay. I was torn between the intro from We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, a Nigerian author, and
"The Matter of Black Lives" by Jelani Cobb, New Yorker from March 14, 2016. So I printed both essays and read them before my classes started at 10:20. And "The Matter of Black Lives" is the clear winner for my sequence. It concerns itself with US activism, social media activism and its impact, and about marginalized groups, which would fit really well with both Kristof and WuDunn and with Gladwell and will build with each essay assignment. And for me it was an educational article since it tries to organize how the movement grew and to give it context. I felt hesitant about teaching this before since I feel like I've only known enough about Black Lives Matter from the periphery and the internet but not the essential things about it. But this essay is good for that and I like the idea of giving my 18 years olds some background too so they can follow the news. I felt like I learned a lot just by reading it. And I'm still thinking about the questions it raised. The feminist essay is good too, but it feels a little too basic to me (I did study women and gender history at a graduate level at one of the best universities in the world for women and gender, so this is probably just my bias, and my students would find good ideas there, but I also want to challenge them a little more).
It felt really good to read though, to read deeply, to take notes while reading, like I was clearing cobwebs from my brain. After being home all summer with my toddler, my brain certainly needed it. I'm read many fiction books but I really needed to get back into work mode.
Classes themselves went well. It was 20 minutes of intro, going over the syllabus pretty much, and then the students had to write a writing sample for me for an hour. So easy day. During the first class I actually worked on my fanfic story for RS Games. I printed what I had so far from Google docs and wrote about Remus and Sirius in longhand. I wrote two full big pages and I felt so incredibly productive. It's due in two weeks so I really need to just finish it. I have the bones, I just need to write it. But it was flowing well, I know where I want it to go and the characters are almost writing themselves, so it's just the matter of finding the time. And during my second class I read the writing samples from the first class. I found two students who had very weak samples, so I brought those over to the director as they should be moved to a section with extra reading help.
My classes were done at 1:20 but I had to wait until 5 for my Dad to pick me up. I tried career center as they were having a workshop at 3 but as I thought it was full. So I decided to go get my school ID updated. It was very, very hot and the school buses between different campuses were very full so it was a bit of the wait. The faculty HR office where they do IDs is a the furthest possible location, so it took a while to get there for about 2 minutes of "here sit for a pic, here is your id". But I got it done and most of the rest of the writing samples so I don't have to think about it anymore.
Yesterday, was very very hot again, but Tanya and I went to the playground in the morning anyway. She being very 2 lately with a lot of not listening and complaining. I think it is a little worse because I went to work. She's definitely having a little more trouble falling asleep. She is staying with my parents tonight while I go back to Brooklyn for Yeva's birthday party at the Russian restaurant. Bear is good with bedtime routine but not actual going to sleep part - she usually wants me or my Mom for that. So we figured she should stay here and my parents would drive her back in the morning. I'm not looking forward to leaving her overnight - I only done it a few times before, and only once when we were not on vacation in Florida with her just a couple of rooms away - I know I'm going to be worried and will miss her a lot. And I'm just not looking forward to this party. But I have to go since there was a whole drama about it.
We still didn't get the Recognition Agreement. I keep calling the mortgage broker, he keeps blaming the bank's attorneys - it is really frustrating at this point. Fingers crossed that this would finally resolve itself next week and we can submit it all to the board.
After printing and photocopying everything I needed - syllabi, my semester class breakdown schedule, first day writing sample, reading guide, reading homework for Monday - I also printed two potential essays to choose from to teach as the second essay in a few weeks. Our textbook is being updated next year and the department wants us to pilot a few readings to see how they work and what readings to keep in the old textbook, since after essay 2 the students need to connect two different essays.
The theme of the first half of the semester (first 3 readings) is activism. I'm starting with the intro to Kristof and WuDunn's book Half the Sky about how essential it is to help women all over the world and how that help will elevate not just women but the countries and whole of society. There are a lot of heartbreaking and inspiring stories of women in this book. I love that book; I read it in 2009, and I've taught this intro before. I usually try to introduce the concept of "agency" to my students with this essay. And for the 3rd essay I'm teaching Malcolm Gladwell's New Yorker article "Small Change: Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted". . He raises concerns with the long term impact of social media "weak tie" activism and questions the ability of this kind of activism to actually change policy. It's a great article to argue with and will lead to second half of the semester about the impact of social media and tech on individuals and the impact of the new communication style.
What I needed is the bridge between these two essay. I was torn between the intro from We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, a Nigerian author, and
"The Matter of Black Lives" by Jelani Cobb, New Yorker from March 14, 2016. So I printed both essays and read them before my classes started at 10:20. And "The Matter of Black Lives" is the clear winner for my sequence. It concerns itself with US activism, social media activism and its impact, and about marginalized groups, which would fit really well with both Kristof and WuDunn and with Gladwell and will build with each essay assignment. And for me it was an educational article since it tries to organize how the movement grew and to give it context. I felt hesitant about teaching this before since I feel like I've only known enough about Black Lives Matter from the periphery and the internet but not the essential things about it. But this essay is good for that and I like the idea of giving my 18 years olds some background too so they can follow the news. I felt like I learned a lot just by reading it. And I'm still thinking about the questions it raised. The feminist essay is good too, but it feels a little too basic to me (I did study women and gender history at a graduate level at one of the best universities in the world for women and gender, so this is probably just my bias, and my students would find good ideas there, but I also want to challenge them a little more).
It felt really good to read though, to read deeply, to take notes while reading, like I was clearing cobwebs from my brain. After being home all summer with my toddler, my brain certainly needed it. I'm read many fiction books but I really needed to get back into work mode.
Classes themselves went well. It was 20 minutes of intro, going over the syllabus pretty much, and then the students had to write a writing sample for me for an hour. So easy day. During the first class I actually worked on my fanfic story for RS Games. I printed what I had so far from Google docs and wrote about Remus and Sirius in longhand. I wrote two full big pages and I felt so incredibly productive. It's due in two weeks so I really need to just finish it. I have the bones, I just need to write it. But it was flowing well, I know where I want it to go and the characters are almost writing themselves, so it's just the matter of finding the time. And during my second class I read the writing samples from the first class. I found two students who had very weak samples, so I brought those over to the director as they should be moved to a section with extra reading help.
My classes were done at 1:20 but I had to wait until 5 for my Dad to pick me up. I tried career center as they were having a workshop at 3 but as I thought it was full. So I decided to go get my school ID updated. It was very, very hot and the school buses between different campuses were very full so it was a bit of the wait. The faculty HR office where they do IDs is a the furthest possible location, so it took a while to get there for about 2 minutes of "here sit for a pic, here is your id". But I got it done and most of the rest of the writing samples so I don't have to think about it anymore.
Yesterday, was very very hot again, but Tanya and I went to the playground in the morning anyway. She being very 2 lately with a lot of not listening and complaining. I think it is a little worse because I went to work. She's definitely having a little more trouble falling asleep. She is staying with my parents tonight while I go back to Brooklyn for Yeva's birthday party at the Russian restaurant. Bear is good with bedtime routine but not actual going to sleep part - she usually wants me or my Mom for that. So we figured she should stay here and my parents would drive her back in the morning. I'm not looking forward to leaving her overnight - I only done it a few times before, and only once when we were not on vacation in Florida with her just a couple of rooms away - I know I'm going to be worried and will miss her a lot. And I'm just not looking forward to this party. But I have to go since there was a whole drama about it.
We still didn't get the Recognition Agreement. I keep calling the mortgage broker, he keeps blaming the bank's attorneys - it is really frustrating at this point. Fingers crossed that this would finally resolve itself next week and we can submit it all to the board.