Unraveling

There are so many loose ends in my life right now, I feel like nothing is woven up, tied off, finished. That's not true, of course: I do keep tying off loose ends, but new bits keep getting added on. I spent two plus hours after my last class weaving in bits of the promotion folder and making sure I have all the stuff I need for next week's classes. Papers are still in ungraded mountains--I've just moved them from the living room to the top of the radiator here in the office (no, not in hope that they'll combust but only because I've run out of flat surfaces on which to pile things). I blew off the meeting I had yesterday in order to churn through miscellaneous bits (bad girl, bad girl!). I expected to feel somewhat guilty but in all honesty was simply relieved. No meeting tomorrow for a miracle, and I'm trying to keep the weekend open enough that I can both work like a fiend and still have time to let down a trifle. I feel rather like I'm trying to dig through a mountain with a teaspoon, but one way or another, it will all get done. It always does. I keep saying that because it is comforting to remember.

I'm not sure how successful class was today. I had restructured the response to a reading in the style manual because I want to emphasize that research requires a focus--a tighter focus than the open-ended language of an assignment--and that the focus comes from them. I also want to show them the spiral of working thesis to research to revised thesis to more research to another revision of thesis--and on beyond zebra. So I had them work in groups on research questions (I'm going to ditch that tomorrow: formulating the need for information as a question to answer is tough to explain and not all that important to do. Instead I'm going to focus on search terms, which are important--and hard to nail down). I also had them work on constructing a working thesis--raiding from Matt's terrific lesson and his six questions they need to ask to ascertain whether their thesis works.

In case you're wondering, the six questions are: 1) Does it answer the assignment question (or in my case, since the assignment didn't ask a question, does it respond correctly to the assignment); 2) does it take a stand that others might challenge; 3) does it use specific rather than general words; 4) does it pass the "so what?" test (readers should find no reason to ask that question); 5) does it pass the "how?" and "why?" tests; 6) can it be supported by specific evidence from...whatever sources the assignment requries.

The main problem was that I didn't have a good way for students to share their results. First I thought I would have students write them on the board but then felt it would be awkward (and, I blush to admit, I didn't have sufficient chalk with me). I could have written the results on the board myself but felt it would take too much time. I think next time, I'm going to have a computer in class: I can type in their results and the students can see them projected on a screen (I type a hell of a lot faster than I write by hand). That way we can also add, move things around, try different phrases, everyone seeing the evolution/transformation... Yeah, next semester I'll try that and see how it flies. The research component will be very different with 102 classes (they focus on analyzing literature, so 102 students have to find literary criticism, not general information about, say, organic farming), but the thesis problems are essentially the same.

In any event, I'll be running the same assignment (except focusing on search terms not research questions) twice tomorrow. It'll be interesting to see if it's better, worse, the same--and what else I change on the fly (which I tend to do as ideas pop up).

By the way, I didn't blog yesterday because right after class I went into Manhattan to meet with my fiction writers group. We submit our creative writing (some stories, most of us chipping away at novels) and the other members of the group critique it. We had two new potential members: I hope they stick with us. I haven't been in a while, and it was a lovely change of pace--even though it did mean getting home quite late for me. (I had submitted, too, and it's fascinating to get the feedback from very different readers.) But I do want to report that in KC yesterday, the students were maddeningly flat and leaden: I finally gave them a hard time about it--and told them that I'll be observed in that class next Tuesday, so if they act that way on the 3rd, they can make my life hell. They promised they'll be better that day. I hope so, but I am also resurrecting an old approach to the reading (which is dense with information), and I think (hope) it will keep them engaged, no matter how lumpish they feel.

RB was, as usual, a circus. There are a few young men I'm going to have to physically separate at great distance: if they sit anywhere close, they encourage each other to act like doofuses (doofi?). It was a gray, gross, rainy day, and they were saying "It's such a beautiful day outside, we just want to be out...." which I could buy the class before, when it was 62 and sunny, but, I mean, really. So I said, "You don't have to be here. You never have to be here. But as long as you choose to be here, I would appreciate it if you would do the work I ask you to do." They tried to be better, but it's like trying to get puppies to work in unison. I know, too, that at least one of those puppies acts goofy because he's lost: bless his heart, he cannot, cannot understand the readings. Not one of them. I have encouraged him to come to me for help, or to use the Writing Center (which also helps with reading), and he doesn't. Much as I feel for him, much as I want him to get the help he needs and to succeed, he needs to do so on his own initiative. This is not high school: I will not mandate that he come see me. His choice. If he's floundering, he needs to figure out how to get the rescue he needs.

And from that I could get into a rant about the "Early Warning System" that the administration wants to institute (force upon us)--which treats us and the students like this is 13th grade (despite the fact that the administration is always huffy about NCC having that reputation in the community at large). I truly could rant at great length. (I also could rant about the language in the memo regarding the system. Many of my students could present it more clearly.) At the moment, we are merely being requested, not required, to participate, but I sincerely hope that faculty utterly reject the whole idiotic mess and clearly point out how demeaning it is to us and to the students. And don't get me started on the fact that sometimes students need to, deserve to, fail. That sometimes the only way they will learn how to be responsible adults is to metaphorically swan-dive into the pavement a time or two. That at some point they actually will have to be accountable for their own success or failure--including knowing when/whether they are doing what they need to be doing without someone else pointing it out.... And this isn't even a start, yet, on all I could say.

But it's a reasonable place to finish for now. If I'm going to get anything like an early night tonight, I need to toddle off home. And, Scarlett O'Hara says, "After all, tomorrow is another day."