What I'm currently reading

Before I can fall asleep at night, I usually need to separate from the course and project work that I probably just set aside five minutes before collapsing into bed. To help "separate," I read or watch mindless TV. Yes, I'm not afraid to admit it. The more horrendous my day has been, the dumber the show has to be.

Last week, after spending hours on the computer, I've been reading Alastair McLeod's No Great Mischief which is about Scots living in Canada, and it is steeped in Gaelic language and culture. Even if I don't read it for a day or two, when I do pick it up again, I'm immediately drawn in.


The mindless TV? Two are absolutely hilarious to me: Rock of Love and The Pick-Up Artist. Can shows get any dumber? If you want mindlessness and to shake your head at the stupidity of others, these are the shows to tune into. Silly, silly shows.


I'm waiting for the next season of Amazing Race though. I love that show! I could never be a contestant; I'd want to do touristy things, not run like mad through a muddy field before hopping on a ostrich, finding an obscure shop, eating weird foods unpronounceable to the average American, and then jetting off to Machu Picchu to do it all over again. :)

And there is my unwind for the night.

Is it possible?

Has another week already gone by? Where did it go? My week looked a little something like this:

Go to neighbors for BBQ Saturday night; spend most of weekend getting online and hybrid course materials created and posted. Kick hubby and baby out of house for most of the day Monday in order to work.

Tuesday: work on online/hybrid classes in the morning to finish the work from last night. Go to HEC for one class. Go back to office to make copies since some textbooks are MIA. Must also make copies to give my 0050 class tomorrow. Go to hubby's volleyball game to watch our rugrat and another guy's. An hour later, I'm home, reading to the little one and tucking her in before logging on and reading posts and emails again.

Wednesday: class at 10, run to another at 11. Have lunch and check/answer emails for an hour. Office hours from 1-2:30 (spend time grading, prepping for next classes, working on the student anthology project I'm co-chairing, answering emails from students, reading discussion posts, watching the blogs, etc). Instead of leaving, I stick around to get all this done and then I ran to get pizza and pop for the Phi Theta Kappa meeting (I'm one of the two advisors) at 6. Finish office work (stop might be a better word) at 7 and head home. Meet hubby and daughter at home. She goes to bed at 8, and I start work again.

Thursday: go into office at 11 to get some work done. Meet with Dean at 2. Rush to HEC, and in the middle of my process lecture--the laptop dies. Clearly, I need a new battery. Afterwards, I lug all my stuff to the Jeep and think how nice--I'll be able to head home soon. But first, I must write a model blog post for the students in that class and hope they start to post soon instead of waiting until the last minute (as of this posting, it's looking grim). Somehow I spend another two hours in office copying pages for students since books have not come in as expected and then go home. I find out father-in-law is in town to take us out to dinner; I decline in favor of some quiet time at home (and to get some diagnostic tests graded for 0050 students). Prep for Wednesday class. Stay up way too late.

Friday: drag self out of bed. Have class at 10 and 11. Lunch at noon with hubby. Work on anthology project, Phi Theta Kappa projects, read my favorite blogs, create tutoring schedules and lessons for students. Try to leave office at 4 but get stopped by student wanting someone to look at a paper she has due soon. Leave at 4:30, run to daycare, take baby to grocery store, get home and put on Dora so I can make supper, feed family, run to post office, run after daughter for a few hours. Am currently blogging while baby plays musical destinations (wants to be in bed, then in living room airchair, then back in bed, turn on Dora, turn off Dora, turn on Veggie Tales CD, turn on light/off light, etc).

Tomorrow I meet my sister in DL for a car swap (she will detail my Jeep while my hubby installs her car stereo). I get to drive her truck this weekend (unfortunately, she sports a window decal reading "If it ain't country, it ain't music." Oh, gross! GAAA. I will jam a Rage Against the Machine CD in her player and correct her decal with a mighty red marker. :) The rest of the weekend looks much like last weekend minus the fun parts.

So far, I'm just summarizing the weeks; I hope to be able to post reactions to individual classes soon! So far, though, 2 of the 3 classes I meet with F2F are pretty quiet and I've yet to get to know the various personalities. Nor have we launched into any philosophical debates :)

Summary of the week

The first week of classes is complete. I've met over 60 new students in person and over 20 via email/internet posts. The week started with ENGL 1101 at the Higher Ed Center. It is, overall, a lively group! Unlike my other classes, this group was asked to answer questions like "what is in your CD player right now, what are 2 goals you have (barring money, family, skills and other restrictions), and a fear. Then I asked them to tell me what they thought were traits of an effective teacher and they came up with quite an impressive list including honesty, understanding, effective communicator, funny, laid back, etc.

My next class was ENGL 0050 at 10 am Wednesday. It was a much quieter group, but I saw several smiling faces. In ENGL 0050 at 11 am, it was even quieter! This group isn't as talkative as the others...yet. In both these classes on Friday, we had an ice-breaker activity based on 20 questions the students answered on Wednesday. Students were asked to find a person in the class who matched a description such as "owns a motorcycle" or "has lived outside the U.S." Only in the 11 am class did a few students break out of the group and ask the instructor which description was applicable to her :) While not required or expected, it was fun to see.

The hybrid, or accelerated, class has started with mixed results; several students report not having seen the note in the class schedule that we don't meet until September 12th. Others were unaware it was an accelerated course. These are bugs that will be worked on as the hybrid course offerings are expanded. This is our first semester with these courses, so we're learning as we go! This class if working on basic tasks that aim to get them familiar with D2L and the course policies and structure.

The online 1102 course has started without a hitch! They too are working on basic introductory tasks.

In three of the five classes, blogs are being used in lieu of journals, so that will be a new twist to each class. I can't wait to see how they turn out!

All in all, it was a productive week! Next week, we start diving into content for all three classes!