Friday, September 03, 2004
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Second day of classes
T
hree classes today. Yeah, they basically treat us like pack mules or something. I teach four classes, and the load is pretty heavy. And three classes on Thursday is a burden, but its okay. I know most of the students and, like I say, I love to teach., I just might love myself to death... wait, that didn't sound right. Hmmm.
Today's classes were my regular class: Readings in Modern Japanese, Bungo (classical Japanese) and Proseminar. I know most of the students in classical and and the prseminar, so its like a big gathering for me, and I think for them, too... well to a degree, maybe. Kizyr was there, as was Grom, Crotchety, and Windward_skies. Imahima, perhaps thinking OUTLOUD, said in a very disconcerted tone that classical J is "wierd". Ender is an incoming freshman and I thought I told her the course was full and I wouldn't add her, but there she was sitting next to the window. I told her it would be difficult to get her into the class and that I might have to ask her to leave. I didn't mean to sound rude or be a jerk, but fuafuahamu told that I DID sound mean, that this was exactly the attitude that intimidated her when she first took a class with me three years ago... To top it all off, I found out that she was legitimately in my class, that she had actually registered for the course. Turns out that another student, for whatever reason, decided to drop the course, changed his mind, and then wanted to come back in, but found out that the class was closed because Ender--who had religiously checked to see if there was an opening--took his spot. So now I have more students than even before. Oh yeah, sorry Ender. I didn't mean to sound mean. I'm just that way the first three weeks of school. I have to get all the wannabes out of my class. I will not put up with slackers.
Anyway, I tell them that classical J is hard. That it will entail a lot of re-learning strange J grammar. But here they are, all 16 of them. This is big for a bungo class, believe me. The readings class is going to be even more hornery. I have--get this--25 students signed in. This is a fourth year foreign language course. Can you believe this? I hate being popular... Hahahahhaah. Just kidding. I have NOTHING to do with it. The program we set up encourages many students to continue with the program and while they usually meet their curriculum requirements by the second year, they wanna continue not just to the thrid year, but to the very end, some even taking classical.
*sigh* I wanna raise.
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Comments (28)
okay, off to class i go~~!! don't worry, you don't have to teach any of them. ^_^
i can see why everyone would wanna take your class though.
^ really that would be cool to attend one of your classes
want a raise?
beat em' down for one!
wait..that's no good...it only works when your a kid xD
If all your students respond to you the way they do here... It would seem you might actually deserve that raise.
BTW, "I Love you to Death" was an hysterically funny movie, I thought.
But 16 kids in a bungo class?! Wow. We had that many in our first semester class last year at UMass, but it was narrowed down to 6 by the next semester, when the focus changed from general analysis to personalized translations of classical works. I preferred the 2nd semester, to be quite honest.
I was hoping Bungo would be a small class, too... But no, we get 16 to fit in a room built for 10. And I have a class across campus that ends 20 minutes prior, so you can bet I'll be the last one in most of the time.
BTW, not to encourage your vanity (you have way too much of it already), but part of this problem is due to your popularity. KF
It could be worse, O-man, just remember that.... If you really want to reduce class size, give them a weeks worth of work in one night. Or you could just become a grouchy old man.
3 days of Freedom left for me :P
classical jap. whoa. that's like classical anything (english, chinese)
ack
>:D meh, maybe you can hint at a raise?
but that scenario sounds interesting; good for ender! it shows that ender would probably be more devoted to learning than the other dude was since ender checked for an opening almost everyday! :D
(... all those corny lectures my teacher preached today is started to get to me...)
>:D and ... i heard somewhere that some college had 300 students in one class and that hte teacher needed a mircophone to speak; is that possible ?
You definitely deserve a raise! What happened to your possibility of being promoted to chairman of something or other...
Again I say, I miss those days!! :(
If your Xanga is any example of your teaching personality I say you deserve the raise. Taking a class taught by you seems as if it would be a blast. Do you ramble on and on endlessly and pointlessly like you do here? =P J/k, I love your rambles.
I'll sign the raise petition as well! Hahahaha, I won't sign the rise petition though. Nastay! Your wife probably wouldn't like it much anyway.