Fall syllabizing...

9 July 2025: Spent a decent amount of time today working on my ENGL 346: American Fiction syllabus. I haven't taught this one--a course on the novel up to 1900--since 2019. This time, because Percival Everett is going to be at the F. Scott Fitzgerald Festival, I am shaking things up, starting with Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and the moving on to James. It's a funky way to start (I usually go chronologically--and it meant dropping a couple of other books), but maybe that will make it fun in new ways.

Out early, then inside all day...

22 June 2024: The song playing on Pandora right now is pretty on point: 

A heat wave has settled into its most intense (I hope?) day so far. This screenshot from just a few minutes ago says it all. 

I planned ahead--got my walk and my trip to the supermarket done early. Since then, I've been inside with the girls. Lots of chores done, some work on the book (soooooo close!), and some work on fall syllabi (!). Ready to call it quitting time and do some vegging. The girls, of course, have this vegging thing down pat. 

"True Blue"

30 December 2023: Been waking up the past few mornings feeling stressed and uneasy about the work I need to get done, including this 102 syllabus. Today, before I got out of bed, I told myself, "You are going to power through that syllabus today and then it will be done." (Thinking back to this post already!) So, I got up and got to work on the stuff on my list. 

Then I hit Sheetz and heard "True Blue" playing. My goodness, do I love this song. Always have. Picture me walking through the store, singing quietly to myself, maybe even doing the tiniest bit of barely-detectable dancing. Instant mood-lifter/motivator. 

Here we go, Saturday Syllabizing (and chore doin')! Need a big old burst of productivity so I can take a break at 1:00 for the women's b-ball game. 

102 syllabizing...

27 December 2023: Spent some time today working on a new version of my ENGL 102 syllabus. For a bunch of reasons (including having course release time), I haven't taught ENGL 102 in eight years. A more or less complete rewrite is in order and this requires, as I knew it would, quite a bit of work and planning. Still, I am excited to get back to teaching this course (two sections, in fact). There is so much that is energizing about teaching first-year writing--the student population, the way you know it really matters.

So, all of the work and the stress/anziety that I am feeling about this syllabus is worth it. 

Spring syllabizing...

19 December 2022: Spent some time today getting my syllabi ready for next semester (which starts in exactly three weeks). It's comforting work, especially when there aren't any new preps--just updating things, making little (what I hope are) improvements, dropping files into place, and getting excited about seeing the students again. I was supposed to spend more time writing my Piatt entry, but my mind just wasn't there and checking a bunch of things off one of my to-do lists makes me feel a bit less anxious about that one part of my life.   

Course prep help...

4 January 2022: I think often about how lucky I am to have a friend like Hannah. Not sure how I would have gotten through this pandemic and everything else without her. 

Here's one more example of her awesomeness: today when she had a bit of time free at work and her boss was away from her desk, she invited me over to help me talk out some questions I had about my seminar. That was her way of "rebelling" a bit at work. The conversation was so good and helpful--she's (at heart) such a wonderful teacher. And I am pretty sure she had fun. What a gift she is. 

And that syllabus and all the other course prep stuff? Just about done!

Burst of progress...

3 January 2022: Had a huge burst of progress today with my Poe seminar syllabus. I last taught this class in 2010--and on a TR schedule--so I didn't want to just do what I did last time. Plus, I've grown and learned some things about teaching since then. Anyway, still some more pieces to hammer out, but if all goes as planned, I might finish that "Winter Break To-Do List" in the next couple of days. 

Started the day, by the way, with an on-campus rapid COVID test, a requirement of everyone when they return to campus. (I kind of never left. Ha.) Negative, thank goodness. (Also took one on the morning Hannah and I painted...) Something about seeing all these Shepherd folks (staff, mostly) coming together to run this big operation gets to me, just like it always does. I want to cry, it's so lovely. This is a very special place. 

Thinking about laughter...

14 May 2019: "...Dr. Richard Wiseman of the University of Hertfordshire...discusses gender differences in humor citing research showing that 71 percent of women laugh when men tell a joke (based on recorded conversations at parties) and 39 percent of men laugh when a woman tells a joke." --Rebeccca Krefting, All Joking Aside : American Humor and Its Discontents

Now that's a depressing sentence from a depressing chapter about the ridiculous yet complicated idea that women aren't funny. Reading it has me thinking about my own laughter...

(Still preparing for that summer class, in case that wasn't clear...)

Summer syllabizing...

12 May 2019: “But humor is different. The humorist is at odds with the publicly espoused values of the culture, overturning its sacred cows, pointing out the nakedness of not only the Emperor, but also the politician, the pious, and the pompous. For women to adopt this role means that they must break out of the passive, subordinate position mandated for them by centuries of patriarchal tradition and take on the power accruing to those who reveal the shams, hypocrisies, and incongruities of the dominant culture. To be a woman and a humorist is to confront and subvert the very power that keeps women powerless.” Nancy Walker, A Very Serious Thing:  Women’s Humor and American Culture

Yes, graduation was only yesterday, but no rest for the wicked. I've already actually been working a bit on this class--a fully online version of Advanced Composition--for a bit now, but got some serious work done this morning. This section will be about women and comedy, with a particular focus on the last 10 years or so. The Walker quotation above (from her 1988 book) is good food for thought.

ENGL 101 syllabizing...

31 July 2016: As July comes to an end (too soon!), I spent a large part of today working on the last of my four syllabi that I need to get ready for the new semester. As always, that's the ENGL 101 syllabus. Without fail, it requires the most time and work and thought. But I must say, working on it today--updating assignments, re-tooling essay prompts--got me excited for the semester and for this first-year class.

Three down, one to go...

Holy burst of productivity, Batman! I am DONE with my ENGL 377 syllabus. This wasn't a simple "change the dates" revision, either. Our semester is one week shorter now (yay!), I had a new book to incorporate (free to students--yay!), and a bunch of other readings I wanted to include.

Sweet. I was not expecting to come even close to finishing it today, but sometimes that's how syllabizing goes: you think and agonize over choices and think some more and then, all of the sudden, it all falls into place. I even got the photocopying and website updates done.

Now just one more...ENGL 101.

Here we go again...

Classes start on Monday, but meetings and stuff start this week. I actually have an 8:15 meeting on Tuesday, which seems mean to me. I've been in my office almost every day I've been in town these past couple of weeks, but being compelled to be here before 8:30 on one of our last days of "break" is a bit much. Oh well.

The good news is that I've got 3 of 4 syllabi ready to go. I am still working on my ENGL 372: Advanced Composition syllabus--and probably will be until Sunday. (Maybe I'll post more about that class later...)

For now, though, how about some good old-fashioned linking-posting as a way of taking a 20 minute break from syllabizing?

1) Just because the kid is so very very cute, I must link the "Baby in Tub Assures You that, No, He Does Not Like Anything You Suggest." I love that the kid is saying pretty awful things, but you can't help but smile--and that you kind of want to ask him/her more questions.

2) Lots of folks are talking about last night's How I Met Your Mother and its big surprise ending. I'll admit that it made me tear up. It's a pretty bold move for this kind of comedy to make, but I don't agree with people saying that it doesn't work because it came out of nowhere. Isn't that precisely the point? I also didn't really get the countdown thing happening, although as soon I heard people talking about it, I remembered certain numbers standing out.

3) This is one of the silliest columns I've ever read at Insidehighered.com. I don't have vast amount of experiences on hiring committees (I've been involved in 6, on the committees for 5, and chaired 3), but I can say that we really and truly never talked about what folks wore. I don't even think it was a "back of my mind"/subconscious consideration for us. Sigh. Fortunately, people are tearing the piece down in the comments. 

4) Women laughing alone with salad. Love it, love it, love it. And, as Homer and Bart remind us, you don't win friends with salad.



5) Well played, James Van Der Beek. And the website is real.

6) Finally, this one, because yeah, it's not exactly new, but it really makes me laugh.

101 Syllabizing: done!

I just submitted my syllabus to the copy center today, so it's (more or less) set now. Here's what we're doing: a paper on the all-campus read, a paper on the Little Albert study, a paper on this study on teacher expectations and the Pygmalion effect, and a paper/group presentations on social psychology. Each group will be assigned one of the following famous psychological study to research and present to the class: the Milgram experiment, the Stanford Prison experiment, the Kitty Genovese case, and Solomon Asch's study on opinions and social pressure.

I've only written the first paper assignment, but know (more or less) what the second and third will be, too. I'm still kicking around ideas for the last paper and group presentations, but at least the topics are set, and that feels good.

One class down...two to go. Well, technically three, but I am teaching two sections of the same class, so it feels a lot more like "two to go."

101 Syllabizing, continued...

This morning finds me still working on my ENGL 101 syllabus. I'm making my way through the Forty Studies that Changed Psychology, paying special attention to those Erin marked with a check in the table of contents. I start reading about one called "The Nature of Love," by H. F. Harlow. (The book actually summarizes the studies and then discusses their influence--it doesn't directly reproduce the original articles.) About a page into it, I realize what study this is: the one with monkeys and fake mothers. Can't do it. Even thinking about this study makes me depressed. Seriously. I told Erin this when we talked about it, but I guess she thought I was joking.

Moving on...

101 Syllabizing...

I've got three new course preps for this coming semester: ENGL 377: Peer Tutoring and Composition Theory, ENGL 301: Introduction to Literary Study (the pre-requisite for all upper-division English classes), and ENGL 101: Written English.

Now, yeah, I've taught ENGL 101 before (lots of times), but I am shaking it up this time, using an entirely new textbook and writing new assignments. Like last year, my 101 class is part of a "learning community" with a section of Psychology 101. Last year, all I really did to link the two classes was have them talk about what was going on in PSYC 101, especially when each student took a turn leading in-class writing. We also spent some time talking about the paper they wrote for their psychology class. But really, that was about it. When my colleague and I decided to link our classes again, I decided to do better. I hope this will lead to all the goals at the heart of the learning community mission: connections between coursework in different classes, better critical thinking, and a higher retention rate for enrolled students.

So here's what I am doing: throwing out the old textbook, which is a good book (and edited by a former colleague!), but didn't allow for readily apparent connections to their psychology coursework. The old book is the required text for all 101 classes, but I can get around that rule because of the learning community. (I see it as my subtly subversive way of beginning to challenge the "required text" idea for everyone.)

For alternative class texts, I was really inspired by an article the students brought in one day about "Little Albert" and the famous experiment about conditioning. Now I gotta say, I had never heard of Little Albert or the experiment, but I was instantly intrigued. And it was one of the best discussions we had all semester. "We should be writing about that!" I thought. Why not, I wondered, just use a series of articles like that one--or a series of readings about famous psychological topics/studies--and base most of the course assignments on those? So that's what I've been working on...finding those articles/topics. For years, I've been saying that I really want to teach a composition class using less than ten readings, since I don't believe you need a big old (or even little old) reader to teach writing.

Fortunately, my teaching partner (also named Heidi) is pretty awesome and very into the idea. She pointed me towards Forty Studies that Changed Psychology, which I've been working my way through. Equally fortunate, Erin, my younger sister, is also a psychologist, so she looked through that book and pointed me towards some studies she thought students would be drawn to.

I also ordered They Say/I Say as our main writing textbook and was especially glad that I did so after my friend Aaron said how much he liked it. It's a slim little book--and almost completely focused on practical moves that good writers make. (I ordered a handbook, too, the one the whole department uses, and one that I have a soft spot for since it was the one I bought my first semester at Roanoke and used all four years--and through much of graduate school.)

My big problem/challenge now is coming up with the actual writing assignments. I think, for instance, that we'll spend some serious time talking about Little Albert, the Milgram experiment, the Kitty Genovese murder, and the Stanford Prison Experiment, but for the life of me, I can't think of freshman-level assignments about them. There's also one that Erin told me about involving false memories--I can't think of the name right now--that should also be good. Basically, I need four or five decent prompts (for essays ranging from about 3 pages to about 7) that freshman can handle.

I tried to find some inspiration from online videos...

Check out this footage of poor Little Albert. Again, maybe most people know about this study, but it was new to me. My students (lovable little jerks...) were like, "You don't know who Little Albert is?" As if they knew before they took the freakin' class. Anyway, the video...



By the way, H.P. Beck and G. Irons' 2009 article, "Finding Little Albert: A Journey to John B. Watson's Infant Laboratory" (American Psychologist 64. 7:  605-614) is one of the most intense pieces I've read all summer--it had me on the edge of my seat! I am thinking I'll base an essay prompt on it...what that prompt will be, though, I have no idea.

Then there's the Milgram Experiment, also quite depressing... I know the students will eat this stuff up, but again, what kind of essay assignments can I base on it? Anyway, here's the first clip (1 out of 3) from a recent recreation of the experiment.



And here's a link to some original footage...again, no idea how to connect this to essay prompts. Maybe sleeping on it will help.

More to come, I am sure, but for now, if you've got any great essay prompt ideas, feel free to share them!

What's new?

Well, unpacking is still going on--and going quite well. I am scheduled (because, yes, I write a daily schedule for myself) to finish up today. Well, except for hanging stuff on walls. I need some time to plan that out.

But, as noted below, I am also packing--that is, packing up my office at school. It's sort of depressing to do, but I keep reminding myself that there is a good reason: that shiny new office. One problem: said shiny new office is totally not ready and no one can tell when it will be ready. Blame the bats, who put construction about two weeks behind schedule.

Anyway, in the meantime, I am working on my fall syllabi (I can't believe they aren't done yet--I usually have them done well before now) and getting back into a somewhat normal routine. I've got tons and tons of links and things saved up to post, but can't devote time to them right now (see paragraph one, re: daily schedule). But for now, how about a cool video? (Via Andrew Sullivan.)



Does that look like fun?

End-of-Summer Syllabizing

I haven't gotten nearly as much work done as I wanted to this summer, but I am rather proud of this accomplishment: as of today, 2 August 2008, I have all my syllabi ready for the Fall semester. Not bad, right? I just put the Xerox requests in and everything. My webpages are ready to go. Go me!

You can check out the fruits of my labor here, if you are so inclined. While I've taught ENG 102 and ENG 204 before, I had to do some re-arranging on two counts. First, each course has switched to new editions of its respective textbook,* which meant adjusting page numbers and, in some cases, reading selections for each. Second, the days both courses meet have changed. In the past, I taught ENG 102 as a MWF class. Now it's a TR. In the past, I've taught ENG 204 as TR. Now it's a MWF. Those kinds of changes do require some reconceptualization, especially for ENG 102, which is a writing course. I rather like the changes made to the 204 syllabus--I've even included three new writers (Richard Wright, Maxine Hong Kingston, and Jhumpa Lahiri). I am not so sure yet about 102. It looks a bit rushed at certain points in the semester (at least on the page), but maybe it will be okay.

ENG 346 is the new one for me--and I am pretty excited about it. It's a version of a class I taught at Richmond, but whereas that course stopped in 1865, I am framing this course as a study of the American novel from the beginning until 1900 (well, technically 1896, ending with Sarah Orne Jewett's The Country of the Pointed Firs). The reading schedule is a bit ambitious, I know. I've already had one student email me and say "You don't believe in light reading, do you?" However, they can handle it--especially if they want to be English majors.

*Don't even get me started on this whole "new edition" issue. I understand the need to keep updating things, but some of these prices are insane. I don't get to choose the books for the gen. ed. classes I teach (101, 102, 204)--and if I did, there's no way I'd pick the hugely over-priced Perrine's. It's a great book, but not worth over $100.