I’ve often felt that a teacher’s life is suspended, Janus-like, between past experiences and future hopes; it’s only fitting, then, that I’m preparing for this new year by looking back. Here’s a countdown of last year’s gratitude journal entries that reminded me how kind, clever,
I teach first-year writing at a small liberal arts college, and on the first day of class, I like to talk about dessert with my students. No, really! Sure, we (eventually) get into the nitty-gritty of the syllabus, but first we talk about dessert.
Proponents of rubrics champion them as a means of ensuring consistency in grading, not only between students within a class but also between instructors teaching the same class. Rubrics, they say, also clarify to students the standards of excellence on which they’re being assessed (Taylor
Like New Year’s Day, new academic semesters start with effervescent promise. Students and instructors recalibrate their sleep and wake cycles, set new routines or modify old ones, and prepare for the work ahead. First days of class can be boisterous affairs, full of nervous energy
The allure of the copy-and-paste approach to course design is ever present. Many of us, out of what often feels like sheer necessity, have fully embraced the comfort of teaching from muscle memory, recalling with ease the structure and rhythms of a course and therefore
The start of a new semester is an emotional experience. As a former kindergarten teacher, I vividly remember spending much of the first day of school making students feel welcome and comforting them while they cried. Whether you are teaching five-year-olds or 25-year-olds, the need
Like millions of people, I play Wordle each day in The New York Times. If you are unfamiliar, Wordle is a logic game in which you get six guesses to figure out a five-letter word. After you submit a guess, you get feedback about each
If you have ever taught (or taken) an online class, you may have fallen into the trap of boring online discussions. You know what I am talking about. These are the kind of discussions where students do the bare minimum. You can tell that they’re
During my third year of college, another student that many of my friends interacted with, who tutored some of us, died. While I wouldn’t call him a close friend, he was an acquaintance, and his loss was felt deeply. I remember wanting to cry, but
Exit tickets are simple diagnostic assessments given to students at the end of a class. The “ticket” in the name refers to the fact that students originally needed to pass the assessment to get permission to leave, but now they are generally for instructors to
