Yesterday Friday period 1 was the last Introduction to American Culture and Literature (America Bunka Bungaku) class of spring semester, and I'd been looking forward to finishing enjoyably, comfortably, coherently, because I like the class and the students so much, but... as happens every year during the last class, there was too much to cover and not enough time and I had to run through in five minutes things that needed fifteen minutes, or cut them out suddenly... I confused the students about the examination, too... And then I finished by scaring them about the course division process, telling them that if too many students the Culture and Literature course or the Language course, some will be moved against their will into the course with too few students, according to GPA, so they should try hard on all their spring term final examinations.
Poor students! I really want to teach them about American culture and literature in an interesting and enjoyable way, but too often I run out of time and go too fast and confuse or lose them, just like yesterday. Well.... All I can do is try to remember for the future, to try to learn from past mistakes, even though I always forget and never learn. Sigh. A good thing happened, though: my Masters graduate student told me she'd gotten a full-time, permanent job with Fukuoka University in administration! Those jobs are very competitive, requiring taking tests, writing essays, and sitting for three interviews, along with hundreds of other applicants. So it's really impressive that she got the job--and a big relief. And last night I went with several other great colleagues to the annual July Union party, where we had lots of sushi and beer and wine and cheese and conversation, and I won a prize: a set of drip coffee packets. Oh--one other nice thing happened, even in that disastrous last Friday class: we covered William Carlos Williams' charming poem, "This Is Just to Say," and even though we went through it too fast, I did get the class to recite it with me a few times... Ah, I love literature.
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Jefferson Peters (JP)
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December 2023
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