I've been so lazy and so busy that I haven't posted here for weeks now! The first semester has been flying along, now about half over. Here are some memories from the last few weeks.
A funny girl in a first-year Interactive English class (for architecture majors) who gave a speech introducing her family's dog, whom she called Kobayashi Mokko. We laughed because her family name is Kobayashi, so she was definitely including her pet among her family members. I asked her if she used her dog's full name when she was scolding her and her given name when playing with and walking her, and she said yes. A slouching under-performing blond-dyed hair boy in second-year Reading and Writing class for Commerce majors sitting in the front (right in front of me) reading a manga on his smart phone while I was teaching, till I scolded him for it, and then realized he had his mask pulled down around his neck so I scolded him for that. The English Conversation first-year English majors doing a great job talking with each other in pairs, finding out everything they could about their partners in thirty minutes, then telling a new partner about their first partner for fifteen minutes, then giving reports about their second partner's first partner, etc., all nice and lively and full of character and effort. My graduate school class for our only first-year MA student, plus my PhD student as TA and my second-year MA student as unofficial participant talking about Stuart Little. They have a sense for the charming and humorous points of the great, compact novel, and it's fun having that class to start each work week. My American Culture class for third- and fourth-year English majors, covering various topics related to American freedom, like "The Star-Spangled Banner" (flag and anthem), the Statue of Liberty, Memorial Day, supermarkets, and school uniforms, etc. I really like all fifty students in the class and enjoy greeting them by name one by one to start each class and enjoy ending my work week with them (it's my last class each week). My second-year Pharmacy major Reading and Writing class being generally charming and neat and on the ball. Ugh--meetings! A Humanities meeting followed by a graduate school meeting lasting from 4:30 till 7:30 one Wednesday; an English department meeting followed by a full-professor English department meeting lasting from 4:30 till 8:30 another Wednesday... Funny thing: I realized the other day that when a student removes his/her mask to get a drink of water etc., and I happen to look at them while looking around the room while teaching etc., my eyes inadvertently dodge away from their face in embarrassment, as though I'd just seen them naked or in their underwear! ANYWAY, so far so good. The second half will be much harder than the first, because my duty as part of the Entrance Examination team this year kicks in after May ends and lasts intensely till into July. And the heat and humidity are just getting going. But as long as I don't catch Covid (knock on wood), this year should be survivable.
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Last Friday I was sailing through the only class of the week (Wednesday and Thursday were holidays for Golden Week) when I heard (from my trusty TA) that Saturday May 7 was a special day for Thursday classes! I freaked out, shocked and panicked, because I had told my two Thursday classes that I'd see them next on May 12, Thursday, and nothing about Saturday.
What happened?? In March or so, when I make the schedules for spring and fall semester classes for the new year, I am very careful to watch out for the strange times when some Saturday is given over to another day's classes to make up the quota of meetings, and of course incorporate such days into my schedules, but for whatever reason, I didn't notice the May 7 Saturday for Thursdays when I made my schedules. For the English Conversation class it's not a big deal really, cause they didn't have any particular homework (they're giving short self-introduction speeches now), but for my Reading and Writing class, it was a problem, because I had worked out a detailed schedule for homework (reading and writing etc.) and given it to them and gone through it with them, including a last day July 21st when classes have already ended (I found out Friday). SO anyway I had to send emails to both classes Friday after lunch telling them that indeed we were having classes on Saturday... Then I had to make a new correct schedule and distribute and explain it in class, though nearly ten students were absent (probably cause they'd made other plans when they thought we weren't having classes). Yesterday was difficult... period 4 and 5 classes on a usual day where I'm recovering energy spent during the week of classes. Luckily, last week was Golden Week, so I only had classes on Friday the 6th, but all Saturday was surreal. I feel sorry for the poor Reading and Writing students, who didn't have time to do homework before class and especially who thought they'd have no class Saturday but suddenly found out on Friday that they would... That was the first time I've ever made that mistake... and I hope the last. **One good bit of news: I have (with the help of photos I took of the classes) managed to memorize pretty much all the names and faces (or I should say eyes and hairdos, because they're all wearing masks all the time) of all of my 150 or so students. ***Though I still have a bit of fun trouble with Ayami, Ayari, and Ayuri in one class, and Hiyori and Hiyori and Yui and Yui in another class. Not to mention Daichi and Daiki, Ryoya and Ryo, Ohtaro and Kotaro, Ryuto and Ryuki and so on in other classes!*** |
Jefferson Peters (JP)
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December 2023
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