Stuff

Hello friends!

I have started this blog to chronicle my time as a teacher. I have several specific goals for it.

1. I want to keep writing. I'm going to be a teacher, not a student anymore (philosophical questions about whether a teacher is a student, etc. aside), and I will not be required to write much in the way of analysis. I'll have to think things through, and discuss them, but that's a bit different. I expect my writing here will still be slightly (VERY) rambly, but I hope it will make sense.

2. I've taught two classes so far, and I have had many entertaining anecdotes. It seems a shame to keep them to myself.

3. I have friends in different places around the world, and I'm sure they're all dying to know all the gory details of my career. Who am I to deny them so keen a pleasure?

If you decide to follow this blog, here are the types of things you can expect:

1. Book reviews. When I say "book review" I don't mean it in a particularly standardized way, but I hope to give an introduction to, and some thoughts on, books I'm reading as preparation for class and that I'm teaching in class. (My review of Sophie's World should be up in a day or two.)

2. Teaching anecdotes. I like to share funny stories. Maybe I'll have interesting serious ones, too.

3. Rambles. This is the dangerous bit. The open-ended category that includes rambles on... my philosophy of education, thoughts inspired by a class, or a behavior, or an incident... ideas about teaching... pretty much anything. I do have a different blog that I update VERY sporadically for truly random stuff, and a livejournal for my fannish geekiness. The stuff on this blog will be school-related stuff. But that is a rather large category.

Finally, a brief overview of what I'll be teaching:

1. Western Thought I --This is a class for Juniors. It includes a historical survey of philosophy from the Presocratics to Postmodernism, and modules on the Enlightenment and Modernism.

2. British Literature -- This is a class for Sophomores. It is just a survey of British Lit. The students will have had two years of literature from a more technical standpoint and one year of American lit. In their Junior and Senior years they take Great Books.

3. Rhetoric -- This is a Freshman or Sophomore class. I am not absolutely clear on what the curriculum is at the moment because it's changed since I went to school, but I know the focus will be on public speaking.

4. Latin -- This is for 6th through 8th grade. The students study Latin from 3rd (4th?... I think it's 3rd, though...) grade on, so by the time I get them, they've done amo, amas, amat hundreds of times. I get to start them on Wheelock's Latin.

5. Music -- Hopefully I'll be conducting a mixed high school choir. But this depends on scheduling and interest, etc.



Well, I am determined to keep this blog up and post reasonably regularly. (Say, once a week at the least, though when life gets interesting, there could be many more.) If my list hasn't frightened you off, I hope you'll stick around.

-An Expert on Stuff