So I’m into my 4th week of lecturing so far for this Art class. How am I doing? I’m not so sure, in some cases I can see my students responding well and it boosts my confidence, while for some students I’m having some difficulty breaking through and it just throws me off.
I’m certainly learning some things so far though, like:
- Students will see through your bullshit. If you don’t know something, I think it’s better to say you “don’t know” rather then pretend like you do.
- Morning is a bitch. I teach an 8am class…which actually starts around 6am for me as I have to drop my wife off to work. Not only am I freaking tired when the class starts, I see a lot of blank faces staring back at me with bloodshot eyes and yawns. I can only assume this will get harder as the days go by and sunrise gets later and later.
- Other instructors have warned me ahead of time that I’ll be hearing every excuse in the book. I guess no longer do students use the, “my dog ate my paper” routine. Today it comes in the form of “my software didn’t load up”, or “my computer got a virus so I couldn’t do it”. Faaancy pants. *grandpa voice* “In my day, our computers ran on tape drives and my printer was loud enough my neighbors heard it across the street…yet I STILL did my work!” *end grandpa voice*
I looked up some information about how to keep the lecturers more interesting and keep the students awake. Here are some tips I found. They’re a little wacky:
- Start with a joke. Tell students your goal is to find the lamest joke in the world. (Hmmm…my joke delivery alone is lame enough. Not sure I can pull this off.)
- Wear something goofy. Wear a funny hat. Bring a teddy bear. I don’t have a hat (my head is too big – you know what they say about big heads right?), nor do I have a teddy bear. (I got a monkey)
- Randomly select a student and ask them to say what they hate most about the class so far. (I don’t think my ego could take it if they immediately pointed to me)
I’ll have to continue playing it by ear. So far not too many drops from my class so I can only assume I’m halfway interesting.
LoweStudio Inc was founded by me, Raphael Lowe, a Honolulu based illustrator and web designer. I presently design and manage a few dozen commercial websites, but my main focus these days is acting as the head developer for Kapiolani Community College and teaching
You say morning is a bitch? At least you get to teach an 8:00 class rather than a 7:45 class. I feel sorry for the instructors that have to teach class at 7:45 in the morning. I mean c’mon, 8:00 isn’t that bad. It just depends on what time you wake up in the morning. I wake up 4:30 in the morning and that’s no surprise for me since I’m a morning person. And for you, well since you’re an instructor, I guess that makes things hard for you since you have to drop off your wife before coming to school and having to teach class… I’m actually liking this class a lot despite the fact this class starts at 8:00 in the morning and at the same time I’m tired from waking up at 4:30. The semester will get better eventually so just in hang in there. It just depends if the rest of the class can survive waking up early for another 3 months just to come for class…
@ Jay
I’m glad you’re liking the class!