Haircuts and Teaching
Haircuts
I went to see Molly on Wednesday for a haircut. It was my first Wednesday of the month session.
My hair was starting to get ratty again. By ratty, I mean it was starting to develop curls or waves and not lay flat on my head. I think I make a bad visual impression when I have this large cowlick standing out on my head.
It was on the warm side in Southern California and I was running ahead of my scheduled appointment time. I decided to stop at my favorite coffee shop, the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and pick up my favorite large ice blended drink. When I got to the Bean, I phoned Molly to see what she would like to drink.
Molly said thanks, through Lindsey the receptionist, and asked for an iced vanilla latte. Since I was drinking a large, I got Molly a large one too. This insured the carrying tray was at least weight balanced.
Molly enjoyed the ice blend latte. This was my first ice blended drink in two and a half months; the last one was just before the surgery in January.
Molly also thought I was a hero for not looking at the Hershey’s and See’s Easter chocolate candy catalogues that came to my house and then ordering something for the Salon.
I can be a nice guy when I want to be.
Molly had Lindsey take a photo of the two of us for the Salon’s Facebook page. I am now a friend of the Salon. I think our photo will be a bit out of place since I was wearing a suit and most of the other photos on the page are casual.
After the photo opportunity, I drove off to school.
Teaching
I met one of the Career Services [job placement office] workers in the hall as I was on my way to the faculty lounge and work area. We spoke briefly. The worker told me that one of my students said that “I was the only instructor who knew what he was doing at school” and that the other instructors were idiots.
She asked me how I felt about the comment.
I thought for a moment and said that “I was embarrassed and disappointed.” I don’t think this was the answer she was expecting. I went on to say that the school should be doing a better job of finding and hiring quality instructors for the classrooms. Then, we went our separate ways.
This is the end of Week 4 of the term. I have quizzes to grade in four of my five classes. The fifth class has a midterm examination in two weeks. I don’t like to give quizzes because I do not believe that they can accurately measure what the student has learned.
I am having some trouble with one of new classes. We have unit plans that outline what we are supposed to teach and include teaching ideas. This past week, none of the week’s student learning objectives was part of their reading assignment. It is difficult to prepare lecture notes when the material and objectives do not match. The course plan calls for spending three weeks, almost 30% of the course, on one chapter. This seems dreadfully excessive and forces me to pass some really interesting topics like international marketing which could be very helpful in Southern California since it is the Gateway to the Pacific Rim.
One of my evaluation factors is class attendance. With three small classes, one absence can kill that week’s evaluation. I have already had two absences in my class of three so that makes my average attendance around 83% or below the standard which is about ten percentage points higher.
Visitors
Surprisingly, the visitorship to the blog hasn’t really fallen all that much.
We had 642 visitors in January; 478 in February, a much shorter month; and 507 in March. The most popular page is January 1, 2007, one of the last of times that I had a Woman of the Moment feature running. The periodic posts are the second most popular page. Maybe if I posted more frequently, I would have even more traffic.
I will try to post more frequently. That will be a challenge since Summer is just around the corner in Southern California and I am easily distracted by young women in bikinis.
Be well and stay happy.
I went to see Molly on Wednesday for a haircut. It was my first Wednesday of the month session.
My hair was starting to get ratty again. By ratty, I mean it was starting to develop curls or waves and not lay flat on my head. I think I make a bad visual impression when I have this large cowlick standing out on my head.It was on the warm side in Southern California and I was running ahead of my scheduled appointment time. I decided to stop at my favorite coffee shop, the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and pick up my favorite large ice blended drink. When I got to the Bean, I phoned Molly to see what she would like to drink.
Molly said thanks, through Lindsey the receptionist, and asked for an iced vanilla latte. Since I was drinking a large, I got Molly a large one too. This insured the carrying tray was at least weight balanced.
Molly enjoyed the ice blend latte. This was my first ice blended drink in two and a half months; the last one was just before the surgery in January.
Molly also thought I was a hero for not looking at the Hershey’s and See’s Easter chocolate candy catalogues that came to my house and then ordering something for the Salon.
I can be a nice guy when I want to be.
Molly had Lindsey take a photo of the two of us for the Salon’s Facebook page. I am now a friend of the Salon. I think our photo will be a bit out of place since I was wearing a suit and most of the other photos on the page are casual.
After the photo opportunity, I drove off to school.
Teaching
I met one of the Career Services [job placement office] workers in the hall as I was on my way to the faculty lounge and work area. We spoke briefly. The worker told me that one of my students said that “I was the only instructor who knew what he was doing at school” and that the other instructors were idiots.
She asked me how I felt about the comment.
I thought for a moment and said that “I was embarrassed and disappointed.” I don’t think this was the answer she was expecting. I went on to say that the school should be doing a better job of finding and hiring quality instructors for the classrooms. Then, we went our separate ways.
This is the end of Week 4 of the term. I have quizzes to grade in four of my five classes. The fifth class has a midterm examination in two weeks. I don’t like to give quizzes because I do not believe that they can accurately measure what the student has learned.
I am having some trouble with one of new classes. We have unit plans that outline what we are supposed to teach and include teaching ideas. This past week, none of the week’s student learning objectives was part of their reading assignment. It is difficult to prepare lecture notes when the material and objectives do not match. The course plan calls for spending three weeks, almost 30% of the course, on one chapter. This seems dreadfully excessive and forces me to pass some really interesting topics like international marketing which could be very helpful in Southern California since it is the Gateway to the Pacific Rim.
One of my evaluation factors is class attendance. With three small classes, one absence can kill that week’s evaluation. I have already had two absences in my class of three so that makes my average attendance around 83% or below the standard which is about ten percentage points higher.
Visitors
Surprisingly, the visitorship to the blog hasn’t really fallen all that much.
We had 642 visitors in January; 478 in February, a much shorter month; and 507 in March. The most popular page is January 1, 2007, one of the last of times that I had a Woman of the Moment feature running. The periodic posts are the second most popular page. Maybe if I posted more frequently, I would have even more traffic.
I will try to post more frequently. That will be a challenge since Summer is just around the corner in Southern California and I am easily distracted by young women in bikinis.
Be well and stay happy.
posted by Chuck Reinhardt at 11:53 AM
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