~C+C Music Factory
I'm back! After almost a month straight of not sleeping in my own bed - housesitting, traveling to DC for an awesome vacation, and driving to Portland for a wedding - I am actually happy to be home for a bit now. It helps that my bed is extra comfy. Of course, my dad just returned from a week and a half long business trip to Holland, Austria and Italy (!!!) last night, and his stories were enough to make me want to go straight to my computer and search flights. But I digress.
Though I'm only teaching two Chemistry classes this quarter, and my life, thus, is much less stressful, I still have some tales to share since it's been a while.
1) After spending two late nights in DC with Mr. Excel trying to figure out the best way to adjust my Gen Chem students' grades to a reasonable result (and let me tell you, I was generous), I started getting some emails to the tune of:
"Professor Klug: I would like to make an appointment with you to discuss my grade this quarter. I am very disappointed and would like to know if there is anything I can do to increase my grade."
WHAT?! What college student honestly believes they can do extra credit AFTER the term is over and their grades are submitted? It's fine for them to come in and see how they did on the final, but those grades aren't changing, baby. The way I have dealt with this frustration for almost two weeks now is by not responding to their emails...perhaps not the best way, but it's working by and large.
2) Last week, between DC and Portland when I was teaching the first week of classes, one of my favorite student quotes slipped out of a students' mouth when I was asking them what they did over spring break:
"I went to karaoke with some friends and found that the remedy for nervousness is vodka."
Well put. Though, it is a dry school. I had a good laugh over that one!
Onward.
Showing posts with label chemistry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label chemistry. Show all posts
4.09.2009
3.17.2009
You better think...let your mind go, let yourself be free
~Aretha Franklin ("Think")
I'm sitting here, watching the minutes tick by excruciatingly slowly as my 55 gen chem students take their final exam. A casual observer might notice the increase in number of people wearing sweats (at SPU, students usually dress up more than your average college student for whatever reason) and the intermittent yawns, neck stretches and blank stares at the page. I think it's a good test...though, if you've been following my blog these last 10 weeks, you'll know that I've thought all my tests were fair and awesome.
Nevertheless, this week marks the end of the quarter. I have (almost) made it. My other class gives their research presentations tomorrow, and I have a beast of a paper to write myself...for which I only have a few disconnected thoughts thus far. All this (and grading these 55 finals) needs to be done by Friday morning at 4am, when I hop a plane for 10 awesome days in Washington DC to catch up with a bunch of friends from SPU and try to get a chat with Obama in about his educational policies.
Maybe I'll reflect more on my professorhood these past months in the future when I am further removed from it. Right now, I am welcoming the break, though I will miss these students, their interested spirits and their smiling (usually) faces and hope they are leaving my class with largely positive outlooks. (I guess I'll see the course evaluations in a week and know for sure.) I've attempted this quarter to encourage and foster critical thinking about chemistry and not just giving steps and saying "that's just how it is, you'll have to believe me." Learning to truly THINK for myself has been the greatest gift my teachers and professors have given me, and I still challenge myself daily to do so more.
I'll leave you with one of my favorite moments from the last week (which has mostly been a blur). When grading some take home extra credit quizzes (I'm such a nice prof, right?):
Much laughter ensued. And, no, I didn't give him bonus points (though I considered it).
I'm sitting here, watching the minutes tick by excruciatingly slowly as my 55 gen chem students take their final exam. A casual observer might notice the increase in number of people wearing sweats (at SPU, students usually dress up more than your average college student for whatever reason) and the intermittent yawns, neck stretches and blank stares at the page. I think it's a good test...though, if you've been following my blog these last 10 weeks, you'll know that I've thought all my tests were fair and awesome.
Nevertheless, this week marks the end of the quarter. I have (almost) made it. My other class gives their research presentations tomorrow, and I have a beast of a paper to write myself...for which I only have a few disconnected thoughts thus far. All this (and grading these 55 finals) needs to be done by Friday morning at 4am, when I hop a plane for 10 awesome days in Washington DC to catch up with a bunch of friends from SPU and try to get a chat with Obama in about his educational policies.
Maybe I'll reflect more on my professorhood these past months in the future when I am further removed from it. Right now, I am welcoming the break, though I will miss these students, their interested spirits and their smiling (usually) faces and hope they are leaving my class with largely positive outlooks. (I guess I'll see the course evaluations in a week and know for sure.) I've attempted this quarter to encourage and foster critical thinking about chemistry and not just giving steps and saying "that's just how it is, you'll have to believe me." Learning to truly THINK for myself has been the greatest gift my teachers and professors have given me, and I still challenge myself daily to do so more.
I'll leave you with one of my favorite moments from the last week (which has mostly been a blur). When grading some take home extra credit quizzes (I'm such a nice prof, right?):
Question: What would happen if you added some hydrobromic acid to the
final solution?
Student: "Probably something amazing. JK. But seriously I
have no clue"
Much laughter ensued. And, no, I didn't give him bonus points (though I considered it).
2.22.2009
when the sky turns black, and we know it will from time to time, we've been through that, and we came out on top
~Ivan & Alyosha (Easy to Love)
Last night, as I was finishing up writing the second (hopefully slightly less difficult!) midterm for my general chemistry course and pondering how my students will fare on it, I found this email in my inbox from a student who has only spoken to me once:
Whenever I start to feel like I confuse my whole class of 56 students and they must hate the subject matter, I get a glimmer of hope from a simple email or comment that lets me know all has not been in vain. I suppose it just goes to show that all students learn and express their learning in different ways. Though I hardly know this student, they are enjoying the class! It has been my experience this quarter that I mostly only hear from the students who are not enjoying or are frustrated because they are not "getting it," but there are others in that sea of fun faces.
We'll see how they feel after the test tomorrow. I'm expecting a huge improvement, though...
Last night, as I was finishing up writing the second (hopefully slightly less difficult!) midterm for my general chemistry course and pondering how my students will fare on it, I found this email in my inbox from a student who has only spoken to me once:
"Prof Klug,
Hey I just wanted to e-mail you and let you know that I
really appreciate your class this term! This is my second time taking Chem 1211
and I'm understanding it much much better this quarter! So yeah I just wanted to
shoot you an e-mail letting you know that. Thanks for your
awesomeness.
Love,
(a student)"
Whenever I start to feel like I confuse my whole class of 56 students and they must hate the subject matter, I get a glimmer of hope from a simple email or comment that lets me know all has not been in vain. I suppose it just goes to show that all students learn and express their learning in different ways. Though I hardly know this student, they are enjoying the class! It has been my experience this quarter that I mostly only hear from the students who are not enjoying or are frustrated because they are not "getting it," but there are others in that sea of fun faces.
We'll see how they feel after the test tomorrow. I'm expecting a huge improvement, though...
1.28.2009
good news for people who love bad news
~Modest Mouse
Allow me to set the scene for you:
An entire weekend of slaving at the new Vaio (which I have named "Wolfram," the element Tungsten's original name...but that's for another time) and producing what I thought was a challenging and long, but reasonable exam for my Gen Chem students ended with me giving a study session on Sunday night, followed by several hours of tweaking, writing final questions and making the test slightly easier. Bed at 2am.
I awoke with a start early Monday morning, realizing I had neglected to attach a periodic table to each exam. Other than that, things were going to be great: I had every confidence in my students' abilities and knew they were going to demonstrate their learning awesomely for me. I arrived on campus at 10:40am, with just enough time to copy the periodic tables and grab the test, and then a series of bizarre events began to unfold.
The roller-door to the science office crashed down without explanation, yet I felt no trepidation because the admin told me that an alarm must have just been triggered in the building. "Oh well," I thought, "when I'm done copying, I have to head out to my classroom anyhow." Exams in hand, I made my way across campus around 10:50am, noticing that other doors were closed in "alarm-mode" and several security guards. "Must be a fire alarm or something," I thought, as I made my way past three Seattle Police cars positioned around the campus US Bank. Seeing a friend of mine from my younger years, we chatted while I held the bookstore door open. I made my way across campus and into the other science building, and just as I set my pile of exams down on the desk, the admin came in: "We're in lockdown. Lock your door and shut it. No one can leave."
"Wha, what?" I mumbled. Are you kidding?! Lockdown? As if giving my first exam as a college professor wasn't stressful enough on its own, THIS had to happen too? Astonished, while simultaneously smiling at life's random curve-balls, I tried to quiet my students down and press onward with the exam, not really knowing how I was going to deal with 1/3 of my students being trapped elsewhere (some, I later found, were just outside but couldn't enter).
11:20am: lockdown called off. "That was peculiarly short," I thought to myself, "how in god's name could they have searched the entire campus in 20 minutes?" The MIA students slowly started trickling in, but I could tell focus would not be their ally that day.
Two days later, nothing more has been said, essentially, about the bank robbery (at 10:40am) and the school's terribly slow and inept response. Apparently there were two "unrelated" bank robberies elsewhere in Seattle that day....hmmmmm. The robber never produced a gun, yet one of my students asked to be excused from the exam because she had "seen" him waving a gun around.
Still, I had to have a little self-examination and realize, as all of my friends and family know already, that I'm terribly cavalier with my own safety (my brother looked me in the eye very seriously before I left for Panama and said: "please be safe - don't do anything stupid"). I don't know when it started, but I rarely feel afraid or threatened, for better or for worse. Now that I'm a teacher, I need to realize that I'm responsible for a bunch of other peoples' safety as well, and this was a good eye-opener in that area.
But, WHY did it have to be on exam day? Come ON! We'll talk about the results of the test another time...
Allow me to set the scene for you:
An entire weekend of slaving at the new Vaio (which I have named "Wolfram," the element Tungsten's original name...but that's for another time) and producing what I thought was a challenging and long, but reasonable exam for my Gen Chem students ended with me giving a study session on Sunday night, followed by several hours of tweaking, writing final questions and making the test slightly easier. Bed at 2am.
I awoke with a start early Monday morning, realizing I had neglected to attach a periodic table to each exam. Other than that, things were going to be great: I had every confidence in my students' abilities and knew they were going to demonstrate their learning awesomely for me. I arrived on campus at 10:40am, with just enough time to copy the periodic tables and grab the test, and then a series of bizarre events began to unfold.
The roller-door to the science office crashed down without explanation, yet I felt no trepidation because the admin told me that an alarm must have just been triggered in the building. "Oh well," I thought, "when I'm done copying, I have to head out to my classroom anyhow." Exams in hand, I made my way across campus around 10:50am, noticing that other doors were closed in "alarm-mode" and several security guards. "Must be a fire alarm or something," I thought, as I made my way past three Seattle Police cars positioned around the campus US Bank. Seeing a friend of mine from my younger years, we chatted while I held the bookstore door open. I made my way across campus and into the other science building, and just as I set my pile of exams down on the desk, the admin came in: "We're in lockdown. Lock your door and shut it. No one can leave."
"Wha, what?" I mumbled. Are you kidding?! Lockdown? As if giving my first exam as a college professor wasn't stressful enough on its own, THIS had to happen too? Astonished, while simultaneously smiling at life's random curve-balls, I tried to quiet my students down and press onward with the exam, not really knowing how I was going to deal with 1/3 of my students being trapped elsewhere (some, I later found, were just outside but couldn't enter).
11:20am: lockdown called off. "That was peculiarly short," I thought to myself, "how in god's name could they have searched the entire campus in 20 minutes?" The MIA students slowly started trickling in, but I could tell focus would not be their ally that day.
Two days later, nothing more has been said, essentially, about the bank robbery (at 10:40am) and the school's terribly slow and inept response. Apparently there were two "unrelated" bank robberies elsewhere in Seattle that day....hmmmmm. The robber never produced a gun, yet one of my students asked to be excused from the exam because she had "seen" him waving a gun around.
Still, I had to have a little self-examination and realize, as all of my friends and family know already, that I'm terribly cavalier with my own safety (my brother looked me in the eye very seriously before I left for Panama and said: "please be safe - don't do anything stupid"). I don't know when it started, but I rarely feel afraid or threatened, for better or for worse. Now that I'm a teacher, I need to realize that I'm responsible for a bunch of other peoples' safety as well, and this was a good eye-opener in that area.
But, WHY did it have to be on exam day? Come ON! We'll talk about the results of the test another time...
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