I keep having dreams where I'm at the side of the stage during a Nine Inch Nails concert. The thought of this being the last tour and having seen them for the last time must have traumatized me worse than I thought!
I need a piece of chocolate cream pie. It's a very specific craving that has continued unabated for days. Hmm... must find chocolate cream pie.
And despite this being the first week of my summer vacation, I spent the entire day working. Am I nothing if not consistent?
Happy Weekend!
This was quite a week! I attended two Nine Inch Nails concerts - one with Greg and the other up in Irvine with Aaron. There is reason to believe that this is the last tour, and thus these were my last NIN concerts. That thought makes me as sad as I was when Calvin and Hobbes ended.
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| From Spring2009 |
Last night was graduation, which made me weepy as always. Youngest graduate = 18. Oldest graduate = 68. Several countries were represented, and so were many without homes. I know at least one student who graduated never went to high school, and yet he now has a college degree. Community colleges really serve as a great opportunity for people who might otherwise fall through the cracks, and I'm proud to be a part of such an institution.
And then, of course, it was the Week of the Book. We caught glimpses of the book in the wild:
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| From NorseCode |
And today there was a book-signing at Mysterious Galaxy:
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| From NorseCode |
Then we finished off the day with celebratory ice cream! Whew! Hope you've all had as good a week!
I really can't complain about yesterday. First of all, Greg cooked breakfast for us. Then we packed up and headed south (or just north of the border) to feast on mariscos and wander around a huge outlet mall in search of shoes. Seriously, San Ysidro is just north of the border. We were looking straight into Tijuana, seeing the Mexican flag and the border fence. I found the following juxtaposition disturbing:
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| From Spring2009 |
After shopping, we headed to Chula Vista to see Nine Inch Nails, on what is stated to be their last tour (for awhile, at least). Here's our view of the stage from our seats before the concert started:
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| From Spring2009 |
I take my NIN seriously. They played "Metal" and "I'm Afraid of Americans" - awesome. I was really sad when the concert ended, though. (Warning to Aaron: I might be an emotional mess at the concert in Irvine on Wednesday!)
An eventful, enjoyable Saturday, for sure. I hope y'all are having a great weekend!
Wow, this past week went by so fast. I've been busy, with just one week left to go in the semester. Yay! I've also been managing to have a lot of fun. We went to see Star Trek again, IMAX this time, and still enjoyed it greatly. Then last night, we met up with Colleenky and others to see Jonathan Coulton with Paul and Storm. I'd only heard one JoCo song before and knew absolutely nothing about Paul and Storm, but really enjoyed the whole show. Quite different from the next concert I'll be attending. (Tomorrow.... eee!!!)
Greg's first novel, Norse Code, comes out on Tuesday. I am so excited! You should go read the first three chapters for free:
And he also has a lovely short story recently posted for free, too: Last Son of Tomorrow
Enjoy!
Busy weekend:
And now to start the last two weeks of the semester! Woo! Hope y'all had a good weekend!
I interrupt my usual academic blathering to squeak over the fact that I have held in my hands a copy of Greg's first novel, Norse Code (publication date 5/19/09). Pictures available here. Eee!!!!
Greg and I were in a used bookstore last week and overheard the following conversation:
Customer: How much is this book?
Proprietor: All books are half priced.
Customer: So how much is this book?
Proprietor: All books are half of the original price.
Customer (looking at the book): The original price on this book is $9.99. How much would this book be?
Proprietor: Well, the price of the book would be half of $10.
Customer: So how much would that be?
Proprietor (more than a little curtly): You take $10 and divide by two, so $5.
Customer: Oh.
I wonder how often the proprietor has that conversation. I do appreciate he tried to make it a teaching moment, with the whole "divide by two" instruction. That reminds me of a conversation a colleague had with a student this week, which went something like:
Student: How big is Mars?
Professor: It's about half the diameter of the Earth.
Student: What do you mean?
Professor: Mars is about half of the diameter of the Earth.
Student: I don't understand you.
Professor: You take the Earth's diameter and you multiply it by 0.5.
Student: Why didn't you just say so?
Dear Counselor,
I know things are rough financially on our students right now. I appreciate that you take their finances into account when helping them schedule their classes. However, would you please refrain from telling students to not consider entire MAJORS because it would cost extra time and money? Telling a student that he/she should not be a science major because they'd have to spend an extra year catching up on math and it would cost them some extra money (and at a California community college, we're talking an extra $60 in fees for the math classes in question) is fiscally irresponsible for that student in the long run. It's like punishing the student for going to a crappy high school or having bad counselors in their past. I do sympathize with your intent and acknowledgment of the poor economy, but dampening the goals of the students with deficient backgrounds who want to go into high-tech/high-wage-potential majors does a disservice for all of us in the future.
Thank you for your time,
Science Professor (who is seeing dwindling numbers of science majors)
At first, I was irritated by the sheer number of people. However, since I can walk to the beach from my apartment in a mere twenty minutes, I decided to allow them to share my beach for today.
I saw part of an interview with Pat Summitt where she mentioned that the current generation of student athletes seem to be less motivated than her previous players. And her players should be among the most motivated of any college student athlete anywhere. This ties in with a recent discussion amongst the faculty that most of the students who are performing below average are doing so because they simply aren't doing the work. Lab reports? Apparently optional. Regularly turning in homework, if at all? Just busywork. Turning in a paper worth ten percent of the grade? Nah.
Speaking of student athletes, my school's basketball team made it to the State Quarterfinals, their best season ever. Nine out of the thirteen players on the roster have taken astronomy with me.
I do not assign any work that isn't useful. Do I assign a lot of physics homework? Yeah, and if the students do it, they tend to do very well on exams. Do I make my astronomy and physics students write short papers? Yes, I do, because synthesizing and articulating scientific ideas are crucial instructional objectives. I even tell them why I give them the different assignments. I make each assignment worth a decent chunk of their grade in the course, so it is worth their time to do the assignments. Motivation has always come from within for me. I'm most competitive with myself. So I find myself wondering how to motivate students to do work they just don't want to do?
A few weeks ago, I had to deal with something that had yet to confront me as a teacher - one of my students committed suicide. I was informed by the college administration, and the campus mental health director offered to come speak to my class. It is a lecture class, but I have my students do group work, so several of the students who had worked with this student were quite upset. It was a rough time, but I'm glad the counselor came and talked to the class. At least one student from that class has gone to seek mental health counseling since, so some good came from it.
I'd also like to say that I would never have suspected this student to have been in trouble from his demeanor in class. You know how after every Virginia Tech-type tragedy there is the outcry to somehow identify troubled students? If I had been asked to provide a watch list, he would never have been on it. He was outgoing, participated everyday, had made friends... the class was stunned to find out what had happened. His family and friends have my sympathies.
On a lighter note, I used Saturn's annoying tendency to gain more moons as a way to talk about how technology enables more discoveries, how the moon is small because otherwise we'd have seen it before, and how silly it is to memorize facts (how many moons Saturn has) as opposed to understanding processes (most moons are small, captured objects, etc...). Having such an example of a fact that changed since the last class seemed to have an impact.
This article about student expectations in the NYT combined with my observations of students taking tests today spur me to mention the following:
Sometimes I feel like I work harder on these tests than they do!
