December 14th

Final exam night!! The students are writing their final exam now and will be submitting their portfolios tonight. While it is wonderful to be finished-now I have much grading to get completed by Friday. It will be a busy week for me.

December 7th

I require my ENC 1102 to give a presentation on their documented argument essay. Generally it is initially met with complaints, however, by the time they do the actual presentation, they enjoy it. Last night was presentation night and i had some excellent power points. They are not required to do a power point, however, many of them do so. It is always so wonderful to see them talk about their essays and essay topics. They demonostrate their research and understanding of the topics in a way the essay does not always show. These presentations have been successful.

Last night I had a particularly striking presentation. One of my students wrote his essay on patriotism-the essay itself was so good, it actually moved me to tears as I was reading it. He waited until the very end before he presented and after his presentation, it was very clear why. He gave the required presentation and then at the end he explained why he went last-he referred to all of the topics and students and stated that each and everyone of them demonstrated their patriotism through the chosen topics. They showed that they loved and were concerned about their country enough to research on topics that affect each and every one, climate, bullying, beauty-image in society, organic food, tattoos in the workplace. It was a very moving presentation and I think it affected every student.

This is why I enjoy teaching!

November 30th

Tonight I was evaluated for the first time at Gulf Coast. I think it went well. I have a good class so they always participate and I had an interesting assignment for them to work on during class time. It was the questioning activity for their documented argument essay. It usually helps the students clarify their topics and the direction of their essays. I did get one student who told me that it really helped her decide where to go with her essay.

November 18th

As we approach Thanksgiving, I could tell that everyone was sluggish and showing signs of burn out. I decided to complete the individual meetings to discuss their documented argument topics, give them an assignment to write and send them home early. I could tell they appreciated the early night! They have so much to complete in a short time period. I want them to be successful! Hopefully, the early night will give them a little bit of a breather and they will return refreshed and motivated to work!

November 16th

Tonight I had the librarian come in to give the class an overview of how to search the databases available on the library site. I find it helpful for me to also view this information again because I forget since I don't use it that much. I also find that the class benefits from it for 2 reasons: they meet a real live librarian and they are given instruction as to how to login and use the databases that they pay for through their fees. Even though many of the students have had this instruction before, it is always good to review. Since they will begin their documented argument essay, this is the first step to find good research for the essay.

November 4th class

Tonight in class we were discussing claims and evidence and did an activity where the students analyzed a magazine and an advertisement from the magazine. They really did a good job of listing the claim and the evidence used by the product advertisement to sell the product to the audience of this magazine. The reason why we did this activity is that the students will be writing argument essays for the rest of the semester and they need to see evidence of how claims are made and supported. We focused on the rhetorical triangle-pathos, ethos and logos. This type of activity always goes over well with students.

October 28 class

I am enrolled in a graduate certificate at KSU titled Adult Students and have taken 2 classes in technology in the curriculum and tried one of the activities last night. There is a website called Kahoot.it and you can make interactive quizzes for use in the classroom or for training. I tried it last night with my class using a public quiz for MLA and citations. It was a big hit with the students. The competition was fun and they learned things about MLA citation that they didn't know. Feedback was good and I know that I will do it again.

This provides me with a place to start with my instruction of MLA format. Kahoot also provides you with a results page so you can see what questions were missed. I plan to do another one in a couple of weeks and see how they do.

I also did my Halloween fun with videos and stories. I don't think it went over as well with this class. I haven't read the stories yet so I will see.

October 22nd

The first class session went well. There was only 1 student who did not show up-I emailed him. I decided to start a class survey so I could determine the technology skills of the class so far they seem fairly tech savvy. I also started a class gratitude wiki-optional-1 student has added a comment. We did the regular introductory activities and the class seems to interact with each other fine. I gave them an in class writing assignment which took them approximately 30-40 minutes to complete. I haven't read them yet.

Overall, I felt good about how the class went and the actvities completed and assigned. The students seemed engaged and interested. There was no pushback on anything in the syllabus even the presenttion!

Opening thought

I have decided that I would like to start a blog where I reflect on my teaching at the end of each class time. I will be teaching an 8 week accelerated English composition class so I plan to blog on what went right and what went wrong in the class. I hope to use this to improve my teaching and the experience for my students.