Since then, I have always attempted to sign up as soon as possible, as the myemcc makes it easy to sign up for a course. I just select the course, click on the add button, and I am now taking that course that semester. I do not have to deal with people this way. I generally avoid the people at the desks, because even the older looking people in the information windows that look like they are in charge seem clueless, such as telling me that dropping a course after the semester started would mean the class would appear on my transcript with a "W" next to it. It did not of course.
So I circumvent them as much as possible, and the myemcc website is perfect for that. The new course listings were just put up, though adding them is not possible on the website yet, and I looked at some to see what I might be interested in.
In my time at EMCC I have figured out a couple of things- that I am devoted to English of almost any sort, and that I am fascinated by Geographic Information Systems, a type of computer mapping. Considering that I have been here three years, two technically in a program and over full time, I should leave soon and go off to do something else. What that other thing would be I have not yet figured out. I always try to keep a laid back attitude, in that if I decide to do something, such as go to another college, when that time is half a year away, then if I plan it all out and commit myself to a routine, then I will limit myself in my abilities to maneuver if another opportunity or twist comes along.
Also, I always think of why many people are not dreamers, why many people just do not believe in, for example, becoming a well known author. The majority of people, if they decided that they wanted to be a famous author, or anything of that sort, would then think of how they would do it. And they think of how "I would have to be really good, which I'm not, and it would have to appeal to everyone and I would probably have to devote a lot of time to it, and it might not work at first, and who would like what I do anyhow? I might as well not do it."
I avoid all of this such above-mentioned though process, by if I decide that I want to do something, I do not think about how to do it until I am committed to it, and then I go through with it. As opposed to cutting myself off like many other people.
Would it help me to know which courses to take if I knew what I would do after this and where I would go? Sure, but after I decided how I would go about it, I would be less likely to alter my plans when situations changed.
That is why I had difficulty with this assignment, there is hardly anything that I think about that I plan into the future much with. I am careful, and am not reckless, as I do consider the future, I just do not plot it all out.
But after that one time in my first semester, I am always careful to get my classes chosen as soon as possible. One course that stood out to me were ENG-162, with Lesley Gillis. I am taking 221 with her now, True Crime, but I think the one thing I have not really taken yet for English at this college is fiction writing. This English course with Gillis does have a lot of work, but I am enjoying it a lot and managing it well.
Another one was Carol Lewandowski's Journalism class. I had looked at her paper every now and then, and was a little disappointed when it was off for this semester. But I thought that it might be interesting to take it myself. Someone from her class did a story on our GIS class once, and just emailed the teacher so we could email him things he could take useful quotes from. I do not really know what it would entail, but public speaking would be my least favorite subject next to dissection, and she taught it enjoyably to me a couple of semesters ago, so I figured that it would surely be an enjoyable class with her teaching it.
Other than that, I have taken many classes that are basic ones, except for ones like chemistry (which I dropped out of this semester), biology, and physics, all of which I have generally found I am distinctly disinterested in. But I would want to be full time, especially as baseball here requires it.
So two english classes, another class, and tack on whatever class is after Calculus III, and baseball? I think it will be a good semester next year. Except for no Mr. Goldfine. :(
Are you certain there isn't an ENG-362?
Well, bless your heart for asking! No, no ENG 362!
ReplyDeleteIn fact, I am leaving online zombie teaching next semester, though there may be an overload 262 online. But I'll be doing 162 live and four live sections of 101.
I'm auditing a Great Courses/Teaching Company course on Creative NonFiction, and it's so bad that it makes me feel good: classic schadenfreude! I may not be the inspirational and saintly teacher, but I'm better than that!
Teaching literature has never seemed attractive. I love books and reading and love to talk about books but feel that discussing themes, subtexts, symbols, discourse, etc drains all the pleasure and life from the book and just leaves a heap of bones to pick over for student papers. Not for me!
Let me put that previous point in a different way: I love writing but do not get upset when someone writes badly. I can help them with that. But when someone does not get a piece of fiction or gets a stupid idea about it, I feel helpless. Or rather, I feel like shaking the student till their teeth rattle and saying, 'That's a frippin dumb idea! Get that right out of your head!'
Something tells me that would not be the sort of fine teaching technique we look for here at EMCC.
I feel the same way about teaching fiction. Fiction is much harder to do and to do well than nonfiction. Taste and aesthetic judgment are vital, and I don't want to find myself saying to a student 'that's just a badly executed bad idea.'
Student repllies: 'That's just your opinion. My opinion is just as good as yours!'
It is too--if you discount five decades more experience reading and writing fiction....
Tom, take it as a compliment that your piece elicited the above comment, which, though related to your topic, is not perhaps strictly relevant. What finer compliment have I got than to say my first reaction was to react, not to critique, comment, teach, etc.?
ReplyDeleteBut now it's time to change gears, so, let's see....
I like the meta quality here. In a speculative piece, it is completely right to explain the assignment's difficulty as you do.
I like the modest, close-to-home material (and I believe you will be able to sign up for your LS courses starting 11/5.) I like the very smooth, nearly invisible organization--relaxed but controlled.
I like everything except your willingness to use 'disinterested' instead of 'uninterested.' 'Disinterested' is too good a word to have its primary meaning submerged and forgotten!
Thank you, apparently I had an incorrect definition in my head of disinterested. Unaffected by self interest makes a lot more sense. Plus, when I think about it, if I said "Wow, that's disinteresting", that would sound horrific. Not sure why I thought of it there, probably because the word prior to it was "Distinctly".
ReplyDelete