Bird by Bird. Just Take it Bird by Bird.

Today I saw a former student on campus. She was in an honors writing class I taught during the fall of 2019, a small lifetime ago. It had been her first semester. She's now about to graduate. The pandemic years thoroughly anchored and impacted her college experience.

During our brief encounter, she surprised me by saying "I can't believe I bumped into you today. I was just talking to my mom about your class this morning."

This seemed impossible. Well, at least improbable. Who randomly talks about a class they took four years ago?

She explained, "On our very first day, the class felt so overwhelming after we reviewed the syllabus. Then you read a quote to us from Bird by Bird, reminding us that we were going to take the class step by step, day by day, assignment by assignment. I never forgot that. My boyfriend knew how much I love that quote, so he had it embroidered on the sleeve of a sweatshirt for me. He was too excited to wait until Valentine's Day, so he gave me the sweatshirt last night. I called my mom this morning to tell her about his gift. That's why I was talking about your class. You probably don't know this, but that quote not only helped me through our class, but also these past few years."

I was amazed. Who knew that this brief moment during our first class session would resonate with one student so deeply that she'd form it into a life mantra and tell her boyfriend, who'd embroider it on a sweatshirt sleeve, which would prompt her to talk about my class with her mother on the very day that she and I would cross paths again, four years later?

I love this so much. What a gift.

And if you'd like to know the quote by Anne Lamott which started it all, here it is in its entirety:

"Thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report on birds written that he'd had three months to write. It was due the next day. We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead. Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother's shoulder, and said, 'Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.'"

Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird

0

A New Community Waiting to Be Built

Classes for Penn State's spring semester started on Monday, and so far, I've had two sessions with my new students. This morning I reflected on how, after 22 years of teaching, I still love what I do. I love engaging with students. I'm not sure how many people can say this after two decades, but I'm in the exact career I want to be in. I'm doing exactly what I love to do.

Each semester has its own rhythm -- the early weeks where everyone feels out the class, the familiar middle when we're in a groove and know our routines, the three-quarters slog when motivation wanes, and the last weeks as we sprint (trudge? limp? plod?) toward finals and grade submissions. Right now, I focus on these initial review-the-syllabus, forge-our-routines, and get-to-know-each-other days.

Because here's something that I've learned: a good classroom atmosphere doesn't just automatically happen. As an instructor, you get to shape how it happens. You work to ensure that when a classroom environment does emerge (because it always does, perhaps except when you're on Zoom), it's healthy. These opening days are the perfect time to work toward this end.

On the very first day when I walk into the room, warmly greet the class, and head toward the podium to pull up our materials on the projector, I notice how students sit silently. They're still bundled from walking across campus in the cold. They're masked. For some of them, you only see a horizontal sliver of their faces at eye level underneath their winter hats. They're entirely unfamiliar with each other, and nearly all of them kill the minutes before we start by turning toward something safe and familiar: their phones.

That's when I offer my first instruction of the semester. As I pull off my own coat and drape my scarf across the back of my chair, I say, "We'll get started in just a few minutes, but for now, take a moment to introduce yourself to the person beside you. Learn their name. Then turn to the group behind you and learn their names, too."

It's so basic that I feel foolish writing it here, as if what I'm doing is special when, in reality, it's remarkably simple, but those few statements completely change the atmosphere. The room comes alive. Students talk. A group in the back laughs. Two people in the corner realize that they come from neighboring high schools. My materials are now ready, but I linger longer, happy to observe them forming connections, knowing that actual classroom work is being done in these moments.

They're a community -- and although they don't realize it yet, they're just waiting to be built. I've never had students balk when I ask them to greet their neighbors and learn names; they dive in like they've merely been waiting for someone to give them the permission to do so.

For the first two or three weeks of class, I start every session this way as I make my way toward the front of the quiet classroom. "Good morning! How are you? We'll get started in a few minutes, but until then, why don't you refresh yourself on the name of your neighbor and greet someone else in the row next to you?"

Every single time I make this request, they play along. Within a few weeks, I won't need to prompt them. When I enter the room, some of them certainly will be on their phones, but they'll also be talking. They'll be greeting each other by name.

And it all starts on the first day, in those first minutes. Bundled in their jackets with their heads lowered toward their phones, they might not appear like it, but they're simply a community who's waiting for that initial nudge to actually be built into one.

0

End-of-Semester Survival Tips

I recognize that this will seem impossible given my remarkably young age (ahem), but I'm currently in the throes of competing my 28th semester of teaching at the collegiate level.  You learn some useful lessons when you complete an activity 28 times.  For example, I've learned that no matter how smoothly a semester wraps up, the process always takes something out of you. If you let it, it'll deplete you to the core, which is why it's not uncommon to end a semester and immediately experience a total immune system collapse.  That's never fun.

Thankfully, there are several tips that can help you to finish strong.

Stay Organized.  I've joked with my students that the end of a semester is like triage.  You're required to move briskly between All The Things, treating the most urgent cases, reviving what's fading, and minimizing casualties.  Everything vies for your attention at once, and when this occurs it's easy to grow disoriented.  My mind becomes like a bulletin board covered with post-it notes with a high-powered oscillating fan blowing on it.  Every thought is flapping in the breeze, dangerously loose, capable of being whisked away and eternally forgotten.

That's why it's so essential to stay organized.  I write lists with incremental goals so I have concrete incentive to maintain a productive grading pace. I create distinct blocks of time to check and reply to email so it doesn't morph into a perpetual, yet halfhearted, task.  I (mostly) abstain from social media.  I plan easy dinners that don't require much thought or effort.

Order is a powerful antidote to being overwhelmed.

Remember Self-Care.  I'm not perfect, but I aim for a baseline of three self-care goals when a semester ends: maintain regular exercise, get 7 hours of sleep each night, and stay hydrated.  This not only keeps a semblance of routine, but it also keeps my body functioning.  Short breaks -- like a walk around my building when I'm on campus or around my yard when I work from home -- stave off computer-screen fatigue, restore energy, and provide helpful diversion.

As Mr. Miyagi once wisely said, "Don't forget to breathe. Very important."

Set Clear Boundaries.  In my final classes as we're wrapping up logistics, I relay an example from the reality show, Survivor.  At the end of each episode, Jeff Probst, the host, says, "Once the votes are read the decision is final. I'll go tally the votes."  His statement is definitive; it's not the time for negotiation. Similarly, I explain, once final grades are posted, the decision is final.  I don't fulfill last-minute special requests for extra credit.  I'm not swayed by students' unexpected discoveries that they need a certain grade to get accepted to this internship or that graduate/med/business school.  I don't entertain Hail-Mary questions like, "What is my grade and how can it magically become an A?"

And -- I explain to my students -- I do this out of fairness, consistency, and integrity to standards, not from a lack of kindness or empathy.  Every single time, I observe students nodding as I speak.  They understand the game, after all.  When I proactively set boundaries in a firm, yet neutral, way, they also accept that I don't play it. 

This simple talk makes the end of a semester so much easier!  It's significantly less draining to calmly explain this principle to a classroom full of students up-front than to receive multiple emotionally draining and personalized emails with the subject line "Final Grade" later.

Once the grades are tallied, the decision is final.  I'll go tally the grades.  Clear expectations and boundaries for the win!


And those, my friends, are my end-of-semester survival tips.  I will now be grading until I die, come to my senses, give up, or reach the bottom of the multiple stacks. I'm banking on the latter option.  It's almost in the books.  Here's to the close of another semester!

0

When You're Given a Snow Day, Take It.

If you live in any of the locations represented above, I'm sorry.  (Even though I'm not sure how to pronounce "cold" with a Minnesota accent, I'm especially looking at you, Minneapolis.  You too, Chicago.  Brutal.)  As a central Pennsylvanian, I feel the effects of the polar vortex, too.

Yesterday when the chill was at its worst, the university where I teach cancelled classes.  If you ask any educator, regardless of what level they teach, it's often harder to miss a day of classes than to go in.  When classes are cancelled, you can't always neatly bump everything back one day.  Instead, you often have to reshuffle the entire deck. 

That was the case for me yesterday.  When you're a kid, a snow day is a snow day -- no strings attached.  When you're an adult, you're expected to be adult-like.  So even though my inner snow-day child wanted to lie on the couch and watch back-to-back episodes of Tidying Up with Marie Kondo, I pulled out my binders and emailed three classes with instructions.  We'd delay the second homework assignment. We'd reschedule the evening speaking contest to a subsequent week.  We'd shuffle office hours.  We'd work some kind of accordion magic to shrink the content into a smaller framework.

Granted, it's a bit inconvenient.  (Moving a speaking contest with 450 attendees is a logistical headache, after all.)  But I adhere to this philosophy:

When you're given a snow day, take it.

Take the snow day!  When you're shaking your head as you work to revise your syllabus course schedule, still take the snow day!  Enjoy being home!  Count it all joy that you're safe, warm, and still wearing your pajamas.  Be grateful that you're able to do laundry while you're grading.  Encourage yourself that, eventually, the confused students who didn't read the instructions you emailed will stop emailing you to ask, "What are our instructions?"

Don't take the bait and get irritated.  Don't bemoan a gift, even if it's wrapped with minor inconvenience and tied with a ribbon of extra logistical work.

No, when you're given a snow day, take it.

1

Every Semester, Do This First

The spring semester begins tomorrow.  I'm not ready for a semester until I do one final task.  It's not creating and photocopying the syllabi, or setting up my course websites, or even printing the rosters to review the names of new students before the first day's roll call.  These are important task, too, mind you, but in my heart, I'm not ready for the semester until I visit my classrooms and pray over them.

I walk up and down the aisles, touching each desk and the back of each chair, and pray for each student.  I pray for their protection, for peace to fill our classroom, and for God's presence to infiltrate our shared space.  I pray for wisdom to teach and evaluate their work, for positive connections to be built, and for their academic, social, emotional, mental, and physical well-being.

Then I linger in the classroom in the stillness just a moment or two longer, preparing my heart for the semester ahead.  Then, and only then, do I feel ready.

0

Being Productive In All the Wrong Ways (an end-of-semester tale)

This is an accurate representation of my professional capabilities at the end of a semester.

We just completed our last week of classes, so another semester is almost in the books.  During the week ahead students will submit final projects, and I will spend my time grading and answering emails that ask, "What is my grade and can it magically become an A?"  In the meantime, I am becoming active and efficient in every other single facet excluding my professional life, resulting in the following recent misplaced surge of productivity:

• Purging expired items from my pantry.
  


• Improved arrangement of the salad dressings in my refrigerator using an arbitrary scale that considered not only bottle size and shape, but also salad dressing color.


• Spray-painting a mirror that benignly had hung on a wall for years but suddenly no longer "looked right."


• Cleaning of bathroom baseboards.


• Rearranged bookshelves, filing cabinets, and desk drawers in my campus office.


• Organized toiletries in my medicine cabinet.


• Sudden desire to scour the house for items to populate next summer's garage sale.


• Emptying old receipts from my wallet.


• Gathering coins from my wallet, compartments in our vehicles, and the kitchen counter's change dish to take to the bank's change machine.


• Deeply introspective analysis of all the shoes I own to determine which ones I regularly wear, which ones I only think I wear, and which ones have seen better days.


• Ditto for my shirts.  And my jeans.


• Discovery of 17 books that I'd like to read for pleasure.

It hasn't yet gotten so bad that I've given adequate thought to useful and seasonally-appropriate tasks, like planning or sending Christmas cards or making a Christmas shopping list.  Nope.  Part of the charm surrounding my end-of-semester cascade of productivity is that it only touches upon matters that have little-to-no urgency.

So, if you're looking for someone to organize your spices alphabetically or help you purge your storage closet, I'm your girl.  Drop me a line or visit my house where you'll find me doing something entirely unnecessary.

0

"It Reminded Me Why I'm Doing This"

Last night I submitted final grades for the four classes I taught this semester.  Today I'm slowly decompressing.  There are still a few details to wrap up, of course, like debriefing meetings and clerical tasks.  And for the next few days I'll check email with slight hesitation because there might be a complaint from a student awaiting me. (So far, so good, though.)

But for all extents and purposes, the semester is finished.  It was a good one.

One the last day of class in one of my technical presentation courses, we finished with short professional talks where students presented key take-aways they've learned from their studies as engineering students.  One student said, "I'm glad we finished with these talks.  It reminded me why I'm doing this."

It reminded me why I'm doing this.

I loved that observation.  At the end of a semester, we all -- students and professors alike -- need a reminder about why we're doing what we're doing, no matter how our semester has gone.  (Don't we all need this periodically?  To step back from the grind to look at the bigger picture from an aerial view instead of from our typical vantage point, which is often right in the thick of it?)

For me, my reminder came when several students sent me exceptionally kind end-of-semester notes: notes expressing how they grew as a speaker or a writer more than they thought was possible, or notes that said I not only helped their academics, but also touched their lives.

As I read each one of these messages, it reminded me why I do this.  There are so many reasons why I do this job. 

It's good to end a semester with those reasons fresh in my thoughts.  We all need reminders, sometimes.

0

An Unexpected Classroom Intervention

With only five minutes left until the end of class, I ask a student to go to the front of the classroom for a quick "stand and deliver" exercise.  He's asked to speak about a topic of interest for one minute, devoid of any verbal fillers, like uh or um, that might distract the audience from his message.

He chooses to talk about how he settled on his major.  He begins, "I've always looked up to my father, so when I thought about what to study, I looked to his career as a model.  He's a chemical engineer.  He has a PhD in it, actually.  When I enrolled here, it seemed natural to follow in his footsteps and major in chemical engineering, so I did.  Except now I'm two years into the program, and I realize that I don't love it.  I'm much more interested in computer engineering, but I worry that I'm too far into my courses to change."

I glance at my watch and I realize that he's already reached his time limit, but nobody in the audience is antsy.  They're rapt with attention.  One student ahead of me nods her head in understanding, then kindly interjects, "You're not too far."

Other students immediately echo the same sentiment:

"No, you still have time to make a change."

"You're preparing for the rest of your life.  Don't settle -- do what you're passionate about. "

"Don't keep going down a road that you know is wrong.  Changing your major might seem drastic to you now, but it makes sense to correct your course." 

The whole class rallies behind him.  I sit quietly, filled to the brim at this outpouring.  He listens, nodding intently, as classmate after classmate echos that he's not as trapped as he thinks he is.

We all thought that he was going to the front of the classroom for a brief speaking exercise.  Instead, it turned out to be the most unexpected intervention from 26 of his classmates, who at that moment, were the best audience I've ever seen.

0

The Five Stages of Essay-Grading Grief: An Illustrated Guide

"Well, it's your problem now."  
- Words said to me by a student upon submitting his essay. Truer words never have been spoken.

After teaching for over a decade and a half, I've carried a hefty stack of freshly-stapled essays out of a classroom enough times to recognize a distinct cycle of essay-grading grief, a cycle through which I progress with textbook-like consistency. The struggle is real, friends.

Stage One: Denial

The classic defense mechanism rises up immediately. I downplay the fact that I've collected 300 pages of student writing to read and evaluate in a thorough, yet timely, fashion while all other work and life responsibilities continue at their regular brisk pace. I set the stack on my office desk or dining room table, glance at it warily, prod it periodically, or perhaps even alphabetize it -- just enough to engage without actually accomplishing anything.

Then I promptly check my email, immerse myself in an unrelated work task that's not due for another month, find a new way to arrange the envelopes in my desk drawer, or decide to clean out my refrigerator and dust the tops of my ceiling fans. Anything to feign productivity is fair game.

This stage lasts anywhere between a few hours to a day, so it doesn't waste much time, except for that one stretch when I sink to reading about 25 celebrities who have aged badly. Still, my newly-organized inbox makes up for it.

Stage Two: Anger

Inevitably, reality sets in when the grading begins in earnest. I carry smaller stacks of essays with me at all times -- to a waiting room, to the sidelines of a child's soccer game, to home and campus and back again. The physical presence of the stack looms heavily, making its weight both literal and figurative. Resentment brews.

I grow irritated with a bad stapling job, and downright agitated over a careless dog-eared fold-over. I begin muttering to myself. Thesis-driven? You call that a thesis-driven argument?

In the far recesses of my mind, I recall once being told that comments written in red ink can appear harsh, regardless of what's being said, and in this stage, I don't particularly care. I like red ink.

Stage Three: Bargaining

Resentment subsides and I redirect my energy. Each time I finish an essay, I count the remaining ungraded papers in the stack, even though I intuitively know the remaining tally. I attempt a new strategy by criss-crossing essays into smaller piles of five, hoping that this altered layout will entice me to reach incremental goals and trick me to grade faster. It doesn't.

At this point, after wondering whether Sheetz is hiring (I'd make amazing Made-To-Order sandwiches), I imagine assigning essays that students can complete like a multiple choice exam. Choose the next best sentence: A, B, C, or D. You picked C? Why, that's correct. My work here is done. My rationale side, which already is compromised, sends up a weak flare to alert me that a multiple choice essay prompt would be a cop-out. Think about how originality and voice would be stifled. How critical thinking would be diminished! How depth and analysis would be shortchanged!  

I dismiss those concerns, of course, because I just want the essays to go away. It's all been a horrible mistake. None of this ever should have happened to me.

Stage Four: Depression

There's no longer any semblance of hope. Wearing yesterday's clothes, I lie on my family room floor, surrounded by a pile of papers. I eat chocolate, rock back and forth, and softly whimper. My family no longer makes eye contact with me.

Stage Five: Acceptance

A new day dawns, and with it, the realization that I've graded more essays than I still have to grade.  I've passed the halfway point. As if I'm a marathoner running negative splits as the finish line draws nearer, my pace picks up. I can feel it in my bones: my feedback is articulate, my evaluations are fair, my job is nearly done.

At the very least, I'm convinced that I no longer will die.

I find an essay that I already know will be good and tuck it at the bottom of the stack, dangling the proverbial carrot for myself, and I work with diligence to reach it as a reward for days of sustained mental labor.  You'll end on a good note, I tell myself, and I do. When the final essay is finished and grades are entered into the master spreadsheet, I rise from my seat and stretch. I tap the essays into neat stacks, secure the stacks with binder clips, and regard them one final time. They look so tame, sitting in their completed state. Then, I carry them one final time to the classroom, feeling light and free as I transfer them from my hands to the hands of my students.

They've come full circle, these essays: their problem, my problem, and now their problem again.  

In the afterglow as I walk away, my work bag nearly weightless, I momentarily forget the pain associated with the entire process. Except there's that niggling reminder that I also introduced the next assignment, and with it, the next due date.

The cycle continues. It always continues.

________________________________ 

You experience essay-grading grief, too?  Connect with me on Facebook or Twitter, or drop me a comment below to tell me about it.  I'd love to hear from you.

2

Draft Workshop (#DemoDay)

An editor once accepted a piece of my writing, but suggested I should start the piece with the final paragraph.  I had worked on the article for weeks, and in my mind, the words were set.  I couldn't envision a different version.  The writing was in place, permanent.  I didn't want to break it apart, parse out new sections, consider new transitions, or kill any sentences I had labored over.

The article was done. I wanted it to stay done.

But I took the editor's advice.  I reconfigured the conclusion as the introduction, found a different stopping point, and filled in the gaps that inevitably form when you bust up a piece of writing.

The end result was a better article.

I tell this story to my students when they revise their own essays.  Today, as we hold draft workshops and students cluster desks together to share their work, I even wear my #DemoDay tee shirt.  I ask them to practice compassionate demolition -- to thoughtfully enter these written spaces, not with sledgehammers, but rather with their pens and comments, with an eye for what's good, what's best, and what's still possible.

Sometimes, after all, whether in home design or writing, you need to bring a degree of destruction in order to create something more fitting, more orderly, and more beautiful.

0

This Is How You End a Semester

For the past several days, I've been immersed in the process of ending a semester.  Eleven years ago when I was a novice in academia, I glibly believed that ending a semester would be quick, matter-of-fact, even.  (Ah, young grasshopper...)

After twenty-one semesters at the helm of a college classroom, I now know that ending a semester rarely is as quick or as matter-of-fact as I'd like it to be.  There are hard decisions regarding students who hover near the cusp of two grades.  There are passionate pleas from students who suddenly want extra credit despite not diligently attending to the regular credit for fifteen weeks.  There's the potential for backlash from students who are unhappy with their grades, even though they're the ones who earned them.

Although I've only experienced student backlash in numbers small enough to be considered statistically insignificant given the thousands of students I've taught, I'm often vaguely nervous as a semester draws to a close.  I scan my inbox warily for the subject line: "Final Grade."  I can recall a few of the more personal and painful end-of-semester skirmishes in great detail, in fact.  If I dwell on them, a sickening sensation rises up within me as if I'm experiencing them afresh.

But not this semester.

For all intents and purposes, this semester seems to be wrapping up smoothly.  Matter-of-fact, even.  I graded final projects from home one day earlier this week, which means that I procrastinated in highly productive ways.  (Floors vacuumed? Check.  Dishwasher empty?  Check.  Laundry folded, bookshelf straightened, bathroom sinks cleaned?  Check, check, check.)  For the remaining days, I stationed myself in my office where there is notably less opportunity for cleaning.

The efforts have paid off.  At this exact moment, my final grades are uploaded.  (And, as a bonus perk, my house is looking pretty good.)

I've received a handful of polite and easily handled grade inquiries, my favorite of which was when a student emailed to ask why he didn't receive full credit for participation.  After I supplied an answer, he wrote back, "Well, I can't argue with that.  Thanks for clarifying."

"Can't argue with that."  That's my boy.

This is how you end a semester.

0

Be That Student Who Breaks the Silence

When I prepare my materials at the front podium before class starts, I sometimes think that my students forget I can hear them.  Over the years I've unintentionally overheard many conversations.  Most are benign, like small talk about lunch plans or loads of homework or the weekend's game.  A few have been self-incriminating, like confessions of not reading the day's assigned chapter or nursing a rough hangover.

But over the years, what I've increasingly heard from my students as I'm checking my rosters and pulling up PowerPoints in the minutes leading up to class is silence.

Students sit with one another, collectively gathered in a common location while pulled away from each other and drawn into their own private devices.  They're side by side yet separated by cues that suggest don't bother me.  The earbuds, the open laptops, the lack of greetings, the eyes turned downward into palmed smart phones: all are cues which subtly indicate that the communication taking place within the devices seems a higher priority than that which could take place in person.

Last week a student walked into a scene like this.  He unzipped his jacket, settled his backpack under his desk, and sat down.  He looked at the two students to his left and his right, both of whom were immersed in their smart phones.

"We might as well talk with each other," he said.  "I don't understand why everyone just waits in silence for a class to start."

His two classmates looked up.  One smiled.  The other momentarily regarded him with a mixture of wariness and shock, like she didn't quite trust him or his hair was on fire.

But then something beautiful happened.  The phones slipped into pockets, and they started talking.  The conversation was about nothing in particular -- the cold weather, the embarrassing fall that one of them had taken while shuffling to class on an unplowed sidewalk.

I was happy to overhear it.

Image compliments of Robert Couse-Baker (flickr.com)

4

The Student Who Stayed Behind

As I gather my belongings at the front desk after all other students have left the classroom, one student stays behind.  He holds his baseball hat by its curved brim in one hand and lightly smacks it into his open palm before he speaks.

"Now that all of your grading for me is done," he begins, "there's something I'd like to tell you."

I'm accustomed to students making appeals at this late point in the semester.  So accustomed that I warily scan my inbox for messages with the brief, yet telling, subject line that reads Final Grade.  (If only students consistently demonstrated as much rhetorical vigor throughout the semester as they do when they're requesting extra credit at the end.)

But this student wasn't making an appeal for me to consider his grade more favorably.  He was simply taking a moment to thank me for turning a class that many students dread -- a class that he had avoided for seven semesters, in fact -- into a rewarding experience. 

"You should know that you're the best professor I've had."

In that one moment, I'm filled up so deeply.

Fifteen weeks ago before the semester began I visited this classroom, then empty, to scout out the layout.  I had stood at this very spot and read aloud from my roster, calling out the name of each student, praying for their studies, for their physical and emotional wellness, for their choices, for their futures, and asking for the wisdom necessary to offer the most fitting instruction, encouragement, and correction into their lives.

In the weeks that have followed, I've planned lectures, and taught classes, and offered feedback, and assigned grades, and doubted my efficacy, and held small philosophical debates within my own head ("what is a B, exactly?"), and poured out energy and time and concern and love because I don't merely want to teach a public speaking course; I want to create better thinkers and communicators.  I want to impact lives.  I want students to know that even on a campus of over 40,000 students, they're seen.  They're heard.  They're known.

And that's exactly what this student did for me, with his baseball cap in hand.  Once again I'm reminded why I do this job.

Image compliments of Max Klingensmith (Flickr)

11

My Best Advice for New Teachers

Next week, I'll start my fifteenth year of teaching and the tenth at the university.  (That sentence makes me sound significantly older than I currently feel.)  Yesterday I was asked to share my best teaching advice to a group of new graduate students in our department.

As I prepared, I thought back to the start of my career.  How I felt nervous every morning.  How I doubted myself.  How I felt like a fraud as I stood at the front of the classroom, just slightly ahead of my students in life.

One semester, one academic year at a time, thousands of students have appeared on my rosters.  There's now a healthy buffer of experience and age between me and them.  From these fifteen years, I drew out three pieces of advice, both practical and philosophical, to share with these new teachers.

Stay ahead, even if it's by one step.  Regardless of the age level or subject matter taught, the work load can be staggering if it's not managed well.  For new teachers who are simultaneously planning a course while they're teaching it (an inevitable reality for every teacher at some point), it's wise to build enough buffer between what you're doing now and what you must do next.

One way to achieve this is to tackle grading resolutely.  Face that stack of essays head on.  Stare down the assignments, speeches, and exams.  This aggressiveness with grading has helped me to return work in a reasonable time frame (something appreciated by students) and it's also prevented me from drowning in a backlog of paperwork as new paperwork is continually submitted.

Act confidently even if you feel insecure.  In my public speaking classes, I teach my students how to present confidently even if they feel otherwise.  I've applied this principle to my own teaching, especially when I was a novice, so that my tone, posture, and demeanor displayed the confidence I wanted to naturally own.

By saying this, I'm not suggesting that teaching is mere theatrics or a disingenuous act.  But I am acknowledging that there's an element of performance to teaching.  Someone who's confident, even if it's a quiet confidence, can command a room. 

Act confidently, new teacher.  Eventually you'll feel confident, and even better, eventually you'll be confident.  You'll own the role that feels so foreign at the start.

Be proactively for your students.  This is the most important nugget of advice.  At the heart of teaching, there must be a genuine care for the well-being, both academic and personal, of students.  I used to wonder what my students thought of me.  I worried whether they liked me.  As the years have passed, that thinking has been flipped.  I aspire to like my students, to enter the classroom each day thinking well of them.

(Because, honestly, whether in teaching or in life, the amount of thinking that others do about us is not nearly as much as the amount we think others think about us.  This is good to accept.  It's not all about us.)

As a teacher, much like as a parent, being for them means that I invest great time and effort.  It means that I serve, support, pour out, and give something of myself.  At the same time, it means that I say "no" and "you can do better" and "try again."  I challenge my students to write, speak, and be the best they can possibly be because, ultimately, I want them to excel, not merely to be placated or awarded for averageness.

People know when you're for them, when you have their best interest in mind.  Students are no different. 

After presenting to the graduate students, I visited the four classrooms on campus where I'll teach this fall.  It's my start-of-the-semester ritual: checking out the rooms and technology, making sure the number of desks matches the enrollment, praying for each student who will sit in those chairs -- for their safety, for their studies, for their physical and emotional wellness, for their choices.

I've often thought it: these students end up on my rosters, and if only because of this, I consider them entrusted to my care.  Here's to the fifteenth year.

3

Think About and Emulate

Yesterday I collected essays from my honors rhetoric class.  Take a look at these bad boys.

I remember a terrific line uttered by a student when he submitted a paper a few years ago.  As he passed it up the row, he gestured toward the paper, looked at me, and then stated, "It's your problem now."

How apt.  At this point, these essays are out of the students' hands, figuratively and literally.  The responsibility now falls on me to evaluate them.  Admittedly, I warily eyeball them for a while, daunted by the prospect of tackling the stack.  Eventually I find my rhythm.

Some essays will be graded during marathon stretches that last late into the evening after the kids are asleep; others will be picked off individually in twenty-some-minute increments throughout the day, perhaps read from the lobby of the dance studio while my oldest daughter practices or in the car while I wait to pick up my youngest from preschool. 

One commonality exists in how I approach the task, though.  It stems from a piece of advice I read about evaluating writing: think about the most useful feedback you ever received, and emulate it.

What kind of feedback has advanced my own writing?  How can I emulate this for my students through the comments I supply?

Today as I'm facing the stack, it's good to remember that these essays aren't problems sitting in front of me, after all.

2

What Students Need. What We All Need.

I regularly meet with students during office hours as part of my job.  Students come to talk about an essay, a speech, or a grade that they received, but by the time they leave, we've often also talked about their home life, a relationship, or some other aspect of their life unrelated to class.

When I first started this job nine years ago, I only thought of these scenarios from my side of the desk.  I wondered how my students were perceiving me; I worried whether I seemed polished and pulled-together and knowledgeable. 

As I've matured, I've consciously worked to switch this mentality and instead focus on them: What do these students most need from me at this moment?  Direction?  Someone to listen?  A challenge to step it up?  Words of encouragement?

It's flipped how I teach.  Daresay, it's flipped how I think and interact with others in most situations. 

Of course, I still wonder how I'm perceived at times.  I still want to be liked.  I'm still affected by criticism.  I'm not immune to any of these things.  Because of this, I remind myself that my students, like every other human, feel the exact same way. 

When I was a nineteen-year-old sophomore taking a 400-level rhetoric course, I once met with my professor after class.  I certainly don't recall every text we read that semester, and I can't remember the bulk of what we discussed during that exchange.  But I vividly remember one specific detail: that afternoon, beneath the towering oaks outside of Sackett Building, she told me that I was smart.

She pinpointed what I needed to hear at that moment, and I've never forgotten it.

I hope that I can do the same.

2

The Calendar Doesn't Lie: classes really do begin.

 I've seen it on the calendar for weeks.  That small block with the note "classes begin."

Funny how it's still a bit of a surprise when I actually get there.  Really?  Tomorrow is go-time?

In preparation, I've photocopied my syllabi, set up my course websites, practiced pronouncing the names on my class rosters, and -- this is essential -- painted my nails.  For the love of all things polished! 

It's become my tradition to paint my nails for the first day of class, an unspoken pledge to enter the semester feeling pulled-together, even if I'm breathing fumes and correcting smudges.

You've got this, girl, my manicured fingers seem to say.  You've got this.

0

Fake it until you BECOME it.

In the public speaking classes that I teach, I tread a delicate balance.  I recognize that many students are afraid to speak in front of a crowd, yet I still hold them to high standards on their speeches.

Each semester I issue one tip that probably sounds counter-intuitive.  I tell my students to fake it.  Not their preparation or research, mind you, but their confidence.  I tell them to go to the front of the room, ground their stance, and speak with authority, even if they're terrified.  Even if they're having an out-of-body experience.  Even if they sit down after the speech and can't entirely recall what happened during the last 6-8 minutes.

I give this advice because it works.

We all know that our feelings -- say, nervousness or fear -- can be revealed through physical actions, like when our hands shake or our voice quivers.  But the phenomenon works in the opposite direction, too.  Our physical actions don't just reflect our inner feelings; they also can impact those feelings.

When I tell my students to act confidently (even if they feel nervous on the inside), eventually their internal feelings catch up with their external display.  They become confident.  Over the past eight years I've listened to over three thousand student speeches (let that sink in for a minute), and I've witnessed some striking transformations.

This advice doesn't just work for public speaking.  In regular life, how I feel internally impacts how I respond externally.  I'm feeling lethargic, so I lay on the couch.  Simple, right?  But sometimes I lay on the couch and then feel lethargic.  (Of course, sometimes I lay on the couch and feel amazing, but that's another message for another post.  It's all about balance, people.)

At any rate, this week I tried an experiment.  What if I applied this principle to my parenting?  What if I took one day and acted like I have energy, even when I don't?  What if I brought outward enthusiasm to every task, no matter how ordinary?

What if I acted like I was delighted to play Strawberry Shortcake figurines with my two-year-old?  Or like I couldn't wait to turn the page of the book that we've read over a dozen times before?  What if I made it my job to lead Simon Says?  What if I appeared like I wanted nothing more than to crawl in circles around the family room floor and give my kids pony rides?

And the results?  I discovered that pretty much everything -- with the exception of playing make-believe with those Strawberry Shortcakes, which always sucks the creative life-force out of me -- wasn't acting.

I wasn't faking enthusiasm just to fake it.  I was faking it until it became real.

And then I pretty much felt like this:

__________________________________________________________

If you'd like to hear the science behind how how our body language shapes who we are, check out this TED talk by Amy Cuddy.  I show it to my students each semester.

Enjoy more from Robin Kramer with her book Then I Became a Mother.

"Hilarious and spot-on!" (Jennifer Mullen, Mosaic of Moms)
"I got so caught up in it, I couldn't put it down."  (Stacie Nelson, Motherhood on a Dime)

6

Preparing for a New Semester

Late last week I drove onto campus, still quiet before the rush of returning students, and walked to each of my assigned classrooms.  I turned on the lights and sat down at the front desk in each room, scanning the empty seats in front of me.  Then, I read my rosters aloud, calling out the name of each student one at a time, praying a blessing over each.

We'll be sharing the next sixteen weeks together, and this is the finest way to prepare for our shared semester ahead.

1

And So School Begins

I have a dear friend who finished her PhD in the spring.  Shortly after graduation, she interviewed for and was offered a tenure-line position at a quality university.  A month ago she received a letter in the mail from her new university welcoming her to the program and outlining her orientation schedule.

The letter began, "Dear Professor Moore."

She did a double-take.  She told me, "I looked at the letter and thought, Who's that?"  Then I realized it was me.  And then I threw up."

She's absolutely going to make it.

This fall marks my thirteenth year of teaching, the last eight of which have been at the university-level.  Tomorrow is the first day of classes.

Admittedly, I still get slightly nervous on the first day.  Earlier this evening I carefully packed my work bag, wrote down my assigned classrooms, and picked out what clothes I'm going to wear in case I'm incapable of making a decision tomorrow morning.  (This closet-induced mental paralysis has been known to happen.  I stand there like a lost child, mindlessly sliding hangers along the rod as I give myself a weak pep-talk: Think, Robin, think!  You can do this.  You're capable of dressing yourself!)

Tonight I'll triple-check my alarm clock.  Tomorrow morning I'll throw out half of my cereal instead of eating it all like I normally do. And then, at the moment when I pass out copies of the syllabus and begin talking to my new students, I'll be just fine.

This twinge of nervousness, pesky as it is, reminds me that I care.  Plus, I love that I can sit down with my seven-year-old who's just two days shy of starting second grade, and tell her that I understand how she's feeling.

It doesn't matter if you're climbing on the school bus, watching your children as they're climbing on the school bus, or facing a group of college students from the front of the classroom.  Everyone feels these first days of school.

7