Teaching...it's so much better this semester

Now that I'm over the hump of teaching the supplemental material, I've settled into teaching the Myers text. I have never appreciated Myers more. I just have to say the supplemental text was horrendous. The students didn't understand it and neither did I. But, I've taught two lessons since the supplemental text, and I've actually enjoyed it. Of course, I love the neurosciences, and it's such a relief to teach it. I'm hoping this enjoyment will last into some of the other topic areas that I know less about. I'm definitely feeling more comfortable teaching in front of the students. Bit by bit, I've moved away from the traditional lecture mode, and it has made a world of difference. There's also a world of difference between teaching in front of the students as a lowly graduate student and teaching as an assistant professor with a Ph.D. My confidence level has enjoyed leaps and bounds since I got that title, and it's associated pay. But, I largely credit some of the changes to the extensive faculty development I received during new faculty orientation last summer. The learner centered approach they taught us makes more sense to me now. The engagement with the students is much higher, and I think students are learning more with this approach. I've also been learning about the students and their lives. They told me about their "hall brawls" and techno raves today before class. I had to laugh. It's good to hear that they still have a little fun.

School has already started

I'm already two and a half weeks into the semester when most colleges and universities aren't starting until next week or the week after. And let me tell you, this has been the most tumultuous start of the semester that I've ever experienced. We have a new course director who's in charge of almost every aspect of the class other than the actual teaching that I do inside the classroom. He had been directed by the department head to make the class more challenging, to incorporate critical thinking into the instruction, and to emphasize anthropology and sociology in addition to psychology. So other members of the department assisted in writing a whole new supplementary text to replace the first chapter and by which to conclude the course. Needless to say, I have felt very challenged to teach in areas outside my expertise. There has been so much upheaval with the class that I have been unclear on how to prepare the students for the quizzes. I suppose this confusion has been affecting other instructors as well because the overall average for the first quiz was 75% and the second quiz was 65%.

Above all this confusion and frustration on my part was that two instructors had to take emergency leave for a funeral and surgery. The rest of us were struggling to cover their classes. I was teaching every day and had caught the cold virus running rampant among the students. It was so stressful. At least I don't have to cover additional classes next week; other instructors who don't teach our course have pitched in to help. But, I was rudely woken up this morning from a terrible teaching anxiety dream. I dreamed I had come back from a conference and was unprepared to teach. The students were disrespectful and complained; the AV equipment was on the fritz, turning off and on at the drop of a hat. Ugh! I hate teaching dreams! And I needed just a couple more hours of sleep to catch up on lost sleep from last week. I was so stressed out last week that I would wake up at 2:30am, 3:30am, or 4am many nights, unable to fall back asleep before I had to get up at 5am (I teach the first class of the day, way to early for me.) I'm really hoping things will settle down soon.