Thursday, February 04, 2010

I feel like dancing for joy


I just cannot tell you how often a student who has missed a class will meet me in the corridor and say, "Did I miss anything on Friday?" or "Did you do anything last class?"
Of course I immediately want to say, "No, we just went to the pub."
Rosemary Riveter (http://painfullyfluffy.blogspot.com/) gave me this link in her comment on my previous post. If you didn't click on it then, I would recommend you do so now. Especially if you're a teacher. But even if you aren't.
I would die happy if I'd written this poem. It's called "Did I miss anything?"

http://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/013.html

13 comments:

  1. I had one class with a very thick syllabus. The instructor read out of it, word for word. The tests came out of this, verbatim. I stopped going to class after the first exam, aced the course.

    Thankfully, I had a lot more classes that actually had content, interested teachers who engaged us, got us to participate and think.

    Best was Anatomy, the professor drew freehand, as we colored along in our book. An artist and dancer and storyteller, and we his rapt audience.

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  2. That is priceless! I especially love the first few lines and also the bit about the angel! You should make copies and hand it out to students who ask that question!

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  3. Hahaha! That's awesome! I'd blow that up poster size and put it in the front of all the rooms I teach in. Thanks for the chuckle and insight!

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  4. Love it! Passed it on to my husband, ex-teacher and now environmental specialist type person - he reckons it applies in both instances!

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  5. brilliant! i just sent the link to my son-the-11th-grade-dean

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  6. I love those opposite responses. Who says sarcasm is the lowest form of wit? They were wrong!

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  7. Wonderful. I think I will post this on the classroom door.

    I ran into a young gentleman yesterday after school who had missed the first class of the semester (which started yesterday). "Where were you?" I asked. "Oh," he replied, "I didn't realize seminars started today." "Well," I said, "I hope you don't mind - we started the course without you."

    What could he say?

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  8. I did enjoy that poem. Thank you Isabelle. I'm very conscious, as a teacher of voluntary students -so to speak-, of trying not to cover too much when I know people are missing. I worry that they'll panic when they return and stop attending tap class all together.

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  9. Not a teacher, but still enjoyed that poem!

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  10. It's ace!

    I think I'm with Molly - any students who ask the question get a copy of the poem!

    I wonder if doing a close reading as the first lesson of the term would have any preventative effect? Probably not, alas.

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  11. Love the poem, it should be posted up in seminar rooms and classrooms everywhere. Husband was once tutor to a student who became absolutely notorious in the university department where he(husband that is) was teaching as a post grad. Said student once turned up about ten minutes before end of tutorial and said in hurt tones 'But you started without me!'(possibly he thought have 'I missed anything' was too hackneyed).
    A couple of years later husband was interviewed for a teaching job at the student's old school. In the commonroom during lunch word had got around and teachers kept coming up to him and saying thing like 'you didn't have to tutor John Somers did you? Gosh, you poor thing, he nearly drove us mad..

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