Standing at the Trailhead of Winter

Homemade Apple Butter I'm supposed to be reading/responding to student papers, but instead, I'm doing all kinds of other things. Like making apple butter. And cutting out the raspberry vines. And researching having backyard chickens in town. I was hoping to have all the papers responded to by late this evening, but at this point, I'll be lucky to have one section of the four completed. With each semester, I'm finding it harder and harder to make myself sit for any length of time to read student work. I had every intention of getting up early this morning to get started on the papers. I did get up at a reasonable hour. It was before 8 am, and for a Sunday, that's early for me. I fixed myself an egg white omelet along with some bacon and coffee, and read a new book while I ate. I figured I'd start in on the work after I finished breakfast. Instead, all I kept thinking about was the apple trees laden with lovely red apples we'd come across on a piece of p...

Seems like I haven't written in quite some time. That's not to say I haven't thought about writing a blog post. I have. Nearly every day. But I just couldn't bring myself to sit down and write. I sound like so many of my students. So, taking the advice I always give to students who lament not knowing how to start a paper, I'm just going to write. The post will be a hodge-podge, so if you stopped by for something eloquent and insightful, you might be disappointed. Or not. Back into the swing of things at work, and this semester I'm trying something new. For years, I followed what could be considered a fairly typical approach to teaching: creating a calendar with exercises and longer assignments listed, their due dates, and all students doing these exercises and assignments. If a student didn't do the exercise or assignment for a given due date, he/she couldn't make it up. The points were just lost. This semester, I still have a calendar with exercises l...