Hey, Thursday – where’d ya go?

It's just about bedtime.  I brushed my teeth and wondered where the day went.  I woke up around 6 AM, wrote a post about David Foster Wallace, and started my work day routine.  Classes flew today.  I did not feel as though I had particularly stellar lesson plans today, however, my habit of overplanning paid dividends today as I have a few things I wanted to get to today leftover for tomorrow.  Whether I overplan my periods or underestimate the needs of my students is up for debate.  I could argue either point, find evidence in my planning and instruction to support both positions.  

My anatomy class is turning out to be a nice surprise.  They're really interested in the subject and they have a ton of questions.  This can turn into a problem if you fail to redirect the class back onto your lesson plan.  If you're going to have a problem with a class, genuine curiosity is a good one to have.  I do not believe they are trying to derail me or get me off topic.  They want to go deeper into the topic, dive straight in without the background knowledge needed to understand the answer to their questions in a meaningful way.  I steered them back on course by asking them to hold their questions for now, write them down somewhere, and ask again when we get near that topic.  I suggested an independent research project to address their plurality of questions, which was met with excitement by the students.  Hooray for research!  Anyway, I'm beginning to dread the class less.  I've set the hook and now it's time to reel them in.

It's nice to end on a positive note for a change.