‘Tis the season for making resolutions for the New Year. Here are five of mine —which I plan to monitor daily.
Mind my waste. I’ve become increasingly sensitive to my having “too much stuff” — affluenza? and too little time to enjoy it. It now makes sense to me to enjoy what I have, explore its potential, and use it more efficiently, more generously, and more wisely. Two very specific projects I have in mind for the near future are 1) spending time mastering the many features of WordPress, which I have yet to explore, and 2) fully mastering the features of my MAC.
Harm no good. Pauline Chen’s marvelous and marvelously written bookFinal Exam: A Surgeon’s Reflections on Mortality has caused me to reflect deeply about what I want to accomplish (and to avoid) in my remaining years.
Do a right thing. I am not omniscient; therefore, I have no way of knowing if I am doing THE right thing. But it is obvious to me that there continues to be room in Professor David’s Neighborhood for doing something just because it is Aright thing to do-–for being good for goodness sake.
Do a Write Thing. I’ve discovered that I truly enjoy the act of writing. Encouraged by the feedback I’ve received from readers of my blogs, I hope to make the act of writing a daily habit. There’s this short story I’ve been threatening to write for years. And that history of that small college.. and…
Do a Thing Right—a perfectionist I am not, though I do enjoy striving for consistent excellence in many of my endeavors. However, I need to make time to return to some of my failures and try again.
The campus should be abuzz tonight with Friday’s arrival of 740 new freshmen. Just sent an email to my six research assistants alerting them to the imminent removal of my invisibility cloak. One, predictably, replied within 30 seconds:). These exceptional students increasingly play a critical role in my ability to accomplish things both inside and outside the classroom. They are fun to be with, bright, and hard-working -though at times we annoy each other! I enjoyed the creative iBook they wrote last semester very much.
Trying now to finalize syllabi and better organize materials on my computers at home. Do I REALLY need 87 apps on my iPad???? How best can I serve Carroll as a Technology Fellow?
This semester, I’m determined to get more writing done. I am most successful in that endeavor when I block off a time to write every day—and do so. Time will tell.
This will be a semester of winnowing and improving course materials. I’m going to take the plunge and use a “free” online text as an ancillary reading source in Experimental Social Psychology.
It is increasingly challenging to protect Carroll College’s traditions as fewer and fewer people here remember anything other than Carroll UNIVERSITY. This saddens me, but perhaps it is a sign. I am going to try to heed the advice of a trustee friend this summer, who gently suggested that some perceived me as overly cynical.
I can learn much from the wisdom of Ruth and Abby Joy (below). Neither has a cynical attitude nor a negative thought.
George Orwell fascinates me on several accounts — his mastery of language, his prescience, and his outlook on politics. While I was faculty president, I gave copies of his book to people as a reminder of the chilling threats and effects of totalitarianism and doublespeak on this campus.
Lewis Carroll, though more playful, is also masterful with language and in alerting us to the dangers when illogic becomes the norm and language is misused.
I find Carroll’s decisions a few years ago (process and outcome) to eliminate the word “department” from our Carroll argot, and the more recent change of our name from “college” to “university,” Orwellian and Humpty-Dumpty-like.
Still, the joy of teaching remains, and the truth will set us free.
Look at my cluttered desktop above (click on the JPEG to see the screenshop taken with SnagIt). Cluttered with Web 2.0 tools waiting for me to fully master, evaluate, and teach.
Doggy is snoring at my feet. My First Year Seminar students are sending me their first formal blogs as I type this. So far, I am pleased by their efforts.
I’m pondering whether to request release time for two courses next year to deepen my mastery of Web 2.0 tools and promote their use among other faculty and interested students. Every day, I discover a new application that has high potential for learners. What do you think?
So much to learn. Should I give up two classes next year and, in return, use that time to become an educator in Web 3.0 tools for all interested faculty and students? Write a book? It’s a tempting idea since time is such a precious commodity, and I think that I now have the knowledge base, the momentum, and the student talent. Carpe diem?
There are so many NEAT and potentially useful gadgets. And I believe potential readers of this blog know that clicking a hypertext link can be rewarding!
Here, for example, is a way for students to search for Psychology topics on the Social Psychology Network.
Time to return through the Looking Glass. (Ask Alice).
Even more curious in Carroll Land and seeking help.
Curious how each piece of blog authoring software takes getting used to. I’m looking for something as close to what I used when I was writing the “Curious David” column JSOnline yet will allow me to share the many things I now know are possible.
I’m writing this on my Mac। I hope to make this blog useful and of interest especially to my students and former students.
It’s odd to rediscover the earlier posts. Robin is now three (and a svelte 127 pounds). She has had two major ACL operations and has matured into a wonderful, if idiosyncratic, companion. She might even think the same of me, though Debbie is without doubt her first love.
And oh, how my blogging experiences have matured (and blogging has changed) since I first explored this tool. I had a year’s experience blogging as “Curious David” for the educational community JSOnline and explored Web 2.0 Learning Tools while teaching a course at Carroll University.
Curious. I seem unable to put to rest this venue where I blogged for so many years with my talented student research assistants. Perhaps it is because I continue to hear from former (and present!) faculty, staff, students, and trustees on Facebook and LinkedIn.
So much to learn. So little time. That platitude is so true – especially during retirement! I’m going to use this venue to s t r e t c h my mastery of WordPress.
Also, to experiment with the MPL-Publisher plugin for ebook publishing.
This will be included in a series of blogs tentatively titled “David in Carroll Land” based on 4 decades of teaching at Carroll.
As is my habit for the past 4 decades, I am sitting in my office this morning of Commencement — reflecting. I drive in early to ensure getting a parking place before the proud families start arriving. Even at this early hour, Carroll staff and administrators are working (unheralded) to make this campus even more beautiful and welcoming for families on this special day. Mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, uncles, aunts, babies, babies-soon-to-join-the-world — the campus explodes with sounds, colors, emotions, and celebratory chaos. Often, I walk around campus taking photos (or accepting an invitation to be photographed).
I don’t know this year’s senior class as well as I used to when I taught five or six different courses that drew freshmen through seniors. These last few years, I have been pretty much a one-trick grey mare, teaching Statistics and Experimental Design. But every Commencement is special, and this one I graduate with the seniors!
My Carroll lifetime friend and business partner, Greg Schneider, shared with me William Bridges’ “Transition Framework,” which I find quite relevant today. There are “Endings,” a “Neutral Zone”, and “New Beginnings.”
Endings involve disengagement, disidentification, disenchantment, and disillusionment, but with time, one reacts to an ending, realizes that one is headed to the neutral zone, and finds new sources of stability and guidance that help one through the transition.
The “neutral zone” is characterized by confusion, resolution, and bipolar reactions. Moving through it involves embracing it, finding a regular time to reflect, and reviewing one’s life to put the past in context and move on.
New beginnings involve understanding, acceptance, hope, and fondness – taking bold new actions as one tests adjustments in one’s life. Helping others who are struggling with the transition is, in itself, healing. Thank you, Greg, for this guidance and support across the years.
A Carroll student asked if he could sit in on my last lecture. Alas, Antonio, I am still writing it, but here are my unfinished notes.
Be authentic
Be sincere
Be kind
Be charitable
Be generous
Be open-minded
Be resilient
Be reflective
Be attentive
Be playful
Be courageous
Be …
My emotions are mixed — no different from those of the soon-to-be-graduates. Joy—sorrow—elation—sadness—weariness—rejuvenation. At the end of the day — emptiness, and some poignant, positive residual reminders. I often tease my graduating research assistants that, upon their exit from campus, I “exorcise” our shared office space to better adjust to the temporary emotional vacuum left by their absence from “Dr. David’s Neighborhood.” When you graduate, you remain in my memories as I have come to know you, and forever that age! Forever young.
My sitting on the stage has its liabilities as I’ll feel that I must behave uncharacteristically well-mannered!
Each Carroll Baccalaureate and Commencement ceremony is special to me, just as each student I have gotten to know is special. I have chosen (or been called) to teach and to learn, and though they (you) may not realize it, I genuinely do learn so much from my students and from the challenges of trying to teach them well.
Thank you, graduating seniors past and present (and for a few ever-so-short more years to come), for all YOU have taught me. Put to good use your many talents, your energy, your playfulness, your empathy, your resilience, and your creative ideas to make the world a better place. Come to appreciate (as I did upon graduating from Oberlin College in 1971) that you have been privileged to receive a good education due not only to your own sacrifices and hard work but also to the many members of the larger community whom you may never have met or whom you took for granted—Board Members, Administration, Staff, Faculty, and Alumni—who
.
deeply care about you.
I hear the sound of bagpipes, and the bells call me.
