First Published on: Jan 19, 2009
It was good to be sitting at my desk in my office at school today. Spring semester classes don’t begin until Wednesday, and I had considerable uninterrupted time to clean the office, organize materials, discard last semester’s uneaten lunch, and think about my three courses. Precious moments of uninterrupted, focused reflection, planning, and action are rare for me once classes begin, because I choose to keep my door open to students and colleagues.
I’m teaching Introductory Psychology (after a one-semester hiatus) for probably close to the 100th time. I taught it as a graduate student at Ohio State, and I have taught here at Carroll on several summers and evenings in addition to almost every semester since February of 1978. Indeed, this coming semester, I shall yet again be teaching a daughter of one of my former students. In some ways, Introductory Psychology is the most challenging course for me to teach. Most students are not majors, and it is a challenge to simply and with integrity condense a discipline I have explored for almost forty years.
This semester, inspired by conversations with colleagues and students, I am going to incorporate several innovations.
- A section on cross-cultural psychology will feature social psychologist Richard Nisbett, who will speak on campus about the “Geography of the Mind” (see my earlier blog).
- Having students read and respond to some of my future (and older “Curious David”) blogs on psychological topics. I may create a special wiki for them.
- Involving students in some fashion with the research I shall be conducting with 12 seniors. I am toying with five research topics: the effects of color on behavior; revisiting the “Mozart effect”; revisiting “subliminal” persuasion; evaluation research (e.g., the efficacy of Rosetta Stone software); and a systematic evaluation of Web 2.0 learning tools. As the President of this institution is fond of saying, “Stay tuned.”
Carroll truly is being enriched more and more by the presence of international students. Today, while photocopying, I struck up a conversation with a student from Brazil. Last semester, I had the delightful experience of learning with and from a Vietnamese student. A graduate school classmate of mine has just become an editor of a British journal. A Norwegian friend who mentored me in 1974 has just published a book. My discipline is finally becoming more culturally aware, much less chauvinistic — see Arnett, J. J. (2008). The neglected 95%: Why American psychology needs to become less American. American Psychologist, 63, 602-614— and recognizing that the world is indeed flat. How exciting; what fun!
There is much to be curious about. That is vital to keeping me playful, energized, and wanting to teach and to learn.
Thanks to my incipient readership. Based on the statistics I can monitor, I am already attracting a readership at a higher rate than I did while writing for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel last year. And this without Mom’s help!
Keep those comments and feedback coming, either through posting or by sending them to my email address.
