At this point in the semester I want to say to my students: Go away. Just go and write your final paper and stop complaining and leave me alone. What do I have to say to them? Nothing.
It is with this loss of language that I approach blogging today. I wish I had something funny to report (nothing. Wait! I did spill chicken vegetable soup all over myself today!).
I'm not sure if it is the late Thanksgiving break, the two day work week, my sinus problems, the pre-finals blahs or some combination, but I am finding it hard to care about anything except chocolate, beer and/or wine, and TV. Oh wait! And potato chips. Seriously. I feel like I could watch hours and hours of TV. But the TV is not cooperating. There is nothing trashy on! What's wrong? (should I be blogging that at TWIT?)
Sigh. What I need is a good mystery novel and a solid month off. I am still trying to figure out what it is about teaching, specifically, that exhausts one so. What is it?
4 comments:
Oh! I know the answer to that last question. It's because the semester is so f***ing LOOOOOOOOOONG.
This is called the Thrashing. It's when just driving toward school is like beating your head against a wall. But then you come home and wonder what what is there to do here either. Head bangs against TV. TV responds as well as students, which is to say not at all.
I think it's this point in the semester when we a) recognize all the things we wish we'd done better; b) recognize how all the things we did well fell on what seems like 75 percent deaf ears, despite everything we know about writing pedagogy yadda yadda yadda; and c) feel the effects of the change of seasons, so that yes, staying in bed and eating carbs of various sorts is indeed our evolutionary imperative.
Teaching is exhausting because it requires one to be both mentally and physically in tune and available to the students and to try to get them, in turn, to be mentally and physically in tune and available to you. This usually does not happen perfectly so we feel discouraged and therefore, exhausted. Also talking that long is tiring!!!
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