It's very easy to get Deaf kids to shush--just turn out the lights. :)

Argh. I intended to go to bed early tonight, cause I was tired today, and I have an appointment early tomorrow, but noooo, it's already 11:30. Doh.

I also meant to get to bed early. I've been exhausted, and I've got to teach early tomorrow. Also, I just got my course evaluations from last semester back, and they were pretty bad, so I'm feeling kind of bad about not having prepared as much for this class as I probably should have. (My evaluations from last year, then only thing I was constantly ranked well on was "Instructor is available and helpful during office hours." For the other stuff, like "Instructor answers questions completely" and "Instruction explains material clearly," all three of my classes were pretty evenly split between "strongly agree" and "strongly disagree," with only a few in the middle. Which is puzzling me, a bit, and also making me a bit worried about what I should do differently so that there won't be so many people who strongly disagree.)

all three of my classes were pretty evenly split between "strongly agree" and "strongly disagree," with only a few in the middle. Which is puzzling me, a bit, and also making me a bit worried about what I should do differently

To my not-knowing-any-different ears, it sound like there really isn't anything you could do differently, because if you changed to make the "strongly disagree" people happier, all the "strongly agree" people would become "strongly disagree" people.

I could be wrong, though. It's been known to happen from time to time.

eta: Kara and Leif just sank in. That would be something else.

Kinda epic, isn't it?

Yeah, you're probably right. I think part of this is just frustration that it took four months to get these forms, and by now, I barely remember half of what I did in that class. And part of it's annoyance at myself that there were that many people having trouble and I didn't know. And almost nobody wrote comments, and those who did only wrote them about stuff that was beyond my control, so it's not like I even have anything constructive to build on here.

And part of it's annoyance at myself that there were that many people having trouble and I didn't know. And almost nobody wrote comments, and those who did only wrote them about stuff that was beyond my control, so it's not like I even have anything constructive to build on here.

If they strongly disagree and don't give you a comment, disregard it completely. They're malcontents who aren't worth wasting your time. Seriously. You made yourself totally available. If they didn't understand something and didn't pursue it beyond the class it's their loss and their resoponsibility, not yours.

Cashmere, JZ, Jen, Kristin, Frankenbuddha, Lyra Jane, JohnSweden, Trudy Booth, DebetEsse, Fred Pete, Laura, and Lysana have new tags.

No Princess Tickybox yet? Okay then. Carry on.

I am probably a bad person, but my new tagline just gives me the giggles. I think it's just what Lyra said early on: the word "sockpuppet" started to look really funny. I may also be entering a teaspoon state as it is late here and I'm really really sleepy.

I don't think you're a bad person, Kristin. I think you're a blonde person.

Now that a proper separation between topics has been established, Susan, IMO you are so very right about "cock." I'm pretty damn certain it's period, it's totally what a soldier would say, it's a vast improvement over candied length, and this Jane Austen-phile has no problem whatever with the word. Plus, I'm pretty sure I've seen it used in a couple of Regencies over the last year or so, so unless my fevered brain is totally making it up you've got established, published precedent. Go team cock!

Thanks, JZ! And that's the exact argument I made to my critique partner--my hero may be an extraordinarily intelligent and self-educated man, but he's a reallyo trulyo soldier, not a gentleman in disguise. Unlike a book I dimly remember from many years ago where an author had a nobly born youth enlist as a common soldier out of some sort of democratic feeling and not wanting to coast on the advantages his parentage bought him. That made me shrug a bit even then. And now that I've taught myself so much about society of the period in general and Wellington's army in particular....you've got to be kidding me. Suspension of disbelief can only go so far.

(Of course, my next book or the book after is set to feature a nobly born common sailor, but that's different--she got taken up by a press gang while running away from home disguised as a boy, and decided she'd rather take her chances at sea than go back and face the things she was running away from.)