The Icing

My friend Jefferson posted his celebrity look-alikes on his webpage. I had to try this out--and when I saw the results, I knew I had to post this.

The site allowed me to edit out two people I'd never heard of--and since one is limited to eight celebrities, that opened up two spots for Joni Mitchell (who I adore) and Adam Sandler (whose appearance as my look-alike totally amused me).

I'm fascinated by the superficiality of this process, the ways that the system seemed to fixate on one feature (my hair?) in order to find my "look-alikes." When I see this collage, I don't really see myself in any of these faces. In fact, I tried it with two other photos and no celebrity appeared twice. In the third picture I scanned, I'm wearing glasses. The result was that many of the same photos (of male celebrities) that appeared as Jefferson's look-alikes re-appeared as mine.

I considered a couple of different endings for this post. The self-satisfied "I'm perfectly comfortable with who I am and the way I look." The academic "Who cares about celebrities anyway." But I think I'll end by saying this was fun to do on a rainy morning at the beginning of my weekend. I'm not sure the process merits any more serious thought than that.

This morning, I got myself ready, set the alarm, locked my back door, and entered the garage. When I pressed the unlock button on my remote, nothing happened. No clicking of the car doors as they unlocked. No single toot of the horn. Nothing. I thought maybe the battery on my remote had died, so I unlocked the door the old fashioned way and tried to unlock the backdoors. Again, nothing. When I twisted the key, nothing. My car was as dead as it's ever been. This after recently, in fact VERY recently, spending a big chunk of change on getting my car repaired.

Since I had meetings to go to at school today, I called my friend Toni and asked for a lift. Soon, she was honking outside and we enjoyed riding to school together. Being the drama queen that I'm not very often but can sometimes be, I told everyone about my car (as I was apologizing for being late). As I worked and attended meetings the rest of the day, so many people offered their help. Rick, Bo, Ginny, and Asao all offered to give me a ride home.

I used to be and can sometimes still be the kind of person who has a hard time asking for help. I've gotten into the habit of walking 5 miles home after I drop off my car to be fixed. And, although I do sometimes ask for a ride back to pick it up, I've also been known to take the bus. When stuff doesn't work in my house, it's sometimes even hard for me to call (and pay) someone to fix it. I have an independent streak that makes me feel like I should be able to take care of things on my own.

But today was one of those days when I couldn't take care of myself. And I'm grateful for friends who were there for me--and who made it easy to accept help.

My car still sits dead in my garage . . . but I'm not stressed out, surprisingly. I know that this weekend I can bum rides, walk, or take the bus to do what I need to do. And I know that on Monday, I'll get a jump or get my car towed to get it fixed. So, aside from the drama of sharing my hard luck story today, I had a good day.

Sometimes I play Scrabble Blast (an online game) so much that my fingers, wrist, and arm ache. I'm headed towards carpal tunnel syndrome . . . but I can't help myself.

I'm really enjoying my classes this semester. In fact, for the last few years I've either lucked out on having good classes . . . or I've made progress as a teacher. I know I'm not a perfect teacher, but so far this semester I've felt good about almost every class I've taught (except for the first day with T.S. Eliot's "The Waste Land").

Today I taught two classes. In the first class, a writing class based on children's literature, my students turned in their first essay, which I'm calling "writing projects" in this class. They wrote literacy autobiographies and we practiced a lot of brainstorming techniques for this essay. They did a literacy lifeline, freewrites, a web, etc. They also critiqued model literacy autobiographies, worked in writing groups, and conferenced with me. Throughout the whole process, most of the students have seemed engaged and enthusiastic (definitely something I didn't expect).

So in today's class, they had compiled a mini-portfolio containing all their brainstorming, drafting, and author's notes (in which they explain where they are in the writing process and what kinds of feedback they need). The first thing we did (after I'd showed them how to access the online materials they need for our next class) was a written reflection on their writing experience. I had specific questions they needed to consider in order to help them 1) recognize what had worked well for them 2) set goals for the next writing project 3) understand how they could use the strategies practiced for this essay in other writing situations. I also asked them to self-assess their own writing using a rubric. I'm trying to help my students learn how to be independent writers and thinkers, so that after they leave my class (and the university), they'll have strong writing strategies and skills to draw upon. After the self-assessment, we talked about what had worked (and not worked) for them and about grading issues. Although there were a few comments about how writing groups hadn't worked, their comments were overwhelmingly positive. Most of them enjoyed the assignment, liked their writing group, and felt confident about what they had accomplished.

We ended the class by reading different versions of Cinderella in small groups (versions from different cultures like Hmong, Turkish, Korean, Filipino, etc.). We didn't have time to process that much, but in the next class we'll start talking about their next writing assignment which is to re-tell a fairy tale from a different character's perspective or using a different gender, setting it in in a different time period, or placing the fairy tale in an ethnic/national setting other than the original story. Did I mention that all my students will be elementary teachers?

In my other class, U.S. literature after 1914, the class entered talking about how frustrated they'd been reading the Gertrude Stein selections, a reaction that I anticipated. I let them vent a little, and then we looked at some quotes from Stein (and others) about The Making of the Americans in particular and Stein's stylistic experimentation in general. Once they started to consider why Stein repeated so much, what she was trying to accomplish, they were more open to making meaning. We looked at a couple of paragraphs together and then divided the excerpt into sections which small groups examined. We ended up having really interesting discussions about gender, American identity, and style. We also looked briefly at "Susie Asado," which didn't work quite as well. I need to figure out how to better teach Stein's poetry.

After briefly and globally talking about e.e. cummings, we shifted to Wallace Stevens' "Peter Quince at the Clavier." Because students sometimes feel a little put off by Stevens, I talked with them a little bit about some of the themes that often recur in Stevens. Then we moved through the poem section by section. We were a little rushed at the end, but the students felt they understand the interplay between desire and art within the poem.

Today was mostly a good day teaching--I felt energized by my students' insight, participation, and enthusiasm. Those qualities are things that I really love about my students at Fresno State.

Johnnie keeps encouraging me to link my blogs from my university website, but I've been hesitant to do so. I haven't been sure that I want my students to read my blogs. And I've wanted to give myself time to find my voice as a blogger. I feel like I'm doing that with my food blog, but I'm still not so sure about this blog. I guess my entries on this blog address whatever strikes my fancy. Although my entries are sometimes thoughtful, they aren't terribly deep or profound. And when I occasionally blog about teaching, I haven't been so sure that I want my students to read what I'm thinking.

Recently, Johnnie sent me a link to an article about this very topic. I found the last paragraph especially interesting:

"Add a link to your own blog to the course website. Students will read it, because some students are interested in what professors think or are working on. Gives students access to the professor that's different than in the classroom, and shows them that professors are thinking about topics outside the classroom."

Jeremy makes a good point here, especially for teachers at universities like mine where many of my students are first generation students who are a little mystified by the academy. Perhaps I should blog more about my intellectual interests . . . and make this blog public. Although I would likely change my blogging style if I knew that my students were amongst my readership, I can also see how some of my blog posts might go deeper and become more meaningful. So far, I retain incognito status, at least where my students are concerned, but I'm contemplating a change.