The chemistry 161 students I mentored for all of summer session I, are going to take their final exam in about 9 hours. I wish the entire class luck, regardless of whether or not they attended PLUS sessions.
On Monday, July 8th, I start summer school. This will be my first on-campus class at Kapiolani Community College. I took an online class, and adult continuing education class (taiko), and interned at the Customer Care Center doing IT for faculty and staff in the early 2000s. I didn’t realize that taking the Math 140 class at KCC would mean buying another math textbook… but I discovered KCC uses a different book from LCC’s math department for Math 135 and 140. After reading through some of the KCC text, I realized I officially hated the LCC math text I was forced to use last semester. The text I like that we’re using at KCC, is: ”Precalculus”; by M.Dugopolski, 5th ed. or custom for Kapiolani Community College: Isbn 978-1256-109310. It’s just written so much better, and with a much more scientific slant. The Professor, Kadala, emailed us today on the 4th of July with the class syllabus. I was stoked since this is a good sign to me that he’s organized and caring. Oh man. This is making me want to switch my calculus I back to KCC instead of LCC…
I logged into the MyMathLab site, but have yet to try anything out. I started reading the book, and plan to read the sections we’re scheduled to cover on Monday, Tuesday, and maybe Wednesday if I can get to it.
With a feeling of slight guilt, I submitted my new availability to my part time minimum wage paying retail job. I had to write it on a note and leave it for the manager that does scheduling. I think she might have a cow, but hope not. I asked for Wednesdays off… thinking I’d have exams on Thursdays. It’s looking like that won’t be the case. On the syllabus, along with the most exclamation points I’ve ever seen on a syllabus before, is a tentative exam schedule that has all unit exams landing on a Wednesday. I also asked not to work beyond 8 PM on Sundays, 6 PM on Saturdays, and 10 PM on Mondays… I said I could close on Thursdays and Fridays. I also made some earlier hours available to them. When the fall semester starts I have to decide what to do. I should probably do that sooner than later.
I debate just going seasonal and not working the part time gig during the semester, but then a part of me thinks it might be good if they’d let me work one shift a week so I don’t get rusty. My paychecks will be like, $40 a week, lol! But, I suppose that’s still food / gas, etc.
You’re going to have to try much harder if you want to bore ME. I found this interesting. Textbooks in general just suck, and in sixteen years of teaching high school, I have never assigned one in any of my classes EXCEPT the math classes, and I hated even using that.
The …for Dummies books should be the starting place for anyone wishing to assign anyone a textbook, if you ask me. As an English major (and someone who’s really sensitive to the way language is used), I’m kind of convinced that textbooks are written in such a way as to create separation between people with knowledge and people seeking to gain knowledge, as if you have to pass some kind of intellectual obstacle course to gain the knowledge. I don’t buy it. Good teachers (and good writers) should be able to explain stuff with language that doesn’t create that separation.