I love the first day of class. Today was great. After having taught in a few different places for several years now, I’ve come to at least one conclusion about my teaching:
My classes will most likely always feel like a laboratory. I take the things that I like from semester to semester, and I get rid of the things that don’t work and try new stuff. This usually means that every semester I’m trying a bunch of new things. This semester I am having my students blog with Tumblr, and I’m really looking forward to it. I’m also using an XP system for grading in which students start the semester with 0 and will end with somewhere around 100,000 points. Neither of these are completely new ideas for my classes, but I’m using both of them in new ways. Maybe someday I will have everything totally nailed down. For now, I feel like my courses are in a constant state of evolution.
I like it that way.