[While I did teach a couple online courses during my Spring semester sabbatical, I didn’t have my usual slate of classes by any means. So in lieu of my usual Semester Reflections series, this week I’ve shared a handful of texts I read over the last few months, leading up to this weekend post on what’s next!]
On goals for one Summer and two Fall courses as my sabbatical gradually ends.
- Am Lit II Online: Technically my sabbatical ends with the end of this Spring semester, so more or less this weekend. But I won’t have to commute to campus regularly until the Fall, as my Summer class is an online one as usual. I can’t lie, I still haven’t really cracked the code on covering any part of the breadth or depth of American Literature, 1865-Present, in a five-week Summer session course. Mostly it has reaffirmed and extended my emphasis on student voices, ideas, and skills, rather than content (as there’s simply no way to ask them to read enough to get anywhere close to a true survey experience in this time frame). And when it comes to the very small sample size of authors and texts, my guiding light for this class, even more than it always is, is diversity, with the goal that every author from a particular Unit/time period be from a different community/culture.
- First-Year Writing I: As is generally the case, two of my five Fall courses (four regular and one online/overload) will be sections of First-Year Writing I. My main goal for those sections, as I described in that hyperlinked post at the end of last Fall’s sections, will be to help make sure the first semester for these new FSU students is as smooth and successful of a starting point as possible, on every front. But in this age of AI’s frustrating ubiquitous presence in every space, including educational ones to be sure, another central goal of mine in all First-Year Writing sections going forward will be to do everything I can to remind students of the value (practical and productive but most especially personal and profound) of leaning into their own voices, in academic/scholarly work just as much as everywhere else. Most of my FYW assignments already prioritize that goal, and I’m thinking hard about how I can make the one that doesn’t (an argumentative analysis of short stories) align more closely as well.
- Capstone: As I hope that hyperlinked post from the last time I had the chance to teach Capstone makes very clear, this is simply one of the most fun and inspiring courses I get to teach. In recent years I’ve amplified those qualities by connecting the students to authors we’ve read, from Kevin Gannon to Monique Truong & Eric Nguyen. As of this writing I haven’t figured out which text and thus potentially which author I want to feature in that space in this Fall’s Capstone section (and I welcome suggestions!), but I know that whatever we read and do, this will be a class that will reaffirm my faith in the young folks who are the future of English Studies, writing, and, y’know, every damn thing else.
Next series starts Monday,
Ben
PS. What’s next for you all?
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