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August 28, 2007
Three out of three and a half down.
And what was I thinking last year?
I'm teaching Art 101 (cave painting to however close to the Renaissance I get), as per usual. But I changed the damned textbook. Why, O Lord? Why? Now I'm having to retool all kinds of things - not that the art's changed, but the specific examples chosen are different.
I've already whined about the two new courses - Art 218: The Age of Chivalry and BiDis 291: Medieval Art & Literature - the Vikings. Yeah, one of those two is team-taught, but that means thinking twice as hard so we can both keep up. I'd read almost everything we're teaching before we even started talking about it, but it's been awhile for some of them. But, hey, we showed the dragon-slaying scene from the Fritz Lang Siegfried on Monday - what's not to love? And Laurence and I always have a good time - and the students seem to love it, too. Not to mention the inevitable unintended fashion show - Monday was floral - my tie, her capri pants.
Then there's Chivalry. Or Gothic. Or High Medieval. I reactivated a course already on the books, so that's my excuse for the utterly-un-Cranky title. Tomorrow I get to do Romanesque - Compostela or Toulouse? Those of my readers who remember the late Thomas W. Lyman know my answer to that one. Pietas. Not to mention dedication dates.
Then there's the half course. The Rome 2008 group is doing a half-credit course-to-prepare thing called Italy Now! My punctuation. We're making them do things like eat Italian olives and see Italian movies and learn the 7 Hills of Rome before they go. I don't know that it will make it better than 2003 (truly, I had a great group), but it might make it easier for the students. We won't start meeting until next week, so I haven't finished a full cycle of my classes yet.
All in all, it's going to be busy but fun.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at August 28, 2007 7:05 PM