Now where'd I leave that flash drive?

Day Two

It was very odd to be working without a paper syllabus the first day and I found that I was nervous about the prospect. Though I did have one hard-copy of everything, the thought of being heavily dependent on PowerPoint and Blackboard and the computers (I did not bring blue-books for backup) caused me more stress than usual for a first day, but the students were fine and class moved along fine. I also noticed two things: 1) I have a tendency not to proofread as well on screen as in hard-copy and found a few mistakes in my syllabus and assignments and, 2) I do not yet work as well off of PowerPoionts as from an in-hand assignment and have a bit of a “chaotic” feel to my presentation of material in Blackboard as I can go in any order. I’ll have to learn to use the non-linearity to advantage in the class. That, I should get better at with time.

The computer in my office is still out. My watch is still dead. My flash drive is now acting wonky as well. Ah for the days of scratching on one rock with another (though I do not miss the sound of chalk as it always sort of creeped me out.) The students are all good with MSWord and tech stuff, so I had all of them logged-in and ready to go ahead of schedule. And the best part is, they seem to be working with minimal multi-tasking, though my ears aren’t used to this lab yet and since this is an Apple lab, the mice sound different. Yes, I can usually hear “double-clicking.” I’ve been doing the lab thing for years.

Now, where did I leave that flash drive? Damn.