Today was my first day teaching again. Observations other than the roughed-in idea that I'm a potential teaching superstar:

1. Three hours is a really long time to maintain a class; two hours was a breeze in comparison.

2. These kids are smart, and I'm gonna have to do way way more in terms of research in order to keep their savvy minds good on the topic of "personal to political." As in, more than assuming I know enough to just waltz. Ouch.

3. Three hours?

That's actually about it. Yeah. So, today, I intro'd my over-elongated syllabi and then we talked a bit about what I call "sensual description" -- all details accessible by the senses, maybe some metaphors: "That pocket of the subway smelled like a 20-year old barnacle-encrusted boat that hadn't ever been hauled out of the water and had yards of seaweed drifting around in lieu of a sail." Then we went outside and "described," which they will also do for homework.

Next week: I get them to ask questions about those sensual descriptions. But I think I might also do some memory (close your eyes) work to get them all concerned with the ethical stuff (how reliable were their descriptions via memory). Then we start the personal essay.

I've also started some group blogs for them, but they don't get up and running for a few weeks as a project. But here's the link to the prototypes, which will be added to a bit this weekend (directions & such). I am soooooo open to any suggestions or links folks might have.