1. Every night I put a baseball game on XM Radio and am almost impervious to what's happening in the game and am more interested in how each play by play announcer and fellow analyst narrates the game, an especially difficult task in baseball when almost the entire game lacks action. Tonight I listened to Rick Monday. Average.
2. I observed, mostly, and offered a few highly non-binding observations to the Denali editorial board as they deliberated over what written pieces to publish. I'm the magazine's literary advisor.
3. I gave as compelling and comprehensive a lecture as I have ever given today, addressing the complexities of Act III in King Lear. Recent trends in instruction tend to discourage lectures, but today I said to hell with trends: I let it rip. I sensed my students were captivated. I hope so.
5 comments:
I'm sure your lecture was inspiring! I remember from college that during good lectures, all the students are scribbling notes. During great ones, the pens, one by one, fall silent. I was blessed to experience many great lectures, especially in my Bible classes. I really miss those classes sometimes.
i agree that the great lecture is an art form, and all the buzz about not lecturing has to be placed in context. i have found that those times when i dive deeply into something that fascinates me, and i am fluent and speaking to students as i would be telling a story, my students are "captivated" as you say, and i can tell they want to hear more. i've even checked sometimes--"is that too much information?" and most of the time they say "no!" i realize they are hungry for a good story--to know what you know, to hear what thrills us. the blanket ban on "lecturing" i think is about something else--droning on from notes written up in 1982, never reconsidered, dead as Latin. : ) anne mcg
When I was in university, nothing thrilled me as much as a good lecture. Seminars? Meh. Give me an eloquent speaker and a compelling subject, and I could listen all day.
I studied literature and a lecture on King Lear sounds great.
Perhaps the trend is away from continuous lecture, not all lecture. Sometimes students need a passionate & informative lecture. It's good sometimes for them to know that you know a lot more about the subject than what they can learn through personal research and discussion in a short semester. Who knows - you may move some to seek to know more. . .
Yes, it was an amazing lecture! The framing of Monday's lecture was easy to follow. You set up the basic key points, and then dove into the deep matter. I see what you are talking about with that contrariety of the comic and tragic visions. I feel like I am truly experiencing the yin and yang for the first time (crazy I know), and it really makes me want to keep reading shakespeare. I think that your lectures work as opposed to others because of your integration of other stories. It seems that you have learned a shakespearian technique by allowing two different stories to make the single truth readily available.
Thank you.
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