The last couple weeks flew by quickly. The semester ended, grades were calculated and submitted, and then it was full speed ahead on prepping next semester.
The prep work for ART 240. I've still got some models for ART 240 being printed up at the library, but that's about all I've got left to do with that one. I reorganized the assignments a bit. One new type of activity that I'm adding this year is that they will need to create design drawings for the physical models they'll be presented with, but then also model them in the computer. For extra credit, they can then print up their models. Combined with some other more open-ended projects, this will bring the students through virtually all the stages of the 3D printing process. The only part that they won't do much with is the tinkering/maintenance of the 3D printer itself.
The MATH 301 course is 100% ready to go. This course didn't need much in the way of updating. There was a little bit of reorganization and minor adjustments to the expectations and a few new assignments, but that was it. The newest addition to the class is that now they will be grading proofs from previous classes. This will hopefully accelerate their learning process by seeing how other students write and then be forced to assess that writing. I've included "word choice" in the list of things to look for, which will hopefully help them to catch the "math crutch phrases" that students use to sound like they're speaking math even if it doesn't actually mean much. We'll see how well that works out. They'll keep on with the previous LaTeX and Excel assignments.
I've started tweaking my MATH 127 course. I'm not going to do too much to it because we may be changing the textbook. But one thing I want to try to do is to give them an explicit list of things that they should be able to do for each section. The information is organized using Bloom's Taxonomy, and by having this list laid out for them I hope that I can help them organize their thoughts. I also want to create a sequence of worksheets that walk them through basic mathematical and algebraic concepts, which will hopefully fill some of the gaps for some of the weaker students. I'm thinking about making videos of me working out problems "live" on camera instead of the videos that I currently have. First, it will be a lot faster for me to do that. Second, I think it will help the students start to organize their thinking a bit better and help them build better mental habits. When students look at a neatly typed up calculation in the notes, I don't think they understand that that's how I hope they would write up their work. So I would like to try to get them to understand by directly modeling it for them. But I don't know anything about how to set up and film those types of shots, so I've got some learning to do before I try that. Maybe that will be more of a Fall semester thing.
The CS 135 course is all planned out, but hasn't been fleshed out. I still need to work out the details of many of the sections as well as lay out the assignments carefully. When I taught this last year, I was building as I went because I needed to get a better sense of how fast the students were picking up the ideas. I think I have a little bit better of an intuition for that, so I can plan things out a little bit better.
When the new year comes, I might be up in my new office. It will only be about 4 months later than what we were originally told, and we may need to vacate it this summer when they do construction on the Dawson building, but at least we'll be in the (semi?)-permanent spaces. I spent a few hours one day last week to pack things up. Fortunately, even though I had opened most of the boxes to get at stuff over the course of the semester, the combination of having moved a lot of the stuff into DAW 104A (the 3D printing nook) and not having actually unpacked most of the boxes, I was able to get everything ready to move in relatively short order.
I flew back to Livermore this afternoon. It was a pretty casual trip through the airport. There was no line at the C gate security check, and it wasn't a packed flight. There were quite a few Raiders fans going to Oakland to the final game at the Coliseum. While I was standing at the BART platform, I could smell the tailgating, and there were lots of fans going into the station. I'm still in some level of disbelief that they'll be in Las Vegas in only a couple years. And having grown up around Raiders fans, I am somewhat pessimistic that things will go well. On the other hand, there are a TON of people in Las Vegas, and Las Vegas sports fans aren't cut from the same cloth, and I'm hoping the numbers of Las Vegas locals will outweigh the troublemakers and alter that reputation. But only time will tell.
I don't really know what we're doing this week, other than heading into San Francisco tomorrow and then Brentwood on Sunday. But not knowing what's going on is pretty usual for Christmas week.
The last year has been another good one. I finished up my year with Leadership Las Vegas, I also completed my first year back in the classroom full time after being Department Chair, the Oaxaca Science Center is really getting ready to roll, my YouTube video creation experiment continues to go well, I've had the opportunity to get involved with curling, I've played a lot of board games, and I have enough projects to keep me happy and busy for the next year. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
