So, it is party time again, folks!

[wiseheart]

Each year this time, we launch my virtual birthday party, which starts on October 1 and ends on October 9 at midnight, sharp. The goals of the party are to post as many comments and collapse as many threads as possible, on as many new pages as we can. It is always great fun, as you can see if you check out the similar entries of the last few years.

This year, I'll also throw the real party at mid-time - and post the recipes of all the food that will be there for you, so that you can all participate if you want to. Virtual food has no calories.

Fandom-related discussions are as welcome as the ones about coffee or chocolate (just to name a few favourites from previous years), and, of course, pictures and recipes of birthday cakes. ;)

So, drop by, tell your story, post your pics or silly poems, ask questions you always wanted to ask and have a good time!

Soledad, in excited expectation




Oh, and by the way, to provide birthday gifts hobbit-style, I've got a revived story and a Kansas 2 update for you.

Enjoy!

Comments

[solanpolarn.livejournal.com]

I have to head to bed now -- should really have done it a while ago, but there are so many interesting conversations I wanted to chip in on! -- since I have a 9am lecture to give tomorrow morning. My students really are a good bunch; last week they had already started showing up at ten to nine, when I arrived in the lecture theatre, despite the fact that the lectures are meant to start at five past whatever hour they are scheduled at...

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

Hope your lecture goes well!

[solanpolarn.livejournal.com]

Thank you! It did, or at least I thought so. The students seemed to follow my reasoning, and were properly impressed by the demonstration I did for them of my (super)paramagnetic putty swallowing a permanent magnet:

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

Oh, that's very cute!

[solanpolarn.livejournal.com]

I have lots of magnetic toys; they are all for purely educational purposes, I promise! ;-)

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

I'm wondering what other purpose they could have...

[solanpolarn.livejournal.com]

*innocent look* None that I can think of! They certainly aren't for my enjoyment! My first year tutees last year actually played with them, without too much encouragement from me. I have only had two tutorials with this year's lot, so they are still quite shy and quiet, though they have been gamely doing problems on my white board. They aren't really playing with the toys yet, though I still have hope.

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

Do have mainly female, mainly male, or a mix? I found my mixed groups were quite shy, while the women on their own were more forthcoming.

[solanpolarn.livejournal.com]

Last year I had two female students and three male ones. This year I have five male students. I think last year's students were rather shy and quiet at the start, too, but of course I remember them as they were at the end of spring semester, when they were happily chatting away about all sorts of things, including, but not limited to, physics! It may also have helped that I had those students in my Monday afternoon lab class, as well, so that they got to see me twice a week.

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

You run tutorials in fives! I wonder you don't pray for them to be quiet & shy.

[solanpolarn.livejournal.com]

The way the tutorials work, is that the students get a sheet of problems set each week by the person lecturing the first year physics module (there are three different people doing that each semester; I am one of the ones in the spring semester). They have to hand in their solutions for marking on Monday afternoon, and then we have the tutorials either at noon (which mine is) or at 2pm on the Tuesday. I think the students will get much more out of the tutorials if they have to show how they solved the problems, than if I talk at them for half-an-hour about how I would have gone about it. Of course, that only works if the students are actually willing to come to the board and show the others how they did it...

In some ways, I think it would be easier to go the 'instructor' route of me doing most of the talking. It certainly would mean I had more control, but I think it is more interesting for both me and the students if they talk. That way, it is also easier for me to see if there are things they have managed to do correctly without understanding, which does occasionally happen.

Some of my colleagues apparently have six (6!) tutees this year; that is one student too far to my thinking. My preferred size of a tutor group is four, I think, with enough students for discussions to be viable, but not some many that some of them might get lost (or hide) in the crowd. There is also the restriction that I don't think I could sensibly fit six students in my office...

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

In Cambridge where I supervised, questions were generally set by the supervisors, not the lecturers. The usual group size in Nat Sci was two, though I supervised groups of medical students up to four, as I recall. Four male boaties could be fairly bumptious. Five feels more like a mini-lecture.

I did have an unfortunate tendency to talk and test their comprehension via essays, rather than attempt to assay it by questions. I don't think I was cut out to be a teacher.

[wiseheart.livejournal.com]

Are you sure it isn't actually an alien? :)

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

Have you seen time-lapse videos of slime moulds?

[wiseheart.livejournal.com]

No, I'm afraid I lead a rather rural life here under the rock.

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

This wasn't quite what I had in mind but it was the best Google came up with:

The Great British Year

[solanpolarn.livejournal.com]

It might be; it bounces if you throw it at the desk, but if you leave it to sit it oozes into a blob...

[jenn-calaelen.livejournal.com]

Very cool!

[solanpolarn.livejournal.com]

Thank you! And it was even relevant to the topic of the lecture. :-)