TeacherTalk

The Harry Potter Experience

    Examiner column for July 8.

    As Andy Roddick and Roger Federer prepared to take center court at Wimbledon, 21 George Mason students arrived at Oxford University—primed for three weeks of intense scholarship and a bit of Harry Potter magic. Our opening dinner introduced students to a dining hall every bit as wondrous as Hogwarts’ hall—filmed just a few blocks away at Christ Church College.

The Trivial and Transcendent in Study Abroad

Examiner column for July 1.

    This weekend, twenty-one George Mason University undergraduate and graduate students, plus two faculty directors, will go to Oxford University for three weeks of summer study arranged by GMU’s Center for Global Education.

    My husband and I have participated in four such programs, and I am struck each time by how disconnected all the mental preparation is from the experience itself. Before classes, students fret about what to wear, what books to bring, what the weather will be like. They make sure their electronics can be adapted to the standard 230V in England, and that they will have internet access.

Let Airline Passengers and Parents Know the Score

Examiner column for June 24.

     As an English teacher, I believe in the usefulness of metaphors. Students always perk up when I say before a test, “Psych yourself up—pretend you can hear a coach cheering you on!”  Or I might encourage them to judge a difficult poem the way they judge a new rap song: “You can’t catch all the words, but you think it’s good, so you listen again and again until you understand it.”

     I have spent the last two days in airports, waiting on tarmacs in planes that never left the ground, and then waiting in lines to be rescheduled. The waits were unreasonably long—three hours in one line where a single agent was assigned to rebook more than 200 passengers.

When Teachers Enjoy Grading

Examiner column for June 17.

    If you assume a group of teachers, shut in together to grade exams from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., would be living their own definition of hell,    you haven’t ever been to an Advanced Placement Exam Reading. Every June, thousands of teachers in 27 disciplines do just that—in Kentucky, Florida, Nebraska, Colorado, Ohio, and Missouri.

    I was “shut in” the Kentucky Convention Center with 2600 other readers in English Literature and Composition, U.S. History, French, and Statistics—and the vast majority liked it, and hope to return next June.

The Power and The Glory at an AP Exam Reading

Examiner column for June 10.

    For more than two decades, I have spent a week every June reading Advanced Placement Literature and Composition exams in a room with one exalted leader at an elevated table, and many minions, including me, arranged in tables at the Question Leader’s feet. This year, for the first time, I am the one seated at the elevated table.

An Inside Look at Advanced Placement Test Grading

Examiner column for June 3.

    329,000 high school students took the Advanced Placement Literature and Composition test this May, and their nearly one million essays will be scored by me and one thousand of my closest friends.

    It all begins with Sample Selection. Before a thousand high school and college teachers arrive to the Literature reading in Kentucky, a group of ten teachers decide how the tests will be scored.

Bond With Your Teen: Read Together

Examiner column for May 27.

    The results of the most recent Nation’s Report Card: National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), include good and bad news: our public school 9 and 13-year-olds are making progress, but our 17-year-olds are performing at the same levels as they were in 1971.

    Although I have no suggestions that might increase scores in mathematics for 17 year-olds, I do have a practical idea that has benefits beyond verbal test scores: read with your teen this summer.

Memo to Graduates: How to Avoid the Recession Monster

Examiner Column for May 20

     Nate Beeler’s cartoon in yesterday’s Examiner was right on point: new graduates find themselves at the mercy of a gigantic, green, recession monster. But a few pages into the newspaper, an article partly offset that grim picture: the Washington D.C. area is better than most in terms of employment opportunities and cost of living.

    My students at George Mason University are quite concerned about their future prospects, as are graduates everywhere. My experience with twenty internship students this past year, and the advice of counselors who work for GMU’s Career Services, have given me some ideas for successful job-hunting. Much of this advice you’ve heard before---but that’s because it’s true.

It's All In How You Say It

Examiner column for May 13.

    In a piece of writing, how you say something is often more important than what you say. Students often throw up their hands when asked to write an autobiographical college essay, or a personal narrative. “I have nothing to say!” 

    They forget that “Seinfeld,” one of their favorite classic TV shows, was “about nothing,” and that Shakespeare is not called “The Bard” for his plot lines, but for his poetic style.

Study Abroad: Dialing Up The Caution

Examiner column for May 6.

    This past weekend at George Mason University, the Center for Global Education held its annual faculty and student orientation. Upcoming study abroad programs range in length from two weeks to two semesters, and include Ecuador, Australia, Beijing, Buenos Aires, Japan, Israel, and the Philippines, along with more traditional places like London, Paris, Berlin, and Milan.

    The orientation’s main message, for faculty and students, was to exercise caution. In a world where the word “pandemic” jostles for position on the front page next to “acts of terrorism,” trips that take students out of their university homes to new environments require faculty to prepare for the unexpected.