September 13, 2010
I was sick last week, had some sort of sore throat bug. That means I drank a lot of hot tea—I believe (not really, but sorta) that drinking hot tea will kill all the bacteria in my throat. It’s a mature belief, folks. When I was in college, I believed that vodka would take care [...]
February 27, 2010
Last week, my Composition I students had to write a blog post responding to Stephen King’s short piece called “Why We Crave Horror Movies.” The prompt asked them to persuade their audience that their method of “keeping the insanity at bay” is acceptable. Here’s my own response. King hit it right on the nose: We [...]
February 26, 2010
This semester, I’m teaching Composition I for OTC online. It is an adventure for sure. I’m just now starting to get used to answering the varied and informal questions I’ve been getting in my OTC inbox, and I’m taking a professional development course that shows instructors how to make the most of multimedia like images, [...]
September 30, 2009
For the final This I Believe podcasts post, we hear about a topic very important to me: friendship. A normally happy, carefree topic, Hannah, Andreas, and Carolin share times in their lives when they encountered difficulties and friends came through for them or they realized the power of friendship, the power of a smile.
September 27, 2009
Today, three students share beliefs that influence they way they deal with life’s most difficult times—including failure and success, rape, drugs, and death—and find hopeful and reassuring answers during their searching.
September 24, 2009
Today, three students share three different sources of strength: Karolina finds direction in her positive thinking, student 4 find peace and new friends because of her belief in our souls, and Katharina finds strength for everyday life in the lessons of the heptathlon.
September 21, 2009
Today, Charlotte tells us how she–a perfectionist–finally learned that life will go on even when the . Student 2 shares her love for music and making music, and student 3 relates a strong belief in the power of friendship.
September 18, 2009
Today we hear from students who express beliefs that developed as they became adults and looked back on their lives. The beliefs they speak about better equip them to deal with their lives as adults, for Carolin 2 as she learns to make decisions, for Julia as she realizes the value of family, and for Christoph as he finds the right balance of pride in his life.
September 15, 2009
Each of these students encountered a situation that made them stretch, grow, and learn about their beliefs and limits. For Jana and Miss Sprengel, it was a goal they had set for themselves. For Katinka, it took pushing herself in an unexpected way to realize what she was capable of, and for Sarah, it was the clash of what her parents had taught her and what she learned in school, and, much later, the election of Barack Obama as United States president.
September 12, 2009
In today’s podcasts, we’ll hear how these students’ futures were turned around by unexpected life events.
