First school day of the new year

And it was a hectic one. I had planned to show Crash first block, but suddenly - despite showing to my College Comp class a few weeks ago - the DVD was missing. So much for that plan. We started reading Fahrenheit 451 instead. But not to worry. I found the DVD and will show it tomorrow. So much for cohesion.

Second block was better. That class will work for me - as long as it involves group work. So I had them working on an introductory assignment to our final unit and then turned them loose to work on a paper contrasting Rupert Brooke's "The Soldier" to Wilfred Owen's "Dulce et Decorum Est."

Then I got the second novel tests ready for my College Comp class. I was amazed at how many grumbled about the test. To which I replied, "This is a college class. Never whine about a test." I know several students didn't finish reading their novels and had to guess. Such is life.

But what makes this class so different from my previous ones is that a majority of the kids are not taking it for college credit. Which makes me wonder, why are they in there? They should be enrolled in our senior English class then. They still have the option, I guess, to take the class as practice for college. But why take a college level class when you aren't going to get credit for it? And it's not like it is that hard to be eligible for college credit (take a pseo test (I think), have a certain GPA and class rank). But what happens is that so many of these kids who aren't taking it for college credit slack off. When they do that, it hurts those who are there to really write and learn.

Next semester I'm just going to rake them over the coals those first few weeks to scare the faint of heart away. I hate to do that, but to do justice to the class that is really what I must do.