Classes were ok today. The second class is generally a little sharper than the first, to measure by grades anyway, but this week the first class has surprised me. On Monday I asked them to do an on the spot writing assignment--they had to describe the world and then attempt to explain how they knew the world to be the way they had described it. A little epistemological justification. The writing was ungraded of course; I just wanted to get them thinking. I've come to realize that just asking a question, even a good question, and expecting a response isn't always fair. So I give them a few minutes to put their thoughts on paper before responding. Anyway, the first bunch had some thoughtful things to say and many of their responses emphasized, rightly, the important place technology occupies in the world today. One young woman even talked about speed--both the increasing speed of technology and the desire for instant gratification that seems to come along with it. Very perceptive. By contrast, the second class was kind of flat. They mostly offered the usual wishy-washy solipsistic relativism that I have come to expect of people their age in America. My intention was to demonstrate how much our understanding of the world owes to the Reformation. And to reinforce the point that Richard Tarnas makes in the reading we did for class: the Reformation, despite its religious character, was ultimately secularizing in its effects. As a strategy, it worked well in the first class but didn't connect with the same force in the second class.
Today we tackled Descartes: Meditations 1,2, and 6. Both classes seemed to still be in sluggish post-spring break mode and as a group they did pretty poorly on the quiz. Worst one of the semester grade wise. I was disappointed because they'd done really well on the midterm and on the last quiz before the break. I love reading Descartes but I've had a hard time finding a good hook to use in presenting his material to my students. I tried a couple different angles thinking maybe they'd respond to his bit about dreamstates. How do you know you're not dreaming? The first bunch ran with it for a few minutes but the second, again, were not so responsive. The result being that I didn't quite get finished with everything in my first class, but finished a couple minutes early in the second. I'm curious to see how they will respond to the contemporary feminist critique of Descartes we're reading for Monday. Alongside of it we're reading one of Borges short fictions: "The Circular Ruins." I'm thinking some of them will love Borges and others will be baffled; what's exciting about teaching is that I know I'll be surprised by who falls into which category.
