This is my seventh year as an instructor at BC and my third time teaching INTER 135. I have also instructed in the Writing Lab, taught Writing Strategies, Writing Poetry, Writing Fiction, Grammar & Communication, Developmental English, Composition for Non-Native Speakers, and Composition. I’m particularly familiar with the needs of the latter three–the same that will be combined in INTER 135–as I’ve not only taught each class separately but have worked with these populations in the Writing Lab.
Having taught on-ground, hybrid, and online formats, I’ve become proficient at balancing classroom and online instruction and all the more interested in integrating technology therein. In addition, having taught ENGL 090/190, ENGL 091/105, and this class–INTER 135–I am accustomed to both team-teaching and meeting the disparate needs of pre-college and college-level students in the same classroom.
Finding such an interdisciplinary approach maximally engaging, I have tried to incorporate collateral learning into my own English classrooms by not only modeling and discussing the work of poets, novelists, essayists, and critics, but that of psychologists, sociologists, philosophers, physicists, doctors, painters, photographers, and musicians. After all, considering that a minority of my students pursue English as a major, I recognize the importance of investigating other subjects in our study of English. subjects that may relate more closely to their academic goals and/or personal interests, subjects that are thought-provoking and applicable to real life, and subjects that–taught together–complement and illuminate each other. Sociology is such a subject, which taught in tandem with Composition serves as an incredible valuable context in which to compose.
In sum, it is my belief that an interdisciplinary classroom, being multi-dimensional and dynamic, will best engage a diverse population with diverse interests. Therefore, I am exceptionally excited at the opportunity to be involved in INTER 135 for the third straight year and to contemplate, together with my students, what constitutes the good life. I’m also exceptionally confident that Sue Cox and I, with our varied expertise yet joint purpose, will once again make a great team.