March 29, 2024

Maybe I should do this every week, but I won’t because it would be too depressing.   I want to remind myself that there’s no rest for the wicked right now, though, so here’s an analysis of my goals and outcomes for the week.

1.  Catch up on grading.  Fail.

2. Achieve inbox zero.  Fail.

3. Prepare for next week’s Twitter workshop.  Incomplete.

4. Catch up on paperwork.  Fail.

5. Take a picture a day.  Fail.

6.  Write a poem.  Done.

7. Cook meals from locally grown whole foods.  Fail.

8. Post to the blog daily.  Done.

9. Survive e-portfolio workshop.  Done.

10. Finalize details for March symposium.  Incomplete.

It doesn’t look very good when put this way, does it?  Tonight I think I’ll work on the workshop prep some.  Tomorrow morning when I’m a little fresher I’ll grade.  I experience more guilt over inflicting decisions made in a state of fatigue on students than I do over inflicting them on colleagues.  With luck, perseverance, and answering emails via phone from my mother’s birthday party, I might be no more than a week behind by Sunday.

I fit a lot into this week.  I stayed busy all day every day at any rate.  I just don’t know what I have to show for it.  So let me try another way of looking at weekly outcomes.

Monday:  Posted weekly updates to Blackboard courses, answered emails, worked on e-portfolio workshop materials.

Tuesday:  Went to the Gulf Coast to give a workshop on e-portfolios and another on personal writing.  Wrote two reports for TYCA-SE.  Answered emails and discussion board questions.

Wednesday: Worked on proposal for MLA, reviewed report for TYCA National, graded discussion boards for week 3 (yes, I was that far behind), met with a couple of colleagues about why we weren’t ready to have a meeting yet.  Replied to emails and discussion boards.  Worked on plans for Welty week in April.

Thursday:  Graded discussion boards for week 4, replied to emails and discussion boards, worked on flier for March symposium, worked some on Twitter workshop, spoke to library group, set up new site for Welty Project.

Friday:  Met with a student, went to department lunch meeting, set up Facebook and Twitter stuff for class, answered discussion boards and some emails but not all.

Okay, even when I look at it this way, it still doesn’t look like I accomplished enough.  I stayed busy all day every day, but the main thing I didn’t do was to spend enough time grading.  It generally takes hours every day for me to answer the questions my students post online.  That, I guess, is what is taking up the bulk of my time. Still, I need to manage my own sense of priorities better.  Those papers have to be graded whether anything else is done or not.  Sigh.

I can do it.  I can.  Tomorrow morning when I am a little less tired, I will grade like a champion.

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