22 June 2009

Schools Out For Summer

Today was a good day. I spent the morning with the family at Powell's Books.

I could spend weeks there. 68,000 sq feet of books = book heaven. I was tempted to buy a few books but after buying a new bookshelf last week and stocking it full with books I already own, I am resolved to reading what I have on hand...or go to the library to grab something new.

HAHA, I am so dang funny.

I've compiled a list of books I want to read this summer, but I keep coming back to the Twilight books. Every time I read them, I see another layer, another aspect, another vein of interest or something annoying. Although, after reading Emma by Jane Austen about 20 times before I could move on, I'm really not surprised.

Persuasion by Austen was even worse, pouring over and over the book front to back. I also read Stephen Lawhead's Song of Albion Trilogy five times over before I could put it down. It feels very OCD but I love diving into books this way. There is so much one can miss the first couple times a book is read.

School went well this quarter, not as well as I would have liked. I made a stupid mistake on my final paper for English but this is what I get for not being better prepared.

Math was also a struggle because I had the Absent-Minded Professor for an instructor. He'd write 4 + 1 = 3 on the board. Or he would be saying "squared" and be writing cubed at the same time. I could tell he was absolutely brilliant but his methodology was not ideal for the way I learn.

The basics of math are to teach the common way to solve an equation or algorithm.

After the basics are down, then the instructor should proceed to teach the students the little short cuts or different ways of finding the answer.

This instructor would give us every way in the book to find the answer to an equation, right off the bat, and then turn and wonder why we were all, "GOSH. MATH IS HARD."

He felt it was more important to concentrate on the many different ways to a solution and focus on the process rather than the solution or answer. I got decent grade in this class, and I'm surprised I did so well.

Computer class was fun for me and the instructor was outstanding. I did have issue with the test. For instance, "Is Proquest similar to Google?"

Well, of course it is similar, because they are both search engines. Although they are not the same kind of search engine. Leave it to me to over-analyze a test. Long story short, my grades were worse this quarter, but not bad, so I've been told. I'm my own worst critic, so I'll get some cheese with my 'whine' and leave it at that until the fall.

~Bee still thinks math is hard.

8 comments:

Heffalump said...

Yay for summer vacation! I think you have earned the down time from school!

Heather said...

You are not crazy--my complete works of Jane Austen has seen 100s of reads--especially Persuasion and Sense and Senseability. Emma has only seen about 15 or so. :)

... Paige said...

and we are glad your are bloggin again too

Happy hot, hot summer (104 here yesterday afternoon)

Danielle Says Hello said...

Glad you are back also!!! But super glad that you were MIA because of school.

sarahgrace said...

Why is it always the Math professors that are geniuses but lack any teaching skills?

Glad to have you back this summer!

sarahgrace said...

Oh, and since you have completely validated my desire to go back an read the Twilight series yet another time, I may just do that. (Sheepish grin)

Jaina said...

Congrats on the semester, I'm sure your grades are good and you'll do even better next semester! Also, I'm very glad to have several new posts in the reader from you :)

JLR said...

Ugh. I know what you mean about math profs. I had a calculus T.A. whose lectures consisted mostly of "um," "ok," "so," "yeah," and "you know.
Instead of taking notes, I'd just have keep tally of how often he said those things. I did not so much do well in that class.

But at least you are done for the summer! Yea! Freedom!

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