Tee hee. I'm so giddy. I just had an awesome tutorial with one of my students, we performed the Messiah on Friday night to a packed house and standing ovation, and my International Medieval Congress programme arrived on Friday with me in it! :) Life is good.
So, I love the Oxford tutorial system because one on one or two on one instruction enables you to cater to the strengths and weaknesses of your students and allows for engaging discussion rather than lectured factoids which are inevitably lost or not heard and forgotten. (Wow that was a long sentence) Basically, I have an objective in my lesson, but how I arrive at it is entirely dependent on the needs of my students, so they are engaged and so am I. I'm not repeating myself over and over, I'm focusing on what help they need and most often, I'm the one asking the questions. If there were an ideal way to learn this is it. There are short-comings of course (for instance that the students here learn only what they study and not anything else for three years), but the system produces students adept at their subject, which ultimately is a good thing. But really, I think, it engages students with their professors to be comfortable, curious, and cared for. These kids are all very smart, but they are also nutured. (There are some baddies of the teaching business, but not currently any at Oriel in History) I love teaching here.
The Messiah went very well (ok I wasn't too keen on the bass soloist and I gotta say counter-tenors make me a little nervous when they are singing parts I can hear my mom singing, but otherwise...) and was extremely well received. I had loads of fun doing it and I hope to stay in the choir. I just loved singing and being apart of a choir again. When you grow up in choirs, you feel as if something is missing when you are no longer in one. And I think it's difficult to pinpoint until you are in one again. Or maybe that's just me, but...
The really cool thing about this weekend was the arrival of the programme for the conference at which I am speaking this summer. It's a really big deal and super exciting and when I received the programme and saw myself in it, I was all smiles. But the most amazing thing was that I was in the Index. I know this seems ridiculous, but knowing you could go to the end, look up my last name, and then find the page on which my seminar is located was too much. I've never been in an index before. I am so humbled by this. I can't begin to comprehend how I've gotten to a place where I'm in an index. Wow.
Sorry this is all over the place, but it's been an exciting few days. Now if I could only get college to stop trying to make me pay them money I don't think I owe...oh well, there's always something. :)
Love,
Elizabeth
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