August 22, 2007
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p.s. I got an email today from Kevin, about my August 15th post/poem. It was neat that he’d read it; it was nice to see that my academic reflection made a professor realize how great he is – how well he teaches.
It occurred to me in recollecting the poem to my chair, Wade, and his wife over lunch that maybe I would not have gained all that knowledge (with the same joy) if the delivery of it would’ve been different. For example, would Expressivism have seemed as “cool” to me if someone else would’ve introduced it and put his/her spin on it? Or Alternative Discourse? Or Naguib Mafouz? I highly doubt it. Teaching is about knowing the subject matter, but it’s also about the delivery. Someone once said teaching is 10% knowledge and 90% entertainment/acting. I’ve known professors who knew too much and could not relay that knowledge to their students.
