Tiny Teaching Stories: Weight

nancy_sommers
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CucciarreChristineHeadShot.jpgToday's Tiny Teaching Story is by Christine Cucciarre, Professor of English and Director of Composition at the University of Delaware.

 

Weight

I read the want ads during the pandemic. At the end of each Zoom class, I clicked “Leave Meeting,” and cried. Maybe I could drive a truck. Sling mulch at Home Depot. Stock shelves at Target. Just to go to work. Leave work. Be home. No torment of failing my students, failing myself.

Fall semester I returned to the classroom. Walk to work. Teach. Return home. Repeat. Still, no lingering with students, office conferences, chatting with colleagues in the copy room. 

The sudden weight of the pandemic was so easy to put on, but it’s so hard to take off.

 

Submit your own Tiny Teaching Story to tinyteachingstories@macmillan.com! See the Tiny Teaching Stories Launch for submission details and guidelines.

1 Comment
april_lidinsky

Wow, does this hit home. Thank you for putting this feeling into words. 

 

About the Author
April Lidinsky (PhD, Literatures in English, Rutgers) is Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies at Indiana University South Bend. She has published and delivered numerous conference papers on writing pedagogy, women's autobiography, and creative nonfiction, and has contributed to several textbooks on writing. She has served as acting director of the University Writing Program at Notre Dame and has won several awards for her teaching and research including the 2015 Indiana University South Bend Distinguished Teaching Award, the 2017 Indiana University South Bend Eldon F. Lundquist Award for excellence in teaching and scholarly achievement, and the All-Indiana University 2017 Frederic Bachman Lieber Memorial Award for Teaching Excellence.