All about Me and You and Learning

Hi there, I’m Lori. You might remember me as a past blogger for student life, but I have moved on to new experiences and I am now blogging for C.T.S.I., The Center for Support and Teaching Innovation!

This year I’ll be inviting you along with me to my classes (especially my 9am ones) and to the library and to any other place on campus that is part of how I learn at U of T. I am of course speaking figuratively; you can’t really come to class with me…

So me in a nut shell: I am carrying a 5.5FCE course load this year, I have two part time jobs, I have two kids, I have a husband, I have a cat, and I have a 50lb backpack full of used textbooks that I am trying to sell.

My mandate is to share with you my fellow undergrads what my learning experience is all about. What helps and what hinders me, what excites me to learn and what incites uncontrollable mid-lecture pandiculation. (That's a big yawn accompanied by an uncontrollable urge to strech...see we're already learning together!!)

It’s my hope that through this dialogue we will find some common ground in what we think learning means at U of T. If you’re in your first year, your classes are most likely huge and intimidating. I’m in my third year now, but I still remember the vertigo I experienced the first time I attempted to take lecture notes on the upper balcony at Con Hall. I also remember my giddy reaction to the smaller class sizes of my second year.

I have traversed this campus on multiple occasions, found nooks and crannies that I never knew existed, and discovered some amazing academic help on campus. I hope that over the course of the year I can help to fill in the gaps of your learning experience here at U of T.

As busy and stressful as the first few weeks of school always are I have already managed to learn a few really interesting things. For example I learnt how to quiet a room of unruly children by just standing stoically silent.  I should mention that I am working towards my B.Ed. I also learnt that even if you rehearse for two hours you can still have a mid-presentation brain freeze, wherein your brain decides that it will not be sending any word making signals to your mouth for a period of fifteen seconds, no matter how hard you may attempt to articulate said word! What interesting things did you learn this week? -Lori