We often ask our student to reflect, in writing, on what they are learning. But how often do we challenge ourselves to do the same as teachers? This semester I set out to chronicle my experiences teaching a web class, week-by-week. I realized that my past experiences with teaching web classes were vague and jumbled in my mind, and I thought it worthwhile, for myself, to keep an ordered record of my experiences this semester. By writing it all out, I hoped to work through issues and concepts that might otherwise just fade away without being resolved in my mind. I chose to put my diary online for others to see. It can be found here. It’s not very intellectual, or polished, just a record of experiences, affirmations and frustrations that ebb and flow every week.

Sometimes people ask me what it’s like to teach a web class, and I find myself unsatisfied by my own ‘overview’ responses. For me there are so many ups and downs in the experience of teaching a web class that it is difficult to summarize it simply with a pat answer. Next time someone asks me what teaching a web class is like, I’ll say check out my blog posts! It’s all there: my mistakes, my successes, the good things students do, the bad things they do, everything that is on my mind at any given time during the semester.