I keep thinking it is Thursday. During the semester, my Thursdays consisted of gym, meeting, set up for the lab I TA'd, TA from noon to 4, tutor, and go home. Somewhere in there I would ALWAYS get a headache.
Today I kept thinking it was Thursday because I felt the headache coming.
This past fall I cracked my neck (in the sense that one cracks their knuckles), and it almost made me pass out. Since then, whenever I get tense, I immediately feel it in my neck and end up getting a headache. I felt it happening today and kept relaxing those muscles, but there is crappy stuff going on at work/school.
Background: We are supported by TA-ships unless our advisor has a grant and decides to put us on a Research Assistantship. Most students have to TA for the introductory biology lab their first year, and often after that. There are complaints by the undergrads that the lab part of the course is not great (to put it gently). As a result, rather than consider revising the labs or working with the graduate students to improve the lab preparation, there is a course being instated that is required of alllllll grad students TAing the intro course.
[I am a reasonable person, generally speaking. To blanket-require a teaching pedagogy course for ONLY those TAing intro bio is ridiculous.]
Many non-first year students have TA'd the course before; many of us have taught our own courses outside of the University on our own. Yet all must take this course. There are other nuances of the whole thing that are difficult to explain. I think it is also ridiculous that information about this mandatory course has been disseminated through the grape vine. When we signed up for TA preferences, no mention of the course. We hear bits and pieces of what the course is supposed to entail, and these details are completely mutually exclusive.
We talk about this mandatory course all the time and how to get out of it. My advisor tried telling me that it would be good for my CV. In my FIFTH year. When I am trying to get out. And I have taught my own class before for a year in China. I don't buy it.
My neck and shoulders are getting tense just thinking about it. I came home and tried to use a couple of glasses of wine to relax and get rid of the headache. I think I'll just hit the sac and go to yoga in the morning.
5 comments:
Go see your doctor :) It may be nothing or who knows they may prescibe neck massages at physical therapy. I think you advisor is full of crap. I would respect them more if they said the class was stupid, but required.
I know someone (L.V.) who was a member of your old lab (when you were a tech) who had to go get shoulder massages regularly to avoid tension headaches. It sounds unusual, but it is better than A) living with headaches B) taking drugs that you could avoid. I don't think the price is that unreasonable either.
And how frustrating that they are disseminating the information about this mandatory course so poorly. It makes it sound like they haven't entirely worked out the details. They have had some problems at my school with TAs not knowing material for the intro bio labs. One class in particular is not getting the information they are supposed to be learning and are consequently doing really poorly on the exams.
Not much into democracy, are they? :-p No wonder you're tense.
I hope that rest and yoga help you to feel better soon.
"When we signed up for TA preferences, no mention of the course"---Arrrgh. Can you get a TAing job doing a completely different course, so that you don't have to do the pedagogy?
Could you take a leadership role in the pedagogy course and make sure it's worth everyone's while? Or would that just be more work?
Ron, I probably should. And doctor prescribed massages would be nice!
Danielle, ditto with the massage thing. It is frustrating that faculty do not really treat us much different than a senior working in their lab!
Spark, the three advil did more than the yoga. :( Yoga only worked while I was actually IN class.
Aurora, I would LOVE to be involved with the planning of a course like that! My advisor had once talked to me about being involved in a seminar she teaches and THAT never happened.
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