The beginning of the semester is always fun as I meet my new students and run into old students. One thing I’ve noticed now is that as I walk around campus, especially during the times when the students are likely to be out, I almost always run into at least two or three students.

I love stopping to chat with old students and hearing about their lives and the things that they’ve been doing lately. Sometimes I would much rather just come home and hide in my apartment nestled away next to the mountain, far from the student dorms, and sometimes I do that after a long day. But when I do get out and run into students and see their smiles, I’m always glad I was out at just the right time to meet them.

I’ve had a few fun teaching moments lately that I wanted to share with you because teaching is full of ups and downs, and it’s great to recognize the ups when they come so that when the downs are there then we can persevere through them.

For the first couple of weeks in my European culture class, we talked about ancient Greek culture, and I decided to focus on mythology because I think that’s interesting and it works with some of the themes that we’re focusing on in the class. I had the students read some of the stories and then talk about them with their classmates, and I enjoyed seeing the students sharing the stories that they had read with each other.

Afterwards, I wanted to give the students time to write their own Greek myths, but, alas, we ran out of time. So at the end of class, I told the students about the activity, and told them that while they didn’t have to do it for homework, if they did decide to write a myth, I would love to read it.

I gave the students three prompts to get them started. First, I told them to imagine a god/goddess for Baiyun mountain (the collection of big hills near our campus). Second, I suggested imagining a god/goddess for the cafeterias on our campus. Third, I suggested they describe a god/goddess for the weather in our city. We live in the south of China, so our weather is constantly changing. The summer is long and very hot and humid. We get lots of rain, and even if a day looks sunny, you should always be prepared for a shower because it can come out of nowhere. Even on today, a sunny day with a blue sky, we’re preparing for the biggest typhoon of the year.

When I told the students about the prompts, they burst into laughter, and many of them took pictures, but I also didn’t hold my breath that many of them would actually do the assignment. However, this weekend, I received a couple of messages from my students, and two of them did finish the activity!

I enjoyed reading about the beautiful and elegant goddess of Baiyun mountain that one girl imagined and the fickle goddess of Guangzhou weather that another girl imagined. However, as I was reading about the goddess of weather who constantly changed her mind, I found myself wondering what God thinks of this activity. I wanted the students to have fun and be creative, but God is the God of the weather, even the craziness of Guangzhou weather. And our God is anything but fickle and changeable even though the weather often is.

I haven’t decided what I think about this or if I will do the activity again next year, but I was happy when two students decided to do extra work just for fun! Let me know if you have any thoughts about the activity!

Another happy teaching moment was yesterday. Mondays are my longest days, and even though I really enjoy all of my classes, most of the time after my last class, all I want to do is come home and go to bed (which is a pretty discouraging feeling when it’s only 3:30 in the afternoon).

In European culture yesterday, we talked about ancient Roman architecture, and I told the students about the different types of columns that the ancient Romans had taken from the Greeks and then how they had used those styles to create some of their own. We also looked at some ancient Roman buildings and talked about how they had different characteristics of Roman architecture.

After we finished talking about it, I encouraged the students to look around them for European style buildings and to see if they could find any examples of these columns. In the past, students have shared examples of these columns when they see them around.

Later that day when I was trying not to fall asleep during dinner, I saw that one of my students had texted me. She was super excited to tell me that she had noticed that the pagoda on campus, right outside the library had ionic style columns with the scrolls in the capital. She sent me several pictures to prove it, and she was so excited to share.

My teacher heart smiled. I’m so proud of my students and how hard they work and how excited they are to learn. And I love that they share things that they notice with me. I hope I never lose that wonder for learning about the world around me. I’ve walked by that pagoda dozens of times and this is my second semester teaching this lesson, and I had never noticed the ionic style columns on that building. Perhaps I need to follow my own advice and look around me for these things that we’re talking about.

I’m so thankful to be back in school with my students. I’m thankful for the chance to invest in the lives of people, and I’m so thankful that I can learn with and from these incredible people.

But no job is all sunshine and roses. So what are some of the challenges? One of my biggest challenges at the beginning of the semester is learning all of the students’ names. I tell the students on the first day that I will try to learn their names, but I also remind them that I have more than a hundred students, and I will most likely forget their names at least once. But I still feel horrible when I can’t remember their names, especially when I have to ask the same person for their name week after week.

Another struggle for this semester is research. I love teaching, but research is not my favorite thing. However, the higher-ups are urging me to do more research, so that’s one of my goals for this semester. If I could just write the paper, that would be one thing, but I’m dreading the process of looking for a journal and trying to get the paper published in the journal (especially since the journal that my colleague recommended has around a $300 entry fee! Yikes!). I need to do it, but starting that process is hard and a bit overwhelming.

Overall, I’m looking forward to this semester with my students, and I’m thankful for challenges that will push me to improve!