And the Attrition Begins

I just taught my second class. All 26 students were there for the first day. Today, I had two no-shows and one rather late. That's to be expected. What bothered me more was that we were peer reviewing a 1-2 page draft today, and 5 of the remaining 21 students had no draft with them, and were hence unable to participate. One offered to read someone's and I had to shut that down. Letting someone read your piece, especially your raw, unedited draft is an act of courage. There's no courage involved in reviewing without being reviewed. I said this and got a slightly ashamed "Uh huh" in response.

That said, I ended up being a peer because there was an odd number of students, and the girl who reviewed my draft had the guts to make criticisms on mine. Hopefully this means that I am accessible. I'm trying to balance that and my authority. I'm getting observed by my department chair on my first class next week. I'm not even concerned with impressing her, I just want to make sure I don't disappoint.