All Meat, All the Time!

When I was in undergrad, I hated those "icebreaker" activities. They were lame and I'd have rathered the professor let us out of class early than to do one. Now that I am teaching a "workshop" kind of class, I use these hated activities on the first day.

To try and be as "fun" as possible, I first had the students talk to someone next to them and find out their basic information: name, where they're from, their major/what they want to with their life. Then they had to introduce their new friend to the class. Yeah, yeah, fairly typical. But, I had them do that first so that everyone had some basic information to go on for the very exciting "Human Scavenger Hunt" that was the grand dénouement of our icebreaking.

So, I gave them this list of 20 statements and they had to find someone who fit each one and write their name next to it. I specifically told them they needed to "get up off their asses" for this one. They actually did, impressively enough. All in all, it worked out pretty well! And then I dampened their spirits by making them write for 30 minutes! (evil laugh)

Things I learned about my students:

• there is only one person born in June (my illustrious birth month) in my class. And none who were born in December or January.

• only 1/3 of my class can roll their tongue.

• in California, at a fairly liberal institution, NOT ONE OF MY STUDENTS IS VEGETARIAN OR VEGAN

I guess I should just bring trays of meat for them, if ever I decide to bring them food, as they were very excited when they realized they were all carnivores.

I think they're going to love my t-shirt, when next I wear it!