Erik Scott

Their letters are always so thoughtful and insightful and this assingment is always a nice soft reset heading towards the last part of the year.

Their first assignment is to write an open letter back to Baldwin based around one of his essays they pick out of three the choose to read first in the book. (They do not need to read the essays in the order they ae sequenced in the book. I allow them to read what is most interesting first.)

I'm about to start my favorite assignments of the year with my AP English Language class. We read Notes of a Native Son by James Baldwin and practice different modes and genre of communication throughout their reading.

The fact that this week Google Slides are essential forcing this "option" on us is terrible. I can't even find a way to turn it off. I'm so angry right now, I can't even explain.

Google Slides pretty much forcing it's AI summarization on people is a big "no dawg" from me. Summarization is skill students should be learning. Creating bullet points is a skill students should be learning.

Once more because why not, but here's everything I wrote/published in 2025 (thread) -

Bringing back Limewire to illegally rip copies of reporting suppressed by the government is definitely some cyberpunk shit

The full spiked 60 Minutes CECOT package, clean & subtitled. 1/5

Maybe if it was normalized for men to show each other physical affection, they wouldn't have to go to these lengths to get a hug

I could be closeted. I could let them all assume I'm a woman. But since I don't, they can't pretend that trans people are some distant other or hypothetical debate. I hope that's doing something.

"This promise of an AI future, is really just a collective anxiety that wealthy people have about how well they're gonna be able to control us in the future."

- @tressiemcphd.bsky.social with an absolute mic drop moment about AI bullshit.

Incredible words.
Listen to all of it!

So this is what happens when we don't put any policy in place at all for these types of things. Which most schools, including higher ed, don't have at this point.

*Teachers creating their own individual classroom policies is not a policy.

Time Magazine's poor parody of the classic "Lunch Atop a Skyscraper" photo with the heads of AI switched out for the original construction workers.

It's telling that my 17 year old student who used the original of this image in a brilliant visual analysis presentation this week understands the picture and what it is supposed to represent better than the editors at Time magazine.

I have a headache just trying to read this.

LOL

Love the Strike Anywhere nod too....

Succinct.

In Defiance of Empty Times | Costa Koutsoutis Get more from Costa Koutsoutis on Patreon

This past weekend I rambled over at my Patreon about coming up on 20 years of writing and other nonsense. Check it out for free;

It's so good!!!!!

This was one of the more difficult years I've had getting students into Othello, but the train seems to be moving right along to the station in Act III now.

Agreed.

All this to say, my knowledge of economics had nothing to do with my A in economics class. To help prove your point.

Our professor spent the first 30 minutes of class everyday yelling at the half of class that showed up about the half of class that didn't. I'm convinced I got an A because she recognized my name on the roster for going to class.

I took a econ class as one of my Gen Eds in undergrad. I had never been more sure I failed a final in my life. It counted as 50 percent of our final grade. I ended up getting A in the class.

I also try to stress t them they need to be proud of what they are writing before they ever think of "me" or anyone really as an audience. Then, they have to focus intently on purpose and intended audience for their writing, because if they don't have these down, they are going to be lost.

My chief rule for them is always if they are bored writing it it shows, and I'm almost assuredly going to be bored reading it. And I don't really want to read 75 boring essays.

I think it's because for so long they've been taught the wrong things about what makes effective writing and tat's often encyclopedic language documents.

I have several assignments in my writing classes I give to fight against what I call "essay-ey" writing and it's SO hard for students to find and embrace their voices with these assignments and to do it without using "I think/I believe" language.

If you look at the criteria, I would argue none of this response proves the student read the article. Calling an article "thought provoking" and then refusing to quote the article even once is the opposite of proof you've read the article.