A Seminary Update

Several people have asked how seminary is going this year, so here's a brief update. Well, not so brief. After all, if it were brief, you'd wonder what happened to the real Auntie K and who the imposter blogger is.

Overall, I think it's going well. I have a larger class, usually about 18 students, but I think they're generally more attentive than last year's class of 12. Unfortunately, as the year has progressed, the students have become more distracted and less likely to answer questions. Some of the girls like to talk to each other too much.

Sometimes the students come up with some really good ideas and ask good questions. At other times, I wonder if anything is sinking in at all. I do have to repeat myself much more often than I would have to do in a class of adults. Guess that's just part of the game, though it makes a small part of me glad I don't have teenagers of my own. Was I that inattentive at that age? Anyway, I digress.

I've assigned a few responsibilities to class members, like arranging devotionals and prayers, conducting class, and setting up the room on Sundays. That has helped a lot. If I get brave, I'll have them sign up to teach a lesson next semester. I'm not sure some of them will do it, however, since I really have to pull teeth to get a couple of the girls to give a devotional thought.

Another improvement is that we start generally on time now. Last year, I had one student who arrived on time and the rest of the class was consistently 10-15 minutes late. It was hard to keep momentum going in a lesson and very discouraging to boot. We have a couple of students who are always late now, but they come into class quietly, we all say hello to them, and they manage to catch up without too much interruption. I still don't get through lessons any faster than I did last year, and I'm not sure they're getting much of a sense of the overall picture of the New Testament, but I think this class spends more time talking about things not strictly lesson-related. I guess that's ok with me as long as they're mostly talking about something Gospel-related. Many of the students are eager to share "missionary moments" they have had at school, and we talk about that more days than not. Many of their school friends know they are LDS and it seems to come up in conversations a lot.

Between you, me and the blogosphere, I think I will probably ask to be released after this year. In a way I feel bad about that, because I really do enjoy the students and I'm reading and learning more about the scriptures than I would have otherwise, and I know that in this area they generally keep teachers longer than two years.

On the other hand, I think I need some time back to try and get my life into some semblance of order. I'm not working enough on writing and "researching," I spend every Saturday I can just recovering from the week while the housework and such piles up and the roaches plot a complete overthrow of the apartment, and I'm a bit depressed by everything I have to do. AND, I'm gaining weight like there's no tomorrow, which I think is in part due to my haphazard ways of eating, sleeping, and exercising. Not that giving up seminary would solve all the above problems, but in theory it would give me more time to work on them. And it may help me break the usual habit of coming home from work, taking a nap, and then getting back up at 10 or 11 to work on lessons (or blog).

Thanks for asking!