First Day of Class

I have my first class today at Hong He University. I'm teaching Introduction to British Literature to junior English majors once a week on Wednesdays. I'm rather excited about it. It will be more of a challenge on my part but a nice change from the typical oral English/speech classes I have been teaching. The class is a very brief survey that starts with Chaucer and finishes with a few 20th century writers. Basically the idea is just to familiarize the students with the major British writers and their most important works. Brian Rice taught this class before so he'll be a help and a good resource whenever I need it.

I also have 5 classes of freshmen Oral English (also English majors); however, the freshmen students have to complete two weeks of military training (this is standard in every university in China) before their classes start. I won't see those freshmen students until sometime after September 12th. This works out nicely for me because this week and next, I'll just have the Brit. Lit. class, leaving me pleanty of time to get my lessons planned and organized, as well as time to get moved in and settled, before having a full schedule.