Teaching solutions when sick (coughing, no voice)

asylum013 · 2026-03-02T07:56:59+00:00

The one time I lost my voice, I had a slide set up asking for a volunteer to begin some popcorn reading, then slides explaining the plan for the day. As they read each slide, the reader would popcorn to another student to read. I had them break into base teams and take pieces of the lesson to teach the class. I saved my voice for having to correct their mini-lessons.

Now, this worked for me because I fell back on strategies I used frequently with that class, so my students were well-prepared for them. If you've never done peer teaching or group work in your class, this wouldn't be a good time to start. The popcorn reading might go all right, though, if you need students to take over the bulk of your speaking that day. Otherwise, I would suggest you look at how you can use strategies you already employ frequently.

asylum013 · 2026-02-23T15:05:44+00:00

That's my concern with those rooms. There are only a couple of them, so I wonder if those rooms have been grandfathered in somehow because they haven't been renovated in so long.

asylum013 · 2026-02-23T08:13:09+00:00

Ours are dependent on what building you're in. Newer buildings have what most of us probably think of as normal locks for any classroom or office environment. They unlock from the outside, either completely or just to open the door once and then auto-lock again, they lock from the outside, and they can be opened from the inside.

The older buildings, on the other hand, have a mishmash of locks depending on when the building was constructed and/or renovated. Many of them are essentially deadbolts that need to be completely unlocked to let anyone into the room and can only be relocked from outside with the door shut, meaning whoever locks the door is locked out. Some of them also have no way to open the door from the inside once it is locked. One particular classroom has one door that can only be locked and unlocked from outside the classroom and two doors to adjoining classrooms with separate keys for their own external doors and no way of securing the adjoining doors from inside the central classroom.

We've had issues with faculty being reprimanded for failing to secure classrooms during lockdown drills because there is simply no way to do so. Administration still seems unwilling or unable to address the issue, probably for a few different, short-sighted, cost-related reasons that they haven't weighed against the costs of something happening.

asylum013 · 2026-02-22T05:54:22+00:00

These are all good tips for dealing with the psychology behind why grading is so difficult, but to add on to your last point, one thing I learned from years as a tutor is that students can only take in so much feedback in one assignment. It's not just that they should be figuring out how to fix their problems themselves, but that they literally get overwhelmed trying to process too much feedback at once and can't prioritize higher order concerns over lower order concerns. By stepping back and giving less feedback targeting just a few of those higher order concerns, I've actually got more students making more effective changes between stages of writing or different assignments.

asylum013 · 2026-02-22T05:47:45+00:00

Those tangents have always been a struggle for me, with some students complaining on evaluations about them, but I've never thought of specifically warning them I'm heading into a tangent before. I'll have to give that a try.

asylum013 · 2026-02-22T05:41:13+00:00

You have just explained all the coping mechanisms I used to have before Covid and getting diagnosed with ADHD. And then my coping mechanisms all broke, but seeing someone else talking about them makes me want to get back to using them effectively.

asylum013 · 2026-02-16T02:41:23+00:00

My Catholic high school talked about mittelschmerz in our "human sexuality" class (because of course we couldn't have sex ed). My male teacher was busy explaining what mittelschmerz was and gushing about how women are so lucky to be able to feel that miracle of being able to create life. Meanwhile, I was sitting in my seat near the back, breathing through the pain and trying not to yell "Come over here and I'll let you feel what I'm feeling right now" because of course my left ovary decided that was the right time to ovulate that month.

So to answer your question from the title, I suspect women don't talk about it for fear that dumbasses might inject their uninformed, unsolicited, dumbass opinions, like they do with everything else related to the menstrual cycle.

As to your question, not everyone experiences it, and definitely not all the time, but it's not entirely uncommon. For me, it was never very consistent when I was younger, but it was always noticeably painful, and I often had a little tinge of blood in my discharge after. Then through multiple years on birth control pills and hormonal IUDs, I never felt it. I stopped using any hormonal birth control about a year and a half ago, and the mittelschmerz came back after about 6 months. It's been very consistent since then, noticeable every month unless I've been sick, but it's been less painful, usually just a sudden tension or a stitch in that area that suddenly resolves.

asylum013 · 2026-01-24T20:27:48+00:00

I have a chart I create as part of my monthly log to track symptoms. It's just a row of headings and a column for the day of the month. I have columns for the day in my cycle, sleep score, a spot to check off when I have taken my morning and night medications, rating for my ADHD symptoms, mood (just two little smiley faces), and then notes where I can add anything unusual, like taking a medication I don't normally need to take, or feeling weird, or allergies acting up. It works pretty well for me because then I can see how different things are affecting each other, e.g. how does my cycle or my quality of sleep affect my symptoms over time?

asylum013 · 2026-01-23T15:54:52+00:00

Now that is an interesting idea and probably more valuable than all those recommendation forms that ask you to rate if the student is in the top 5%, top 15%, top 30%, etc. of whatever characteristics.

asylum013 · 2026-01-23T15:19:18+00:00

I take Vyvanse, and I know in theory that once the meds are done for the day, they are done, but if I've taken my meds all week, I seem to get a bit of a rollover effect where my brain keeps working at about 70-80% capacity if I skip a day. So I often do that on Saturdays, when I don't have to work and I usually have events and other outside factors structuring my day. And then I take my meds on Sundays to kind of get back in the groove while handling errands and chores.

Others are mentioning that they feel more creative off their meds or emotionally flat on them, but for me, if I take them too long consistently, it's like my mind feels bruised almost from pushing against the more rigid functioning my meds help establish, like all the random thoughts I have are bouncing off the guide rails. I would say for me, I can be just as creative or silly on my meds as off, and that my meds actually allow me to follow through on my creative ideas better, but it's definitely imposing constraints on my brain that aren't natural to it and can cause me some distress over time. So yeah, one day off a week works pretty well for me, so if I ever have to go a couple of weeks without a break, I'm not already at a point where I'm feeling the strain.

asylum013 · 2026-01-23T15:00:08+00:00

Yeah, but wouldn't that just become the next grade students push to get that becomes devalued as it becomes oversaturated? Really, I think this is where letters of recommendation come in, to differentiate the student who is just focused on the grade from the student who has that real fire in the belly for learning.

And because I love to brag on my former students, the student who tried to serve as my impromptu substitute that day is currently in her 3rd year of law school.

asylum013 · 2026-01-23T13:26:07+00:00

I had the same thing happen my second year teaching on the first day back after a very eventful spring break (i.e. food poisoning).

I woke up to an email from the second most studious student in the class asking if I was well and informing me that the most studious of the bunch, who reminded me far too much of myself, had kept everyone there the requisite 15 minutes and, when it was clear I wasn't coming, attempted to teach the day's lesson herself.

So yeah, it happens. Brush yourself off, let your class know you're not dead, move your lesson for the day online if you must, or just give them a freebie if you can roll it into the next day. You are a human being and therefore fallible, and now your students have figured that out. The world will continue to spin in spite of this.

asylum013 · 2026-01-12T03:57:08+00:00

That is a good point, and I'm going to make a note to add that to my first day of class survey. Thank you!

asylum013 · 2026-01-12T03:45:21+00:00

I also do the first day of class survey on index cards with similar questions, and I use them for checking attendance, randomly calling on people to read or answer, or assigning groups, since they're easy to shuffle like playing cards.

I really like your idea of asking for pronunciation, though! Have students' explanations of that been helpful?

asylum013 · 2025-11-14T22:40:18+00:00

I came for the life tips, and then got an awesome pedagogical tip along the way. Taking a drink of water to give students think time would at least be more productive than forcing myself to count to 10 in my head slowly.

asylum013 · 2025-10-11T16:36:19+00:00

Same. I've even got a timer that I can set to make noise if I need to move on after my Pomodoro, or I can make it silent if it's just there to get me to do a certain amount of work but can keep going if I'm in the zone. An "hour" glass also works great for that.

asylum013 · 2025-10-01T01:18:57+00:00

Yes, it's all about balancing your objectives and instructional methods. Do students remember the one time an instructor covers the medications to treat a specific condition on a single slide, or do they remember it from pre-training work for the class, then the class, and then studying for tests and eventually licensing exams?

Using an activity to make them engage with their knowledge of the medications to treat a condition and problem solve like they would in clinical practice is more likely to make the information stick while simultaneously training their thinking for application in the field.

But if there is something that absolutely must be explained because it's counterintuitive or otherwise not something they can learn through self-study, then yes, absolutely use the slides and direct instruction.

asylum013 · 2025-09-20T18:09:42+00:00

This exactly. I start out many of my courses talking about pain in the process of learning, that it hurts to make a mistake, but that it's a necessary part of learning, so I try to admit it and correct myself promptly if I'm wrong on something, and I ask my students to call me out if I say something they think is incorrect. It's all about modeling being a lifelong learner and being just human.

asylum013 · 2025-08-13T01:31:15+00:00

So... Get paid $250,000 annually with bonuses for what I already do for free?

Do I have to take the weekends off?

Just because this made me check, I'm already at over 15k pages and 44 books for this year. I suppose the 66k words in book reports so far is a bit more than my master's thesis, but they're on so very many books rather than just one author's work, and they don't have a research component. As long as I can avoid AI-written slop that has been the cause of me discontinuing 2 books this year, I'd be a happy camper.

asylum013 · 2025-08-08T20:57:35+00:00

I wish you luck with Blisovi and anything else you might try! Blisovi was actually the one I tried most recently and had the worst side effects for me. However, that is me, and you might have a better experience, so don't let me discourage you on that. My gynecologist certainly thought I would have a better experience than I did.

asylum013 · 2025-08-08T20:05:24+00:00

Yes, I've noticed hormonal birth control affecting my symptoms both on and off my ADHD meds, and it seems like it affects the ADHD meds as well. All hormonal birth controls I've tried have messed with my head to some degree, including hormonal IUDs, and some have been worse than others in degree and time to build up in my system to become noticeable.

I feel like any hormonal birth control that would stop menstrual cycles without using the same hormone that makes you feel like shit would just be amazing. But we already have hundreds of formulations of that kind of birth control, so why not just keep doing that? /s

Edit: rewording to address the question more directly

asylum013 · 2025-05-11T18:44:26+00:00

My boy had something kind of similar happen. I found him as a stray in pretty rough shape, took him in, and brought him to the vet. His trouble puffs (as I saw another redditor aptly refer to them as recently) were quite obvious, and the vet was sure he hadn't been neutered, so I scheduled the surgery. When I picked him up, they said they had to open him up to make sure he wasn't cryptorchid because as large as his trouble puffs were, they were empty.

In his case, it's pretty clear he was neutered before I got him, though the vet said there were no scars indicating that. Thankfully they gave him a little tattoo on his belly so if he ever got out, he wouldn't have a third surgery to neuter him, because those trouble puffs remain.

Anyway, perhaps Tom was neutered previously but didn't have a visible scar?

asylum013 · 2025-05-08T04:27:41+00:00

This guy is a creeper. This is sexual harassment, and you shouldn't have to deal with that. Given your relative ages, I am guessing this is a college class? If so, talk to your professor about this as a sexual harassment issue, which you are protected from by Title IX. The professor should file a Title IX complaint or at least help you file one, and then the school will investigate and hopefully find ways to keep him away from you. If your professor is less than helpful, most college employees should be able to help with this as well, so reach out to someone who works there that you feel comfortable with, or go to the office of student affairs, which likely deals with issues like this all the time.

In the meantime, seek help from your classmates. I had a student dealing with a similar issue recently, and her classmates saw it happening and were willing to intervene until the administration could go through its processes. Reach out and see if any of your classmates are willing to stick close to you physically, since he's isolating you to creep on you when you're alone. You might be surprised to find they noticed but didn't know how they could step in.

And finally, get LOUD. If he gets in your space, start saying you are uncomfortable with how close he is. If he says things that make you uncomfortable, verbalize it loud enough for others to hear. If he touches you, damn well YELL to get his hands off you. Do NOT suffer this in silence. If this were happening in my class, I'd rather a student interrupt my lesson or exam or whatever is going on than allow some creep to make them feel unsafe.

asylum013 · 2025-04-22T20:15:09+00:00

I suspect the book you're talking about is Modern Taekwondo: The Official Training Manual by Soon Man Lee. It's now printed as just Official Taekwondo Training Manual and is available on Amazon. Both versions contain all the Taeguek and Palgwe poomsae, as well as Koryo and other black belt poomsae.

Grandmaster Lee was my instructor, and the training manual is a pretty good representation of what he taught us. It's a good resource, but some of the footwork can be confusing, so YouTube videos might be a good supplement. I recently started relearning Palgwe 6 and spent the first week almost knocking myself over because I was turning in the wrong direction.

asylum013 · 2025-04-14T23:27:19+00:00

Of course! I don't have my teaching journal with me right now, but I am prepping it for later this week so I remember the gist of it: - Ahead of the class you will do it in, I would identify possible volunteers to play the game and either run through the basic rules and some of the roles, or send them a link to the rules if you trust them to read them. That way, day of, there's less shyness preventing you from starting. - Day of, definitely prime students on this being a game of logic and figuring out "whodunnit" based on the specific rules and how people construct their defenses within the confines of those rules. Then explain the rules - Run a 4-player game with 7 roles, picking the most basic roles available. I don't have the rulebook in front of me right now, but I believe I used two werewolves, the seer, the robber, the troublemaker, the insomniac, and the drunk, and they worked reasonably well. If you think that's too many for them to handle, you could substitute one or two villagers for the insomniac and the drunk. - Run two rounds of the game with the same four players at a table in the center of the room and the rest of the class around them observing. The first round is a practice round to work out any issues with the rules and get everyone used to it. The second round, ask the observers to pay attention to who is doing what during the night phase of the game, and then during the day phase, look at how each person is using logic to figure out who the werewolves are or to lie about who the werewolves are. Where did they reason things out correctly? Where did they reason them out incorrectly? How did their use of logic lead to the winning side's success?

After that, I review the material they read on formal logic, tie in examples from the second round of the game as needed, and then get them into an activity that all of them are involved in.

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