The Cult of Personality
I have 24 hours of duty today, so this is probably the best opportunity I have to update my long neglected LiveJournal. I had hoped to post some of my teaching experiences with my first class, but I was too busy teaching to do any real posting on the subject. Now I have another class and I haven’t posted a single thing about the first one. It appears that being busy in a good way is not good for LiveJournal.
Class 006
This was my first class. It was a little daunting to be so new here and have to be in charge of their instruction for two and a half months. I didn’t really know how things are supposed to be done here. Although, I know how things are done in the Army and I spent the last four years in the special operations community where things are done a little bit differently. And, there really wasn’t much guidance as to how I was supposed to do things and all my other instructors were as new as I was. Fortunately, things worked out well.
As is usual, it took some time for my class and I and the other instructors to get to know each other. Once we did, class time was great. Even when I wasn’t teaching, I hung out it the classroom to talk to the students, tell stories in class, and answer their questions. I think that’s the best thing about teaching, I actually get paid to tell dorky war stories to an audience that’s captive, intensely interested, and very appreciative.
After a few weeks, my class turned into something like my own little cult of personalty. The students and other instructors came up with the nickname Team Fulton. This annoyed the hell out of some of the other instructors. Haters, what can you do? :P
The really cool thing is that my class tuned into exactly the sort of soldiers I wanted them to be, they worked hard and played hard. Most of the students here are so uptight they can’t have any fun with this. That’s a shame, because this is an incredibly fun job. Anyway, my students were the ones who always did things a little bit different and, got themselves into some mischief.
Some instructors get a little freaked out when someone does something different or they get themselves into a little but of trouble, but it’s all part of learning the army to me. It’s funny to me because I never really pushed this on my students and am not really sure if it’s my bad influence that made them that way or if fate just happened to place students who are a little like me in my charge.
Smoke Sessions
So the first day of class some students got sleepy and weren’t able to stay awake. No biggie, this just means a little smoke session during break. A smoke session is when the students have to do push-ups, mountain climbers, flutter-kicks, etc, until we tell them to stop. One of my instructors loves doing this and is a master at it.
This is actually one of the cool things about the Army, if you fuck something up, you get a little smoke session, and then all is forgotten. There’s no grudges held and no one’s career is ruined for something minor and push-ups and flutter-kicks are actually good for you. I’ve made a career of fucking things up, taking my punishment, and moving on.
I had a pretty interesting assortment of students. One, Walt, had been a sergeant in the infantry ten years ago. He had to go through everything all over again. It sucked, because he’s as old as I am. He’s a good guy, though, and never complained and set a great example for the new soldiers. Then there’s Scott, who has a private pilot’s license and is an excellent soldier and Julia, who was an All American soccer player in college. I also had some problem children. I was certain that Joe was a Columbine shooter just waiting to happen. He’s definitely different, but turned out to be not as weird in person and his biographical essay had suggested. Then there was Josh, who is easily one of the worst soldiers I’ve ever known. He has no strengths. After over four months here, I still don’t think he can run two miles as fast as he needs to. More on him later.
Goofy Class Stuff
Some of the classes we have to teach are boring and most won’t be of any interest to anyone outside the field, but some resulted in some amusing stories. One class concerns eliciting information from someone. Now elicitation is finding something out without the person you’re talking to knowing that was the information you’re looking for. We paired the class off and students were tasked with information they had to find out about each other.
As fate would have it, Joe was paired up with Julia. As I mentioned earlier, Joe is one of those guys who’s just different and-although he’s reasonably intelligent-his interpersonal skills are somewhat stunted. Julia-on the other hand-is attractive, athletic, outgoing, ambitious, and very intelligent. Joe was helpless, mere putty in her hands. Julia flirted shamelessly with Joe, smiling at him and giving him this adoring gaze. Then she sort of leaned back and made sure he got a nice view of her breasts under her t-shirt. Joe looked like a kid on Christmas morning. I could almost see his mind shouting, ‘Oh my God, I’m talking to a girl!’
It was so funny I couldn’t help but laugh right there in class. Joe would have given Julia his ATM card and PIN number. After the exercise, I told Julia she was soooooooo bad and-of course she protested with ‘what?’ like she didn’t know what she was doing. I demonstrated her elicitation technique for the class and it got a big laugh. She’ll actually do great in this job since she really does have a good technique.
The Cult
When I first had barracks duty here, it was deathly dull. I was new, had no classroom time with any of the students, and spent the entire time there just watching the soldiers check their mail and go in and out of their rooms. It wasn’t easy to stay awake or stop pacing around out of sheer boredom.
Once I had a class, things changed. I actually liked duty. It afforded me more time to talk with students. In the classroom, I often pushed through the lesson plans so I’d have time to add in some anecdotes at the end. On barracks duty, I get to talk to the students unencumbered by any lame-ass lesson plan.
Fortunately, my students didn’t let me get bored and took turns hanging out at the duty desk to talk with me. They also didn’t let me go hungry either. I was kept well supplied with pizza, cookies, and coffee. At the time, Scott and Julia were in a bit of a competition to write the best report so I joked with them about bribing me with food. Julia struck first, and was the first student to bring me food. It was cookies from the mess hall. Others brought more cookies, then pizza, and the coffee. I was stuffed, they almost brought me too much food.
Scott and some others got their chance to bribe me with food the next day. They got another chance because I was stupid. I had thought I had duty on a different day so I ended up being late. My punishment was to have duty again the next night. I really didn’t mind, I enjoyed myself on duty.
So, the next night all my students are asking me why I have duty again and I tell them I’m being punished for being late the night before. It was actually funny because three of my students, Julia, Walt, and Reid, had been caught drinking on a night before a work day. It’s a pretty stupid rule, really. And three of MY students breaking it seemed appropriate. It was also appropriate that I would get in trouble, too.
Julia wasn’t allowed anywhere except the mess hall because she was in trouble. Scott had managed to not get caught and he and some other students were still able to go anywhere. One of them, Sara, did a little elicitation on me and asked me what type of ice cream I liked. It wasn’t a surprise when they brought me some from the Cold Stone Creamery in town, but it still felt damn good to have my students take care of me like that. I still get a warm and fuzzy feeling thinking about it.
All Good Things Must Come to an End
Shortly after that, they were no longer my students. They weren’t gone, but they were moving on to another committee and another set of instructors. It didn’t take me long to miss them. I still saw them from time to time, every once in a while, I’d stop by their new classrooms. It was nice to see them again and they always seemed excited to see me. They even came up with a new platoon mascot. It had been the Marauders, but they changed it to Pirates in honor of my “thing” for pirates.
Class 006
This was my first class. It was a little daunting to be so new here and have to be in charge of their instruction for two and a half months. I didn’t really know how things are supposed to be done here. Although, I know how things are done in the Army and I spent the last four years in the special operations community where things are done a little bit differently. And, there really wasn’t much guidance as to how I was supposed to do things and all my other instructors were as new as I was. Fortunately, things worked out well.
As is usual, it took some time for my class and I and the other instructors to get to know each other. Once we did, class time was great. Even when I wasn’t teaching, I hung out it the classroom to talk to the students, tell stories in class, and answer their questions. I think that’s the best thing about teaching, I actually get paid to tell dorky war stories to an audience that’s captive, intensely interested, and very appreciative.
After a few weeks, my class turned into something like my own little cult of personalty. The students and other instructors came up with the nickname Team Fulton. This annoyed the hell out of some of the other instructors. Haters, what can you do? :P
The really cool thing is that my class tuned into exactly the sort of soldiers I wanted them to be, they worked hard and played hard. Most of the students here are so uptight they can’t have any fun with this. That’s a shame, because this is an incredibly fun job. Anyway, my students were the ones who always did things a little bit different and, got themselves into some mischief.
Some instructors get a little freaked out when someone does something different or they get themselves into a little but of trouble, but it’s all part of learning the army to me. It’s funny to me because I never really pushed this on my students and am not really sure if it’s my bad influence that made them that way or if fate just happened to place students who are a little like me in my charge.
Smoke Sessions
So the first day of class some students got sleepy and weren’t able to stay awake. No biggie, this just means a little smoke session during break. A smoke session is when the students have to do push-ups, mountain climbers, flutter-kicks, etc, until we tell them to stop. One of my instructors loves doing this and is a master at it.
This is actually one of the cool things about the Army, if you fuck something up, you get a little smoke session, and then all is forgotten. There’s no grudges held and no one’s career is ruined for something minor and push-ups and flutter-kicks are actually good for you. I’ve made a career of fucking things up, taking my punishment, and moving on.
I had a pretty interesting assortment of students. One, Walt, had been a sergeant in the infantry ten years ago. He had to go through everything all over again. It sucked, because he’s as old as I am. He’s a good guy, though, and never complained and set a great example for the new soldiers. Then there’s Scott, who has a private pilot’s license and is an excellent soldier and Julia, who was an All American soccer player in college. I also had some problem children. I was certain that Joe was a Columbine shooter just waiting to happen. He’s definitely different, but turned out to be not as weird in person and his biographical essay had suggested. Then there was Josh, who is easily one of the worst soldiers I’ve ever known. He has no strengths. After over four months here, I still don’t think he can run two miles as fast as he needs to. More on him later.
Goofy Class Stuff
Some of the classes we have to teach are boring and most won’t be of any interest to anyone outside the field, but some resulted in some amusing stories. One class concerns eliciting information from someone. Now elicitation is finding something out without the person you’re talking to knowing that was the information you’re looking for. We paired the class off and students were tasked with information they had to find out about each other.
As fate would have it, Joe was paired up with Julia. As I mentioned earlier, Joe is one of those guys who’s just different and-although he’s reasonably intelligent-his interpersonal skills are somewhat stunted. Julia-on the other hand-is attractive, athletic, outgoing, ambitious, and very intelligent. Joe was helpless, mere putty in her hands. Julia flirted shamelessly with Joe, smiling at him and giving him this adoring gaze. Then she sort of leaned back and made sure he got a nice view of her breasts under her t-shirt. Joe looked like a kid on Christmas morning. I could almost see his mind shouting, ‘Oh my God, I’m talking to a girl!’
It was so funny I couldn’t help but laugh right there in class. Joe would have given Julia his ATM card and PIN number. After the exercise, I told Julia she was soooooooo bad and-of course she protested with ‘what?’ like she didn’t know what she was doing. I demonstrated her elicitation technique for the class and it got a big laugh. She’ll actually do great in this job since she really does have a good technique.
The Cult
When I first had barracks duty here, it was deathly dull. I was new, had no classroom time with any of the students, and spent the entire time there just watching the soldiers check their mail and go in and out of their rooms. It wasn’t easy to stay awake or stop pacing around out of sheer boredom.
Once I had a class, things changed. I actually liked duty. It afforded me more time to talk with students. In the classroom, I often pushed through the lesson plans so I’d have time to add in some anecdotes at the end. On barracks duty, I get to talk to the students unencumbered by any lame-ass lesson plan.
Fortunately, my students didn’t let me get bored and took turns hanging out at the duty desk to talk with me. They also didn’t let me go hungry either. I was kept well supplied with pizza, cookies, and coffee. At the time, Scott and Julia were in a bit of a competition to write the best report so I joked with them about bribing me with food. Julia struck first, and was the first student to bring me food. It was cookies from the mess hall. Others brought more cookies, then pizza, and the coffee. I was stuffed, they almost brought me too much food.
Scott and some others got their chance to bribe me with food the next day. They got another chance because I was stupid. I had thought I had duty on a different day so I ended up being late. My punishment was to have duty again the next night. I really didn’t mind, I enjoyed myself on duty.
So, the next night all my students are asking me why I have duty again and I tell them I’m being punished for being late the night before. It was actually funny because three of my students, Julia, Walt, and Reid, had been caught drinking on a night before a work day. It’s a pretty stupid rule, really. And three of MY students breaking it seemed appropriate. It was also appropriate that I would get in trouble, too.
Julia wasn’t allowed anywhere except the mess hall because she was in trouble. Scott had managed to not get caught and he and some other students were still able to go anywhere. One of them, Sara, did a little elicitation on me and asked me what type of ice cream I liked. It wasn’t a surprise when they brought me some from the Cold Stone Creamery in town, but it still felt damn good to have my students take care of me like that. I still get a warm and fuzzy feeling thinking about it.
All Good Things Must Come to an End
Shortly after that, they were no longer my students. They weren’t gone, but they were moving on to another committee and another set of instructors. It didn’t take me long to miss them. I still saw them from time to time, every once in a while, I’d stop by their new classrooms. It was nice to see them again and they always seemed excited to see me. They even came up with a new platoon mascot. It had been the Marauders, but they changed it to Pirates in honor of my “thing” for pirates.