First Post

My name is Brian Shephard. People usually end up calling me Shep. You are welcome to call me whatever you like.

I work at AFS Intercultural Progams, a non-profit high school foreign exchange organization. I worked for 18 months as a volunteer coordinator, assisting volunteers in their efforts to find homes for and support exchange students. I'm working for AFS part time now in a different capacity. It's a great organization.

I'm taking this course as the first step on my way to becoming a high school teacher. I was happy to see that it was my first class; I think I'll find it compelling.

My least favorite subject in school was math. I still haven't quite figured out why. Perhaps this class will shed some light on it. I loved most of my classes and was generally a good student. Those things were not true when it came to math. I could go on and on about this.

I suppose my favorite subject was History. I was biased from the start, as my father is a high school history teacher. I've always enjoyed reading about history, and it was one of my majors in college.

I've never taken any sort of Pysch class before, so I'm excited about this. The other class I'm taking this semester is basic Pysch, so I'll be getting a brainful of the subject this Fall. I'm excited about that; people fascinate me, and I'd like to check what I think I've learned about people over the years against the science. I'm also hoping it will make me better at poker.

What else should you know about me? I spent a year on the JET program as an assistant language teacher in a tiny Japanese town. Since then, I've been working in international exchange on the high school and university level. As a result, culture and how it affects learning are of particular interest to me.

I'm not going to pick a topic yet. But as I mentioned above, culture and cultural education interest me. I'm also eager to think about the way that the information/communications revolution we're living through will change the way students learn and teachers teach. I suppose I'll talk more about this in my journal entry, I suppose.

I guess I would prefer to write the journal electronically. I'm alright with either way though.

Have a nice day.