Marking, marking, marking...

This is the worst time of year for a lecturer. There’s so much marking and examining to do. And for me this year has been particularly busy, hence the lack of a recent post (I would have posted on Monday but the hotel wifi wasn’t working as advertised). So far I’ve done 128 Analysis exam scripts (I’ve been team teaching the module but rather than half of the marking I ended up with closer to two-thirds because my questions were so popular), I’ve attended nearly 20 student presentations and I only finished marking History of Mathematics essays last night. (Rather than marking a third of the total I again got nearly two-thirds due to the popularity of my questions. Next year I’ll try to make myself less popular and approachable!) Just to add to my work load I was in Liverpool on Friday to examine the PhD of Joel Haddley (or Dr Joel Haddley, I should say!). This involved a viva (an oral exam) which went on for a considerable length of time (we like to make the good students sweat!). On Monday I travelled to Oxford to do some more external examining for Oxford Brookes Mathematics Department on Tuesday. So you can see I’ve been quite busy! Normal service should resume on Friday with a blog post on the Otley Science Book Group and one next week on my thoughts on student answers in the Analysis exam. And I might get back to answering emails. If I haven’t replied to your email, then I’m...

Email slog

I’ve spent a lot of time recently writing my lectures for our new History of Mathematics module. (Strangest fact I discovered: Geoffrey Chaucer wrote a textbook for his son. On the astrolabe. Weird. That’s got to be an internet hoax surely. Somebody must have added it to Wikipedia as a joke.) Anyhow, I’ve been falling behind with my email so today I am slogging my way through it, replying and apologizing for lateness. I’m just taking a break to relax. What have I been up to recently? I gave my card cheating talk in Manchester at Aquinas College. Thanks to Kate Clitheroe and John Kennedy for organizing the event and making me welcome. Next week I’m giving my Poincare Conjecture talk in Belfast. A lot has happened since I last gave it – the conjecture’s been proved for one thing! I’d better get back to that email...