 Hey team. So I just recorded a little how-to video for lab number two and so I'm here. I figured dude, I might as well share some of my observations. It is Friday. The class has been open for a whopping six days. Woo, woo, you made it six days. I made it six days. I think that is quite a success for all of us. And I figured I've definitely been having like jillions of thoughts. And so I sort of wanted to just check in with you and say hi and kind of share my thoughts. So first of all, I love you. Like, no question. I am so excited about the group of humans that are joining me in this little adventure. I feel like you guys are super proactive. You're very creative. You are brave. Like some of the things that I've seen with the videos that you've been making and kind of stretching outside of your comfort zones. I feel just super impressed and pleased at the level of contribution that's already come into the scene. So yay, it's been really fun for me. I'd like to take a second to give you a little pep talk to... You know, there's been a lot of like getting kind of oriented for the class and it sounds like I didn't quite realize this, but it doesn't surprise me at all because nothing I ever do is like anything anyone else does. So I tend to be rather abnormal anyway. But it sounds like this class is a little more interactive than what you experience normally in an online class. And I don't think I could teach this class if there wasn't this like really kind of engaged piece of it. Like I'm keeping notes on you clowns. Like I'm like making notes of like, oh my gosh, that's the one that has the pug and that's the one that makes the mosaics. That person might be the same person who has the pug and the mosaics. But even in my face-to-face classes, like I get really excited to give people nicknames and to like get to know people and make connections. Like that's part of why I teach is because I love humans. And in the online scene, like I feel like it's a little bit harder to... Like it's easier for people to disappear behind typing and I just don't want that to happen because I will lose engagement and motivation. So I really appreciate the personal piece of it and hopefully you get comfortable and feel like, you know, really there's nothing to lose because I would talk to you in a face-to-face environment when I and you probably would talk back to me, right? So making me videos and like shooting me emails and contributing to the discussions. That's just part of what keeps this engaging. Another piece of the pep talk for you is, y'all made awesome schedules. I've been looking at your plans for how you're going to do the class and the schedules look good and we're about to get real. And this week has been a little bit like fluffier, trying to know each other and bonding, which I love. I could do it for 16 weeks, but we're going to get into some pretty intense content. And I want to make sure that you are mentally prepared for that and that you're ready to be disciplined to make it happen. One of the recurring themes that I'm hearing a lot of is that, you know, a lot of y'all are ready to graduate and that this is a class that's required for your graduation. And it's one of the reasons why CR was really excited to put this class together. So they found the sucker to teach it and build it. So they're excited because it means that you can't. It increases access significantly to degrees because you can get your lab requirement done online. What that means is that we're in for some adventures. Like this hasn't been done here at CR before. And so we're going to be working some stuff out. I just did a whole, like Lab 2 is ready to go. I think you should probably at some time, even though it's not week two yet, I think you should probably look at what materials you're going to need for that to make sure that you can get them. You're going to need some pH paper. And that's a super random. Like you probably will never use pH paper ever again. But those of you guys who have kids out there, like kids will love this stuff. They'll be super fun. They'll be spitting all over, like testing the pH of their pee and like slug slime. And I'm sure there'll be all sorts of cool stuff that they'll have to test. So if you have kids and dude, you guys will probably be like, dude, look at the pH of this. That's awesome. You're going to need some cabbages. I mean, there's just some weird stuff on the list of requirements for next week's lab. So go into the lab notebook and you'll see that the lab, look, I'll even show it to you. Here it is. And look, chemistry of life is ready for you because it has a title on it. Don't go into any of these other places. Stay out. But go ahead and go into the chemistry of life and see what's going on in that crazy scene. I want to adjust the lab groups. And let me, I'm going to have, I want you to see this. So I'm going to somehow post this Google doc to Canvas. And I'll probably put it at the bottom of the week one module. So I'm going to take this thing and what I want you to do in looking at your schedules you guys have had, like, I'm going to do the lab on this day. I'm going to do the lab on this day. I want to match you guys up by when you're going to do the lab so that I can, so that you have people to talk to so that somebody who's planning to do the lab on Saturday isn't in the same group with someone who's doing the lab on Monday. Because if you're doing it on Monday, you don't want to be hanging out. There's a reason you're doing it on Monday. You need to get it going and you need to get it done. So come into this Google doc and just put your name underneath the day that's closest to when you're actually going to do the lab work. And then I will try to group you as close as possible to others that are going to be doing the lab work at around that same time. I think that will increase the efficiency of our lab groups so I'm excited about that. I feel good about that. Okay, so I will give you information about how to get there. Dude, module zero was fun. Module zero is gone. By the time I leave here, it is 3 o'clock in the morning right now. And by the time I leave, I'm going to publish the external brain assignments so that you can go in and you can finish that piece. I'm also going to publish the quiz for the week so that you can go in and you can finish that piece. I'm not publishing week two until like I'm working on it, but I'm not going to publish that thing until Saturday. So Saturday I will let you get ahead and start working on that. I also want to talk about the muddy fun discussion. We're in process of this muddy fun conversation around the lecture content. And one of the things that I've noticed is that there's a lot of commenting on the lecture style, which I totally appreciate because I'm a feedback junkie and so it's super helpful for me to be like, oh, yay, so the colors work for people. And you felt like it was engaging and interacting. Like that's awesome. But we need, especially in the stuff coming up, we're going to need to focus in on content. Like I'm going to want you to really dig into the meat of the science and the topics. So just be kind of thinking about that when you're going through the video lectures for the future. Again, it's not a hoop to jump through. Like the muddy fun discussions, my goal is that we have a place to clarify things that are confusing just like we would in class. In my face-to-face classes, they watch these lectures and since the class has flipped, then they come to class and I've got an hour and a half to like answer questions and challenge them with concepts. So I'm trying to give you guys that same kind of opportunity to really interact with the material and think about it and get your questions answered. So make sure that you're being kind of proactive in that discussion board. There's something else that I wanted to tell you. I kind of feel like, I don't know, you guys can give me feedback on this too if the video is the helpful way to get like an update like this that you would actually prefer that I actually type it out. I just feel like I get typing. I want you to see my face. I want you to see that like, dude, I'm here and I'm engaged with you and I'm thinking about you like I'm super present in this class, which you probably already know that because I probably said the same thing to you like eight times in all eight of your things that you submitted to me this week. Okay, I'm going to go now and get all this stuff published and holler at me if you have any questions and we're in for a fun adventure. Okay, bye-bye.