Introducing my analog teaching kit
Wintry weather kept my school virtual all but one day this week. I leveraged the extra time at home to transition out of my first bullet journal of the academic year. The Hobonichi Plain Notebook housed six months of planning, lesson plans, meeting notes, lecture notes and the like.
Tiny grid + coated paper + compact = excellent teaching notebook
It took six months of teaching to fill the Hobonichi’s 288 pages. Eight index pages, ten blank pages spread throughout as separators between major projects, and 270 hand-numbered pages.
A quick introduction to the rest of my teaching kit.
The unsung “offensive line”
I home my Hobonichi in a Midori cardstock cover. The MD case has withstood serious abuse these past six months with grace and style. And the woven cardstock construction stands out in the notebook cover world because it is not leather. I suppose I am not beyond vanity. Hipster cardstock vanity.
I also lean heavily on a small Westcott ruler. It’s the only plastic ruler I’m aware of with a beveled edge. The bevel is key. The top edge hangs over the paper, which keeps wet ink from pooling underneath the ruler.
The stencil is used for to-do list boxes. Seriously: I only use the check boxes. And I made my own page markers out of spare ribbon.
This week’s Inked Tines update includes my most recent currently inked writing tools.
Toolset
Pens. This week’s short-lived standout was the Monteverde Giant Sequoia.
All-Madden Team
Empty. The M-SIG handled the shimmer in Brane like a champ. No clogs, hard starts, or burps. Smooth enough to handle fast writing. Shimmer made the ink bright enough to see from a distance — a requirement for usable lecture notes. Lesson plans, journaling, meeting notes, lecture notes.
Montblanc 146 — Empty. Writing more regularly corrected the hard start issue from last week. Oyster Grey shaded well towards the end of longer writing sessions like journal entries. Task management, lecture notes, reading notes, scratch notes.
Kaweco Sport Classic — 1/4. The BB nib is generous and smooth. The Sport is a sturdy pocket carry. Diamine’s Smoke on the Water is a lovely, well behaved sheen monster. Together: they hard start every time I start writing. Just not great together. Meeting notes, lecture notes, lesson plans.
Pilot Kakuno — 1/2 of a Con-70. This pen was continually in my hand. The M is a bit wide for work-related writing. Purple Wampum is wet enough to feather on Midori paper, which is generally well-behaved. Coated paper only for this pairing. Journaling, some lesson plans.
Pelikan m805 — 1/2. A dry combination. The Architect grind add just enough wetness to bring out Yozakura’s great shading. Reading notes, lecture notes (accents), poems after journal entries.
Nagasawa Black Proske — 4/5. The dry feed brought out 13’s brighter tones. Excellent accent color for notes. Easily readable at a distance for lesson plans and lecture notes. A bit scratchy for longer writing sessions as the feed would dry out. Reading notes, lesson plans, lecture notes, journaling.
AG Spalding & Bros. — Dumped. The AG’s stepped section was uncomfortable with my low grip. The section would also unscrew as I wrote. Underwhelming. Aurora was lovely. Lecture notes, lesson plans.
Notebooks. Work bujo. 14 new pages, not counting the three index spreads in the front of the notebook. A monthly priorities spread, four lesson plans and four pages of lecture notes. I enjoy attending lectures. I enjoy lectures more when I have two pens to make notes with.
Journal. The past week was hectic at work. I arrived at post-dinner wind-down completely exhausted nearly every night. The result was two journal entries, totaling 7 pages. Both entries ended with a Marisa B. Crane poem.
Written dry. Two pens ran dry this week: the Monteverde and the Montblanc. The Monteverde started the week nearly empty. The pen ran out on Tuesday. The Montblanc lasted all week. The Little Prince coughed up Friday afternoon during a phone call for work.
I set the AG Spalding aside to be dumped Friday afternoon. The pen remained a frustrating writing experience after a week’s effort. Life is too short to write with a pen/ink combination that is less than joyful.
Newly inked. I lasted the entire week without inking a new pen. Look at how not-in-any-way-obsessed-with-inking-more-pens I was this week; with maximum effort.
The Collection
Incoming / new orders. A small order from Yoseka Stationery arrived Tuesday: a black B Lamy nib, a clip-on A5 notebook strap, and a Kaweco twist converter. In addition to a couple packs of Stalogy stickers for my partner. They use stickers as status markers in their work planner.
Strapped
The B nib awaits Lamy’s newest Safari re-issue, which Lamy calls Terra. Lamy’s US distributor isn’t stocking B nibs as an option for the special issue. So I picked up the spare steel nib on my own and ordered the pen in F. More to come when the pen rolls in.
Outgoing / trades or sales. None this week.
Currently reading and listening
Fiction. Rhythm of War sat on the shelf this week. Instead, I found myself re-reading Timothy Zahn’s Heir to the Empire. Admiral Thrawn is a charming, cunning, politik baddie. I was in high school the last time I read this series. Four chapters in after my first sit-down.
My partner and I also read two more chapters of Name of the Wind.
Nonfiction. My reading was scattershot. My exploration into constitutional law is winding down. Of note is a stirring essay by Andrew Coan on the ability of Congress to address bad actor presidents. He breaks bad actors down into two types: bad seeds (presidents who misbehave without the support of their party) and tips of the iceberg (those who misbehave with the support of their party’s base). In brief, Coan argues that bad seeds are easier for Congress to rein in.
Music. Hauschka. I play calm instrumental music in the background while I teach. Hauschka’s A Different Forest was on repeat Wednesday. And again just for me Thursday and Friday.
