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0 pointsAgentlien4y ago0 comments

My favorite story about him was when he caught a student sleeping in his class. He paused, mid-sentence, and asked the student if they were too tired. The student looked up sheepishly and confirmed.

"Did it get a bit late last night? Can't keep your eyes open?"

Again, the student agreed. Rolf flashed a huge smile and in a singsong voice said "then I have something for you!". He walked over to his bag, pulled out a stuffed animal and a tiny embroidered pillow. (I have a grainy photo of them somewhere).

Rolf tiptoed up to the student, put the pillow in front of him, and as the student rested his head on the pillow Rolf gave him a pat on the head.

After this Rolf went back, said that if you're that tired it's better to sleep in your own bed. He resumed the lecture, picking up in the middle of the sentence where he'd stopped. No one slept in his class for the rest of the course.

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valvar4y ago

I have a similar anecdote which completely stunned us, but which may possibly be part of his standard routine, and thus something he does for every set of students:

He always wore the same striped sweater. At one point, he took a break to drink some water and remove his sweater. But beneath the sweater was another identical sweater!

I assume everything he did was very well-planned and part of his pedagogic system and routine, but it was often hard to tell if he was acting, or if he was actually being serious but eccentric.

AgentlienOP4y ago

I don't remember that but a lot of his antics seemed to be planned and part of his way of keeping people awake and paying attention. If it is part of his routine I wonder when he added it. I took his courses in 2006-2007.

valvar4y ago

I took that course in 2015 or 2016, so yeah, I guess that's about a decade in which he could have added it. I just browsed around Chalmers' course pages and am very happy to see that he's still teaching that course.

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valvar4y ago

I have a similar anecdote which completely stunned us, but which may possibly be part of his standard routine, and thus something he does for every set of students:

He always wore the same striped sweater. At one point, he took a break to drink some water and remove his sweater. But beneath the sweater was another identical sweater!

I assume everything he did was very well-planned and part of his pedagogic system and routine, but it was often hard to tell if he was acting, or if he was actually being serious but eccentric.

AgentlienOP4y ago

valvar4y ago

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