Teen wisdom and later

Thoreau said that the old have nothing of value to say to the young.  Sometimes, that is true, depending on which old, young, subject and occasion are involved.

One of the most common differences between experienced and inexperienced educators is that the newbies tend to think that if something is said or read, the students know it.  Sometimes, that is true but often one or more students wasn't listening or didn't read or didn't understand or didn't remember.

Karen Maezen Miller is an author I admire deeply.  She has written "Hand Wash Cold" and "Momma Zen" and her new book "Paradise in Plain Sight: Lessons from a Zen Garden" will be out in May.  I read Hand Wash Cold aloud to my wife while traveling and we both benefitted from her astute, clean, witty and agile language.  Maezen Miller is one of those writers that benefit the reader with their writings on any subject.

 Maezen Miller specializes in pointing out the Zen and meditative possibilities in ordinary married household life, although she while still young, has lived in several different roles, including high-powered, driven business woman.

Miller runs retreats from time to time and in various places.  She reports in her blog about a question at the end of a recent retreat,"What have you imparted to your (14 yr. old) daughter?"  Miller says that her reply was "Nothing" but that her daughter has imparted lots to her.  I am writing that this is clearly not the case, based on clear evidence Miller herself reports.  I have never been a mother or a daughter.  But my experience is that the bonds and anti-bonds that build up between them have a particular and strong nature.

Teachers are forever hearing that we don't understand the nature of a given individual victim of rules and regulations, from both boys and girls.  We are often told that we don't understand the nature of the reality of a given teen's life, which is true.  We are told that the conditions of their lives are different from what we lived, also true.  However, the fact that the teen makes these statements is a demonstration of the love and strength that have promoted the teen's ability to see, to disagree, to speak out.

I once told a class that to see a prediction of themselves in future years, they should look at their same sex parent.  A young woman came up to me afterwards, trembling with fervor and rage, and said,"I am NOTHING like my mother!!" I never got to meet the mother or make a good comparison but I have my doubts.

 

In my opinion, it is not possible biologically for a child, DNA-wise as well as mind and personality-wise to not be anything like a parent, especially if you include strong revisions, as where I decide to avoid smoking BECAUSE my dad smoked so much.

Mark Twain remarked that when he was 14, his dad was the stupidest man in the world.  But when he was 21, he was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.  I am confident that Maezen Miller and her daughter both know these ideas and will be willing to admit so in 20 years.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Meditation steps for geeks, moderns and techies

It's worth a look:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/americanbuddhist/2011/06/geek-meditation.html

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Thumbing in the upper grades

When I was in the 7th grade, it was 1951.  Computers were not a retail item at that time.  We didn't get our first home computer until 1984.  However, local 7th graders today must come to school with "flash" (a.k.a. "thumb") drive, a finger-sized device that stores computer files on it.  In addition to needing a thumb drive for school, they learn to use spreadsheets and other commercial software.  That makes sense since such tools can greatly enhance an individual's productivity and ability to handle paperwork and information.

Maybe five or ten years ago, I heard a career-planning official from some college state his opinion that the single most valuable skill college grads could take from college is knowledge of how to use a spreadsheet, another computer tool that did not exist in my junior high days.

When I first began to use a computer, the year was 1965.  No need to rehash the days of decks of punched cards but they did exist and they enabled rapid and more or less error-free computing of math and statistics.  My first home computer used small disks that were encased in hard plastic for protection.  They probably didn't weigh much more than today's thumb drives, especially the ones that are about the size of my thumb nail.  However, the thumb drives have a much, much larger capacity: much larger than the campus academic computer that I was in charge of, like 4 million times the storage space.  But at the time,that academic computer was the latest and hottest item and rented for only $16,000 a year.  It was the size of a desk, not a thumb.

By the way, the business end of a thumb drive is what is called a USB connector.  You can buy a thumb drive that has such a connector on the end of a plastic thumb, that looks like a human thumb.

Of course, the school has a computer lab and students have a regular class in using a computer.  Sometimes, they get homework but questions for me arise: what about kids without a home computer?  What about kids who have equal but different software at home?  What about teachers trying to juggle several formats of computer file that homework comes in?

There is an app for iPad/iPhone called "Air Drive" that may be of interest.  It allows transfers to and from Macs and PC's of files of many types.  Costs $2.00 and may be worth it.

Modern American schooling is complex and challenging and technology is just one part of it.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Speedos and nature

We see remarks comparing the stress of women worrying about their appearance with the self-satisfaction of men whose prime time of attractiveness was several decades ago.  Sometimes, one hears that men grow more attractive as they age but that things are different for women.  As a man working on his 8th decade, I can tell you that many younger women seem child-like while women 60 and older seem beautiful.

One can find pictures of large bellies, even very large bellies, sagging but overly-ample love handles, sagging shoulders, flabby biceps and quads on men strolling along a beach in a tiny and fully revealing Speedo bathing suit. The men seem unashamed, maybe proud of their bodies, while their wives and lovers are more willing to confess to doubts and shame over their wrinkles and extra pounds.  At the same time, the wives and lovers spend far more time and effort on their appearance and dress, are more engaged in beautifying themselves and know more about doing so than any male of any age.

I am here to inform anyone interested that the super-perfect skin I see on many young women looks to my older eyes, surreal, overly perfect, untried, unused, unripe.  The same goes for youthful voices, youthful hopes and fears, youthful interests.

AARP reported a survey that on 12% of American women reported being satisfied with their bodies.  I used to wonder about the difference between the male and female situations regarding appearance and attractiveness.  Like many Americans, I more or less started from a stance of seeking equality or maybe reciprocity between the genders.  But the more I watch, listen and think, the more clearly I see that nature, a very strong, powerful and relentless force operates behind all this.  Biology has implanted markers in our brains and bodies that we overlook or discount only with great effort.  And these forces and markers differ between the sexes.

The two genders may actually get to be more similar in their later decades but there are still very deeply buried forces and memories in both that come into play.  The sign for female in some sciences is a mirror, which strikes me as appropriate since whether we like it or not, we are preprogrammed to appreciate the beauty of a female face in a way and to a depth that females do not appreciate a male face.  The female is a gift to the male in a way that he is not a gift to her, especially initially.  She is more likely to gauge his ardor, an indicator of her security with him and of her power over him, than he is to gauge hers.  He is more likely to assume that because he is bigger and stronger than she is, that the depth of her ardor is irrelevant.  He wants to possess her, yes, keep her in his tower. He will strive,often mightily, to keep her happy there but that is after he gets the deed to her.

She knows that her shape, her hair, her voice, her compliance attract and bewitch him in a way that those parts of him do not affect her. So, naturally, if her hair loses its sheen and shade, her voice and shape change, what will she have? Again, older males can see beauty, charm and magnetic pull where younger males do not.  Older males can see the biological markers that electrify their sons and grandsons but they have a diminished effect personally.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Helpful strategies with myself

The basic strategy of first acceptance and viewing and later considering analysis and possible steps to prevent, alleviate or undo difficulties and challenges underlies these ideas:

• Watch my worrying, observe it

• Notice, better yet, record when I begin worrying and what the worry is

• Wait

• In an hour or a day, I will be past the worry stage and can then:

• Suffer for points, that is, realize while stewing, cussing, objecting and feeling full of woe, that suffering is part of life and may gain us points of noble character or better conditions in heaven

• After a short time for sensing and tasting, apply analytic brain to the worry to see what might be done about it

One of the most intriguing things I have read lately is the comment from Julia Sweeney that she learned from Kelly McGonigal's book "The Willpower Instinct", that self talk is received internally much as talk from others is.  So if I tell myself that I am too flighty, the comment gets handled by my internal processing much as the same comment would be if you told me that.

One of the reasons that gets my attention is that I had just noticed a day or two earlier that when I tell myself something, say, "That shoelace is too loose.  Re-tie it", the command feels like one that comes from the boss or my parent or some authority I obey.

I can sense the shoelace looseness and the need to retie it but giving myself a clear-cut directive feels more focused and more powerful.  Of course, it is possible that I wait until I am actually ready to act before delivering the direction to do so.  One implication from this idea is that negative comments from me to me carry weight.  If I am trying to train myself to be both less flighty and more accepting of my personality, making impolite negative comments will not help the project.  

It does seem that self-talk matters and that there is an actual difference between what I plan to say to myself and actually saying it, whether silently in my head or aloud using my voice.  This idea seems to relate to the notable excitement an experienced teacher like Cheri Huber found when her students and clients employed tape recorders (or the free iPad apps that record) to give themselves advice and encouragement.  They said to her that listening to what they had recorded was extremely helpful.  That procedure is a little different from the usual meaning of self talk but Huber has found it to be very powerful.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Two tailored listings

One of the problems with sending links is that the source or target of the link might disappear.  In that case, you get a "broken" link that will simply produce a message that says the "page" (computer file that creates the 'page' on your monitor screen) can't be found.  Still, links are the backbone of the World Wide Web, which itself is an important part of the internet.  I think if I post this statement soon both links below will work.

This morning I have seen two headlines relating to Twitter, the limited-to-headline-like messages social media service.  The first relates to popularity of Twitter vs. Facebook among teens:

It says that Twitter is now reported to have a slightly higher following among teens than Facebook. (from Business Insider and the online Slate)

The second reviews some of the basics of how to use Twitter. (from the New York Times)

My life and business do not engage me with very many teens, although I realize that what they do and what they like may well have implications for the future, mine, theirs, yours and the country/world.

I have been seeing that for me, there are two accumulations that matter to me in addition to email and Google News.  One is Twitter and one is my use of Feedly.  As described in the 2nd link above, Twitter works in a way that allows me to search for people and organizations that I am interested in.  I "follow" them, allowing me to get a copy of the "tweets" (messages) they write.

"Feedly" and other reader/accumulators, such as "Reeder", work in a similar way with blogs.  The nature of a blog is that of a possibly irregularly updated syndicated column.  The reader/accumulator shows a snippet of the latest post a blogger makes.  So, opening Feedly gives me a chance to read through the openings of about 100 blogs I like to see if I want to read further into any new post.

Both of these services are providing me with a tailored, self-chosen news and contact stream that is both informative and manageable, at least so far.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Worried about excitement shortage

We know that much of the world depends on oil as a fuel.  We are having trouble finding any alternative that packs the same punch.  Moving giant ships and 18-wheel trucks takes deep energy.  So, the picture of having too little for world desires and our habitual way of living is a scary one.  Similarly, with the even more essential substance, fresh water.

But, at least in my part of the country, I wonder about running low on excitement.  It seems that excitement, including fake excitement and very low grade excitement, is a major ingredient in marketing and advertising.  Take a look at the tv ads: Drink our beer!! Or even: Drink our beer!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  You have probably tasted beer.  You may not like it.  Here in Wisconsin, we are required to love it officially and we have enough beer that while it has some very strong fans and supporters, it is too everyday to get very excited about.  One way we compensate for over-exposure is to vastly increase the choices and varieties.

A quick sample of ads will reveal every Tom, Dick and Harriet enthusing over this product and that: air ducts, Friday night fish fries, fancy cars and practical cars.  In my next life, as an ad writer and director of philosophy for a large advertising agency, I plan on understatement.  I think the future is in quiet.

Consider this evidence: Acorn TV is available on the computer and the Roku streaming service and it is strictly British TV.  My friends who pay $50 a year (less than Netflix or Amazon Prime tv) to get Foyle's War, Doc Martin, The Broker's Man, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries and other gems are thrilled.  Now, take a look at those shows and compare them to the average American show.  The understatement in the British shows is apparent.  Let the story line, the clever remarks speak for themselves.  British shows a little older still run with a laugh track, as American shows did for quite a while.  That practice seems counter to the trend to use maximum wit and surprise but let it stand on its own.  Don't run ads for the show that display the most exciting scenes.  Of course, when the storyline and the language are properly intertwined, the situation differs from a car exploding or driving off a bridge.  It is harder to show a witty remark in a show trailer since it can't be appreciated by itself.

Anyhow, for the sake of American commerce, I hope we don't run out of youth excitement and shouting and visual effects of Photoshoped tsunamis just when the large corporations and their many employees are counting on sales and income.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

New levels of mind, new demands, new crowds

There is a big literature on stories, their construction and consumption.  Much of the time, we take "stories" to mean fiction.  In non-fiction, stories are often anecdotes, short examples or incidents known or encountered during communication or research.  Over the past 20 years or so, the branch of research methods often called "qualitative research" has grown up and in some fields and research communities, has more respect than "quantitative methods" dealing more with numbers and analysis of large data sets.

At one time, it was assumed that those who could read and write and did so, had a special talent, much as we today think of a person who can draw well.  During the last 300 years or so, that notion has changed into the basic assumption that everyone can learn to read and write and do math, the 3 R's.  As recently as 1950, many of the countries of the world had an educational system, if they had one at all, that was built to educate only a small portion of the population.  It is still the case that in many parts of the world, the government does not offer schooling to all citizens or only does so up to the end of elementary education, again the 3 R's and some exploration of history and science.  Again, a basic assumption that few minds are capable of much knowledge and that society needs few such minds.

Wired magazine can be an embarrassment, with its ads aimed at young male fashionistos, but it has a fairly good view of the electronic/technical world.  Its current cover shows a young Mexican schoolgirl instead of the latest hot electronic phone or computer.  Why?  Because she lives in a poor section of the country where children typically do poorly in school but this young lady got the highest math score in her entire country.  Her teacher, Sergio Juarez Correa, his inspiration the TED talk prize winner Sugata Mitra, and a long line of Americans like John Dewey and John Holt and Ken Macrorie and many more in and out of our country are changing the picture of how education proceeds.  Their approach and the fact of the internet are getting minds to levels unknown and previously thought to be unattainable.

If you want to see how minds are changing, you can also go to the other extreme, the senior citizens.  I regularly participate in a local organization that arranges for presentations and field trips for retirees, for those with a free schedule who can attend talks at any hour of the day.  A friend who lives in the world's semi-capital of Washington, D.C. was talking on the phone yesterday.  She is preparing for her second trip to India and is no slouch when it comes to knowing the world and savoring its delights.  She asked what I had been doing lately.  I told her that in the last four days, I have attended presentations on

• The cultural impact of baseball

• Is globalization good for us?

• New successes in cardiac arrest survival

• Can Congress do anything right?

• Literacy needs in central Wisconsin

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

I am a process

To the naive eye, I look like a thing, a physical object.  I have weight and a skin, that is, mass and a boundary. However, long ago, my mommy and my daddy mixed their chemicals in Mom and I was the result. At the beginning, I was quite small and had very little mass or outside boundary.  But, see, I am a process, as I might add, are you.  As the process continued, I expanded and became the adult size I am.

Being a process means I am ongoing.  I started as a single cell but now many cells are cooperating to keeping me going.  You know that processes begin and end.  I am approaching my end as a process although the components I use in myself will continue to exist after my process ends.  I don't expect my process to conclude any time soon but it might.  Once, a human process has continued for as long as mine has, it might cease at any time, although the current expected duration for my current age is about 11 and a half years.  Confidentially, I expect to live longer than that but who doesn't?

The things we know about in this life are processes, not actually things.  They run their course of existence and then dissipate, drifting into participating in other forms.  Understanding that "things" are not permanent and they are not static makes life easier.  Its ebb and flow, its waves and peaceful moments seem to fit into an understandable and even beautiful pattern.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Spaghettification

"Spaghettification" is a new word I just learned yesterday.  It is the process I would be put through if I were to fall into a black hole.  I am not sure where the nearest black hole is nor how far away it is but I am pretty sure it is quite far.  Maybe on the order 1000 to 1500 light years but the answer seems to be a matter of debate.

I wrote about the iPad app for Great Courses but now it appears there is an Android app for Kindle Fires and Android phones and the like.  The iPad app works very well but the Android app, out since July, has low ratings and negative comments.  Buy the digital version of a Great Course and it is immediately available for streaming and downloading.  Video courses have not been convenient for me since I like to listen while driving.  But being more or less immediately available on my iPad mini, I get more viewing of the only-video courses done and I do it more conveniently.

The course I have been concentrating on is "Our Inexplicable Universe" by Prof. Neil Tyson, a very good presenter.  The course is a run-down of scientific mysteries in several fields.  Tyson explained that falling into a black hole would stretch me and thin me to the point that I would be like the toothpaste extruded from a tube of toothpaste. I would be stretched into a strand of spaghetti and that is exactly the scientific term for the best guess of what I would become.  The process happens because of the difference between the gravitational pull on my head and my feet.  That difference grows greater and more important as I fall into the black hole and it pulls me into a long thin strand like spaghetti.

Anyhow, "spaghettification" is indeed a scientific term and should net you many points in your next Scrabble or Words with Friends game.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Down with the curriculum? - Part 2

Politically, parents, taxpayers and adults generally want to "know" what is going on in schools.  That is actually impossible, in the extreme.  Even 5 or 10 humans do, say, think so much so quickly that no one person can truly be aware and attuned to all that happens among them.  This knowledge, this impression of accountability and oversight is a political and administrative need, not an educational one, but it persists.  

However, two other forces are assisting the transition to a much more diverse and individualized educational process.  One is the complexity of modern electronic devices, including surprisingly cars.  The other is the existence of Google, Bing and other internet search engines.  We are slowly getting used to exploration instead of instruction in our lives.  We actually have no choice, since our human world in all aspects grows steadily more complex.  We can't have the internet's contents written down in a book.  It would be impossibly large and most of it would be written in languages each of us cannot read.  

It is usually older people who have experienced and seen learning from a lecture or a textbook who feel both irritated and lost when they get a new device but it doesn't come with a book of instructions.  My mother got an Apple IIe and a big heavy book about how to use it.  She wanted to know and experience it all so she sat with the book and started reading from page 1.  Of course, that is not a good way.  You can't remember and you need to see and feel as well as read but I could not convince her of that.

Further, a little experience with Google, the Wikipedia and other internet sources quickly shows us that day by day, hour by hour, we can go and get what we need at the moment.  We see that learning it all is impossible.  By the way, we also see that "what is to be learned" is actually changing continuously, too.

Teachers and the public know that schooling and the curriculum are basically irrelevant.  We have plenty of examples of dropouts and low-grade achievers who have succeeded very well and many whose grades were very high who have not had happy nor productive lives.  On the other hand, the amount of education and of schooling keeps on correlating with later success, at least in general and statistically.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Down with the curriculum? - Part 1

Sugata Mitra is an Indian-born professor of educational technology at Newcastle University in England.  He recently received the TED Talk Award of 2013, which seems to me to be a wonderful achievement since the TED talks feature some of the most creative, brilliant and articulate people on the planet.  Prof. Mitra is famous for his Hole in the Wall project.  That was back when he worked with a computer company in India next to a slum, where the kids stood no chance of much learning.  He fixed it so that some of them, playing near his office, could get access to a computer but gave them no instruction or organization or supervision.  They showed amazing and very rapid learning, working just with each other, and soon had mastered internet (which they had never heard of) browsing.

Entering his name in the search window on this main TED page will bring up his many TED talks.  He is worth listening to and watching for his language and presentation skills in addition  to his messages.

Having repeated his Hole in the Wall project in several places and situations, he is firmly in the project tradition.  This approach touches on John Dewey, the most famous educational philosopher and theorist in the last couple of centuries, on the work of William Kilpatrick and his "project" method, on the work and book "Summerhill" by A.S. Neill and on the book by Herbert Kliebard called "The Struggle for the American Curriculum (1893-1958)".  It touches on the story told in the play and movie "Auntie Mame", starring Rosalind Russell. It is also the story of high school students told in the movie "A Town Torn Apart". It is basically the idea that faster and better cognitive and emotional progress is made by learners when they work together on something they care about rather than listen to a teacher and follow instructions.  The two approaches, learner-centered and presentation-centered, are at the heart of American schooling debates.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

If only

If only I were richer, but I'm not.

If only I were better looking, but I'm not.

If only I were smarter, a faster thinker, had a better memory, were younger…

I like to start with toleration.  An "if only" might be part of a smart idea.  If I only had this or that, I might indeed be better off or I might be able to fix it that someone I care about would be.  So, the idea that if only this were true might be the start of a dream or hope that could change into a plan that could change into a realization of something fun, cool, life-saving or life-enhancing - that idea might be right.

However, I like to color "if ony" red.  "If only" is the start of a counterfactual statement: it isn't the case, it isn't reality, it isn't now.  It isn't true.  I have limited insight and limited understanding.  Wishing for something different, hoping for a new possession is a common way to look down on the assets I actually have.  Not being all that good at thinking, I may well be mistaken about the bliss just around the corner.  A new acquisition may cost more than it pays off.

I like to use "if only" as a reminder to consider doing without and appreciating both what I have and what I am not already burdened with.

[Technically, using the words "if only" implies that the wished-for condition is ALL that is missing.  Were that condition to be fulfilled, would my life really be complete?  Doubtful, at best.]

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Brushing teeth and meditating

When we watch movies about the old West or read about pioneer treks across the Great Plains and the Rocky Mountains, we don't read about them taking a moment to brush their teeth.  Flossing was probably unknown.  But we and our parents and our kids brush and floss.  Things must have changed.  I read somewhere that much of the difference in the US is due to imaginative and energetic marketing and advertising.  Some of the difference seems to be due to young men being required during military service to brush their teeth and the habit carrying over to later life.

Making something into a regular habit certainly helps in the practice of the activity.  What we are trained to do, gets done.  As evidence and testimony piles up in favor of meditative practice on a regular basis, I think the day will come when as many of us meditate as brush our teeth and for a similar reason: our well-being and that of those around us.  

Dr. Emma Seppala writes a blog "Feeling It" as part of the very large collection of blogs all written by professionals and housed on the Psychology Today website.  

Emma Seppala, Ph.D. is the Associate Director of the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education at Stanford University. She is also a Research Scientist and Honorary Fellow with the University of Wisconsin-Madison's Center for Investigating Healthy Minds.

She received a B.A in Comparative Literature from Yale University, a Master's Degree in East Asian Languages and Cultures from Columbia University, and a PhD in Psychology from Stanford University. She completed her postdoctoral studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where she was promoted to an Associate Scientist Position.

- See more at: http://www.emmaseppala.com/about/

She lists 20 scientifically backed reasons to have a regular meditative practice here.  You know that tooth health is good for you and those you love.  So is meditation, so:

• Sit down and set a timer for 5 or 10 minutes

• Be still until the timer rings

• Pay attention to your breath during that time.  When your mind wanders and it will, bring it back to your breath without judgment or rancor.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety