Kid gush, again--skip on if you have low tolerance...
So, my 6 year old has been struggling with humor for some time now. He laughs (and always has) at bodily functions, situational humor, slapstick--but word games, puns, etc...he's reasoning his way through.
I find this absolutely amazing.
It reminds me of Star Trek: TNG when Data (an android, in case you did not know) was sometimes striving to be more human. He would attempt jokes, jazz, emotions, etc...
My son is great because, unlike a self-conscious adult, when he does not get the joke, he will ask outright: "What makes that funny, dad?" Sometimes, anticipating he won't get a joke, I'll tell the punchline and immediately go into explication of it. He will interrupt me, "I get it, already." Other times, even if every word in the joke is w/n his vocabulary, he may still wrestle with the joke for days or weeks. Almost always, whenever he does finally get it, he dredges it up again from some fantastic memory bank, verbatim.
I imagine similar issues are afoot for people studying a second language. Since many puns and word-related jokes are on the fringes, border crossings of slang and such, I would bet they are not commonly covered in classes on language. I think it would be a super course, however, to have a capstone course on jokes in the language..."Humor in Klingon," for example.
A) What do you call a truckload of Bison?
B) What kind of spell turns you into a dinosaur?
C) Knock, knock.
Who's there?
Olive.
Olive who?
These are the kind of jokes he's now logged into his repertoire and fully understands. They're just the kind of stuff I like to use in class, too!
A) Buffaload
B) T-hex
C) Olive you!
Monday, March 23, 2009
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
40 years of M.E.N.
At last, after years of begging for this for Christmas, now the 8000 articles of Mother Earth News, a 4 CDROM set, is mine! This is all the stuff you can't always get on the net, complete w/pictures, how-to illustrations, the works.
Now I am fully equipped, in the head at least, without excuse, when it comes to all-things-on-the-farm. That's right, it's allllll in there. Now, if only it were all in my head! Oh well, I'll absorb it all over these last colder / wet days and sleepless nights leading up to summer.
Eventually, maybe this fall, I'll offer a review of the discs and articles, but I'm just now digging in. I can say that the early MEN was ever-more earthy, grassroots, less commercial, it seems.
Well, enough of this, I'm going to go read some before the sun comes up.
Now I am fully equipped, in the head at least, without excuse, when it comes to all-things-on-the-farm. That's right, it's allllll in there. Now, if only it were all in my head! Oh well, I'll absorb it all over these last colder / wet days and sleepless nights leading up to summer.
Eventually, maybe this fall, I'll offer a review of the discs and articles, but I'm just now digging in. I can say that the early MEN was ever-more earthy, grassroots, less commercial, it seems.
Well, enough of this, I'm going to go read some before the sun comes up.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Here it comes....
Yes. I like this video a great deal both as a parent and educator.
I really included it for the song, today, "La Breeze" by Simian.
What's coming? Can't you feel it in the air tonight? Hold on...it's Spring Break! Why does that matter? If you are asking, you are not in academia. Spring Break is just a week in the midst of things, but what a welcome relief if offers! Whew!
Real-world workin' folk don't relate. "Geez, teachers, you only work 30 weeks a year anyway, so how's it that you need a week off after only running 8 into the new year?"
Well, aren't you Ho-diddily-o-lier than thou, asking that!
For me, like the song, pressures are building, tensions rising, everything is building to that moment, this term, this Friday! Then it's pandemonium, but it's all pleasure. I won't crack a book, may not even log into my classes. I'm going to garden, travel, fix stuff, farm--everything I couldn't do in the last entry of lamentation!
Sunday, March 08, 2009
What I'd rather be doing...
- anything
- hanging w/family
- wandering my property
- going to the garden show
- writing
- reading
- napping
- taking a road trip
- going out to the movies
- de-cluttering home, office, car, garage, universe
- visiting friends in person
- downloading music
- building something
- fixing something
- surfing the web
...instead, I'm grading.
Poop.
Friday, March 06, 2009
Shooter Drill
In two hours, this campus will be chaos.
We're having a demo/drill for the worst-case-scenario, a gunman on campus. There will be live shots fired (blanks, of course, but indoors it's dramatic). There will likely be fire alarms, screaming and yelling, policia in full-on bravado.
I understand the purpose of the drills, and I know they help ferret out problems in our security and response systems. I am fully aware that the scenario has been a reality at far too many schools, and I know it could happen here as well as anywhere else.
We have tornado drills here. Fire drills, too. Now school shooting drills. It's hard to find enough time to get our jobs done amidst all this drilling. Speaking of which, at another building I may head for to avoid this shooter drill, there is a good deal of drilling going on, too. In this case, it's jackhammers and cement saws and such, for that place is getting a facelift. Thank goodness I have headphones and music to retreat to when I'm grading!
Maybe we should have drills "in the event of" other things:
In the same way the calamity drills help us become sensitized, prepared, and teach us to anticipate the worst, maybe my drills would have the same effect on the lighter side, and as we drilled, so we might become punctual, efficient, and kind.
We often need to go beyond merely expecting something; we have to practice as-if scenarios. I propose we do this for the bad (of course) but also to anticipate the best.
We're having a demo/drill for the worst-case-scenario, a gunman on campus. There will be live shots fired (blanks, of course, but indoors it's dramatic). There will likely be fire alarms, screaming and yelling, policia in full-on bravado.
I understand the purpose of the drills, and I know they help ferret out problems in our security and response systems. I am fully aware that the scenario has been a reality at far too many schools, and I know it could happen here as well as anywhere else.
We have tornado drills here. Fire drills, too. Now school shooting drills. It's hard to find enough time to get our jobs done amidst all this drilling. Speaking of which, at another building I may head for to avoid this shooter drill, there is a good deal of drilling going on, too. In this case, it's jackhammers and cement saws and such, for that place is getting a facelift. Thank goodness I have headphones and music to retreat to when I'm grading!
Maybe we should have drills "in the event of" other things:
- everyone shows up for class on time (less likely than a tornado)
- everyone submits all work on time (even less likely than a gunman)
- people stop to help one another out (a giant comet is more likely to hit the earth)
- commuters intentionally park as far away as possible, for exercise and to be kind to others (c'mon!)
In the same way the calamity drills help us become sensitized, prepared, and teach us to anticipate the worst, maybe my drills would have the same effect on the lighter side, and as we drilled, so we might become punctual, efficient, and kind.
We often need to go beyond merely expecting something; we have to practice as-if scenarios. I propose we do this for the bad (of course) but also to anticipate the best.
Wednesday, March 04, 2009
ANGER
The only broken bone I've ever had was in my hand due to punching walls. I destroyed a wall of an out-building with a big hammer once in a rage. I used to have anger management issues, to say the least.
My son, only six, sometimes gets mad beyond words. It looks silly on him.
I remarked recently in conversation that I'd not been truly angry, yelling-type angry, in years. Most people, especially those who know only this recent manifestation of myself, have no idea that I have this tendency to blow my stack. Every time it has come up, people just laugh and say, "You?"
Yesterday, however, I revisited my anger in such an excruciating, full-on outburst that I have aching muscles and a woeful heart today. At least I took it outside, away from everyone and every thing, burning off my angry energy by tearing down a corral w/a sledge hammer.
I wish I could get angry at someone other than myself, but that is the center of my s*storm. For me, it is very painful to be mad at me...but I guess it's better than burning bridges, hurting others, or owing anyone but myself an apology.
Now I'm mad at myself for getting so mad at myself.
GRRRRR!
Honestly, anger is right down there with guilt as an emotion that has no redeeming value. I guess there is a "righteous anger," but my vein-popping version is anything-but-that. Anger is silly, immature, and a waste of emotion. Actually, I guess I'm writing of RAGE...just being mad/angry has its place. I seem to just perk along, merrily, then skip from bliss to rage.
There's something to work on!
My son, only six, sometimes gets mad beyond words. It looks silly on him.
I remarked recently in conversation that I'd not been truly angry, yelling-type angry, in years. Most people, especially those who know only this recent manifestation of myself, have no idea that I have this tendency to blow my stack. Every time it has come up, people just laugh and say, "You?"
Yesterday, however, I revisited my anger in such an excruciating, full-on outburst that I have aching muscles and a woeful heart today. At least I took it outside, away from everyone and every thing, burning off my angry energy by tearing down a corral w/a sledge hammer.
I wish I could get angry at someone other than myself, but that is the center of my s*storm. For me, it is very painful to be mad at me...but I guess it's better than burning bridges, hurting others, or owing anyone but myself an apology.
Now I'm mad at myself for getting so mad at myself.
GRRRRR!
Honestly, anger is right down there with guilt as an emotion that has no redeeming value. I guess there is a "righteous anger," but my vein-popping version is anything-but-that. Anger is silly, immature, and a waste of emotion. Actually, I guess I'm writing of RAGE...just being mad/angry has its place. I seem to just perk along, merrily, then skip from bliss to rage.
There's something to work on!
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
Library Litany
Today my classes are going to the library.
When I was young, going to the library was a real treat. We visited the scriptorium, filled to the ceiling with rolls of papyrus just waiting to be read. If we were on our best behavior, the librarian would dust off stone tablets for us to read!
Well, it was a treat, though not quite so old-fashioned.
I grew up in an era and area in which going to the library was almost like going to college. Few people went, fewer still learned from the visit. I, oddly enough for a farm boy, was among the few who would bury my nose in the books and come up educated. Trips to the library were reward for good behavior. Whenever we went to town, I was able to con my way into a library visit. (I still have my original library card, from almost 40 years ago!) I still have the four or five books I owned as a kid, but hundreds more went through my hands via the library!
When I was a child, I read everything I could get my hands on. I think this was due to my father's model behavior--he read a novel a day (very strange for a farmer) and had a den lined floor to ceiling with books. I can still remember giving my parents a book report on a biography of Ulysses Grant (I was scheduled to do this at school and was wigging out, so they had me practice with them.) It was that kind of modeling and support that kept me deep in the books.
When I went to college, my first job was...in the university library! This place was unfathomably huge, literally containing millions of books. While my hometown library was only one floor, this library was eight floors! One of my first observations, duly recorded in my journal from my first college experience, was that the libraries both smelled the same! I have since come to learn that virtually all libraries smell the same--some bookish smell that is a mix of musty paper and book binding glues, maybe.
Over the years, I have been a "Friend of" several libraries, been on library committees, and built up (and let go of) an impressive library of my own. Oh, I know what they say about libraries going away due to the Internet, but they said television would go away, too, and it has not. I recall the claim that movies would surrender to the home video, but that never happened, either. No, I think libraries are going to be with us a long, long time. They are evolving, becoming more multi-media and hip, but they are not going away.
During wars, libraries are special targets, either to be preserved, sacked, or burned--depending on the sentiment of the warring faction. Benjamin Franklin was a promoter of the modern American lending library, and we all owe him, in my opinion, a debt of gratitude greater than any owed to a president or political leader, statesmen or inventor.
I love libraries!
When I was young, going to the library was a real treat. We visited the scriptorium, filled to the ceiling with rolls of papyrus just waiting to be read. If we were on our best behavior, the librarian would dust off stone tablets for us to read!
Well, it was a treat, though not quite so old-fashioned.
I grew up in an era and area in which going to the library was almost like going to college. Few people went, fewer still learned from the visit. I, oddly enough for a farm boy, was among the few who would bury my nose in the books and come up educated. Trips to the library were reward for good behavior. Whenever we went to town, I was able to con my way into a library visit. (I still have my original library card, from almost 40 years ago!) I still have the four or five books I owned as a kid, but hundreds more went through my hands via the library!
When I was a child, I read everything I could get my hands on. I think this was due to my father's model behavior--he read a novel a day (very strange for a farmer) and had a den lined floor to ceiling with books. I can still remember giving my parents a book report on a biography of Ulysses Grant (I was scheduled to do this at school and was wigging out, so they had me practice with them.) It was that kind of modeling and support that kept me deep in the books.
When I went to college, my first job was...in the university library! This place was unfathomably huge, literally containing millions of books. While my hometown library was only one floor, this library was eight floors! One of my first observations, duly recorded in my journal from my first college experience, was that the libraries both smelled the same! I have since come to learn that virtually all libraries smell the same--some bookish smell that is a mix of musty paper and book binding glues, maybe.
Over the years, I have been a "Friend of" several libraries, been on library committees, and built up (and let go of) an impressive library of my own. Oh, I know what they say about libraries going away due to the Internet, but they said television would go away, too, and it has not. I recall the claim that movies would surrender to the home video, but that never happened, either. No, I think libraries are going to be with us a long, long time. They are evolving, becoming more multi-media and hip, but they are not going away.
During wars, libraries are special targets, either to be preserved, sacked, or burned--depending on the sentiment of the warring faction. Benjamin Franklin was a promoter of the modern American lending library, and we all owe him, in my opinion, a debt of gratitude greater than any owed to a president or political leader, statesmen or inventor.
I love libraries!
Monday, March 02, 2009
Really?
From time to time I'm asked by students, "What should we call you?" I know all the answers from teacher training, how a degree of distance is appropriate, how getting too chummy is certain ruination, etc. I pause and think of what I call people I should respect, say, like my doctor . I use his title, sure, but not "Dr. Boris Smartgui, MD. sir" when addressing him.
Their question always throws me into a tailspin, considering all the ramifications of the education system established as it is, with the Imparting of Knowledge in exchange for a Degree, a Rite of Passage into a Career rather than a Job. That whole thing.
Yes, I am in this line of business (and yes, Pollyanna, it is a business), and yet I question its validity. I know that in some small way I am helping people better express themselves and think more critically and all that. I know other classes advance students a bit here/there...but really, is it the best format in this day and age?
I am leaning ever-more toward what we call "blended" classes at my college. In this delivery format, the content is online; students are to read their texts and online content, then come to class to wrestle with it for comprehension, clarification, and generally get the face-to-face time that many still benefit from. I lean toward this, for it is how I learn. I don't wait around for people to tell me something in a lecture; instead I go find it online and soak it up, then return to someone local w/questions. It works for me.
In this age of aliases, avatars and alternate identities, I realize that one could become quite the poser online, even in education. Is this any different from a guy in a tie behind a podium? That is no more me than the text "me" of my online instruction. It's a uniform, a standard of performance and delivery that is expected and sometimes needed to convey content and build confidence.
Last summer I had a couple of college guys come work on my place. After a few days, one of them said, "You know, you're like a different person out here." I pressed, he added, "I mean, you don't even wear a tie." Regardless of how impractical a tie might be in any circumstance, it is just not the fashion accessory to accompany jeans, boots, and a t-shirt, to say nothing of the inherent dangers of getting it snagged in a PTO or weed-eater. His comment resonated throughout the summer, as he continued to marvel that I ate, slept, drank, spoke--like anyone else.
I wonder, as I am sure others do, just who I really am. What would I really like to be called? What's my true name? All other expectations and utilitarian standards aside, what would I really wear. Really.
Their question always throws me into a tailspin, considering all the ramifications of the education system established as it is, with the Imparting of Knowledge in exchange for a Degree, a Rite of Passage into a Career rather than a Job. That whole thing.
Yes, I am in this line of business (and yes, Pollyanna, it is a business), and yet I question its validity. I know that in some small way I am helping people better express themselves and think more critically and all that. I know other classes advance students a bit here/there...but really, is it the best format in this day and age?
I am leaning ever-more toward what we call "blended" classes at my college. In this delivery format, the content is online; students are to read their texts and online content, then come to class to wrestle with it for comprehension, clarification, and generally get the face-to-face time that many still benefit from. I lean toward this, for it is how I learn. I don't wait around for people to tell me something in a lecture; instead I go find it online and soak it up, then return to someone local w/questions. It works for me.
In this age of aliases, avatars and alternate identities, I realize that one could become quite the poser online, even in education. Is this any different from a guy in a tie behind a podium? That is no more me than the text "me" of my online instruction. It's a uniform, a standard of performance and delivery that is expected and sometimes needed to convey content and build confidence.
Last summer I had a couple of college guys come work on my place. After a few days, one of them said, "You know, you're like a different person out here." I pressed, he added, "I mean, you don't even wear a tie." Regardless of how impractical a tie might be in any circumstance, it is just not the fashion accessory to accompany jeans, boots, and a t-shirt, to say nothing of the inherent dangers of getting it snagged in a PTO or weed-eater. His comment resonated throughout the summer, as he continued to marvel that I ate, slept, drank, spoke--like anyone else.
I wonder, as I am sure others do, just who I really am. What would I really like to be called? What's my true name? All other expectations and utilitarian standards aside, what would I really wear. Really.
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