A Differently-Abled Son

The cartoon of the navel-gazing blue skunk created for this blog was drawn by my “differently-abled” son, Brady - one who has taught me a great deal about meeting the needs and interests of different kinds of learners.

My child number one, Carrie, was (and remains) an academically-oriented student: early reader, good writer, terrific researcher, top grade earner, great test-taker, and maybe even a bit of the teacher’s pet. You looked forward to her parent-teacher conferences.

Child number two, Brady, was an (ahem) indifferent student. He disliked reading for school, did the minimum in class to keep him from failing (mostly), hated any kind of test, and did everything he could to keep the teacher’s attention directed away from him. Let’s just say parent-teacher conferences were interesting.

Yet, both my kids are very bright, good natured, talented, sweet as can be, and wickedly funny. It’s just that one like learning from books; the other liked learning by doing. One pursued a college degree in linguistics; the other is in art school.

Here’s the thing. We as educators have to recognize that both kinds of kids (and probably other varieties as well) need to be excited about school and learning. While traditional education served my daughter very well; it failed Brady to a large extent, except for his art and technology classes.

I know the Bradys are often tougher to teach, to connect with, to motivate - especially for those of us who are ourselves more academically oriented.

But here’s my plea to teachers everywhere. Do what you can to reach those who may not love to learn by reading and listening and worksheets.

I love my son Brady no less than I love my daughter Carrie - I don’t think you should either.

At the end of a hot, muggy exhausting Monday afternoon. - Doug

Balancing Work and Life: The Climb to Eagle Mountain

One of my best buddies, Cary G., and I took a couple days this week to head to Minnesota’s beautiful North Shore to hike what passes for mountains around here. We conquered Eagle Mountain, Minnesota’s highest point. At 2301 feet, this may not seem like much of a challenge to those of you from less vertically-challenged states like Colorado or Alaska, but we felt the five hours spent on rough trails to get to the top and back was pretty good for a couple of old guys.

The trip itself, of course, was an excuse to have long manly talks about kids, careers, politics, books, movies, and writing. And yes, the subject of women came up a time or two. We’ve been friends long enough that most of our stories are not new, but all the more enjoyable for the re-telling and embellishment. It’s wonderful how past adventures get more dangerous and past loves get more beautiful the further they recede into the past. We are both settling into our role as long-winded geezers very nicely, thank you.

One topic that seemed to be new this year, however, was how we were both attempting to (and are both confounded by) trying to establish some balance between our work and our personal lives. While we both have day jobs, we also do a good deal of writing, consulting, volunteering, and other sideline work that seems nearly as consuming as the day job. We marvel at friends and relatives who work only to earn the money they need to pursue hobbies, and wonder if they’ve made a better choice than we have.

This certainly hit home when I opened my e-mail this morning after being gone a few days. Over two hundred messages with very few of them being spam. (The shoemaker’s elves once again failed to appear!) There were questions regarding school business, of course, columns to be edited, the fall school media conference I am chairing, state technology issues, national library discussions, updates on upcoming events at which I will be speaking, and even about Kiwanis and Lake Association events. I’ve been replying to e-mail now for about three hours, and still have the toughest knot of about a dozen replies yet to go. It’s nearly lunchtime, the sun is shining, the boat beckons, the lawn needs mowing, and I feel like I already need a nap.

In a very real sense, I am very fortunate since my “work” gives me genuine satisfaction. Giving up a beautiful Sunday morning, to take care of business isn’t as painful as it sounds. (It’s only work if you’d rather be doing something else.)

And I know I am not alone in finding that work spills out of work hours, especially among educators. It’s the rare teacher, librarian or techie who doesn’t carry home papers to grade, books to read, professional journals to skim, or software to learn. Most professional organizations rely heavily on volunteers who do things for the good of the group on their own time. I get plenty of business e-mail sent by other professionals either late at night or early in the morning.

So what is the secret to balancing one’s work and leisure time? What parameters do you set for yourself? Should you count work that you enjoy as play? Does all work and no play really make Jack a dull boy? Should a person be able to take a few days off to go hiking knowing that the e-mail won’t get answered in a timely manner? Or is it egotistical to think the world can’t get along without you just fine for a couple days?

Let me know. I could use some help.

Bullshit Literacy

(The bullshitter) does not reject the authority of the truth, as the liar does, and oppose himself to it. He pays no attention to it at all. By virtue of this, bullshit is a greater enemy of the truth than lies are. Harry G. Frankfurt, On Bullshit

Once again I’ve had a perfectly nice Saturday morning ruined by yet another set of “21st Century Literacy” skills dumped on my lap. Sent to me by my good (and I am sure well-intentioned) friend, Ian Jukes of Committed Sardine fame, this one comes from the New Media Consortium - whatever that is.

New Media Consortium Global Imperative: the Report of the 21st Century Literacy Summit joins a couple others, including NCREL (Learning Point) eGauge 21st Century Skills and Partnership for 21st Century Skills, excoriating we simple educators for not doing an adequate job of preparing this current batch of kiddies for the big bad work world of the future.

If current employment trends continue, it looks like about 90% of our students will work for Wal-Mart where the most important job skills are:
- Looking good in a day-glow vest
- Passing drug screenings
- Living on the minimum wage, not getting ill, and coping with the relatives who are wiling to take them in.

For the other 10% of the workforce, their single, salient marketable skill will be knowing how to bullshit. (See professor Frankfurt’s definition above.) When, then, are the responsible think tanks going to call summits and issue papers addressing this serious gap in our schools’ curricula?

Since this is a beautiful morning and I’ve only been thinking about this topic for about ten minutes, the core competencies in bullshitting below are somewhat sketchy. You, dear reader, need to embellish.

The Bullshit Literate Student will:
1. Show no social conscience or balance when deliberately distorting factoids, data, or expert opinion in presenting a conclusion.
2. Skillfully use any medium and all persuasive techniques in order to convince others. This includes the ability to use technology to doctor images and edit text.
3. Consistently, vociferously, and blindly hold to a single point of view, and know that volume, repetition and rhetoric trump reason. (ie: Stay the course.)
4. Convincingly fake sincerity.
5. Ably disguise personal gain as public good.
6. Take a single incident or news story or incident and follow it to an illogical conclusion. (See employment prediction above.)
7. Claim any idea as original.
8. Deny prior knowledge. (ie: Nobody expected the breach of the levees)
9. Create a website, wiki, blog, or podcast. (beginning level). Find a publisher, broadcaster or corporate sponsor for whom the bottom line is the bottom line. (advanced).
10. Never, never, never show doubt.

OK, I think I have that out of my system. I’m going on a long - hopefully cynicism-draining - bicycle ride.

Other skills the Bullshit Literate should master?

A follow-up post with a link to Art Wolensky's rubric for measuring bullshit literacy attainment.

A 2009 revision is here.

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2 Comments »
[…] Bullshit Literacy. Oh yes. This one really works for me. All those surface ideas that sound good but lack substance: 8. Deny prior knowledge. (ie: Nobody expected the breach of the levees) […]

Pingback by Tangled up in Purple » Slacker — September 10, 2005 @ 2:07 am

we have in washington, an administration that makes blatant use of these skills. they are completely in the open about it and have been since day one. and they got re-elected. conclusion: 1 through 10 above are not merely tolerated — they are rewarded.

i long ago came to the conclusion that a politician’s job is to listen to what people say, to look behind the words so you can give them what they *really* want, and then convince them that the two are the same.

Comment by jim shirey — October 4, 2005 @ 2:10 pm