techie this week

here's a short of the computery things i've done so far this week:
IMed with some friends and family
typed up many, many documents on word for work and school
listened to a 3 hour lecture on powerpoint
emailed a lot!
texted to my honey
participated in an asynchronous discussion for psycholinguisitics class
downloaded materials off of blackboard
downloaded several journal articles online from online databases and online magazines
watched several clips of the ROOTS TV series in class on my laptop DVD player
used the library card catalog

more to come...

love/hate relationship

i have a love/hate relationship with TV. i used to say that i would never have a TV in my house, but i do. but what i don't have is cable. i think TV contributes to laziness, allowing the viewer to take, take, take, and give nothing in return. it's easier to sit on the couch and turn on the TV and let it feed you entertainment or information. it's harder to pick up a book and read or get the things done around the house. hours can go by sitting on the couch watching TV. does Johnson make some good claims about the value of television? yes, he does. watching certain TV programs require viewers to reach into their cognitive toolbox and make predictions, recollections, connections, and characterizations. these are the same qualities that we attribute to book reading. the quality of TV has gotten better because viewers demand more stimulating and challenging plots. while we don't physically want to move, we want our minds to be pursued and moved. there are few shows that i keep up with, but i do enjoy watching LOST. in the past season, the plot has become so predictable that many religious LOST viewers are blogging and writing that LOST has lost its way. the characters are quickly losing depth, the plot seems to be going nowhere or is feeling redunant. i am losing patience with the show, and i don't look forward to wednesday nights like i used to. and do i love watching shows without depth? sure i do. but in this regard, i take an oppositional stance and stand on viligant guard against shows that will probably not add something positive to my well-being. and i take an oppositional stance to shows that might have depth but again, don't add something positive to my well-being. shows like deperate housewives. like the "Dallas" example in our reading, someone who loves that show will definitely need to write me and explain your obsession. do you love it because it takes you into a fantasy world? do you hate it but watch it anyway to poke fun at it?

maybe i'm a marxist

i don't know that much about marx, but some of the pieces that shannon pulled from marx, i believe. such as: "Marx calls this alientation--the subordination of the worker to the reified product of his labor." yes, i once was the subordinated worker who labored over making sure her students manufactured good quality products--passing TAKS test scores. perhaps shannon refers to students as the products of labor, but these days, tests are the products we strive to manufacture with perfection. children are just the tools we use to create those great products. with great products comes money, fame, and the coveted "exemplary" status. i was compelled to read (from wiki, only) about marx and his other beliefs. he was an enemy of capitalism for sure. the goal of his historical project was to claim the "universal right to be freely active, to affirm ourselves, to be spontaneous in our activity, and to pursue the free development of our physical and mental. YES! dewey would say YES! too. the mantra of capitalism might also sound very similar, though. the pursuit of happiness through the almighty dollar. can't it be read that way?? obviously, it comes down to philosophical differences in the goals of education. and i stand on the side of marx.

technofied thoughts

i have moments when i'm in the middle of a tech moment where i marvel at the speed at which i can gather information or complete a transaction thanks to the tech age we live in. yesterday i had to explain to my elderly neighbors how we write research papers these days, browsing through thousands of online journal articles, reading at least 50 of them, and writing at least a 30 page paper. my neighbor told me that back in the 1930s, when she was in school at UT, she remembers having to write a "term theme" by hand and slaving hours over it at home wishing "she could be out on dates with willie (now her husband)." times have really changed.

on that very same day, i had a flashback moment when my mom was trying to teach me how to cook a favorite chinese dish of mine. chinese turnip cakes. while she probably could have sent me a recipe (or i could have found one online), i needed to have her demonstrate, face-to-face, and orally, how it was to be done. "first you cut up the turnips and grate it in the food processor. then you add this much water if you had this much turnip." i don't think the tools of technology could have captured the depth of this learning moment. how does one define "this much water with this much turnip" through written remarks without something going awry with my recipe? i needed that oral coaching and proximity to fully understand just how to make a recipe that probably was passed down to my mom from her mom.

so i guess im trying to say that we're walking in between different worlds these days. sometimes we slip back into the roots of oral tradition, but for the most part, we are walking the path of technology. i feel fortunate to be living in this awkward age of in-betweens. i can't imagine not having my mom teach me how to make my favorite chinese dish any other way. i can't imagine writing a term theme by hand. and i sure can't imagine writing a paper without online journals.

Theory of Mind

"The theory of mind is nothing other than the set of mental concepts which correspond to the expression of the illocutionary force of utterances" (Olson, pg. 270). since this course started, I have been thinking about the idea of 'theory of mind' and what it is. to me, theory of mind sounds a like the ideas of cognition. or it is the recognition of cognition, similar to metacognition? quoting a definition on wikipedia, "the phrase 'theory of mind' has more commonly been used to refer to a specific cognitive capacity: the ability to understand that others have beliefs, desires and intentions that are different from one's own." okay, so it's a part of cognition. so in this definition, theory of mind sounds more like empathy/sympathy, especially when many say today that autistics lack theory of mind--the inability to process the beliefs and feelings of others. olson relates theory of mind to illocutionary force--that illocutionary force is the manifestitation of theory of mind. i don't see the connection--can someone out there help??

another interesting part of the reading this week was the chapter on interpretation. i think it's safe to say that many of our world conflicts stem from misinterpretation. studying the philosophy of interpretation should be everyone's work, as we are all engaged in interpretation. this becomes an especially important task for those that make and execute laws, those involved in religion, and even in our profession as teachers. the repercussions of misinterpretation could mean life or death to a criminal, heaven or hell to the religious, or promotion or retention to a child.

I'm published on the web!

this is amazing. in my vanity, i have googled myself many times to see if i have a place on the internet. and it looks like i finally do. i have not realized, until today, that i AM published on the web with this blog. there are actually people out there that want to read what i have to say. can i just say how powerful and more meaningful this blog is to me now??

in my last blog, i mentioned that i would like to learn hebrew. and i got a response back from some guy IN israel, referring me to some websites where i could. it truly amazed me that people all over the world have access to my blog. can you imagine the influece this could have with our students? in my psycholinguistics class, we are learning about using language as a cultural tool (see Wertsch) and i believe that the knowledge and use of blogs can create a cultural tool for students to use and see that they DO have power with words in this world.

i wish i could learn hebrew

in class on monday, emily gave us a mini-lesson on the hebrew language. on page 83, /k/, /t/, and /b/ is explained as being the root word 'write' but when vowels are added in between those consonant forms, it can morph into 'he writes', 'they wrote', 'writing', etc., similar to how affixes are added to words in English. She said that the Torah is written only with consonant sounds and therefore requires a mediator to assist one who might want to read it on their own. If looking at the Torah for the first time, you wouldn't know how to pronounce /k//t//b/ beacause you wouldn't know which vowels went in between. Once given the pronounciation, it is expected that you memorize it.I thought this was so interesting, because it doesn't quite made the Torah a literal text until the oral is matched to it. It's one of the few examples of language we've read about that sits on the continnum between orality and literacy.
There were other examples of semi-literate cultures that used knots and tally marks as mneumonic devices. With the history of writing as a mneumonic device and serving a pramatic purpose, I am awed by how language today has evolved as it has into more.