Times Up, Buddy

This is it. The last one. Like it or not, I just looked at what I had to have done in the next five days between school and work, how far I am behind, and what adjustments I can make and... this is it.

So this one about the blog. I can't say that I have really liked doing this: I think I started hating journalling of any sort about 10 years ago when I took a brief look at some mission journals and the odds and from them on and just though, "Who would want to look at all this stuff? If I don't want to read it, who else would? I'm not on any path to glory where someone is going to want to examine the minutia, so, what the hell?" That unfortunately is how I came into this thing, and with the exception of a couple of sentences, I don't think I'll really ever want to look at this again. I don't say that the process is useless, but I'm not sure if all of this needs to be done in public. A kid at school sold me a CD once that he and some friends had put together, and all I could think of while I was listening to it was, "We have made this way too easy." It used to be that to put your thoughts out there, you had to really work for it. Now?.... Five minutes and Google will design a template for you that is "exactly you" and put your words out there for everyone to see. You and all the other unique snowflakes in the world. ( http://despair.com/individuality.html )

(And if you happen to hit that link, look at the one on blogging.)

Anyway. Yep. Done. Learned a lot about the value of planning, carefully. Had some fun with too many nights at the library. (Where I am.) Blathered on to myself and two or three people kind enough to put up with it. I will say, that like any other writing I have done, it does give me a chance to think. And that I do it better this way than others... Well, that isn't true. Working a problem in clay has the same effect. The same thing was true of directing (but writing is a whole lot less annoying to the actors.) (That last string of thoughts is an example. I sort of have to say it, and immediately out of my mouth I know that it wasn't exactly what I meant or that it isn't really true.) But this stuff of the internal monologue being spoken... well, it can be funny as improv, but very tedious in print.

Haiku. Or some other short form. That is what it should be. There should be blogs that are only haiku that act as links. Catch your interest? Peeked by the image? Then you click on the haiku. No? On to the next one. But at least the writer had to do some work. Had to try to get it shorter than a sound byte.

I've said too much. Yessiree. Class was good, info was good, project was tough, talking WITH others was very good. But this? Ah, well. One idiot crying in the wilderness. I hope everyone else liked them.

And the last complaint... responding. So, my little gift. Do exactly this: respond in the following way. "Uh, whatever."

Cheers folks. It really has been fun.

Haiku

Underneath the hood

still searching for the damn jack

but at least I'm safe.

Late Night with... Me.

I've been responsing tonight. A lot of good thoughts out there about what we've been doing. I particularly liked Beth's. If anyone sees this, you should go browse and at least get through the Apple design video. That would be something to really aspire to: design that was so transparent that your response would be, "Of course it's like that. Why would it be any other way?" Bauhaus meets IDET.

Time to go. I need sleep. "(IDET) hath murdered sleep, and therefore Cawdor shall sleep no more." This quote!! The first part just popped into the head, and I go out to look it up and find that Cawdor is the second part! There is this little kid from Nigeriain one of my classes that pronounces my name that way! I'm not sure if I should be just amused or very scared?! (More exclamation points than I have used in much time.)

Obligatory haiku:

Patches of bondo

Thumbs with winter's first cracking.

Months of Super Glue.

... and then there was one.

My One week left. The project is in, more or less, minus a few more responses. What did I learn?

My thoughts in one-sentence forms: Assessing attitudes with any degree
of accuracy is a real pain.
I was wondering about the deliverable part, considering the level of
detail that I had tried to do, but I found that even with all that
detail, there was a lot that I didn't understand until I got to
putting together the slides. Lots of details that I didn't think of.
I'm not sure that I would ever take the assessments myself...
Good up-front planning makes the whole thing a lot easier. At least
the focus isn't on what to teach but how.
I really wish I had had time to do that Monty Python style animated
SME.

And a few more: I think the important one was about the planning. Like I said, it was still tough to get the thing done, the issue was delivery more than content. And it was really nice working with the group that I did, Carl and Kevin. I have a tendency to overdo, and they were good about being able to see when I was running too far afield. I was still thinking about that element of not making the assumptions that a teacher does about delivery of content--- (I can fix it on the fly.) It seems a bit double edged having worked through this: I think more about the exact content that I'm going to deliver, but as a result don't always write it down... 'Cause, after all, I thought it through more carefully.... Yeah, well.

I was also thinking about this as I was sketching up the idea for tomorrow's IDET class. I think I'm getting a little better at seeing the problems, but it also means that at some point I just say, "Run it once and find out if you are really seeing problems or just imagining them."

11:40 pm. Oh the crap that is coming up from my lungs today. Guess I better head for home. So I'll probably take one more crack at another posting- make it an even 12... or is it 13?

Tonight's haikus from an "attended" moment walking back from the shed, and an NPR moment that has stuck with me this week:

Southwest sunsetting

winter light warming breath clouds

both fading faster.

Hands releasing from

a fog dewed gun grey railing.

Now I want it? Now?

KILNED

So, on the night before Thanksgiving, I’m stuck at school (job school) babysitting a kiln, stuck in a small hot room since the alarms are on with a computer that I thought had come through a fall/drop okay, which I just found out won’t play a DVD… and it will be off to the Apple Store… on Black Friday… ON BLACK FRIDAY! Kiln? Kilned. Sort of like killed. Dead. Man.

School. The other. I am starting to feel a little overwhelmed. Buried. Everything is coming due. So today, when I had planned on studying, I instead spent the day loading and firing, and mixing clay. I feel something more than cheated. Maybe violated is the word. I was beginning to feel that I had things under control. A pretty little illusion. I’m looking at the icons for a couple of Powerpoints for Piaget and Vygotsky. Schema Theory and a rhino. And it is a surrealistic moment. All for me.

What am I thinking of in class? One, for all the bad press a SME gets in class, it would sure be nice to be one on clinical trials or have easier access to one. Sometimes, when you are working on some item, it would be nice to just be able to answer the question or at least know if the answer was easily available or if the problem being faced were easy or complex. In other words, to have more knowledge. Two, unfortunately, often I find my own lessons lacking in a way that I never would have guessed. But, it makes me more willing to change it right on the spot, in spite of the plan. Three, watching someone else’s plan in action reveals a little more about thinking through the process. It makes design, good or bad, seem more transparent. And last, carving out a little time of my own is really essential to my sense of any self-worth.

Cone 9 is starting to move. I might be out of here by 11:15 p.m.

Gloves and dark glasses

Searching in brilliant white heat

Minute spire bending.

See him flip her off

She’s squeezing through bending heads,

Who pays her for this?

slogging... no offense

I got through about half of the blogs tonight, and I think that what we should be doing is haiku instead: try to get it all of it into 17 syllables. Seasonal...

Slogging to the car,
In a red sky and blown leaves.
Too many ideas.

Mr's Clark and Kozma,
Verbal cannons fire point-blank.
"Hey, man! 'Ya missed m'...."

superhero, kozmaclark!

It's been fun to watch this "debate" progress this last week or so. From the point where people seemed to actually be of an opinion, to the point in the last couple of days where people seem to be saying that the two sides are really the same thing! I sort of get where people are coming from since we are sort of trained not to have arguments, but it would would be nice to hear someone refer to someone else as "My learned friend from across the isle..." Me, I'm pretty sure that the problem is that we don't really want to say that technology is simple a method of delivery nor do we want to say that the role of the teacher is anything but supreme. One attacks the profession of a lot of us, the other attacks what I would guess was the reason for a lot of us getting into the IDET program... Educational Technology. I still think it's probably somewhere in the middle, but the problem with that position is that it as soon as you agree with that, then tech can have an educational effect of it's own. So, we make both of them right, a position that Kozma seems to accept. I'm less convinced of Clark's compliancy. So, there we are. Some song I've heard recently, "No one is right if anyone is wrong...."

The design phase.... jeeze.

Trivia... There is another design for a manhole cover, though it would be impractical. An equilateral triangle. I know this because I have started to see small utility covers in this shape.

I hate standard time.

Thinking Out Loud: Dumb and Proud

I just wanted to get this out there: a kind-of apology. I found in college, the first time around, that to get through the really boring classes, forcing myself to comment would help keep my head in the discussion (all but the Sociology of WWII class- not the actual title). Then I found that making comments helped me think... that for some annoying reason, if I SAID the thing, I would immediately pull it apart once it was out of my mouth. It was/is often embarrassing, but it did/still does seem to serve the same purpose.

So if I talk too much in class, sorry. Just trying to work things out for myself... at everyone else's expense. (See what I mean?)

Ah well, only 6 more weeks. And a couple of articles before tomorrow. Time to become more self-determined.

And can I just say how much I love Pandora? A station of all Brazilian? Or all instrumental Bluegrass? Or all Palestrina? ALL Palestrina!? Quoting Louis Armstrong, "If it sounds good, it is good."