activism, optimism, compassion, occupy love, zainab amadahy, International Indigenous Gathering 2012 In this article, guest author ZAINAB AMADAHY explores the power of positivity as a force of transformation in the world. Here at Occupy Love, we are always looking for love in all the wrong places, and finding it. This is an era of unimaginable crisis, and unimagined possibility. It’s time to start creating the new world, that we know is possible. A world that works for everyone and all life. On a panel discussing the relationship between “Love and Decolonization” I once spoke about protocols and ceremonies that are used by Indigenous communities in struggle. Because ceremonies allow participants to give thanks, vision an optimistic future, feel grounded on the land, connect to ancestors, feel responsibility to coming generations and cooperate together, they generate wellness. Mainstream science now understands that cultivating thoughts and feelings of generosity, gratitude, optimism, hope, compassion and cooperation are good for your health.
Praise versus Encouragement Most of us believe that we need to praise our children more. However, there is some controversy regarding this point. If we always reward a child with praise after a task is completed, then the child comes to expect it. One of the main differences between praise and encouragement is that praise often comes paired with a judgment or evaluation, such as "best" or "highest" in these examples. According to Bolton (1979, pg 181): Evaluative praise is the expression of favorable judgment about another person or his behaviors: "Eric, you are such a good boy." According to Ginott (1965): Evaluative praise.....creates anxiety, invites dependency, and evokes defensiveness. According to Taylor (1979): A real life experience, illustrating these principles, was provided by the well know cellist, Gregor Piatigorsky (1965). "Mr. "Bravo! "Splendid! Bewildered, I left the house. The greater was my shame and delight when, a few years later, I met Casals in Paris. Sam: It's scary. Mr. Sam: This is hard. Mr.
The 14 Habits of Highly Miserable People Photo Credit: Shutterstock.com/aastock November 18, 2013 | Like this article? Join our email list: Stay up to date with the latest headlines via email. Most of us claim we want to be happy—to have meaningful lives, enjoy ourselves, experience fulfillment, and share love and friendship with other people and maybe other species, like dogs, cats, birds, and whatnot. So if you aspire to make yourself miserable, what are the best, most proven techniques for doing it? Here, I cover most areas of life, such as family, work, friends, and romantic partners. • When you’re miserable, people feel sorry for you. • When you’re miserable, since you have no hopes and expect nothing good to happen, you can’t be disappointed or disillusioned. • Being miserable can give the impression that you’re a wise and worldly person, especially if you’re miserable not just about your life, but about society in general. Honing Your Misery Skills 1.
How The Memory Works In Learning How The Memory Works In Learning By Dr. Judy Willis, M.D., M.Ed. Teachers are the caretakers of the development of students’ highest brain during the years of its most extensive changes. This introduction to the basics of the neuroscience of learning includes information that should be included in all teacher education programs. Teaching Grows Brain Cells IQ is not fixed at birth and brain development and intelligence are “plastic” in that internal and environmental stimuli constantly change the structure and function of neurons and their connections. It was once believed that brain cell growth stops after age twenty. These physical changes of brain self-reconstruction in response to experiences including sensory input, emotions, conscious and unconscious thoughts are so responsive that human potential for increased knowledge, physical skills, and “talent” in the arts is essentially limitless. High Stress Restricts Brain Processing to the Survival State Memory is Sustained by Use The Future
Meditation for the damned - Notes & Errata by Mark Morford You guys! Great news: Researchers have identified a new, fifth kind of boredom. It’s true! Apparently the first four – behavioral psychology fans may know them as indifferent, recalibrating, searching and reactant – were apparently getting a little musty, a little inadequate to describe what researchers say is a new, ultramodern kind of disinterested numbness, as experienced by a small percentage of German students on particular days when they just don’t give a damn about anything or whatever, I mean who cares just shut up and leave me alone OK geez. Apathetic boredom is your hot new flavor, which may sound a little redundant, which might sound downright silly, but if that’s what you think, well, you clearly don’t deserve to be a boredom researcher, blithely adding to the great tradition of sub-dividing our many contrived woes into smaller and smaller categories, so we may carry them around like spiteful pets, trot them out at parties and make everyone sad. You’re doing it wrong
What schools need: Vigor instead of rigor - The Answer Sheet This was written by Joanne Yatvin, a veteran public school educator, author and past president of the National Council of Teachers of English. She is now teaching part-time at Portland State University. A version of this was originally published in the Atlanta Journal Constitution. By Joanne Yatvin Though my years in the classroom are long past, at heart I am still a cranky old English teacher who bristles at some of the neologisms that have crept into public language. I never tack “ly” onto ordinal number words, or say “myself” when I mean “I” or “me.” Even so, I remain politely quiet when others commit such grammatical transgressions. Part of my reaction is emotional, having so often heard “rigor” paired with “mortis.” Now, more than ever, “rigor” is being used to promote the idea that American students need advanced course work, complex texts, stricter grading, and longer school days and years in order to be ready for college or the workplace.
Why indigenous and racialized struggles will always be appendixed by the left Inspired by artists, academics and activist colleagues who have rolled their eyes at the spiritual beliefs of their Indigenous counterparts as well as protested the inclusion of prayer and ceremony into political, academic and artistic activities, I have decided to share my thinking on some fundamental differences in values and knowledge ways that impede relationship-making across our communities. While I can't generalize about what Indigenous or other racialized peoples mean by the words "decolonization", anti-racist or "anti-colonial", I can certainly observe how SOME philosophies and action strategies employed in leftist movements relegate anti-colonial and anti-racist struggles to the periphery. Furthermore, concepts of "decolonization", as they are talked about in many Indigenous and other racialized communities, are not always compatible with what are essentially Eurocentric philosophies and actions strategies. That isn't to say that glasses can't ever be useful.
How your brain likes to be treated at revision time If you're a student, you rely on one brain function above all others: memory. These days, we understand more about the structure of memory than we ever have before, so we can find the best techniques for training your brain to hang on to as much information as possible. The process depends on the brain's neuroplasticity, its ability to reorganise itself throughout your life by breaking and forming new connections between its billions of cells. How does it work? Information is transmitted by brain cells called neurons. When you learn something new, a group of neurons activate in a part of the brain called the hippocampus. Your hippocampus is forced to store many new patterns every day. So what's the best way to revise? Forget about initial letters Teachers often urge students to make up mnemonics – sentences based on the initial letters of items you're trying to remember. Repeat yourself Pathways between neurons can be strengthened over time. Use science to help you retrieve info
There's More to Life Than Being Happy - Frankl "It is the very pursuit of happiness that thwarts happiness." In September 1942, Viktor Frankl, a prominent Jewish psychiatrist and neurologist in Vienna, was arrested and transported to a Nazi concentration camp with his wife and parents. Three years later, when his camp was liberated, most of his family, including his pregnant wife, had perished -- but he, prisoner number 119104, had lived. In his bestselling 1946 book, Man's Search for Meaning, which he wrote in nine days about his experiences in the camps, Frankl concluded that the difference between those who had lived and those who had died came down to one thing: Meaning, an insight he came to early in life. As he saw in the camps, those who found meaning even in the most horrendous circumstances were far more resilient to suffering than those who did not. Frankl worked as a therapist in the camps, and in his book, he gives the example of two suicidal inmates he encountered there. Viktor Frankl [Herwig Prammer/Reuters] As Anna S.
Science, Creativity and the Real World Gifted Homeschoolers Forum Science, Creativity and the Real World: Lessons Learned from the U.S. Homeschool Community By Corin Barsily Goodwin and Mika Gustavson, MFT A great deal of concern surrounds the lack of quality in science education in the United States. A simple Google search of “science education in America” brings up link after link on the horrific failure of standards and the many additional problems inherent in the current system of education. A 2012 study by the Fordham Institute[1] identifies four main factors for the failure of science standards to produce a flock of achievers: an undermining of evolutionary theory, vague goals, not enough guidance for teachers on how to integrate the history of science and the concept of scientific inquiry into their lessons, and not enough math instruction. Creativity is any act, idea, or product that changes an existing domain, or that transforms an existing domain into a new one. ~ Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi ~William Butler Yeats Science and Homeschooling Conclusion
Online disinhibition effect The online disinhibition effect is a loosening (or complete abandonment) of social restrictions and inhibitions that would otherwise be present in normal face-to-face interaction during interactions with others on the Internet. This effect is caused by many factors, including dissociative anonymity, invisibility, asynchronicity, solipsistic introjection, dissociative imagination, and minimization of authority.[1] General concept[edit] Because of this loss of inhibition, some users may exhibit benign tendencies, including becoming more affectionate, more willing to open up to others, and less guarded about emotions, all in an attempt to achieve emotional catharsis. With respect to bad behavior, users on the Internet can frequently do or say as they wish without fear of any kind of meaningful reprisal. CB radio during the 1970s saw similar bad behavior: You don't know me[edit] You can't see me[edit] Core Concept: Invisibility See you later[edit] Core Concept: Asynchronicity See also[edit]
Teaching Expert Learners Harrisburg Presentation Resources Here are some resources from my presentation in Harrisburg. Defining and Exploring Gamification from Karl Kapp Here is some additional information. Articles and Blog Entries of Interest 8 Types of Stories to Effect Change Storytelling and Instructional Design Eight Game Elements to Make Learning More Intriguing Games, Gamification and the Quest for Learner Engagement Gamification, […] Continue Reading → 2014 DOE Symposium Conference Resources Here are my resources for the 2014 DOE Symposium Conference. Continue Reading → Great fun at ITEAA Conference & Introduction of Exciting Game-Based Learning Modules Last week I had a chance to attend the ITEAA Conference which is the conference of the International Technology and Engineering Educators Association. Continue Reading → Instructional Games and Narrative Instructional games work best when there is a narrative that provides the learner with the proper context for the learning that needs to take place.
Picasso, Kepler, and the Benefits of Being an Expert Generalist One thing that separates the great innovators from everyone else is that they seem to know a lot about a wide variety of topics. They are expert generalists. Their wide knowledge base supports their creativity. As it turns out, there are two personality traits that are key for expert generalists: Openness to Experience and Need for Cognition. Openness to Experience is one of the Big Five personality characteristics identified by psychologists. As you might expect, high levels of Openness to Experience can sometimes be related to creativity. However, creativity also requires knowledge. If you are not willing to do something new, then it’s hard to be creative. At the same time, creativity often requires drawing analogies between one body of knowledge and another. In order to have deep knowledge about a discipline as well as a wide base of knowledge that can be mined later for analogies, it is important for someone to enjoy thinking. How About You?
Speech GraphicsSpeech Graphics creates world’s first high fidelity animation of human speech organs » Speech Graphics Oct 14 '13 Author: Speech Graphics Posted in: Press Specialist audio animation studio, Speech Graphics, announced today the launch of the world's first high fidelity animation of the human speech organs. Using technology they originally developed for the video games industry, Speech Graphics has created 'Simone', a fully computer animated language teacher, seen for the first time on language learning site, Saundz.com. Communication in today's global economy is critical and for the approximately 2 billion people learning English as a second language, accent and pronunciation are two of the most difficult aspects to master. Gregor Hofer of Speech Graphics explains: "A strong accent can be a major barrier to effective communication. Revealing a hidden world never seen so clearly before, Simone is a fully functioning cutaway of the inside of the mouth, nose and throat. Viewed from the front, Simone's face moves in perfect synchrony with audio recordings of sounds and words.