End of Life Revisited

Discussions about healthcare consistently get me thinking about end of life issues. I have discussed this stuff before. Notably, in The Ugliness of Modern Death, but now I am past some personal situations involving death and so am more capable of thinking about these issues.

DyingWell.org is not a cheery site, but it is an important one. I recently bought Dr. Byock's Dying Well and really am looking forward to the read. It's morose, but critical.

Education: Will Choice Give Us Smarter but Isolated Kids?

I work for a company that does online education stuff. A coworker recently asked me what I think about what we do from the point of view as a former teacher.

First of all, I am in favor of choice.

1. I don't think that one particular type of school is best for every student. For instance, some kids have significant learning or social issues that make a brick and mortar classroom environment a bad fit for them.
2. Choice can lead to some competition. Some schools get so bogged down in just surviving that they lose track of the idea that they are supposed to be educating kids. Most public schools have a monopoly, so they don't have to care about the quality they provide. I understand that most people in public schools are wonderful, caring people who believe that educating children is a calling. My grandfather, mother, aunt, cousin, and I all fall into this group. I am not calling educators lazy or incompetent. All I am saying is that many educators could use a shift of perspective to help focus on what really matters.

On the other hand, a fractured school landscape worries me. I am a public school guy in great part because I believe in heterogeneous social environments that allow students to see different perspectives. We all need to be exposed to diversity. This isn't about having enough black kids or hispanic kids so the class picture looks diverse. This is about having truly diverse perspectives.

• Rich/poor
• Christian/Jewish/Muslim/Hindi/Atheist
• American/Russian/Hispanic/Indian
• smart/mediocre/struggling (each of these in each academic arena)

Choice is great, but so is heterogeneity.

Music Monday: Ida Maria and Yoav

Ida Maria's voice and energy work. Check her out.

• I Like You So Much Better When You're Naked
• Oh My God
• When It Comes to You

The girl is gettin' it done.

Yoav (song: Beautiful Lie)

Cool song that inspired a couple remixes:Robert Sansixto mix and KeeMo's Terrace Mix ... but I like the original best. Yoav is yet another artist using on-the-fly sampling to create interesting music.

Web Stuff Friday: Scat and Underground

S&*t You Should Know is hilarious. The language is quite colorful, but the posts are informative and hilarious.

• .9 repeating equals 1 is the post that got me there. A couple colleagues and I were having a discussion about this topic and I went looking for other thoughts on the topic.
• Reader Submission: The Immaculate Mis-Conception taught me something.
• Learn how to use a fucking semicolon. Fuck. is hilarious.
• I know you think “myself” sounds fancy is another funny gem.

I could go on and on, but you get the idea. Everyone should read every entry, either to learn something or to learn how to teach others the idea.

Urban Explorations is incredible. Check out the photo gallery and the videos. Undercity New York is cool and reminded me of Man on Wire, which was an impressive documentary.

New Math Education Wars: The Wrath of Khan

With their tutorial videos, Khan Academy has made a big splash in the education world. Having Bill Gates sing your praises in a TED Talk is a sure way to get a lot of attention.

Over at Action-Reaction, Frank Noschese has an article Khan Academy: My Final Remarks. I agree with many of his points. Here is a quote from near the end of the post:

Khan Academy is just one tool in a teacher’s arsenal. (If it’s the only tool, that is a HUGE problem.) Khan Academy can be useful for some kids as vehicle (build skills) to help them get to better places (solving complex problems).

On his Quantum Progress blog, John Burk also chimed in with Project Euler vs Khan Academy: The Future of Online Learning. I agree that Project Euler is really, really good, but that is a topic for another post.

Back in 2007 (before I ever heard of Khan Academy), I started developing instructional videos that are somewhat similar to Khan’s work. I think they are great tools, but they are not the be-all and end-all of online education. When placed in the context of a complete course, they can be helpful tools. We need to continue to innovate, but just shouldn't get too carried away by the latest educational fad and think it will solve all our problems. Good teaching isn't about amazing lectures. It's about feedback and engagement and connections.

At their best, instructional videos are pretty sentences. Quality education is a set of engrossing interactive stories.

Brain Calisthenics: Using Perceptual Learning

A friend sent me a link to a New York Times article Brain Calisthenics for Abstract Ideas. The idea is that "playing" with a concept can yield big educational gains. A strictly top-down approach to education (here's the formula, now apply it) is not necessarily the best way to work. This perceptual approach seeks to leverage our ability to build intuition through experience.

Here are some of the games the article references.

Basic Math

Measurements and Graphing: Match the equation to the graph and learn to perceive basic measurement concepts.

Positive and Negative Feedback

Extreme Ball: Time a fan to blow and push a ball attached to rubber bands.

Extreme Population: Help your city reach a population of one million citizens.

Stabilize Ball: Time a fan to blow and stabilize a ball attached to rubber bands.

Stabilize Population: Help your city's population stabilize at 500,000 citizens.

DaVinci's Resume

Back in 1482, a job-hunting Leonardo DaVinci sent a letter to the Duke of Milan. This letter got into the hands of a guy at The Ladders (a job search site) and it made the rounds recently as DaVinci's resume.

DaVinci's resume is interesting, but I prefer a geek's take on the DaVinci resume.