TITLE: A Loosely-Connected Friday Miscellany
AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford
DATE: August 07, 2009  2:18 PM
DESC: 
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BODY:
<EM>An Addition to My News Aggregator</EM>

Thanks to
<A HREF="http://www.johndcook.com/blog/">
   John Cook</A>,
I came across the blog of Dan Meyers, a high school
math teacher.  Cook pointed to an
<A HREF="http://blog.mrmeyer.com/?p=4310">
   entry with a video</A>
of Meyer speaking
<A HREF="http://www.pecha-kucha.org/">
   pecha kucha</A>-style
at OSCON.  One of the important messages for teachers
 conveyed in this five minutes is <B>Be less
helpful</B>.  Learning happens more often when people
think and do than when they follow orders in a
well-defined script.

While browsing his archive I came across this
<A HREF="http://blog.mrmeyer.com/?p=4227">
   personal revelation</A>
about the value of the time he was spending on his
class outside of the business day:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
I realize now that the return on that investment of
thirty minutes of my personal time isn't the promise
of more personal time later.  ...  Rather it's the
promise of easier and more satisfying work time
<B>now</B>.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

Time saved later is a bonus.  If you depend on that
return, you will often be disappointed, and that
feeds the emotional grind that is teaching.  Kinda
like
<A HREF="http://www.cs.uni.edu/~wallingf/blog/archives/monthly/2009-07.html#e2009-07-27T15_28_18.htm">
   running in the middle</A>.
I think it also applies more than we first realize to
reuse and development speed in software.

<EM>Learning and Doing</EM>

One of the underlying themes in Meyers's writing seems
to be the same idea in this line from Gerd Binnig, which
I found at
<A HREF="http://commonsensequantum.blogspot.com/2009/07/physics-quote-of-day-july-19-july-25.html">
   Physics Quote of Day</A>:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
Doing physics is much more enjoyable than just learning
it.  Maybe 'doing it' is the right way of learning ....
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

Programming can be a lot more fun than learning to
program, at least the way we often try to teach it.  I'm
glad that so many people are working on ways to teach it
better.  In one sense, the path to better seems clear.

<EM>Knowing and Doing</EM>

One of the reasons I named by blog "Knowing and Doing"
was that I wanted to explore the connection between
learning, knowing, and doing.  Having committed to that
name so many years ago, I decided to
<A HREF="http://knowing-and-doing.posterous.com/">
   stake its claim</A>
at Posterous, which I learned about via
<A HREF="http://www.thoughtstoblog.com/articles/2009/08/04/where-to-blog">
   Jake Good</A>.
Given some technical issues with using NanoBlogger, at
least an old version of it, I've again been giving some
thought to upgrading or changing platforms.  Like Jake,
I'm always tempted to roll my own, but...

I don't know if I'll do much or anything more with Knowing
and Doing at Posterous, but it's there if I decide that
it looks promising.

<EM>A Poignant Convergence</EM>

Finally, a little levity laced with truth.  Several people
have written to say they liked the name of my recent entry,
<A HREF="http://www.cs.uni.edu/~wallingf/blog/archives/monthly/2009-08.html#e2009-08-03T20_51_23.htm">
   Sometimes, Students Have an Itch to Scratch</A>.
On a whim, I typed it into
<A HREF="http://translationparty.com/tp/#279098">
   Translation Party</A>,
which alternately translates a phrase from English into
Japanese and back until it reaches equilibrium.  In only
six steps, my catchphrase settles onto:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
Sometimes I fear for the students.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

Knowing how few students will try to scratch their own
itches with their new-found power as a programmer, and
how few of them will be given a chance to do so in their
courses on the way to learning something valuable, I
chuckled.  Then I took a few moments to mourn.
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