Delusions of Adequacy

I see I had a visitor from Hiltons, Virginia.  This pleases me.  One of my fondest memories is the time I went to Hiltons and saw Johnny Cash, June Carter Cash, and Tom T. Hall at the Carter Family Fold, back in 1999.  Hot summer day, thousands of people crammed into a barn on a hillside, lawn chair digging into my backside for ten or eleven hours before the Cashes took the stage to sing a handful of songs to an audience that would have walked barefoot across hot coals to hear them.  Absolutely wonderful.

Thank you, Carter Family, and thank you, Hiltons.

If you aren't, you should be reading Michael Yon's blog.

I mean it.  Go read it now.

I note, by glancing off to the Blogdom of God links on the left of my page, that Andrew Sullivan is in the BoG.

Interesting.

I wasn't aware of Sullivan's religious leanings... ie., that he had any.   But I see from various sources -- not all complimentary (note apparently family-unfriendly links at bottom of page; you have been warned) -- that he's Roman Catholic.

Of course, the only scandal here is that he's getting a link on my page and not reciprocating.  Greedy of him, wouldn't you say?  Hey, Andy, how about spreading some of the link-love around?

(Oh, yeah... and World Mag Blog could do some reciprocating, too.)

(Oh, crap... I need to get that link to Dave Worrell's page back up before I turn into a complete hypocrite.)

UPDATE: My hypocrisy is history!  Sorry, Dave.  Congrats on making Jedi, even if... you know... not really.

Model Classrooms are a geek's dream -- a 40-inch interactive computer screen called a Smartboard, a Jeopardy!-like classroom quiz-by-remote-control system called CPS, and various other gadgets designed to make learning fun and engaging.  They're the future of classroom instruction, and to get one, you have to apply for one with our technology office.  The application is a questionnaire designed to test one's commitment to the use of technology in instruction.  Because I found some of the questions -- and my answers -- interesting, I'm posting a few here.  

Would you give this man a Model Classroom?

(Questions in bold; my answers in normal text beneath each.)


5.  How do you think these instructional technology tools would effect student achievement? (300-word limit)

A great inhibitor of student participation -- their unwillingness to take risks in speaking a foreign language -- would be obviated by the CPS system, leading to greater participation from the students and better feedback on comprehension, by which I would be better able to tailor lessons, practice, and assessment to enhance student learning.  Audio-visual presentation of vocabulary using the Smartboard would enhance comprehension, retention, and ability to apply the vocabulary in context.  The ability to use technology to enhance their presentations of dialogues and research projects would lead to greater student involvement in these activities.  I have seen similar effects in the classes of other teachers and have no reason to doubt they would emerge in mine as well.  On this matter, I have no doubt: student enthusiasm for the class, investment in its activities, and willingness to participate would all be greatly enhanced by the Model Classroom technology, and their achievements would be commensurately higher.  

6.  How do you perceive the role of technology in the future of education? (300-word limit)

Technology will solve many of the problems we face in education, but will raise many of its own, and it is important to keep a clear and unromantic perspective on this matter, for our own sakes and those of the students.  Two enormous problems that face the full implementation of technology -- paperless classrooms, true remote learning, etc. -- are money and technological development itself.  In terms of technological development, the fulfillment of technology's many promises will require the invention, production, and implementation of not only a faster and more reliable Internet, but also -- at the classroom level -- the availability of affordable student interface devices (laptops, etc.) that are tough enough to withstand the school environment.  (I suspect that technological obsolescence -- the dreaded "it was a paperweight the minute we bought it" problem -- will not be a great impediment to educational technology.  Barring the development of some sort of Star Trek three-dimensional holographic display system, there is only so much that needs to be done with text and images, and our current technology is adequate for most of it.)  The greater problem is money -- engineers and developers can overcome any technical obstacle, but the willingness of society to foot the bill will assuredly be more erratic and inconsistent.

Another problem is that of diminishing returns.  In the short term, student involvement in learning, and their enthusiasm for school, will be enhanced by the availability of new technologies such as the Internet; the relative novelty of such technologies, compared to the archaic book, pencil, and chalkboard, will for a time ensure that students are attentive and invested in their classes.  However, in time -- and likely in a very short time indeed -- the novelty will wear off, and we will find that students who only recently were enthralled by technologies such as those found in the Model Classroom now find them routine, workaday, and boring, in and of themselves.  It will again fall to teachers, as it always has, to find new ways to engage students in learning without being able to rely on the "wow-factor" of technology to do their work for them.

Technology will always find its best application in the presence of dedicated and knowledgeable teachers who can act as guides, encouragers, and -- when necessary -- filters for students who have more access to more information (some of it unreliable) than any generation that has gone before.  

7. Please add anything else you think we need to know to make our decision. (300-word limit)

During prior availabilities of the Model Classroom, I did not apply for one because I felt that the limited quantities of the technology militated against its use in a non-core academic class such as Spanish; I believed Model Classrooms would find better and more productive use in math, reading, social studies, and science classrooms.  With the advent of our two-year program for high school credit, however, I believe the situation has changed drastically.  I am now responsible for teaching one of a handful of middle-school classes for which student performance will be scrutinized not only during middle and high school, but for the process of college admissions.  It is not an overstatement to say that my class will affect the rest of my students' lives.  I believe that my students and I will succeed in this new challenge, and I believe the Model Classroom will be a vital component in that success.

It's not basketball, but it'll do.

Softball season has begun.  Three of the girls from last year's eighth grade girls' basketball team, apples of my eye, are on the JV softball team this year.  Thursday, I drove thirty miles to Fort Oglethorpe to watch them play against the number 1-rated 4A team in Georgia, and on Saturday I went back to the same stadium to watch them play three games in an all-day tournament that pitted them against three teams that had them sadly outclassed.

The games themselves followed the same depressing pattern: excellent (or at least reasonably good) defensive play in the early innings, keeping the lid on the opponent's score, but wasted by a stubborn inability to score, followed by a sudden defensive breakdown in the fourth or fifth inning.  And opponent scores that balloon from 0 or 1 to 6 or 8 in the course of a handful of at-bats.  Followed by yet more inability to score, despite loading the bases at least once per game.  It's not hitting that's their problem so much as scoring.

By the time the team came up to sit near me in the bleachers during the game between their second and third games, they were tired, discouraged, and ready to get out of the blistering Georgia sun.  Seldom have I heard a dozen girls make so little noise.

(During the games, though, they make noise -- some of it incomprehensible to anyone who's not them.  I tirelessly interpreted a chant of "nice eye, nice eye" as some kind of Steppin Fetchit "no suh, no suh."  In my defense, their own mothers, who were sitting beside me, didn't understand it either.  In all our defenses, the girls were chanting in a Southern accent thick enough to armor a tank.)

(That particular chant, by the way, provided endless amusement for the rednecks who'd come out to cheer Dade County, the last of our three opponents for the day.  One of them, a rangy-looking guy in a NASCAR T-shirt and a battered ballcap, delighted in yelling "nice eye, nice eye" and the accompanying "woop-woop" throughout the final couple of innings of the Dade game, commenting that our dugout had gotten quiet and making other observations.  I was waiting for him to step over the line from complete moron to window-licking frontal lobe amputee, and dreading it -- at some point, somebody's going to say something at one of these things that I can't ignore, they're going to go personal on my kids, and then it will be on, my friends, oh yes it will be on.  Like white is on rice, it will be on.)

Sammy Sosa -- not her real name, nor even close, and how she came by that nickname is something for another post that I'll probably never write -- was first to plop down beside me after the second game.  She'd fanned air three times in her latest turn at the plate.  And she was unhappy.

My hitting sucks.

What do you think the problem is?

I don't know.

(Okay, I think; back to the fundamentals.) Are you keeping your eyes on the ball?

No.  I keep closing my eyes.

(This may be a joke.  Play along.)  Well, there you go.  You're not gonna hit much with your eyes closed.

Big grin.  Big Sammy Sosa grin.  (Her grin is not why her nickname is Sammy Sosa.)

She makes a big catch later in the game.  Sighs of relief all around.

There may be pictures -- Cassie's mom brought a camera and gave me an address to request the photos from.  If there are, I'll either post some here or give a link.

Next game's on Tuesday, if Katrina will cooperate -- which looks doubtful.  

But whatever happens... basketball season is coming...

Now it can be told, and who will despise me?

... I love "Time (Clock of the Heart)" by Culture Club.

Love it.

Listening to it right now, actually.

DON'T YOU DARE JUDGE ME!

Closets are for clothes, people.

Wow... four posts in one day.  That's gotta be some kind of record.

Actually, technically, since I was posting the first couple of these posts early this morning, just after midnight, to me it seems like these posts have been divided up over two days.  So... no record.

But still... four posts in two days is also some kind of record for this place.

Well, I suppose I owed the content-starved masses that click to this blog on a daily basis, each bedraggled one of you quivering with anticipation for new posts, only to have your hopes blasted to smithereens by my relentless laziness, something to ameliorate the long days and bitter nights of no word from me.  Take these posts, like crumbs from the master's table, as your reward for your devotion.  Will I do better in the future?  I have no doubt that I won't.

I may be a little slow on the uptake, but last week's news that Hugh Jackman has turned down the role of James Bond strikes me as singularly good news.

Not only because Jackman needs to stay available for X-Men 3, but because Jackman is just too... too... too not Bond to play Bond.

I've never heard of the contenders recently mentioned in British tabloids, except for Goran Vijnic, whom I would oppose based on the same problem of non-Bondness.

Personally, I'd like to see Jason Statham -- he of the devastating martial arts and the receding hairline -- as 007.  And believe me... as time goes on, I'd more and more like to see Statham because of the receding hairline.  But this is just wishful thinking.

It'll probably be Clive Owen... and as I watch Casino Royale, I'll have to try to forget the dreadful stillbirth that was King Arthur.

Venture Brothers is on now, bay-bee!!!

When, oh when, will we see the second season?

"Brock... is it okay if I cry?"

Tonight, Adult Swim showed the Harvey Birdman episode that purports to be an actual one from 1967.

I am happy, because I taped it.

Which means that now I can hear Birdman yell "BIiIiRdman!" any time I want, and thereby revisit my memories of watching the show in black-and-white on a friend's TV set in Mexico.

Adult Swim's schedule has gotten much stronger lately -- I credit the hiatus of Tom Goes to the Mayor.  May it become permanent, if it hasn't already.  

Actually, the Saturday schedule could be better.  I guess I'm not really hip to the anime stuff -- I like Trigun, I like Cowboy Bebop, I like GITS:SAC, but I can live without Inu Yasha or Full Metal Alchemist.

Though Full Metal Alchemist could probably be vastly improved by having Vincent D'Onofrio show up in every episode and shoot an authority figure, then himself.

Finally got to see it, and I can see why Hollywood is embarrassed by it:  it depicts Americans as heroes and liberators and as victims of Japanese brutality in WW2 rather than complicit in it (as even "Pearl Harbor" managed to imply).  Worse, from Hollywood's POV, it portrays the American military as competent and heroic, rather than as drug-crazed rapists and cold-blooded murderers -- or as helpless victims, which is usually the best American soldiers can hope for from their Hollywood treatment.

Unfortunately, it's also something of a lost opportunity.  It never quite combusts; there is little of the tension that the men who actually took part in the assault must have felt; the tacked-on love story feels tacked-on.  It falls far short of the technical marks set by Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers.  The Kiefer Sutherland-starring To End All Wars is a far more compelling depiction of the horrors of a Japanese POW camp.

Still, I'll probably buy it on DVD, because I want to encourage the production of more movies that show Americans as they usually are when at war: fierce, strong, and decent.

Of course, we're quite often that way at peace, too.
  

This is a test of Blogger's new Blogger for Word software.

I'm hoping it works, because I fully intend to write all future posts in Word instead of on-line.  I've come to this cross after only two instances of losing long, thoughtful, well-written posts to random Firefox crashes, including a really nice one that I wrote last night about the first week of school and how things are going better than I expected.  

So here's hoping it works.

UPDATE: It works!!!