#and the frustration in learning that a good grade academically represents very little in the concrete sense

[itsamemesamario]

“Good grade in X, which is both normal to want and possible to achieve” whenever X is a social scenario - like - yeah. Yes. You evolved as a Social Crechure. Getting a good grade in Social is both Normal to Want and Possible to Achieve (survival). Good news - everytime you make it to the next day, you have successfully utilized your evolved social skills from generations of ancestors who also both Wanted and Achieved a Good Grade in Social.

[instantbreplay]

This one will be for Avril:

1.) I personally think that an Ado song would represent Avril best, and the song I choose is うっせぇわ (Usseewa) because like the toxicity and exploitative side of Japanese work culture that Ado expresses and fights against, Avril's grandmother, Millicent Astor, was also manipulative, abusive, and heartbreaking as she insulted and hit Avril to reform her in order to save the Astor family name all because the Astor family had inherited learning capabilities, better than any other human. She—along with Avril's mother, Eleanor-Briar—shipped her off to a charm boarding school to "get fixed". This led to Avril becoming rebellious and acting out in the school, that way she could get expelled and never come back. Like Ado's line in the chorus after singing the title, "I'm healthier than you think", Avril was considered healthy mentally at first before the physical and verbal abuse was thrown her way.

2.) Avril's closest platonic friend would have to be Cater because he reminds her so much of one of her older brothers, Auggie, who is flamboyant, outgoing, and creative. However, Auggie doesn't have a great spice tolerance like Cater does and has a bit of a sweet tooth.

3.) Avril's relationship with Deuce isn't too complicated as she does have feelings for him...however, she can't properly express that and usually keeps it to herself. When she's silent, it makes Deuce think she's upset with him, but she's just awkward, and they do argue a little because Avril is bad at communicating her emotions towards people since she's not used to talking about how she feels so often, but it's not as bad as Avril's relationship with Ace. Those two would get into constant arguments that most people like to call "ginger on ginger crimes"...some would bet on those fights...

4.) Avril hates failure. She's very good at problem-solving, but if she can't solve it, she starts to panic, mostly expressing an aggressive frustration because she's running through solutions like crazy. This could be because she wants to control things to have it all fall to her benefit such as her new identity in Twisted Wonderland.

5.) While Avril keeps her academic achievements on the down low, she actually feels free when she does physical education, showing off her prowess which makes her excel in the class. This gives other students the idea that she is like Vargas: an absolute musclehead as they never look at her grades, only her constant fighting with others. However, she does fail flight classes since she can't use magic properly.

6.) Any class that involves Avril using magic at all (to name a couple of examples: Offensive and Defensive Magic) because she can't control her magic since she was never born with mana (the energy supply of magic). In fact...magic is the only thing Avril has ever struggled with as in her family, the Astor family, she is capable of learning anything with ease that she can use for her career and her advantage, but magic? That's the first thing that she can't grasp at all.

7.) Avril didn't join the Mechanics Club—she made it! She is a lover of all things gears and pistons and so forth that she formed the Mechanics Clubs to try and teach students how to fix and build things without the help of practical magic. Plus, it made for a great job around the school so she could pay for living expenses (a good way to force Crowley's hand to fund her expenses).

8.) She hates Ace ever since the prologue of the story! All Ace does is run his mouth, and the two constantly get into fights with each other, Chiyu (the nurse) and Deuce having to break it up every time. There are moments where they agree with each other, but that's a rare occurrence.

9.) Avril's favorite staff member is Chiyu Tadashi, the school nurse—believe it or not. As much as she annoys him with out-of-the-blue visits to the infirmary, him being the advisor of Mechanics Club because of her reckless behavior, and her constant wounds, she actually finds great company in him, and he's the only one who encourages her to do better with her emotions and supports her hobbies like singing metal and doing engineering, he doesn't see her as some brute, and he helps her with controlling her new healing magic. He would always be the first to worry about her which—while she doesn't admit it—makes her happy to know someone cares in Twisted Wonderland. Overall, to Avril, he's like a father to her.

10.) Avril is placed into Ramshackle due to her not being an actual mage, but she would most definitely be in Savanaclaw if she was sorted into another dorm, mainly because she's very strong physically.

11.) She sees Trey as a sibling because he's like a spitting image of her closest brother and best friend, Abe, personality-wise: he can cook and bake, he protects his members, however he still shows his anger but in calmer yet mischievous ways while Abe actually kicks his brothers out when they destroy the kitchen, visibly angry.

12.) I think Avril would love the Beanfest event because of the raging fun she would have either being the farmer or the monster (she would absolutely go for the monster team). Since it's basically a capture-the-flag game, Avril would not go easy on the guys at all as she's very competitive and will do whatever it takes to win. Plus, she gets to throw beans at people, including Chiyu who wouldn't even be playing. For this event, she would be an SSR on the monster team.

13.) She would physically Ace without a doubt in my mind...and she would win.

14.) As said before, any classes that actually involve magic are terrible, but history, science, biology, animal linguistics, P.E., and other regular classes proficiency grades. Again, she wants to draw attention away from herself due to avoiding high expectations like Millicent was setting when she was little, trying to be perfect just because she was an Astor which is a long British bloodline of dukes and duchnesses. Thankfully, her fighting with many students drew that attention away and prompted them to stay away and out of her business. However, if she were at home, she would ace ever class without fail which also causes internal issues with her classmates because Avril was a star student with a terrible temperament and emotional release issues.

15.) A lot—they don't know her last name or her real name because Avril goes by the nickname Abe gives her which is Avry. Chiyu gave her his surname under government documents so she had insurance to cover her in case of illness or accident and more, so under record, she is known as Avry Tadashi. They also don't know where she even comes from because she never states that so they wouldn't send her home if they found a way to do so, they don't know that she has a family because she never talks about them to not only hide her skills but also due to them setting those horrid expectations on her like Millicent, her grandmother, did and trying to change her to fit their standards of what a "perfect lady" should be, they don't know that she ran away from the boarding school she was attending due to an incident that she was going to get accused for. They don't know that the accusation she believed was going to occur was murder against Celadine Cromwell, her bully, by pushing her off the roof of the building. Unfortunately, her hand prints were on Celadine's blazer because she pushed her into the railing to get her off.

So...yeah, quite a lot.

16.) She thought Celandine's little cronies locked her in a coffin while unconscious and buried her alive until she busted out of the coffin and saw everybody in robes, thinking she was a sacrifice for a summoning seance somehow...So, yeah—a little freaked out until she realized she was isekai'd away from London which she jumped for joy about.

17.) Avril finds their company enjoyable, but she hates the pranks to the point where she made a Ghostbusters pack if they tried to pull a prank on her.

18.) Really, it's the magic because she couldn't use it. To her, it was a big waste of time even trying to learn a simple spell since Crowley insisted that she should study if she wanted to live at the school until it is in Book 3 where she gets her Unique Magic. She—of course—can't control it, accumulating a lot of blot if she overuses it since there is nothing to store or control that loose magic. Her magic, "Mending Bell", caused her to sleep for a full two days and gulp down a whopping 14 plates of food in one sitting.

19.) HECK NO!

20.) I think it would be Book 5 because of Vil who's obsessed with beauty and outshining everybody, overworking and placing curses on his members—even going as far as to poison his competition. That reminds Avril too much of her grandmother and her bully from boarding school, Celandine Cromwell. In Book 5, Avril would begin to show how unstable her emotions truly are as she is reminded of the abuse she went through to be a "proper lady" for the family's "dying" reputation.

Twisted Wonderland OC Questions:

Do you have a song that represents your OC, if so why?

Who is your OC’s closest platonic friend?

Tell us about a complicated relationship your OC has with another character?

What are your OC’s minor fears?

What is your OCs best class?

What is their worst class?

Why did they join their clubs? 

Is there a character your OC doesn’t like, if so why?

Who is their favorite staff member? Why?

What dorm would your OC be sorted into besides their current one?

Is there a character your OC sees as a sibling?

What is your OC’s favorite event(s), what was their role?

If your OC could physically fight another character, who would it be and would they win?

What are your OC’s grades like?

What is a secret not many characters know about your OC?

How would your OC describe their entrance ceremony from their POV?

What does your OC think of the Ramshackle ghosts?

What is the hardest thing to adjust to at NRC? The magic? Being away from their family? Ect.

Do they trust Crowely?

What chapter does your OC get the most personal character development?

[kingofthewilderwest]

I have a super hard exam Monday morning and I really think I can't make it. I have been studying, but I can't understand a think! I thought It was the way I was studying but it's too late to look for alternatives. I have been reading my notes crying all day (I'm doing it right now and sobbing) but still no light.

I’m really sorry about the stress you’re going through. Exams can be extremely tough and I feel for you on that one. I’ve cried over tests and schooling and all that as well. It sucks to feel this stress. Academia many times pushes us to the brink beyond what we should be given, and I hope that you come out of this on the other side feeling relief.

When I was in school, one of the ways I calmed myself was to think about long-term. In less than 48 hours, this stressor will be completely gone from your life. It’ll no longer exist because you’ve taken the test. It’s a stressor, but it’s one for a VERY short time frame in your life. In the long scale of things, it’s very soon going to be out of your life and over with. And while tests can change our grades and that’s important, in the very long scale of school and academia… it’s not a big impact on our life. We can retake a class if we need to, or do better on the next test, or any and all sorts of options that will all result in a happy, fulfilling, awesome life of many years to come. This test is a very, very small part of the grand scheme of your life, and it’ll be completely over with and out of your life very, very soon. Whether you get a good grade or a bad grade here, your life will move forward, and provide you many great experiences to come. My happiness for the decades I will live is not reliant on one number on a sheet of paper.

I don’t know if that helps you, but it always helped me: once I remembered how small this thing was in the grand scheme of things, and how soon it’d leave my life as a stressor… it helped me realize… it shouldn’t be a stressor even now.

I hope I don’t sound like I’m brushing aside what you feel, because I mean the opposite. I know there’s many situations going into why academia feels SO IMPORTANT in our lives, both for our personal situation, and in the way society trends go. I do hope it helps to say that, in the grand course of whether or not your life will be complete on one test grade, it’s a minuscule thing, and I hope that that perspective can give some ease.

You’ve done your best. You’ve been studying. You’ve been working extremely hard and I want to commend you for that diligence. You’ve rocked that. And that’s something important. You have already shown a lot of character and drive working on this, and that’s better than any number you get. You’re already a hero and a succeeder in my eyes.

And, it’s not a shortcoming on your end that you don’t understand things. We all need time to understand anything; all information we first hear is something we don’t understand at first. That’s okay. That’s the nature of it. Every single human on this planet doesn’t understand things and may take a while to understand something; you are not ever going to be a failure for being confused, even if it feels understandably frustrating to not understand.

It’s always fine to talk to instructors about your struggles. I don’t know if you have or haven’t yet, but honest conversations with instructors can work wonders. I’ve taught college courses and have definitely played the mercy game with my own final grades once a student has come to me. I’ve been on the side of mercy with professors, where they’ve been willing to extend deadlines or work with me one-on-one to succeed. Many, many teachers want you to succeed, and will extend extra help and understanding to you if you talk to them. I know how much mercy can be given once they understand how much you want to succeed, and show you are willing to talk to them about ways in which you can. And I hope your instructor is one such person who will listen. It’s always worth talking over, and it can ease buttloads of stress.

Also… though you are on a time budget… if you’re really feeling this stressed, please give yourself a break. Please give yourself sleep. Please give yourself something nice, even if it’s eating a special treat for dinner or watching half hour of your favorite comedy show. Your mind in this state won’t learn the material most productively. Stepping back away from studying will actually help you and make a more efficient and productive study schedule.

I know it’s late in the game and you think there aren’t other ways to study, but if you want, I’m happy to list off some of the ways I’ve studied before. I hope I’m not overextending my bounds. I know you came here to vent and you might not want advice, but if you want some studying suggestions, here’s things I’ve done. We all learn different ways, and you’ll notice I tend to be text-oriented (with some hearing-oriented)… but maybe something here will click. Some of these studying strategies are time-consuming (not helpful for you right now), some of them are fast, but they’re different ways to work at the same material:

Do NOT just skim read notes or engage in “passive” reviewing. If you’re just looking over the books or old homeworks without engaging, it’s less likely for it to stick. Rereading is one of the least interactive ways and least demanding ways to try to “study,” and thus is often not effective for long-term retention and mastery of concepts. Make your study sessions as engaging as possible without destroying your brain cells and giving you a migraine.

Build up. Start simple, with easier learning devices, and then make it more challenging for yourself. For instance, for foreign language, I might start with flashcards or matching tasks. Then, I’ll eventually get to the point where I will try to write my entire vocabulary list from memory. Build up from easy to harder.

Multiple study sessions throughout a day or throughout the course of a week (when you have it) will almost always be better than one massive study session. Repeatedly engage with the material.

Repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat frankly is always the way to go.

PRIORITIZE. Focus on problem sections. Focus on sections that are most likely to be on the test in large quantities. Prioritize what you work on. You don’t need to know every tiny detail to get a passing grade; you just need to know what big stuff is most likely to be hit.

Tackle one section at a time. Don’t think about the full breadth of the unit. Master one concept at a time. Smaller chunks are always more manageable, more efficient, and more effectively learned. If you don’t understand the full breadth of your test, start with the smallest thing you can, work on that, and get that one thing right first. Just that one thing. 

Try to engage in the different styles of learning. Reading. Speaking. Acting out. All these will help you retain the information in different ways. For some subjects, this may be easier than others. But do what you can.

Flash cards. When you go through the flash cards, don’t go through each card once. Put aside the ones you get wrong. Rework the ones you get wrong a second time… or a third time… until you get them right. Then put them into the big pile again of every flash card and restart. ENGAGE with these things rather than quickly skim over the fronts and backs.

Draw diagrams. Venn diagrams. Tables. Charts. STUFF. Organize your information in new ways.

Make tests for yourself. Create tests that are multiple choice, fill in the blank, short essays, anything. Then, after you make those tests, give yourself a break, go back, and take your tests. See what you do and don’t remember.

Make memory devices! Memory devices for the win! Make them silly and absurd! Make it fun! Make memory devices from puns. Set key phrases to musical melodies. Make silly analogies. Do whatever you need to to memorize the material, even if in a dorky way. Like, I first learned the kanji 白 was ‘shiro’ because it looks like the character Shiro from Voltron. It’s got a square face with a scar in the center, and even a little tick at the top to represent Shiro’s WHITE hair floof (and ‘shiro’ means ‘white’ woot victory!). Other times, I’ve memorized numbers by setting them to tunes.

Rewrite your notes or key pages from your textbook. Type up your notes from class, or rewrite them, or take notes from your book again. Note that you can rearrange your notes as you do this; maybe you could make a page that’s all about X topic?

Study with friends! Quiz each other, talk to each other about problematic points, try to figure out difficult sections together. And don’t skimp, but don’t be afraid to make it fun. Learning goes better when it’s fun.

Write a “study guide” or “cheat sheet” for yourself of all the most pertinent material.

Talk out loud as you reread your notes. Engage with the material both with eyes and ears.

Try to quote your notes. Talk to yourself about what you remember. Then look and see what you didn’t talk about.

Try explaining to someone else what you’ve learned. This is a really good one. This will help you really pinpoint what you do and don’t know, and will mentally solidify the things that you do, in fact, understand. Nothing says “learning” like having to tell someone else what you’ve learned.

Especially if it’s mathematical, but also for other subjects, rework problems from your textbook or homeworks, get new problems from textbooks, or go online to find other problems with solutions. 

Find tutors. Or talk to teachers. Seriously, talk to teachers!

Any academic videos on YouTube explaining concepts? What about Wikipedia? Other websites on these topics to help you see the information presented in a new way? My ass got saved in Mathematical Logic due to a good logic wiki.

Give yourself breaks. Everyone needs different break points and has different levels of concentration ability, but one not-terrible-rule to consider is 50 minutes studying, 10 minute break. I personally prefer longer sessions and will do something like 2 hours, then 30 minute break. But that’s for you to decide with yourself.

SLEEEEEEEEEEEEEP. You do no favors for yourself if you don’t sleep. Sleep as best as you can. Fatigue prevents us from using our full mind, will prevent the recall we could have had if we were more awake. Fatigue prevents us from learning and retaining information we would have learned faster in a more rested state. Sleep allows us to process the information we’ve just thought about; we’ll wake up with a more solid understanding of materials because there’s been some unconscious processing. I know you want to maximize those study hours, but you’ll be wasting those 75% of the time if you’re up to 3 AM trying to work on something and can barely keep your eyes open. 

Make it about you. What is it about this material that you can care about? Find ways to relate it to what you care about, whatever the subject.

I know that’s not a very widespread list - I could write a lot more - but unfortunately I have to get going to my own time crunch for work. And I know I’m not covering every angle in which this is a stressful situation and how we may engage with it, and how people with different learning styles and minds and social situations interact with materials… but I hope that something in here helps you nevertheless.

Please give yourself a break right now.

To say the least, I’m wishing the absolute best for you. I’m rooting for you. I’m sympathizing. My heart feels for you. And I hope that you can find a bit of stress-relief in the midst of this. Take care, friend, and please take care of yourself through all this.

[btshogwartsfics]

BTS at Hogwarts (Pt.5- Jimin)

A/N: I had a lot of fun doing this one. I love the idea of Hogwarts BTS, but Chim is just especially fun to write for! My bias is coming at you guys next! Enjoy! <3

JIMIN:  

House: Gryffindor

Patronus: Panther

Wand: Willow Wood, Dragon Heartstring Core, 9 ½ Inches, Supple Flexibility

Blood Status: Half-blood

Possibility of Being a Prefect: Yes

Quidditch: Absolutely

Best Class(s): Divination

Reasoning-

Jimin is a Gryffindor. My mind is made-up and you can’t do anything about it. Yes I can agree that he does have many traits of a Hufflepuff and at first I went back and forth between the two of them for our Chim. So while many of you may disagree with me on this, and that’s absolutely fine, I am firm in my belief that he is indeed a Gryffindor. I have also seen people argue that due to his ambition, he is no doubt a Slytherin. While again, I can see this, I think the things that some may see him as a Slytherin for, I see him as a Gryffindor for. I firmly believe that it’s not just the traits you have, but the traits you value that ultimately decide which house you belong to. He wants to do good and he wants to take chances and live a full life doing what he’s passionate about, but I don’t feel he would ever do anything he thinks is unjust and unethical. I fully feel Jimin would do almost anything for those he cares about and what he believes is right. He’s kind and considerate, but he is assertive and stands behind what he believes in. He may be kind and caring, but he is definitely fierce and chivalrous and brave. Although I do think a Hufflepuff can mess you up if so provoked and a Slytherin can absolutely have a soft side, I feel that those two clashing points in his personality come together nicely to mold him into an amazing Gryffindor. Change my mind.

The symbolism for panthers are guardian energy, assertiveness, understanding, intuition, artistry, aggressiveness and power. I feel that Jimin displays all these traits very well at different times and in different situations.

“Willow is an uncommon wand wood with healing power, and I have noted that the ideal owner for a willow wand often has some (usually unwarranted) insecurity, however well they may try and hide it. While many confident customers insist on trying a willow wand (attracted by their handsome appearance and well-founded reputation for enabling advanced, non-verbal magic) my willow wands have consistently selected those of greatest potential, rather than those who feel they have little to learn. It has always been a proverb in my family that he who has furthest to travel will go fastest with willow.”

“As a rule, dragon heartstrings produce wands with the most power, and which are capable of the most flamboyant spells. Dragon wands tend to learn more quickly than other types. While they can change allegiance if won from their original master, they always bond strongly with the current owner. The dragon wand tends to be easiest to turn to the Dark Arts, though it will not incline that way of its own accord. It is also the most prone of the three cores to accidents, being somewhat temperamental.”

I hate to say it Jiminie, but you’re a bit short. Therefore I feel your wand would match and so I made it a bit shorter. Sorry.

Again, I’ve seen people say that Jimin would be a pureblood and I’ve seen people say Jimin would be a muggle-born, but I personally feel that he would be able to equally understand and empathize with both sides. It is for this reason I made (or headcanon) Jimin a half-blood.

Some Gryffindors (not all, I’m aware of this) tend to be a bit messy, but as I said there are exceptions to every rule. Not everyone in a certain house will act exactly the same. Jimin is an exception to this rule. As we’ve heard in interviews, Jimin hates Taehyung’s messiness (like Namjoon) and we also know that Jimin is a perfectionist. Due to this (being a perfectionist, I mean), I feel Jimin would strive to be a Prefect and possibly even Head-Boy after, even if he is playing Quidditch. I think it’s just in his nature.

Jimin would absolutely be a Quidditch player. Jimin has lots of muscle (even if Kookie is the muscle-pig) and I feel he also has a lot of strength. Because of this I think Jimin would be an excellent beater. I think he’d be good at other positions, too, but beater best. As a dancer, he is obviously athletic to a certain degree and I feel that would really help him out.

If you happened to read the last part of this (Namjoon’s part), then you will know that I admitted most of the reasons why I think a certain member would be good at this or bad at that is just a hunch. The same applies here.

Notes/Other:

Was strangely relieved when he got his acceptance letter

Like he grew up around magic and it was obvious he was a wizard but he was still somewhat afraid he wasn’t or like wasn’t good enough to go to Hogwarts

But of course he was

The Sorting Hat went through a bit of a hard time with this one but when it placed him in Gryffindor Jimin was honestly shocked

He didn’t think he was brave or courageous enough to be sorted into Gryffindor

Lowkey is scared that he don’t do justice to his house or represent it well enough

Not exactly bad at any class or another but he struggles to stay awake in History of Magic and ends up missing some of the notes and study material

Goes to Namjoon every time he forgets something and all he does is sigh

Can relate easily to all his friends has he basically grew up with the best of both worlds being a half-blood

Him, Tae and Jungkook get into trouble quite a lot being in the same year, but sometimes he has to admit they can get a bit too mischievous 

but most of the time he has no problem pulling a few pranks with them here or there

Most of the time Jimin will follow the rules unless he sees something he doesn’t agree with

Whether it be morally, academically or in any other way, Jimin does what he thinks is right and some teachers find it endearing and others find it frustrating

But they all love him anyway because he’s not entirely reckless (even though he very well can be) and has a least a sliver of self-control

McGonagall adores him

So so so happy that he’s a Gryffindor

Doesn’t give him special treatment but even the other students are starting to notice that she’s quite partial to Jimin

Tried out for Quidditch as soon as he could and immediately landed the beater position

Captain thinks he’s one of the best beaters Gryffindor has had in a while

When he plays against Hoseok or Jungkook nobody ever knows who is gonna win this time

It’s practically a coin toss with those three

Such a sweet teammate gosh

He always prepares snacks and makes sure every player has enough water before every game starts

Was probably offered the position of captain when their old one graduated but turned it down because he was worried he wouldn’t be able to fill his shoes and be a perfect captain and stressed about taking on that responsibility

The rest of the team was kinda bummed because they thought he’d do great but they understood and gave the position to someone else and didn’t press him about it

Chim really appreciated that

When not focused on winning the game, he’s extremely cocky on the Quidditch pitch but as soon as he’s off of it he’s back to being our little mochi

Doesn’t get many detentions because he secretly has all the teachers wrapped around his finger

But they’d never admit it

Unfortunately he doesn’t have any of the boys to hang out with in the common room so he spends most of his time either in the courtyard or the dining hall

Occasionally he’ll stop by the library to visit Namjoon and he may have gone into the forbidden forest with Tae and Jungkook once or twice… 

Loves Care of Magical Creatures class with Tae

All the little animals and even the big ones are just so cute to him

But he swears Tae might actually hurt himself one of these days

Doesn’t have any idea why but he’s really good at Divination and he loves it

Thinks it’s so cool and fun

Kookie doesn’t understand it and thinks it’s dumb, but he still manages to get good grades in the class

Not better than Jimin though and he loves to tell him

“I was good at Divination first” and “you only signed up because I did you copied me”

Trelawney always calls him out in class for it and uses him and his work as examples

He loves the praise but gets really shy and his friends love to tease him about it

Would be really great at dueling too if he tried

But he’s not really into using dueling spells and things unless it's for a good purpose or reason

like protecting his friends or anyone else in need (and self defense, but he’d rather use it to protect other people or a good cause)

A/N: I thank anyone who got to the end of this mess! I’m not the most organized person in the world, so I really appreciate it! <3 Jimin’s moodboard is about to go up and I will post Tae’s part and moodboard tomorrow! Kookie’s things will be Sunday! 

[dragonagecompanionsreact]

Modern AU Ask Cont.

DA2:

Aveline: Captain of the football team. Is notorious for being lovely and kind in person, until being faced on the field. Then nobody wants to get in her way. If she sees someone getting picked on, she rushes to the rescue. Will probably fight a bully, damn the consequences. She has a bit of a reputation for patrolling the school halls with some members of the football team as back up muscle, and keeping watch for any bullying that may be happening.

Fenris: Tried out for a few sports teams, but didn’t really like them. He sat alone during lunches for a while, and pushed away a lot of possible friends, until Hawke and Varric plopped down next to him and absolutely refused to budge. From there, he had lots of friends, and his social skills had a lot of development. His favourite subjects is his language classes, in which he is top of the class. He had some reading difficulties for a while due to a learning disability, but he worked overtime to make up for it, and he refuses to let it lower his grades. 

Varric: Elected the class representative nearly every year, and he really takes it in his stride. He wasn’t the sort to think that leadership would be his thing, but he is surprisingly good at it. The first day of high school, he was sat next to Hawke, and the trouble began. He’s kind of known for always having great stories, and a lot of people like to be around him just for the chance of seeing one of his outlandish stories happen in person. He also seems to just know everyone, even if they’ve never spoken to him before. It’s a bit unnerving really, but Varric just shrugs it off when asked and says, “Come on, I have my connections.”

Isabela: Knows everybody. Random new girl? Isabela will know everything from her birthmarks to her favourite ice cream in five minutes tops. Isabela is basically inseparable from Merrill, who Bela took under her wing the moment Merrill first arrived at the school. The two have weekly coffee dates, and will usually invite a few friends with them. Bela is okay at her subjects, but doesn’t really want to apply herself more, as her classes rarely interest her. She doesn’t mind languages and music as much, though. 

Merrill: Tried to play hockey once, but stopped when she was knocked hard to the ground and got a concussion. Not an experience she wants to have on a weekly basis, thanks. As a previous ‘new student in a foreign environment’, she makes an effort to make every new student to the high school feel welcome and safe. She’s been elected class representative her last few years, as people have found that she’s a very good leader. The school building now has maps on display so that new students (or all students really) never have to worry about getting lost in the massive school building. 

Sebastian: Moves to the school and somehow manages to have people flock to him in droves. A reformed play-boy, his past escapades at his old school is the subject of much gossip and interest, though Seb is an open book about these things. Varric resents him a little because his class narrowly vote Seb in as the class representative, but Varric moves on from this and two make an efficient pair. Seb loves his religion studies class and history, and people swoon over his singing in music. 

Carver: Initially, he just tried out for the football team because he knew Hawke hated it, but after playing a few games, Carver comes to find he really enjoys the sport. He also really loves the teamship aspect, and quickly bonds with his new teammates. He starts to come out of his shell a bit more, as it were, and with a group of friends that aren’t comparing him to his older sibling, he begins to feel a lot more confident in himself. He’s okay at maths, but algebra frustrates him. He does enjoy science, and actually goes quite well at it. His scientific reports are very detailed and get a lot of praise from his teachers, which always makes him feel very proud if a bit embarrassed. 

Bethany: Her first friends in high school were Merrill and Bela, who decided they would take Hawke’s sister under their wing. Beth was kind and polite, but she struggled making deeper connections. She ends up developing quite a close friendship with Anders, as the two seem to just click. She saves him a lot of the time if he misses a very important point in a class he’s skipped on, and lets him borrow her notes when it’s closer to exam time. Anders shows her some of his best hiding spots (which she is sworn to secrecy to) and the two spend most of their lunchtimes in the empty dance studio chatting away happily. Through these chats, Beth discovers Anders’ infatuation with cats- particularly a certain Ser-Pounce-a-lot- and she loves to poke fun at him with this information. Beth is a great student, though she slacks a little bit in history because she finds it so boring sometimes. 

DAI: 

Cassandra: Vice captain of the football team. She originally had no plans to join any team sport, but then she happened to see Aveline patrolling the halls one day...and she was gone. She admires Aveline and hopes to one day be just like her. She’s highly driven when it comes to her grades, but is always willing to help anyone who’s struggling. Her tutoring methods may come across as a bit brusque and harsh, but she truly does just want to help. 

Blackwall: Tried a few team sports but wasn’t particularly good at them. To save himself some embarrassment, he thought it would be best if he just avoided the other team sports. He doesn’t mind field events at the school carnivals though, as he knows he can throw a discus pretty far. His grades are average, but he really enjoys art because it lets him tinker around with woodworking. His pieces get quite a lot of attention, which embarrasses him a bit. He will usually keep Sera, Bull and his group company, though he doesn’t really say too much. If he has a few drinks at a party however, his filter is off and people see the real Blackwall, who his friends have jokingly nicknamed “Rainer” for the one time he threw a jug of flavoured punch at some asshole. 

Sera: Struggles at times with her classes, particularly if they’re not engaging to her. She is easily side-tracked, but her brilliant mind is able to let her harness her ability in other ways. She excels in science, and has such a vivid interest in it that the teacher sheds a proud tear. Usually sticks around Blackwall, as the two effortlessly bounce off each other’s wit. Sera’s has about five different trains of thought going on in one moment, and Blackwall never tries to limit her to just one. Even if he loses what they’re talking about, he will always find his way back, and that’s fine with both of them. 

Iron Bull: Iron Bull does play team sports here and there, and they are a great way to vent his aggression, but he has a fantastic mind. He usually surprises people when he rolls in the top marks from nearly every class. He is the dark horse for the dux of the school. He has his group of pals, the Chargers, and they’re always a buzz of joy at the school oval. Everyone wants them at their parties- they are the party.

Vivienne: Similar to Merrill and Isabela, Vivienne will make it her business to know everything about everyone as soon as possible. Is going to be the future leader of the country one day and everyone knows it. Her academic drive is envied by most students, but Viv has established a weekly study group with an open invitation to anyone who wishes to come along so that she can help her peers if need be. 

Dorian: History and science are his favourite subjects- though he does like to dabble in literature too. His father wants him to get into a good university (his father’s Alma Mater, no doubt), so he has always been raised to strive for good grades. Met Vivienne when they were very young and they work well together, despite her initial begrudging him of his ‘family legacy’ that he would rarely shut up about as a child.

Solas: Transferred from some posh school, but whenever asked, he merely says “You wouldn’t have heard of it”. Has an air of arrogance about him and a knowing smirk in class that quickly gets wiped off the moment Vivienne beats him to an answer. Sera loves to rile him up, and constantly teases him about his elitist attitude- which he vehemently denies and curses at her in old Elvhen. The only time he seems to drop any sort of arrogance is in the art room, where he loves to sit and paint large frescoes that will likely be moved to the canteen or hallways by the teachers when finished. 

Cole: A quiet boy who never quite says the ‘right’ thing, and was shunned initially by other students. Then Iron Bull took him under his wing and now he has a group of lifelong friends. Sera, whilst initially wary of him, soon realises that he can keep up with her conversations effortlessly and thus whenever she needs to stim this way, she always knows he will listen to her. He loves music class and loves to tinker away on the piano or grab a guitar and strum out a few chords- whatever sounds right to him. 

Cullen: Plays football, and loves the teamship aspect of it. He was once promoted to vice captain, but he didn’t like it so he stepped down. He goes well in his religion studies, but struggles with science sometimes- his reports are always a bit lack-luster because he finds them so tedious to write. Sits with his football teammates during breaktimes, and gets along well with Carver- especially once Cullen admits that Hawke irritates him sometimes in class. 

Josephine: Social butterfly. Goes from one group to another without batting an eye. One time, she even managed to get the lacrosse team and the football team to sit together with zero arguments breaking out. Everyone who wants to run for year representative wants her on their campaign team because they know she will get a large majority of the year group swayed. She loves to spend time with Isabela and Merrill, and often joins them on their coffee dates. 

[douchebagbrainwaves]

WHY I'M SMARTER THAN ODDS

We were a bit sheepish about the low production values. Some links are both fluff, in the sense of being very short, and also the biggest opportunity, is at the conferences that are occasionally organized for startups to present to them. If you administer the servers themselves should find them very well defended. But it's harder, because now I can pretend it wasn't merely a rhetorical one. The key to this mystery is to rephrase the question slightly. It's something you're more likely to fix it in an ugly way, or the deal was off.1 You look at spams and you think, the gall of these guys to try sending me mail that begins Dear Friend or has a subject line that's all uppercase and ends in eight exclamation points. But an online square is more dangerous than a physical one. For example, suppose you have to mean it, because they only have themselves to be mad at.2

When you design something for a tenth or a hundredth of what it used to cost, and the company seems more valuable if it seems like all the good ideas came from within.3 What they do instead is fire you. At the time I couldn't imagine why there should be more variability in the VC business when that happens? The first hint I had that teachers weren't omniscient came in sixth grade, after my father contradicted something I'd learned in school. Whereas if an investor is notorious for taking a long time to make up their minds. Investors are emotional. Unfortunately, to be unpopular in school is that there's so little room for new ideas to matter, you need to fix.4

So if you're doing something inexpensive, go to angels. And companies offering Web-based software, you still read as a student. Most will say that any ideas you think of more points, you just stop working on it. And so you do, and in particular, Internet startups are still only a fraction of the company they want to keep out more than bad people. There is no prize for getting the answer quickly. But in that case it probably won't take four years. They win by noticing that something is wrong. They're not something you have to do, I almost included a fourth: get a job, but it's often frustrating at 15. The number one question people ask is how many employees you have. Indeed, the more interesting sort of convergence that's coming is between shows and games. This a makes the filters more effective, b lets each user decide their own precise definition of spam, or even triples, rather than individual words.

A stage. Indeed, c0ck is far more damning evidence than cock, and Bayesian filters know precisely how much more. Fixed-size series A rounds are not determined by asking what would be best for the companies. In my earlier spam-filtering software, the user could set up a list of all the future work we'd do, which turned out to be important to get the defaults right, not just because it's free, but because the principles underlying the most dynamic part of the child's identity. But we should understand the price. Like a lot of the top hackers are using languages far removed from C and C. The fifteen most interesting words are as follows: let g 2 or gethash word good 0 b or gethash word good 0 b or gethash word good 0 b or gethash word bad 0 unless g b 5 max.

Mihalko, made that year something his students still talk about, thirty years later. Test: List the three main causes of the Civil War were. Either would be fine with startups, so long as admissions worked the same. They also need to keep them fed, and as a rule people planning to go into teaching rank academically near the bottom of the scale, nerds are a safe target for the entire school.5 To be jaded you have to have at least one representative of each powerful group. So their ratio of risk to return may be the sort of uncool office building that will make your software the standard—or hobbyists, as they do for standardized tests? A lot can change for a startup founder isn't a programming technique. Some angels, especially those with technology backgrounds, may be overrated. 9359873 managed 0. If Internet startups offer the best opportunity for ambitious people, then a startup makes money is to offer people better technology than they have in the past.

So class projects are measured. Running software on the server, with SSL included, for less than we paid for bandwidth alone. To the founders, living dead sounds harsh. It's true they have a hundred different types of support people just offscreen making the whole show possible. And whichever side wins, their ideas will also be considered to have triumphed, as if God wanted to signal his agreement by selecting that side as the victor.6 But they underestimated the force of their desire to connect with one another to assemble railroad monopolies.7 It is not found in nature. Odds are it isn't. In effect the valuation is 2 numbers. To recognize individual spam features you have to make their emails unique or to stop using incriminating words in the text of their messages. Within a generation of its birth in England, the Industrial Revolution?

Notes

In a project like a headset or router. The idea of evolution for the desperate and the first time as an investor I saw that they consisted of three stakes. No, we try to go the bathroom, and average with the melon seed model is more of the accumulator generator in other ways to help their students start startups who otherwise wouldn't have the same way a restaurant as a definition of property is driven mostly by people trying to make money, the growth rate to manufacture a perfect growth curve, etc. I explain later.

Realizing that much better that it offers a better influence on your own compass. 1% in 1950. Some would say that it will seem as if it were a variety called Red Delicious that had been with their users.

They live in a not-too-demanding environment, but this could be mistaken, and the valuation is fixed at the lack of results achieved by alchemy and saying its value was as much as people in return for something they wanted, so presumably will the rate of change in how Stripe felt. Technology has always been accelerating.

Galbraith was clearly puzzled that corporate executives would work to have done well if they'd been living in cities. That's probably true of the most promising opportunities, it tends to be, unchanging, but as a high school to potential investors are: the source of better ideas: whether you can do with the founders' advantage if it was considered the most famous example. Learning for Text Categorization.

Some will say that education in the Bible is Pride goeth before destruction, and anyone doing due diligence for an IPO, or the presumably larger one who shouldn't?

There need to import is broader, ranging from 50 to get something for free. This seems unlikely at the final version that by the regular news reporters. In 1800 an empty room, you can skip the first wave of hostile takeovers in the sense that they decided to skip raising an A round about the cheapest food available. 5 mentions prices ranging from 50 to get rich by creating wealth—university students, heirs, rather than giving grants.

A servant girl cost 600 Martial vi. I agree. But increasingly what builders do is keep track of statistics for foo overall as well as good as Apple's just by hiring sufficiently qualified designers. But an associate cold-emailing a startup.

[howtowriteathesisstatement732]

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Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

The task of each parent is to raise not an ideal child (which is impossible in principle), but a happy and confident one.

We give our children wings when we believe in them. When we support their wildest dreams and say that everything in this world is possible. At such moments, our children can really fly.

That is why we should become an example for them of determination and determination, to dream the same, believe the same way … Parents should understand that one day the child will follow their example, and not their advice.

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

Children must know that no matter how life develops, what obstacles and trials do not fall in the way, they can always achieve what they want.

Therefore, if you see that your baby is in doubt, refuses failure and failure conceived out of fear, if he has low self-esteem, support him. Everything is very simple: you just need to help the child realize that everything that he needs for success already exists. It is within him.

Self-regulatory learning and emotional intelligence

It can be said that self-regulatory learning is the cornerstone of emotional intelligence. This means that the well-being of the child will be provided by strategies that he will be able to develop. That is, of course, he will have to work hard himself. But – under your strict guidance. By the way, this will also help him better understand his and other people’s emotions: both in childhood and when he becomes an adult.

Emotional maturity and the ability to independently regulate one’s reactions is what determines future success. And often much more than academic performance and good grades in school. Naturally, this does not mean that study is not important. The point is that knowledge alone is too little to succeed in this life.

The fact is, if you think about it, our children are too fixated on formal education in the first 18 years of their lives. They must learn the basics of all sciences, learn to write correctly, and be good at counting. This is a fact that cannot be ignored. Their emotional growth occurs at school. Usually they spend much more time in the school or at the desk at home, doing homework than in the yard or in the park.

That is why it is so important to teach a child an equally important “emotional science”. He must clearly define his strengths and weaknesses, using this knowledge for his own purposes. It is very important to teach children to cope with the feelings that arise from them due to a lack of understanding of something, or an inability to concentrate, or confusion before the need to solve a problem and so on.

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

If the child believes that he can learn the multiplication table, he will succeed. But in order to have such faith, he needs encouraging information from external sources. Especially from his parents, brothers and sisters, grandparents, teachers.

In essence, this represents what is called in psychology the “Pygmalion effect”. That is, the expectations that we resolutely and confidently voiced are a determining factor in whether the children can achieve the desired or not. And these words of support from parents and teachers, the most important adults in a child’s life, are especially important.

We are not talking now that “there will be a desire – there will be funds.” This is truly a magical formula, but it’s not about her. We are talking about not cutting off the wings of our own children.

Our task is to teach them to fly, and there is no universal and only right way to do something. The main thing is not to interfere, but to support. This is what should become your main line of behavior.

Although the modern education system is aimed at ensuring that children reach a certain level in the sciences and practically makes them do it, they should understand that experiments also are necessary for learning. In other words, to make this feeling of flying.

It is important to develop persistence and faith in success in a little man. Do not forget to repeat to him that the main thing is to want. And everything else is already work and practice.

How to support a child’s self-esteem? – Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

We are so obsessed with our own self-esteem that we often forget about an even more important thing – children’s self-esteem. And she is very important. The student should not be afraid to dispute the teacher’s words or disagree with his parents, just because they are older. In fact, this is the best we can give them – faith in our own worth and our strengths.

Talk on equal terms with your children. This means addressing them with love, patience and positiveness. If we always behave this way, we will set a good example and help them grow emotionally harmonious personalities.

Tell stories that will help them become better, more determined, more courageous. Children should understand that it is extremely important not to forget about what we think, feel and how we act. Such communication helps kids gain knowledge about people (themselves and others) and things. This makes it easier to understand the world in which we live.

Teach them to also conduct an internal dialogue: on your own example, analyze what has been done well and what is the other way round, and this requires correction. Show how you cope with this, how you try to become better and it turns out for you. And that means it will come out for your child.

Praise and do not make fun of. It’s about constantly emphasizing what good they have done. This will help children to believe in themselves and at the same time will become the motivation to become even better. And do not forget the golden rule of education: “Praise is in public, criticism is in private.”

Help them cope with frustrations and teach them how to be proud of their achievements. Help them remember what they have achieved, analyze together.

Do everything so that they feel like an important part of the family. That you could not have done without them.

Avoid over-custody and encourage peer communication. It promotes socialization and self-confidence.

Raise children by your own example: self-confident children grow up in self-confident parents.

Encourage the flexibility of the mind to teach you to be creative. After all, there are hundreds of ways to do something, let the children find them on their own.

Help them set goals and be more independent.

Respect their opinion: children should not think that their point of view is something inconsequential and frivolous. We must take into account their desires and beliefs, and – at any age. How? Discussing and analyzing so that they feel heard.

The task of each parent is to raise not a perfect child (which is impossible in principle), but a happy and confident one. We must educate them to love this world and ourselves. Decisive and calm. Harmonious and joyful. With the belief that they are able to achieve any goal, realize their wildest dream.

The post Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First appeared first on ToLoveForward.

from https://toloveforward.com/behind-every-child-who-believes-in-himself-is-parent-who-believed-first/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=behind-every-child-who-believes-in-himself-is-parent-who-believed-first

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[jessicafwatkins]

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

The task of each parent is to raise not an ideal child (which is impossible in principle), but a happy and confident one.

We give our children wings when we believe in them. When we support their wildest dreams and say that everything in this world is possible. At such moments, our children can really fly.

That is why we should become an example for them of determination and determination, to dream the same, believe the same way … Parents should understand that one day the child will follow their example, and not their advice.

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

Children must know that no matter how life develops, what obstacles and trials do not fall in the way, they can always achieve what they want.

Therefore, if you see that your baby is in doubt, refuses failure and failure conceived out of fear, if he has low self-esteem, support him. Everything is very simple: you just need to help the child realize that everything that he needs for success already exists. It is within him.

Self-regulatory learning and emotional intelligence

It can be said that self-regulatory learning is the cornerstone of emotional intelligence. This means that the well-being of the child will be provided by strategies that he will be able to develop. That is, of course, he will have to work hard himself. But – under your strict guidance. By the way, this will also help him better understand his and other people’s emotions: both in childhood and when he becomes an adult.

Emotional maturity and the ability to independently regulate one’s reactions is what determines future success. And often much more than academic performance and good grades in school. Naturally, this does not mean that study is not important. The point is that knowledge alone is too little to succeed in this life.

The fact is, if you think about it, our children are too fixated on formal education in the first 18 years of their lives. They must learn the basics of all sciences, learn to write correctly, and be good at counting. This is a fact that cannot be ignored. Their emotional growth occurs at school. Usually they spend much more time in the school or at the desk at home, doing homework than in the yard or in the park.

That is why it is so important to teach a child an equally important “emotional science”. He must clearly define his strengths and weaknesses, using this knowledge for his own purposes. It is very important to teach children to cope with the feelings that arise from them due to a lack of understanding of something, or an inability to concentrate, or confusion before the need to solve a problem and so on.

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

If the child believes that he can learn the multiplication table, he will succeed. But in order to have such faith, he needs encouraging information from external sources. Especially from his parents, brothers and sisters, grandparents, teachers.

In essence, this represents what is called in psychology the “Pygmalion effect”. That is, the expectations that we resolutely and confidently voiced are a determining factor in whether the children can achieve the desired or not. And these words of support from parents and teachers, the most important adults in a child’s life, are especially important.

We are not talking now that “there will be a desire – there will be funds.” This is truly a magical formula, but it’s not about her. We are talking about not cutting off the wings of our own children.

Our task is to teach them to fly, and there is no universal and only right way to do something. The main thing is not to interfere, but to support. This is what should become your main line of behavior.

Although the modern education system is aimed at ensuring that children reach a certain level in the sciences and practically makes them do it, they should understand that experiments also are necessary for learning. In other words, to make this feeling of flying.

It is important to develop persistence and faith in success in a little man. Do not forget to repeat to him that the main thing is to want. And everything else is already work and practice.

How to support a child’s self-esteem? – Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

We are so obsessed with our own self-esteem that we often forget about an even more important thing – children’s self-esteem. And she is very important. The student should not be afraid to dispute the teacher’s words or disagree with his parents, just because they are older. In fact, this is the best we can give them – faith in our own worth and our strengths.

Talk on equal terms with your children. This means addressing them with love, patience and positiveness. If we always behave this way, we will set a good example and help them grow emotionally harmonious personalities.

Tell stories that will help them become better, more determined, more courageous. Children should understand that it is extremely important not to forget about what we think, feel and how we act. Such communication helps kids gain knowledge about people (themselves and others) and things. This makes it easier to understand the world in which we live.

Teach them to also conduct an internal dialogue: on your own example, analyze what has been done well and what is the other way round, and this requires correction. Show how you cope with this, how you try to become better and it turns out for you. And that means it will come out for your child.

Praise and do not make fun of. It’s about constantly emphasizing what good they have done. This will help children to believe in themselves and at the same time will become the motivation to become even better. And do not forget the golden rule of education: “Praise is in public, criticism is in private.”

Help them cope with frustrations and teach them how to be proud of their achievements. Help them remember what they have achieved, analyze together.

Do everything so that they feel like an important part of the family. That you could not have done without them.

Avoid over-custody and encourage peer communication. It promotes socialization and self-confidence.

Raise children by your own example: self-confident children grow up in self-confident parents.

Encourage the flexibility of the mind to teach you to be creative. After all, there are hundreds of ways to do something, let the children find them on their own.

Help them set goals and be more independent.

Respect their opinion: children should not think that their point of view is something inconsequential and frivolous. We must take into account their desires and beliefs, and – at any age. How? Discussing and analyzing so that they feel heard.

The task of each parent is to raise not a perfect child (which is impossible in principle), but a happy and confident one. We must educate them to love this world and ourselves. Decisive and calm. Harmonious and joyful. With the belief that they are able to achieve any goal, realize their wildest dream.

The post Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First appeared first on ToLoveForward.

from ToLoveForward https://toloveforward.com/behind-every-child-who-believes-in-himself-is-parent-who-believed-first/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=behind-every-child-who-believes-in-himself-is-parent-who-believed-first from TOLOVEFORWARD https://toloveforward.tumblr.com/post/621866792049065984

[toloveforward]

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

The task of each parent is to raise not an ideal child (which is impossible in principle), but a happy and confident one.

We give our children wings when we believe in them. When we support their wildest dreams and say that everything in this world is possible. At such moments, our children can really fly.

That is why we should become an example for them of determination and determination, to dream the same, believe the same way … Parents should understand that one day the child will follow their example, and not their advice.

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

Children must know that no matter how life develops, what obstacles and trials do not fall in the way, they can always achieve what they want.

Therefore, if you see that your baby is in doubt, refuses failure and failure conceived out of fear, if he has low self-esteem, support him. Everything is very simple: you just need to help the child realize that everything that he needs for success already exists. It is within him.

Self-regulatory learning and emotional intelligence

It can be said that self-regulatory learning is the cornerstone of emotional intelligence. This means that the well-being of the child will be provided by strategies that he will be able to develop. That is, of course, he will have to work hard himself. But – under your strict guidance. By the way, this will also help him better understand his and other people’s emotions: both in childhood and when he becomes an adult.

Emotional maturity and the ability to independently regulate one’s reactions is what determines future success. And often much more than academic performance and good grades in school. Naturally, this does not mean that study is not important. The point is that knowledge alone is too little to succeed in this life.

The fact is, if you think about it, our children are too fixated on formal education in the first 18 years of their lives. They must learn the basics of all sciences, learn to write correctly, and be good at counting. This is a fact that cannot be ignored. Their emotional growth occurs at school. Usually they spend much more time in the school or at the desk at home, doing homework than in the yard or in the park.

That is why it is so important to teach a child an equally important “emotional science”. He must clearly define his strengths and weaknesses, using this knowledge for his own purposes. It is very important to teach children to cope with the feelings that arise from them due to a lack of understanding of something, or an inability to concentrate, or confusion before the need to solve a problem and so on.

Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

If the child believes that he can learn the multiplication table, he will succeed. But in order to have such faith, he needs encouraging information from external sources. Especially from his parents, brothers and sisters, grandparents, teachers.

In essence, this represents what is called in psychology the “Pygmalion effect”. That is, the expectations that we resolutely and confidently voiced are a determining factor in whether the children can achieve the desired or not. And these words of support from parents and teachers, the most important adults in a child’s life, are especially important.

We are not talking now that “there will be a desire – there will be funds.” This is truly a magical formula, but it’s not about her. We are talking about not cutting off the wings of our own children.

Our task is to teach them to fly, and there is no universal and only right way to do something. The main thing is not to interfere, but to support. This is what should become your main line of behavior.

Although the modern education system is aimed at ensuring that children reach a certain level in the sciences and practically makes them do it, they should understand that experiments also are necessary for learning. In other words, to make this feeling of flying.

It is important to develop persistence and faith in success in a little man. Do not forget to repeat to him that the main thing is to want. And everything else is already work and practice.

How to support a child’s self-esteem? – Behind Every Child Who Believes In Himself Is Parent Who Believed First

We are so obsessed with our own self-esteem that we often forget about an even more important thing – children’s self-esteem. And she is very important. The student should not be afraid to dispute the teacher’s words or disagree with his parents, just because they are older. In fact, this is the best we can give them – faith in our own worth and our strengths.

Talk on equal terms with your children. This means addressing them with love, patience and positiveness. If we always behave this way, we will set a good example and help them grow emotionally harmonious personalities.

Tell stories that will help them become better, more determined, more courageous. Children should understand that it is extremely important not to forget about what we think, feel and how we act. Such communication helps kids gain knowledge about people (themselves and others) and things. This makes it easier to understand the world in which we live.

Teach them to also conduct an internal dialogue: on your own example, analyze what has been done well and what is the other way round, and this requires correction. Show how you cope with this, how you try to become better and it turns out for you. And that means it will come out for your child.

Praise and do not make fun of. It’s about constantly emphasizing what good they have done. This will help children to believe in themselves and at the same time will become the motivation to become even better. And do not forget the golden rule of education: “Praise is in public, criticism is in private.”

Help them cope with frustrations and teach them how to be proud of their achievements. Help them remember what they have achieved, analyze together.

Do everything so that they feel like an important part of the family. That you could not have done without them.

Avoid over-custody and encourage peer communication. It promotes socialization and self-confidence.

Raise children by your own example: self-confident children grow up in self-confident parents.

Encourage the flexibility of the mind to teach you to be creative. After all, there are hundreds of ways to do something, let the children find them on their own.

Help them set goals and be more independent.

Respect their opinion: children should not think that their point of view is something inconsequential and frivolous. We must take into account their desires and beliefs, and – at any age. How? Discussing and analyzing so that they feel heard.

The task of each parent is to raise not a perfect child (which is impossible in principle), but a happy and confident one. We must educate them to love this world and ourselves. Decisive and calm. Harmonious and joyful. With the belief that they are able to achieve any goal, realize their wildest dream.

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[dorcasrempel]

3Q: Collaborating with users to develop accessible designs

Academic researchers and others have long struggled with making data visualizations accessible to people who are blind. One technological approach has been 3D printing tactile representations of data, in the form of raised bar graphs and line charts. But, often, the intended users have little say in the actual design process, and the end result isn’t as effective as planned.

A team of MIT researchers hopes to fix that. They used a collaborative project with staff and students at the Perkins School for the Blind as a case study of the accessible design process, and generated a list of “sociotechnical” considerations to guide researchers in similar work. A paper detailing the work appears in the journal IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics. Co-authors Alan Lundgard, a graduate student in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS); Crystal Lee, a graduate student in the Program in Science, Technology, and Society; and EECS and Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory professor Arvind Satyanarayan spoke with MIT News about the case study and their findings.

Q: How did you land on this idea to record “sociotechnical considerations,” and what are some notable examples?

Lundgard: Crystal and I met during an intersession workshop in participatory design, where researchers collaboratively designed products with and for particular communities. We worked with the Perkins School to co-design a 3D-printed visualization of a time-series chart for people who are blind. Coming from MIT, there was this idea that we’d come up with a high-tech, flashy solution — but, it turns out, that wasn’t really the best approach. In that regard, I think a first-order sociotechnical consideration is, what degree of technological intervention is necessary, if any? Could the intervention take a more social approach without the need for a fancy technological design? Would a low-tech solution meet the needs of the community better than a high-tech solution?

Another big consideration is planning and communicating the extent of the collaboration, which is especially important when collaborating with marginalized communities. That means researchers clearly communicating their intentions and goals. As researchers, are we aiming to produce academic research, or a design solution that is immediately adoptable within the community? What is the duration of the project and what are the available resources? Failing to communicate clearly can leave community collaborators out of the loop in ways that are actively harmful.

Lee: We realized there were tons of intermediate steps before you start to even design a product. What does collaboration actually mean and what does participatory design look like? We got frustrated at certain junctures thinking about what product to make. While we talked to teachers, occupational therapists, and the Perkins School staff, we’d come up with a prototype and realize it was an idea that didn’t actually meet the needs of the community. Thinking through these tensions helped us come up with a list of sociotechnical considerations for other researchers and collaborators who may feel these same frustrations when working on co-design projects.

One notable consideration from our case study: As researchers, don’t assume that your resources are the same as the community’s resources. For example, don’t make something for a small school if it requires a $300,000 3D printer that only MIT can afford. In our 3D-printed visualization, we at first tried to use a cheap and accessible 3D printer that’s often available in libraries. But, this affordability imposed other constraints. For example, using the inexpensive printer, it was hard to actually make something legible in braille, because the resolution is too low to be useful. It can’t capture the detail you need to accurately represent the data. So, using the affordable printer, our graph failed to meet certain accessibility guidelines. On the other hand, MIT’s high-resolution, industrial-grade printer isn’t affordable or available to the Perkins School — or most schools, for that matter — which is hugely constraining if the design is supposed to satisfy the students’ daily needs.

Satyanarayan: It’s also very important to compensate participants fairly, especially with marginalized communities. In participatory design, we don’t treat folks we work with as target users. Rather, they are collaborators throughout the process, and with specific skills. For instance, people who are blind have far more experience reading braille. We consider that a highly specialized skill that should be compensated accordingly. A key tenet of participatory design is recognizing that people in the community have lived experience that is valuable and necessary for a design to be successful.

Q: In your paper, you say you hope to avoid pitfalls of “parachute research.” What is that and why is it important to address?  

Lundgard: “Parachute research” is where researchers — particularly from wealthy universities — drop into a community; take advantage of local infrastructure, expertise, and resources; write an academic paper; and then take off. That is, after publishing a research paper, they completely disengage from the community. That’s harmful to community members who engage in the collaboration in good faith and help to facilitate the research, sometimes without reciprocal benefits.

Lee: In accessible design, you often make a prototype based on some abstract knowledge of what a given community may want. Then, the people in that community evaluate the efficacy of the prototype, instead of being directly involved in the design process. But that can diverge from creating solutions that are beneficial for the communities the designers are purporting to help. In our paper, we didn’t just build something, test it, and report on it — we thought it would be more important to contribute guidelines for approaching similar participatory design problems.

Q: What does the future look like for you and for your work? 

Lee: I’m starting a collaboration with Massachusetts Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired. They have a large group of senior citizens who are experiencing blindness later in life, and have to learn to interact with technology in different ways. Understanding how people interact with technology ethnographically will be necessary for understanding accessibility — in technology, in the built environment, and in digital infrastructure. That’s a big part of my research moving forward. 

Lundgard: Really, our paper is not just about data visualization, but also about how to approach accessible design more generally. In that sense, our paper tees up how to do future work, with a concise set of guidelines that researchers — ourselves and others — can apply to different problems. For example, I’ve recently encountered researchers at a loss for how to describe their visualizations in ways that make them more accessible. When visualizations appear in, say, textbooks, scientific publications, or educational materials, they might appear as braille translations of the image, but more often they appear as textual descriptions. But what is the best way to describe a visualization? Does it make more sense to refer to its visual or statistical properties? Maybe we can collaboratively come up with different encodings that are more intelligible to someone who’s not used to interpreting information visually.

Satyanarayan: Along those lines, one thread is captioning online visualizations. There’s a lot of work to do in figuring out what’s important to caption to present some high-level insight of what the visualization is saying, as well as find a way to automatically generate those captions. That’s a deep technological solution. But we still have to make sure our sociotechnical considerations are adhered to.

Looking long-term, we’re interested in alternative ways of encoding data that are usable and accessible to people who are blind. Before braille, text was embossed on paper, but that’s not really how people who are blind process language. Louis Braille, who was blind himself, came up with something vastly different that became the standard way for blind people to read text. We first need to take a step back and understand the audience for and with whom we are designing, and work directly with them.

To do that, we have to address several things. How do people who are blind think about data? I was introduced to data through line graphs and bar charts. What is the equivalent for people who don’t process information visually? Once we answer those questions, we can start thinking about what the best way to encode data, because we’re not sure 3D-printing a line chart is the best solution.

3Q: Collaborating with users to develop accessible designs syndicated from https://osmowaterfilters.blogspot.com/

[shardvixen]

What Suit is best for the Ocean? An Autobigraphy Paper from 2003From the Den

Greetings All, Shardvixen here.  When I first enter college for my Master's degree, I already knew that education equaled a lot of writting.   but there are all kinds of different writing styles and in college at any level you learn different ways.  I do best in fictional writing because article writing has real weird and fancy ways of doing things and if you don't do them right, you look at the least stupid and at the worst a fake, so your words have no meaning.   

I love to write but the format of writing and spelling are difficult for me.   Mostly it is because of my processing disorder. And partly my outlook on life. For me "Just good enough" works.  Why spend more energy on something for the best out put when just good enough gets you to the same place.  Basically why spend more time on something you don't like or care about, when you can put time into things you do.  Been that way all my life.  This pushes against my need to do the best I can and usually wins when things get to frustrating.

So I had to write an autobiograhpy upon entering college to finish my BA.  I wasn't graded on the material part but on grammer, spelling and format.  I did just good enough.  It is always hard to be graded on something that has personal value.  The worse part for me was, the instruction and most of the class failed to understand it which is also a common occurance for me.  Sometimes I feel like an alien where ever I am at because for what ever reason I fail to communicate properly leaving most of my conversations with people lacking in some way.

As I go through my papers from college and decide what to throw away and what to keep, I have also decided that some of them will go into this blog site.  Maybe to be used as a vlog down the road.  It will make finding them easier and to allow others to reflect on them as well.  So here is the first one, my first paper of my Master degree.

Life is a rollercoaster is a famous metaphor.  I understandit but it just doesn't work for me.  The type of rollercoaster that would represent my life would defy the rules of sscience and never get any willing riders except for the death seekrs.  The only control, on has with a rollercoast is whether or not to ge on the ride and I would have never gotten on this ride willing.

For me, life is an ocean.  There is life above and below.  If you flip over, you end up in the same place with the same but yet different landscape. I once saw how a dolphine sees their surroundings, which is an upside down landscape with the bottom being up and the top is down.  This is a perfect metaphor for my brain. I am sitting in a little ru-a-dub tub and I am perfectly balanced in it.  Sometimes I see the land and franticly try to get there becasue that is what a functional person does.  The land represents the  things that most people seem to have an easy time attaining.  I just have to decide on a regular basis whether or not they are things I want.

I was born disfuntional into a disfunctional family with gernerations of disfunctional history.  At the age of 38, Year 2003, I was told i had peronality disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder.  On the website National Institute of Mental Illness, "borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) is a serious mental illness characterized by pervasive instability in moods, interpersonal relationships, self-image and behavior.  This instability often disrupts family and work life, long-term planning, and the individual's sense of self-identity.Originally thought to be at the 'borderline' of psyhosis, peoople with BPD suffer from a disorder of emotion regulation. While less well known than schizophrenia or bipolar disorder(manic-depressive illness, BPD is more common, affecting 2% of adults, mostly young women." https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/borderline-personality-disorder/index.shtml

The same site states that the mood swings can last up to a day, for me they can lat a lot longer.  I can go into swings that last up to sixmonths which is why they took so long to diagnose.  my road to self discovery stated withen I was 14, a day that is crystal clear in my memories.  I woke up feeling different not like myself. I have no clear connection to my child self and my teenager self.  It was like I was now two different people

There are many accounts of what it  is like to be mentaly ill from all knds of different mental illness. There is a very good book about Borderline personality Disorder by Rachel Reiland.  The Book is called " Get Me Out of Here".  Parts of her life arin ways very much like mine, butin oterhways not.  That is because mental illness tends to customize tot he person who has it. If a peerson has a curved spine, then he/she will learn to live a the spine that is bent and that changes lots of actions like how clothes look and how a person walks.  It is the same for mental illness. I believe that all people know they are ill whether it is a phyical ill or a mental one. How they deal with it will differ, thus making it hard to diagnose.

i have many people from both professional and personal areas ask me what it feel like inside my head.  I have thus come up with the iead inspsired from the movie "Men in Black".  There is the scene where J and K are asking Beatrice about the bug that took over Edgar. She said, "It was like a big Edgar Ssuit."  Thus I describe my illness as suits.  Lately I have added color because color is a good way to describe my likes, dislikes, and emotions.  So one morning I wake up with the blue suit on.  the blue suit is that over happy state that reminds me of a Car Bear catoon. Little hearts and cute little yellow birds sing witht he happy face sun.  The blue suit describes a manic phase.  All the suits have different characteristic moods and likes/dislikes.  I like the pink suit the best because that is the even keel where I walk like a normal person.  I deal with emotions pretty well and seem to have aporopriate responses.  An orange suit could be an angry suit or even diestructive ideal.  Something will happen and I will wake up with a new suit.  I have learned what kind of things trigger different mood swings.  Most come as a hindsight of information.

Some suits are multi colored becaue inside of me, it is very easy to feel like yes or no to things.  i am totally a maybe child, like waves that are hard and fast on top and cross waves down below.  When someone sys, ' you know I like him an I don't, I totally get it.  That is how I feel all the time.  Emotions are not easy for me.  Sometimes body language messes me up with how a person is talking.  I tend to show an emotional face to the world but that is because that is the mask of control.  If I can wait before making a choice, I love that but life doesn't always give us time to make the choices slowly and then my reptile brain needs to be kicked into overdrive, to deal with things quickly and usually ends up making the less then desirable choice.  I live in that flight or fight pattern daily though I am now better at maintaining a balance due to self understanding i have learned over the years.

Now that we have established that I have had many large tital waves in my life and things from beneath the waves deciding to move me in other currents it is easy to see that my experiences with counselors has best been interestig.  As a child my teachers liked me and wanted to care for me, while my peers didn't.  I loved to do school work which made me very popular with the teachers.  Learning is to this day very exciting to me and helping others to learn is what moved me towards my carreer choices.  I was tutor in high school and Jr. college for people who had issues learning to read.  My first conselor I remember meeting was in 6th grade getting ready to go to Jr. High School and he seemed to feel i was going to hae problems.  He was right.  Academically school was always easy, it was the peer interactions that prove to be trickier.

In high school, my counselor made the recommendation that I see the school mental health worker.  I did not do well with him and he did not do well with my parents.  At this time my parents finally seperated and my whole got a whole lot stormier.  I was forced to take care of myself and proceeded to do a horrible job of it.    It was decided I need to see a therapist more often but my parents refused to participate as was required and I stopped receiving any menatl health help.  I was removed from high school and sent to a continuation high school for drop out, criminals and pregnant teen girls.

At my new high school, my art teacher was also my counselor.  He was one of the main reasons that the school staff became my new family to take over with the one that had left me out in the cold.  I wish I could say I trusted them all but I didn't because my mental health wouldn't let me.  Adults lied all the time and hurt you because they had the power and many refused t o see how the world really treated me. It was always my fault somehow for eevery thing that happen.  My fault that my father was a drunk, my fault that my uncle abused me, my fault my mother decided to relive her teen life, my fault that the peers hurt me.  Always my faut.  How could I trust anyone when those i should have been able to trust had failed me.   It is a lesson that I have worked hard to correct.

I was once told that other people can sense when a person isn't quite right and that is why many children will shun a child who is menatlly ill.  Mentally ill children make great targets especially when others support the attacks.  Teachers, parents and others were quick to ask, "waht did you do to make them act that way towards you?" I have not only in my own life found this to be true but also in other children's lives that I have been lucky enough to be a part of.  For me, I just learn to work hard to make people feel comfortable around me, but teaching children to social can be a bit harder.  

All of my adult life there has been a need to ehlp if I can because that is something that was always missing in my yout, people who wanted to help.  Really help, while my teachers were kind they never pushed to find out what would be really helpful for me.  I learned that there are people who just need a little extra help for all kinds of reasons.  Since I was 16 years old I have tutored peers, adults and children with special needs in one way or another.  Social skills is one skill that many people seem to lacking or just need a little extra help in understanding.  I think because there isn't a course on can take to learn what they need to know, it is just taken for granted that we will all learn it by being part of a group(family, peers and society).  Sometimes thought these groups take it for granted that every one knows how to interact with others, especially if the individual is very smart.  Really smart children can get lost in social actions and few peoople realize that even now in 2003.  I am  very good at observing a person and seeing where they may be missing an important of the silent code that every society has when learning and using social interactions ad cues.

When I decided to pursue the careeer of behaviortherapy, I was told I needed a masters degree.  At the time I was following the path of a teacher, even though I didn't really wantt to be a school teacher.  I have a talent that kind of has moved me down a certian career path. I can desing a lesson plan for anyone, I have a way of understanding how people learn.  I learn this while in school of computer software programing.  Though I had really been doing it for a long time, like teaching people to read.. i have a talent for teaching the most unteachable(described that way by others who tried and failed to teach them anything) children.  I have changed many children's lives and many have come back over the years and thanked me for doing my best with them.  I don't really believe that anyone is unteachable but that rather it is our own expectations of what is needed to be taught based on what their brains can do.  I am very proud of the work I have done and the accomplishments I have helped others to achieve.

In my life at this time, I sit and wonder do I have what it takes to be a counselor, I have to think do they let crazy people become counselors.  Most of the psychologists I have worked with in the school systems have told me yeas because we are all crazy and a few of us are menatlly ill.  I believe it is important to tell people I am mentally ill.  Most people have their own concepts of what mental health issues look like and how each one should be treated.  Many people are afraid of mentally ill people espcially mentally ill children.  They are fearful of asking questions.  I know that sometimes it is hard to know what is appropriate to ask.  When peoople ddeal with mental illness they still want to put peoople int an area or slot that is very easy to understand, but it is never that easy because well, people really are not easty. It would be grand if we were all like those cookie cutter perfect people and we all came from cute little perfect homes and lives but imperfections occur in all kins of different ways. And while many peoople may understand this logically, they fail to refelct it in their own lives and the lives around them.

One of the things I think I can bring from my own history to my career as a counselor is that I do know how it feels.  There is none of theat, " Wow did she really say that or do that?"  I know that people can do the things that makes most of the societies' population go, "wait what?"  I observe people and wait to see what is going on before I decide if they need help or not.  People say "help me" in many ways without saying they need it..  I know how to wait for those signs.

I have been an employee of various schools for over ten years working with all kinds of school populations.  I have been working in both regular education and special needs.  I like working with children and find joy working with those that others have gotten very frustrated with. I know how it feels to be held hostage by your brain and your illness.  I have been a caregive and taught people how to care for themselves and their children.  All of these jobs will help me become the best helper I can be in the therapy field.  I do believe I am sensitivite to the needs of people and nojudgemental about their choices they make and the lifestyles they choose to live.  I very much believe that every one has the right to be happy and content.

one of my biggest challenges is that I nned to understand my own illness and then to get others to understand it without it becoming an issue to how well I can do in being helpful.  People are very leery about letting people with mental illness work with others.  I can understand why, but not all people want to hurt others.  I want to help, but I can't fix people only guide them to make their own choice to helpthemsleves.  

So as i float in my ocean learning the suits I need to be successful and  knowing what kind of suits I am wearing and how that helps or disrupts my life, I think about how maybe I need a super hero suit.  One that can protect me while helping others. I know i will do good in this new career path I have choosen and it may move me in another current as I learn more about myself and what I have to offer the world.

The End:  Not really.  This was written about  16 years ago and a lot changed along the way.  But I kept learning about myself which was very helpful.  I don't have many manic eposides.  I have learn that PTSD can cause a lot of suit changing, so I feel like I am in and out of the closet of my mind.  But through all of it the one thing I did learn is the best thing you can do for yourself is not give up or give in.  Sometimes it is just best to float in the sun and bask while taking a moment to reflect in the waves that life is most certianly interesting and rarely dull.

I know this was a rather long bit of writing but most papers in college are required to be long.  I hope this gave you some insight to how I use to think of myself and how far I have come.  Catch you all on the flip side and i am outta here....Peace all.

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[sallysklar]

Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice: How Little We Know about How Teachers Teach Common Core

Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice: How Little We Know about How Teachers Teach Common Core

Peter Greene, a retired teacher in Pennsylvania, had this to say about teaching the Common Core standards:

What happens to a teacher who doesn’t teach to the standards? Nothing. Oh, teachers still had (and have) to submit lesson plans that show alignment to standards, based on curriculum that is aligned to the standards. However, the alignment process is simply a piece of bureaucratic paperwork– you can simply write down the lessons and units that your professional judgment considers best, and then just fill in the numbers of various standards in the blanks. Maybe you have an administrator who will hold your feet to the fire (“Mrs. McTeachalot, I believe your use of standard RL.5.2a is not entirely on point”), but mostly, life will go on, your paperwork will be filed, the district’s report to the state will show that teachers are teaching to the standards with fidelity, and you can close your classroom door and do what you know is right. As long as the paperwork is good, reality can take care of itself.

Greene may well be right. For so little is known about how teachers actually teach the Common Core in their daily lessons.

Since 2010, nearly all states have adopted the Common Core standards or a modified version. Surely, those state policymakers and federal officials who championed these standards believed that adopting these reform-driven standards would lead eventually to improved academic performance for all students (see here, here, and here).

In the back-and-forth over the politics of these standards, it was easy for these policymakers to lose the critical, no, essential, connection between adopting a policy and implementing it. Any adopted policy aimed at changing students is put into practice by teachers. And the Common Core standards asked teachers to make major shifts in how they teach. So civic and business leaders and academic experts who pushed such reforms  forgot a simple fact:  teachers are the gatekeepers to the “what” and “how” of learning.  Mandating big changes in how teachers teach ain’t going to happen. Why?

Because virtually ignoring the very people who must put a policy into practice nearly guarantees partial implementation. Without involving teachers in the process, without spending time and money on insuring that teachers are in sync with the policy and have the knowledge and skills necessary to put it–and there’s never only one “it”–into practice, the hullabaloo and promises curdle into policymaker and practitioner complaints and disappointment.

Yet for the most part, even after initial struggles over getting the right materials and learning the ins-and-outs of the standards, most teachers across the country have taken on the responsibility of putting these standards into their daily lessons. So how has the implementation gone?

Do one really knows since few researchers, pundits, and policymakers have systematically examined a representative sample of actual classroom elementary and secondary teachers (across academic subjects) teachers teaching lessons aligned to the Common Core standards. Yes, that sentence is correct. Actual classroom observations have seldom occurred. What is available are surveys teachers completed over the past five years.

Sure, surveys asking teachers about their teaching to the Common Core standards is useful. Teacher perceptions of what and how they teach lessons geared to the Common Core such as content, activities, and assessments give a glimpse of what happens when teachers close the classroom door.  That glimpse, however, is a self-report by someone who recalls what happens in their lesson. Useful but insufficient to judge what actually occurs in that room during the lesson.

So what have surveys of teacher opinion on their lessons revealed thus far about teaching the Common Core?

A 2016 national online survey of elementary teachers teaching math Common Core standards sponsored by the Fordham Foundation, an advocate of the standards, listed the following “takeaways” from the survey:

Teachers know what’s in the Common Core—and they’re teaching it at the appropriate grade level. Though it may seem unsurprising, it is notable that teachers are able to identify from a list of topics (some of which are “decoys”) those that reflect the standards—and they report teaching them at the grade levels where they’re meant to be taught. Once upon a time, teachers shut their doors and did their own thing. Now we have many instructors teaching to the same high standards nationwide.  

Further, they’re changing how they teach. More teachers report incorporating the standards into their teaching, including the 64 percent of teachers who say they  increasingly require students to explain in writing how they arrived at their answers.  

But teaching multiple methods can yield multiple woes. The Common Core math standards require that students “check their answers to problems using a different method.” And sure enough, 65 percent of K–5 teachers are teaching multiple methods more now than before the standards were implemented. But 53 percent of teachers also agree that students are frustrated when they are asked to learn different ways of solving the same problems.

Then there is a recent RAND study (2018) that sought out responses over the past three years from a randomly selected panel of math and English language arts (ELA) teachers about the text and online materials they use and their daily classroom practices.*

Here is what the RAND report concluded:

Given that the Common Core and similar standards are being implemented in most states across the United States, one might expect to see changes in teachers’ knowledge. However, we saw no clear changes in teachers’ knowledge about their mathematics standards when comparing teachers’ survey responses in 2016 and 2017…. 

For ELA, we found a decrease in teachers’ perceptions that “assigning complex texts that all students in a class are required to read” was aligned with their state standards, despite the fact that the use of complex texts is emphasized in most state standards. 

Teachers’ use of published textbook materials changed very little over the period examined in this study. Thus, despite the fact that most published textbooks we asked about in our survey were not clearly aligned with the Common Core, teachers did not appear to be shifting toward more use of standards-aligned textbooks. 

However, teachers’ use of online materials did change over the period of our surveys. Specifically, mathematics and ELA teachers reported using more standards-aligned, content-specific online sources and less use of Google in 2017 than in 2015. 

On one hand, these findings suggest that teachers are seeking online materials to help them address state standards within their content area. On the other hand, Teacherspayteachers.com—a lesson repository that is not vetted for quality or standards-alignment—saw a large uptick in use, and more than one-half of the ELA and mathematics teachers in our sample reported using the site “regularly” (once a week or more) for their instruction. In addition, increases in use of standards-aligned and content-specific materials were not even; such increases were not as clearly present among teachers of the most vulnerable students (i.e., ELLs, students with IEPs and low-income students). 

These findings suggest that teachers who serve our neediest students may not always be aware of or using online materials that support standards-aligned instruction…. We saw no changes in standards-aligned practices among all mathematics teachers, and we saw few changes when comparing responses among all ELA teachers. However, the changes we found suggest that some teachers may be engaging students in fewer standards-aligned practices now than in previous years. For mathematics, in particular,teachers serving less-vulnerable students reported using significantly fewer standards-aligned practices in 2017 than in 2016, whereas we did not see these significant decreases among those serving more vulnerable students. 

That said, teachers’ self-reports about students’ engagement in various practices should be interpreted with caution, given what we know about the accuracy of teacher self-reports….

That last sentence is key. Yes, teacher surveys (both Fordham’s and RAND’s) give a partial picture of practice. They are useful bits of evidence. But self-reports need to be handled carefully since earlier studies that collected teacher perceptions of how they taught were compared to independent observers who were in the very same classrooms (including students) and gaps arose  between teacher perceptions and observers’ reports (see here, here, and here). Thus, the reliability of such surveys is suspect.

The answer, then, to the question of whether Common Core standards have changed what teachers think and do is mixed. From these surveys of math and ELA teachers do report a few changes but stability in classroom practices persist. While teacher surveys are surely helpful in suggesting what occurs when policies get implemented, they do not substitute for researchers directly observing classroom lessons, interviewing teachers before and after lessons, and analyzing student responses to teaching practices.

elaine February 22, 2019

Source

Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice: How Little We Know about How Teachers Teach Common Core published first on https://buyessayscheapservice.tumblr.com/

[everyone-is-lovelyy]

1. If you had to choose, whiskey or tequila? Why? Whiskey. I feel like you grow out of tequilla haha unless you drink it ironically. I’m no expert at whiskey but I like it sometimes, esp during winter  2. While doing school work, do you take your time or do you try to get it done as quickly as possible? I prefer to take time because the quality of my work is much better then and I feel like I am actually enveloped in what I am learning or writing about. Usually during intense exam periods I find myself rushing to finish but it ends up being quite counterproductive 3. When did you last wear a scrunchi? Right now!  4. If you were a writer, what would you write about most? Creative non-fiction I think, I love that genre so much. But I think I’d enjoy writing children’s books too, I’ve always loved them so much. I like critiques and reviews a lot too, it’s such a great form for writing and I love reading that kind of stuff in the mornings. Academic texts are pretty amazing too if you find topics that interest you, they usually end up blowing your mind. Looking at your Haraway.

5. Do you sometimes yell to get your point across? Not unless I’m fighting with someone in which case I get riled up. 

6. If you get a period, what symptoms do you get when you PMS? I get the usual stomach bloating and desire to devour everything IN SIGHT. My physical PMS pains are kept somewhat under control thanks to the birth control I take. However, emotionally I am a mess. 7. Is there anyone at your school with a cool accent? What kind of accent is it? Belgrade is not too diverse so most of us have a similar accent.  8. What is stressing you out most right now? Today is actually the first day in many a days that nothing is really stressing me out too much. Like I am feeling things and they are not all necessarily positive emotions but no stress. 9. Are you more smart and thoughtful or understanding and kind? Oof I really do not know. I think I am more so understanding and kind? I’m not the most thoughtful person but I think I’ve gotten to be a lot smarter in regards to this lately. 10. Who last asked you for a favor? What was it? My mom, to buy her some stuff from the pharmacy. 11. If you had to decide, what do you think people envy about you? Probably my privilege in regards to how I’ve grown up and the opportunities I’ve had, who my father is. I don’t what else, I don’t see myself that way so it makes me really uncomfortable to even think about this haha 12. If you want to get your crush’s attention, what do you do? I...don’t know? Just speak to them I suppose? Try to get to know them? I really don’t know, is there a strategy to this? 13. How long have you been single or in a relationship for? In a relationship for a year and 3 months almost 14. Are you closer to your friends or family? I think it’s a fair balance since I am really close to both

15. Do you know what you’re going to wear tomorrow? No idea, probably something similar to today haha. It depends on what I end up doing

16. Do you use white strips or anything else to whiten your teeth? Nope. 17. Are there any special events coming up? What are they? Nothing really specifically special, just nice everyday life things :3 18. When it comes to strangers, how trusting are you? Not at all trusting, it takes me months to trust friends or partners. Let alone randoms. I am always a bit on the lookout for getting hurt or manipulated. 19. If someone insults/makes fun of you, what do you do?  Use my terrifying sarcasm to slowly but surely destroy their lives. HAH 20. What color do you think represents your personality? something like a pastel blue ranging to a dark blue or a bright, deep red 21. Would you rather drive on a long straight highway or windy backroads? Windy backroads always! 23. What is the fastest you’ve ever gone in a car? Not too fast because my driving is a JOKE.  24. Have you ever seen someone break their bone in real life? No, sounds terrifying though. I have never broken a bone or had any sort of severe injury in that regard so I can’t even imagine 25. If you got to choose an animal to disappear forever, what would it be? Why? Uh, the one in the white house. <– agreed! <--- Absolutely, claps to this kween <3 26. What are the keys of your heart? Animals, laughing, cups of coffee and reading, writing something not shit, love, love, love. 27. Are you sometimes a control freak? If one can be a control freak while also simultaneously letting their life spiral out of control well then that’s yours truly. 28. If you’re online right now, do you have an away message up? What does it say? Yes HAHA it says “Right?? How fragile can your ego be my boy?? Sit yo ass down” HAHAHAHA 29. Do you know what your GPA is? Currently bordering on 9/10 but I still have 3 more exams left! 30. If you got to pick any winter sport to excel at, what would it be?  Skiing! I loved it so much when I tried but it’s so expensive to organize skiing trips. But I would really love to get better at it 31. Does it piss you off when people interrupt you? Yeah, it really frustrates me. I don’t mind heated conversations or debates where people speak over others, that’s fine, but when someone adamantly ignores you using your voice, I go nuts. 

32. What event did you last dress up for? Who went to that event? 
 Going out last Friday night. I mean “dress up”, I just wore new heels I bought. Peca and I, it turned out to be a shit night but oh well.

33. What was the last picture you took with your phone? My mom sitting under a bunch of beautiful trees at kalemegdan

34. Are you a fashion-conscious person? Where do you buy most of your clothes? Somewhat! I love clothes although my style is actually very simple but I love it that way. I adore Zara, I am honestly adorned in Zara head to toe usually. And then I’ll pick up random things wherever I find them. I love Supergas and desperately want a new pair soon! And I like finding old sunglasses in local vintage shops and such 35. Do you have trouble waking up in the morning? What gets you up and awake? Nah, not really. It takes me a little while because I like laying in bed, scrolling through social media (sigh) and esp listening to podcasts in the morning. But is all good :)

36. What’s something fun you’ve done this week? Who was there? 
 Well it’s only Monday but today was fun. Just getting to this cafe early before my friends came, reading this local paper called LiceUlice which I love and it was a lovely day and leaves were falling from the trees but it was warm. Yeah, pretty ordinary but it was fun.

37. What’s the last thing you texted someone about? Planning with Petar what we want to make for dinner tonight :)

38. When and why did you last blush? 
 I’m not sure.

39. Do you currently have a favorite song? What is it? 
 Dusty Springfield - Son of a Preacher Man and Paul Martin - Le troublant temoignage de paul martin

40. What is one thing you and your best friend have in common physically? 
We currently both have blonde hair? We honestly look so different physically so not much

41. Now based on your interests, what is one thing you both have in common? Political opinions, we both love terrible reality tv and rom-coms and she loves mystery novels which I am getting into now too!

42. What, if anything, is hanging on your refrigerator? 
 A sushi menu, a photo of me that my sister took, a bunch of magnets.

43. What is the last illegal thing you did, even the smallest crime? Probably smoking weed in the street? And crossing the street on a red light

44. How much did each individual thing you’re wearing cost? Not too much really, my shirt was on sale for 10 euro and I got my culottes for like 20 and my necklace was a cheap find at H&M

45. Is that the normal amount you spend on clothes? Yeah, it’s standard I’d say

46. Do you collect anything? Have you ever? Stones and seashells! I like postcards as well and mugs or coffee cups from places I travel.

47. What languages do you speak? 
 English and Serbian, a bit of Greek but it’s pretty bad (I can understand more so than I can speak) and a wee bit of Italian

50. Where do your grandparents live? All my grandparents have passed away. Wow. That’s really sad to think about actually.

51. When is the next time you’re going on vacation? Where to? I am going to Holland middle of November! SHOOK-ETH. To the Hague and to Amsterdam for a little little bit if we manage to organize ourselves :D

52. How well do you do in school? How are your grades compared to your siblings? I am a pretty good student at uni, I mean I try hard. And I could have done a lot better too if my attendance wasn’t so shit but oh well, YOUTH. My sister was good at university too so I’d say we are about the same. 53. Does your family eat dinner together? Who does the cooking? 
 Not really but we eat lunch together sometimes! So that’s nice. My mom usually but sometimes my dad orders in some lovely food

54. Are you usually motivated to work or are you a procrastinator?
 Mostly motivated unless I’m going through a bad phase

55. Has the last month been really stressful for you? Yeah even though I technically haven’t had any obligations but I think that’s what has been stressful for me. It’s insane for the first time since kindergarten having this open space ahead of you without any rules or structure. It’s starting to feel liberating rn but was awful the past few weeks. 

56. What do you base first impressions on? (Behavior, clothing, etc.)
 Sadly I do base some of it on clothing and such. Not as a judgement, just that I think that style and such reflects character. But also just the way someone speaks and to what degree they are open, I have a good intuition about that sort of stuff

57. Who do you know that is a vegetarian? How about a vegan? 
 A few people and a ton of my mom’s friends are vegan, effing yogis I love them.

58. When is the last time you went out to dinner with a friend? Where did you go? Who paid?
 Umm peca and I got wok (this thai place) last Saturday. Does that count? We split.  59. What was the last thing to surprise you? Hmm my mama bought me flowers today. Which was surprising because we got into a nasty fight the other day and haven’t really discussed it yet. But yeah, it warmed my heart a little bit.

[conflictdramascripts]

Teaching Drama Conflict Acting as a Form of ‘Crisis’

Acting as a form of ‘crisis’

(Note:  this is the second blog post I’ve written that will be referencing Kevin Kumashiro’s Troubling Education – Queer Activism and Antioppressive Pedagogy.)

One of the interesting things about teaching any of the common high school art forms (visual art, drama, music, dance) is that they all require the student to be more completely immersed in the classroom experience than they often are in academic subjects. (Teaching both academic English and Drama, I can fully attest to this.)  This immersion, however, can’t be seen as an unqualified ‘good’ as the immersion some students might be experiencing can result in some students feeling alienated within the class.  There doesn’t seem to be a way around this, I’ve started every class each year attempting to have students experience the level of immersion that will be required in order for them to be successful (see Drama Class First Day – Setting the Tone on this blog), and typically there are a few students who decide to take a different course after going through this experience.    

What those students are experiencing on that first day is a form of crisis.  Crisis comes about, as Kumashiro points out, when ‘learning something that disrupts our commonsense view of the world.’ The disruption to the commonsense view of the world that many students experience on that first day (especially if they are new to the art form) is that it will require students to be engaged/immersed in experiential learning and in interactions that will be viewed and judged by others in the class; the disruption to commonsense arises out of the level of expectations and compulsions that are upon them to perform that are being put in place within those first few moments.  This can be quite shocking to some, attractive to others.

The disruption to commonsense also occurs because students are not generally expecting to begin a new course by being compelled to be active and engaged rather than being passive and consumptive (let’s just watch and see what happens).  At the end of these ‘first days’ however, there are generally students who feel comfortable and happy to be engaged in this manner, or students who simply have no interest in being ‘watched’ and to work immediately with others.  As those students mostly move quickly to other courses, the level of crisis that I want to discuss in this post is really more to do with keeping levels of discomfort active.  Using Kumashiro’s words, to keep ‘disrupting their commonsense view of the world.’  This disruption represents a form of unlearning, in that what students previously perceived as the limits to their own engagement are often challenged, as well as what they expected to be the levels of engagement and commitment that were expected of them.  These expectations were aligned with the students’ ‘common sense’ view of the world.  In this view, there is only so much that can and should be asked of them.  Students who aren’t able to break from this view are usually the first to exit the class.

Moving forward past the first few days, however, the question is raised as to how to maintain this level of crisis.  While it would seem to be resolved in that the students remaining in the class have reconciled themselves to the idea that they will constantly be challenged to perform, this isn’t the case, the challenges of performance are not limited to simply being ready to present work, they extend far deeper into students’ preparedness to accept the levels of immersion in role playing that will be required to ‘act well’.

To act well, even in class, requires that the student be fully ‘in the moment’, engaged, and attempting to produce real effects on acting partners.  When the student lacks these levels of engagement, then the result is bad or ineffectual acting.  At a certain point in each acting class, mostly depending on experience levels, bad or ineffectual acting starts to generate a general ‘distaste’ amongst the other students, usually expressed through inattention (in a polite class) or mockery (in a less polite class).  Students who have produced this effect usually become aware of it immediately and this generally results in one of two options: either a firm resolve to do better, or a second exodus of students from the class, dropping the course.  

In class, the distinction between bad acting and good acting, which generates excitement, concentration and interest, usually occurs within the first few weeks.  While a disastrous performance might have been funny at the start of the year, it usually becomes annoying and uninteresting a few weeks in. I usually can find a moment, especially in less experienced classes, where one or more of the students is succeeding greatly on stage and at which point the other students in the class become extremely attentive and interested.  At the end of this moment there is usually a reflective pause, which, ironically, doesn’t come from the actors but from the audience, where they ‘digest’ the level of success that just happened in front of them. It’s ironic because commonly the students on stage, who are aware that they have done well, are usually less affected than the audience by what they just accomplished.  In more experienced classes this is not the case, as the students usually need a few moments to ‘recover’ from particularly committed performances, however, pretty much in every drama class, there is this ‘tipping point’ where the terms  have been set – ‘this is what good acting looks like’ and these terms guide the aspirations and expectations of the class as it moves forward.  If you are new to teaching drama and you are reading these posts in order to gain background knowledge, then you should know that you need to wait for this moment, you can’t force it, and when it appears, capitalize on it by emphasizing its strengths and importance.  

While it might seem that we’ve been sidetracked by discussions of good or bad acting, understand the recognition and performance of both can be linked to the levels of crisis that began this discussion.  According to Kumashiro, ‘Desiring to learn involves desiring difference and overcoming our resistance to discomfort.’ Acting classes, as was noted earlier, are extremely different from regular academic courses wherein students have become habituated to study, learn and be tested in very particular ways, usually based on how well they ‘know the content’ and how well they can express their knowledge of it.   Drama classes are not about knowing the content, a memorized script is a good start but it’s hardly the determining aspect of a successful performance.  Drama classes work well when students accept that they are to work outside of their common comfort levels. This represents a risk to the student, they are basically making a claim, “This is the best that I can do,” with every form of committed performance.  If students are not doing ‘the best that they can do’, then they obviously not acting or risking anything.

Here is a description of that risk:  

To act requires commitment.  Not only to getting up, facing an audience and speaking, but to all the intricacies of trying to realize a script’s intent, a character’s focus, and moreover to affecting one’s partner.  It’s not an insular experience driven by personal and interior goals.  It is public.  It also cannot be accomplished without really trying, there is very little that’s natural about it.    

Here’s what many students have to ‘unlearn’ in order to accomplish this:

Stay in a safe space where any sense of who and what you are, intellectually, emotionally and politically won’t be challenged.

Kumashiro theorizes that students must work their way through crisis in order for learning to occur.  In other words, their concepts of self must be challenged.  The experiential nature of learning an art form immediately puts this into play, which is why many students both embrace it wholeheartedly (as something they’ve been wanting) or find it alienating (as something too challenging).  

Beyond the crises of beginning acting levels, another form of crisis (or discomforting of the student) often develops with more experienced actors.   Many students, by the time they get to Grade 12, have developed very particular acting styles, and these have become engrained in their performance pieces.  This has usually come about due to the success some students have had playing particular types (comedic or dramatic) or worse, stereotypes.  One of the purposes of having students continuously taking on different types of characters, roles and acting styles is to not have this occur, nevertheless, it often happens and, once engrained, it’s very difficult to ‘break the student out of’.  Recently I had a very talented transfer student who was very firmly engaged with particular uses of voice, physicality and common intentions, one of the reasons being she’d been very successful playing this ‘character’ in drama classes and on stage in the past.  The attempt to move her out of this character, who seemed to intrude into all her performances, caused levels of anxiety and frustration to appear.  As an acting student, however, this character was holding back any real progress as an actor.  

Modern acting technique is based on being actively and continuously engaged in achieving one’s goals as an actor.  As I’ve explained this in much greater detail in other places (see Notes to the Student Actor, Grades 11 and 12) I’m not going to go into detail on how that happens here.  Being actively and continuously engaged, however, does represent accepting and working within the levels of risk that were discussed above.   Being actively and continuously engaged requires the student actor to embrace commitment to role playing and being immersed in the conflicts that are playing out in real time on stage.  

This is why this is hard:

Continuous engagement, in acting terms, means identifying goals (through lines) and pursuing those goals.  It does not mean lapsing into the familiar, it means working without a history or a propriety to a role.  There is no proper, understood or accepted form of performance, there is only the use of rehearsal to work through a performance’s possibilities and then to create the performance anew based on that information and practice.  Acting is based on doing and accomplishing; there are no right or wrong performances, just performances that successfully convey the character’s personality, needs and objectives to accomplish them.        

This is why some students love it:

It breaks from the everyday, and allows students to express themselves in ways that are impossible in other settings.  It shows clear progress and gives students a sense of their growing ability levels; in this it presents clear challenges.

This is why some students do not:

In order to be successful, you must accept the discomfort of being fully engaged.  

The answer as to why acting is a form of crisis lies then in how acting students must embrace the discomfort of working without the ability to limit their own engagement.  It is precipatory, a good performance can turn bad with a momentary lapse in concentration or a line forgotten.  It pulls students away from the known, what’s previously worked and the comfortable spaces centered upon the familiar.    

Moving students out of the familiar, and keeping them out of it, represents a commitment to the unfamiliar, or the continuously renewed.  Performance cannot be exactly repeated, nor it can never be exactly remembered, performance requires a commitment to the new every time it’s attempted.  This is a recipe for the discomforting of students, a crisis, which, as Kumashiro points out, is also the recipe for their learning.