Entries Tagged 'humor' ↓

Fuel

Lately, my students and I have been studying not only the effectiveness of biological illustrations, but also the efficacy of their own illustrations to personally enhance the knowledge of abstract concepts.  As well, I have been engaged in some short but interesting discussions with Dr. Mishra at MSU concerning the validity of visualizations.  None of these interesting interactions, however, hold a candle to those between my eldest daughter and I.  Big surprise, huh?

She has shelves upon shelves of amazing books that have come from her mom and I, gifts from others, or direct picks from Delaney herself.  One of these books is the subject of this post.  I had noticed the scientific inaccuracies on “number seven” before today.  Yet-  I hadn’t really looked seriously at what was going on because I generally hate this book, and usually try to get mommy to read this one when it comes up.  Yes, this one was a gift.  No biology instructor would ever purposefully unleash this one upon their progeny.

Details?  Who cares?

I understand where you are coming from if you tell me the content details that are so fouled up here aren’t important at age two.  I get that.  However, this kid can tell the difference between a barracuda and a salmon in one book, and then be able to transfer what a barracuda looks like and “does” when seeing a photograph of mine flash across my laptop’s screen saver:

I don’t know.  As I’ve said before, I’m no early childhood expert.  My learning about EC education occurs as we experience it through our lovely daughters.  However, I have to at least give myself props for keen observation skills and an active framework for constructivist learning (as well as other approaches).

However, page seven of this book is just… well…  dumb.  Page seven features an octopus as a painter with tubes of paint in all tentacles.  Not only is this the representative creature for the number seven, it has seven tentacles.  Yes-  count them.  Seven tentacles.  One tube of paint in each.  Not to menton the fact that the page goes on to suggest that seven rainbow paints can “…make a world of make-believe or Never Never Land.”  Wow.  Perhaps this is a feeler to draw kids in to the Never Land Ranch? If so, sorry Mike, my girlie’s not remotely interested.

All silliness aside…  are you kidding me?  Page seven?  The octopus sits on page seven in this book?  I mean, this creature isn’t named “tentacle-critter.”  It is named “OCTO-pus” as in:  eight.  Eight of something-  you don’t even need to know what.  But ask someone before you put the brush into the paint can next time.  Seriously.  Or wait-  perhaps the illustrator simply applied color to the author’s words?  Regardless, there you have it in the end, a seven-tentacled beast staring gleefully back at you.  Am I saying that a children’s author needs to hold a degree in biology?  Not remotely.  Though I would argue that if you wish to publish, take note of basic prefixes.

What I thought a few weeks ago was a glaring error, just tonight became a full-on dumbfest.  A silly soiree.  When skipping to page ten, we see ten terrific sea turtles.  Actually, according to the book, we see “ten tiny tortoises swimming in the sea.”  Yeah-  no.  No we don’t.  I am willing to bet no one has seen tortoises swimming in the sea.  Considering the general common language surrounding the taxonomic order Chelonia is that all are turtles.  Those spending their lives near water (and especially those spending it in water) are always referred to as turtles.  Only those living the most terrestrial of lives get to be called tortoises.  Even those in the middle, who spend some of their lives near water are often referred to as terrapins…  but never tortoises.  A book depicting “tortoises” doing loop-de-loops in the sea, is not for me.

What is this-  a conspiracy?

I have no author to blame here.  Honestly, I can’t.  This book hasn’t an author listed, an illustrator credited, etc.  The front and back covers depict a series of books called “Animal Crackers” to which this particular volume belongs, although there is no other information to be found.  I would chalk this up to the nature of a children’s book, though all of our others seemingly have a plethora of documentation and credits.  I do suspect that it makes some sick sense to not want any sort of “credit” for this remarkable work to be placed upon your resume.  The only thing I can find on the back cover is “Copyright 2005 Edicart – Printed in China for Books Are Fun Ltd., 1680 Highway 1 North, Fairfield, Iowa.”

My wife is from Iowa.  Smart people hail from Iowa.  So tell me readers…  why am I crazy here?  Why is this really no big deal at all?  Why is it not embarrasingly funny and sad all in one icky-literacy-burrito?

Holiday break, for an educator for sure, is a time to spend time with family and friends…  regroup, and just relax.  It is a time for reflecting on the previous year (if you haven’t already) and planning for the year to come.  It is also a time for indulging in fun.  Fun food, fun drink and even some just plain…  silliness.

So before I return to my three young ladies for the evening, allow me to introduce you to a very fun time-waster.  Really-  if you are a bit more motivated, this site could really even be a valuable marketing tool for your classroom or department.  As I said-  this certainly isn’t a post to turn your educational philosophy on end.  This isn’t definitely not a post that will add significantly to your pedagogical repertoire.  Forgive me, for I too, am on holiday break.  This post is to educational technology as cheesy spinach & artichoke dip is to nutrition.

If you have read this blog for even one day, you know that visual literacy is fundamental to my core.  I can’t write a paragraph without an image helping my cause.  Perhaps this is an homage to my realization that human words cannot do justice to a carefully crafted photograph. Perhaps as well, this marks one more post on this blog as of late that isn’t so grippingly “instructional” or “edtech.”  However, hopefully you have checked out my About page by now.  That  -in a very indirect way-  explains the hierarchy here.  I hope that works for most of you…

Enough blabb.  If you are unfamiliar, allow me to introduce you to the fun of BigHugeLabs as one last cheesy nugget of 2008.  Not only is this site a potentially fun time-waster, it can also be a valuable relationship-builder in the hands of the enlightened.  In fact, it can also be a “Christmas gift creation tool”  -if you have both the images and the verbal initiative to pull it off.  I say that with utmost cockiness after having delivered these two gems (framed) as Christmas gifts for my parents.  Toss in the birth of their newest granddaughter and you have the makings of a sweet little gift.  Seriously, would you not prominently display these?  Also-  have I yet mentioned how amazing my parents are?  They are.  To me, these images immortalize that fact.

I have used the BHLabs website in the past.  In the past five months, I shot the first two weddings of my life.  The fact that a good friend from graduate school and then her friend trusted me with their wedding day photography was…  frightening.  Conclusions?  I doubt I can even be a wedding photographer on the side.  Why?  1) Way too much stresss.  2)  I hate weddings.  (to clarify: marriage is treating me splendidly.  weddings are just most generally not a guy’s thing)  A million other moments are more important throughout the course of a life, and few hire a photographer for those.

Sad.

That said, I used BigHugeLabs to add a sheen of fun to the disk of images delivered to my two new brides.  Whether highlighting the beauty of a bride in splendid excess, or laughing at a groom as sex symbol, all is great fun.  Whether it is the “motivator” tool, or one of the other “you don’t eeeeven need Photoshop for this” -style images, you will almost always find something fun and fitting.  I mean, hey-  not everyone loves me…  but foreign leaders somehow seem to.  Well, foreign leaders and models.

All of these images, as well as 95% of those I post on this blog to both highlight the ideas I am selling or to celebrate the work of amateur artists (usually both), are hosted on my Flickr site.  Flickr is currently the place to store your photos online.  At one time, I housed hundreds of photos at the now-defunct Clubphoto.  One fun day a couple of years ago, management walked into the offices and told folks to pack up their **it and *it.  I, of course, had backups of all images on my hard drives.  What I didn’t have were the countless hours of captions (lengthy explanations) I had invested in each image for many years.  I once used these as educational blurbs for my students, and especially for the parent of my students  -and prospective students of a very unusual and expensive class (for public school).

Happy New Year to you all.  May you find a thousand photographable moments headed your way in 2009.  By the way-  this marks the ninth year I have been disappointed by the “F” volume of the World Book encyclopedia from my sixth grade year.  I remember that future entry which showed transportation in the year 2000 to prominently feature svelte little rocket cars zipping about to-and-fro a la George Jetson.

Oh well.  You can’t win ‘em all, right?  Right??

Here begins a new post category.  We could call it “stupid things found on the web.“  Or perhaps “computers ain’t as smart as people.“  Call it what you will- here it goes:

What do you think?  Don’t see the humor?  Keep looking- I have faith in you.  See it now?  Seriously, how great is that?  Now that couldn’t be secretly purposeful could it?  Ahhh, the perils of abbrev. 

It actually reminds me of a post I made back in June on our Marine Biology network at Ning.  It is a quick story about how Google’s AdSense ads (now removed from education networks @ Ning) can unknowingly juxtapose some really conflicting ideals.  We spend page after page of our site extolling the beauty and wonder of living coral and the ecosystems they inhabit.

So, when ads for what seem to be unethically-harvested coral began running on our page, the irony was thick.  Now those Google ads are gone.  I soon found out from Steve Hargadon that Ning was allowing educational networks (aimed at grades 7-12) to run ad-free upon request.  Of course COPPA requires that students under 13 not be allowed to use social networking sites for security and privacy issues.

And thus-  with COPPA, this post comes strangely full circle.  Wow.  I think perhaps I stumbled upon a vortex of web weirdness on this lovely winter day.

Artwork thanks:

(true story alert)

A friend of mine who is an instructional coach at a local elementary school relayed a very telling little story to me today via e-mail. =>

She said that a friend’s first grade daughter, named Riley, was trolling through a pumpkin patch this past weekend…  and apparently, she eventually found one she liked but wanted to keep looking in case she found a better one, and she told her mother, “let’s bookmark this one.“

That was pretty funny to me the first time I read it.  Of course, after it settled into my brain a bit more, it became even more amazing.  This first grader gets it.  She understands the concept of why one would perform such a seemingly simple, yet terribly valuable task.

I suppose because this provides such powerful contrast to another recent conversation with a teacher who detailed for me how he helped explain the concept of bookmarking to his high school principal. (yes, garden variety bookmarking- not social bookmarking, as in Delicious, etc.)  So yes, just this past month, he walked this principal through the process of bookmarking sites within a web browser for the first time.

I frequently rail against the pigeonholing of folks by nearly age alone into Prensky’s (2001) “digital natives” and “digital immigrants.”  Kids certainly possess a much higher comfort level with technology, but their proficiency often seems grand only in the eyes of the technology illiterate.  I can certainly say that for the high school students I work with, few truly show characteristics of being truly “digital native.”  For this, and many other reasons, I really wish I’d stop seeing this term.  This weak differentiation can even be rather counterproductive at times.

However, my hatred of the phrase weakens a tiny bit hearing stories like this one-  not at all because this story makes it true, but because it does allow me to see where people might have generated this idea in the first place.

So how do you bookmark a pumpkin?…  I think I had just better contact little Riley for the tech specifics of that one.

Artwork thanks:

Bell, Darwin. “patch o’ pumpkins.” Darwin Bell’s Photostream. 24 OCT 2007.
Flickr. 31 Oct 2008 <http://www.flickr.com/photos/darwinbell/1723126935/>.