antici

I'm passing the time before F. and I leave for LA. First I was at work, but I couldn't concentrate, so I went home. But everything that can be packed has been packed, so I'm not sure what to do here either. Also! My shirts arrived today. I dress so snappy.

Yesterday in my teaching class, we discussed an article about the effects of unexamined assumptions on the classroom environment. Teachers can assume things about how learning works, the effectiveness of certain teaching methods, and even their relationship to their students and their schools. We talked about some kinds of assumptions that can be accidentally harmful. For instance: "teaching is a vocation, a calling, and I would do it for nothing." This one makes teachers feel good about themselves for being teachers, but also creates an obligation to put up with being overworked and earning low salaries. It also can make teachers profoundly guilty for not being constantly elated about their jobs. (Just like the similar assumption that everyone who is a mother loves being one.)

We also discussed some assumptions that were not mentioned by the article, and one of them was particularly interesting to me. I think engineering departments assume that "engineering education is intended to prepare students to be useful to their employers." At first this didn't seem so unusual, but I think in other disciplines it's more common for students to study the subject for its own sake, or because they want to put it to their own personal use. Literature, math, and languages are all subjects whose faculties think students are studying for more intrinsic reasons.

I think assuming that the purpose of engineering education is utility to corporate interests is particularly harmful, because educators are assuming that students aren't intrinsically motivated. It may even imply that students shouldn't be intrinsically motivated. Students tend to catch on to and adopt the assumptions of their instructors, so I think this assumption is likely to lead to students who don't have a personal stake in the profession. I don't think having a financial stake in it (in the form of a future job) counts the same way; in that sense the pressure to get good grades is a little bit like economic coercion. So when teachers assume students are studying the subject just to get jobs, the students themselves may be more likely to view their work as uninteresting and not personally relevant.

All registered athletes are in the list below

I leave for the Pan Ams this Thursday evening. My matches will be sometime Friday afternoon. I'm so excited! Now I have to go work out.

technology works as designed

I went for a run this morning with my new iPod. It was a lot easier and more fun than running with no music! Just like it's supposed to be! I wish the headphones had a clip, though -- the weight of the wire bouncing around sometimes causes them to wiggle out of my ears.

intrinsic aptitude my ass

I'm working on the references for the final project in a class on "College Teaching and Academic Careers." The project is a research proposal about classroom research; I'm writing mine about gender differences in participation styles. Having noticed that women often don't raise their hands and are more passive when doing group work, I want to come up with and test what I've named "low-stakes participation."

The whole thing seems to be a problem of confidence - active participation in class and small groups both builds and requires confidence. So maybe lowering the confidence requirement for participation will help train students (and women in particular) to be more confident in their ability.

Anyway, the article I am reading right now (Felder et al., "A longitudinal study of engineering student performance and retention: III. Gender differences in student performance and attitudes") keeps dropping bombs like this:

The converse question was also posed, i.e., what the most likely reason would be if the students performed above their expectations in the course (Table 10). Hard work was cited by the highest percentages of both men and women, but men were consistently more likely to report their own ability as the most likely factor while in four of five courses women were more likely to cite help or support from someone else. These attribution patterns match those observed by Fennema and Leder [25], who found that female mathematics students tend to attribute failure to themselves and success to help from others while male students tend to do the opposite.

Later on:

In the second semester of their senior year, the men remaining in the experimental course sequence were twice as likely as women to feel that they did more than their fair share in their groups and the women were significantly more likely to feel that their contributions were undervalued or ignored by other group members. This feeling is similar to one expressed by female Radcliffe College students, who reported that too often their contributions in small mixed study groups were not valued and so they preferred to study by themselves.

Yikes. And this, from a different article:

[Jacquelynne Eccles] found that even though girls got better math grades than boys, parents of daughters reported that math was more difficult for their child than parents of sons. For the math success of boys, parents rated talent and effort as equally important. For the math success of girls, parents said hard work was much more important than math talent. Ultimately, these young women have a lower opinion of their abilities in math and science and in their general intellectual abilities, even though they average higher college GPAs than young men.

And!

While boys quickly jump into a role and compete with one another to get their colleagues' attention and admiration, girls want to be in a group with people they like, and tend to wait to be invited or encouraged to assume roles.

Multiple sources and situations point to symptoms of the same disease. Lack of confidence and passivity are more common in women than in men, and they contribute negatively to learning.

Everyone agrees that group work is good, but how can instructors make sure confident students don't steamroll timid ones? In discussions with the whole class, the instructor can be there to guide the discussion and ask for contributions from students that need to be invited to participate. Small groups don't have the benefit of a facilitator like that.

Speedy!

I don't want to jinx it, but I think the weather has warmed up for good now. Even the ten-day forecast is in the 50s and 60s. Great news, because I just fixed my bike like you would not believe.

I'd been riding around with worn-out back brakes for a month or so - I could only use the front ones. Horribly unsafe, I know. This weekend I replaced the brake pads, and it's amazing how fast I can stop.

A week or so ago, it also came to my attention that there was some shifting trouble. I noticed the cable going into the shifter looked a little frayed, so at first I just tried replacing that. But the shifter itself had a very tiny, very important plastic nub broken off on the inside. This must have happened at some point before I noticed the problem (perhaps due to overzealously trying to shift) or maybe even while I was taking it apart to replace the cable. I spent the weekend messing with cables before I realized the shifter was broken, but it was absolutely no trouble to replace yesterday.

Last night I zipped over to Bdon's house and was reminded of the difference a sealed bottom bracket makes. Some things are so quietly good that you can only notice them when everything else is working properly.

I also got myself some fun bike accessories: a bell, so I don't have to ruin my bike-mood by shouting "get off the bike path" at people; a helmet that fits my head right, so I don't have to feel guilty for not wearing the old one that would just fall off anyway; and a great new red windbreaker that isn't intended specifically for cycling but works fabulously. It's even cut long in the back so my lower back doesn't get cold.

At work yesterday I mentioned my shifter story to R. (because I had the replacement in my bag at the time) and she said, "You take really good care of your bike, don't you?" People are surprised when you are a bike commuter and take good care of your bike, but nobody blinks when drivers take good care of their cars.

The thing is, I have to take good care of my bike. If I let something on my bike stay broken, it's unpleasant to ride, and then I'd rather just take the bus. Ewwwww, the bus. If I could make it more pleasant to ride in the winter, I'd even do it then. Not when there's snow in the road, though, because I'm worried about skidding. Maybe some ski goggles and one of those face hoods would help the rest of the time. My main problem is the killer wind.

Speaking of unpleasant to ride, Matt's bike was broken for more than a year before he even tried to fix it. He'd been in a crash, and I guess when he fell he landed on the frame and bent it. It was not repairable. But before he got a shop to look at it, he was in limbo and couldn't start the process of preparing to replace the fallen soldier. G. has a book about motivation, and one of the interesting facts in it is that if you promise to help people but put them on a waiting list, the people on the waiting list actually improve more slowly than people who express interest but don't get put on a waiting list. Basically, if you tell them to wait before you'll help them, they won't help themselves in the meantime. But people who are not waiting will improve on their own. Matt's bike feelings were, I think, a little like that. He threw it away Saturday night. All that's left is the front wheel, which we kept in case I ever screw mine up. Pour one out for a faithful old bike, y'all.

Completely ridiculous

Some people don't believe me when I say this is a real thing that actually happens.

exhaustion

I would be really good at this if it was just the daytime stuff I was supposed to do. But even now I am expected to be working. I won't!

whoa!

This article is awesome. But this quote is disturbing.

...But it never occurred to me there was anything I could do physically to protect myself. Why? Not because I was drunk. Because literally no one my whole life had told me that my body could work in my own defense (and many, many messages had told me to the contrary).

ooooo, you said a bad word

I bought a new computer! I wasn't planning on it. But there was an Opportunity. This is how it was:

1. My computer has been getting older. I was thinking about replacing it in the next year or so.
2. It started having a problem with the power cord connection that I'd had fixed once before (almost exactly a year ago).
3. Matt bought a MacBook, and I was very impressed.
4. I heard some things about Windows Vista, and I wasn't very impressed.
5. I heard CDW had previous-generation MacBook Pros on super-discount.
6. I checked, and I don't care too much about "Core Duo" vs. "Core 2 Duo."
7. I can still get AppleCare even if I don't buy directly from Apple.

So yeah, I bought a computer. I will probably get it Wednesday, or at least Thursday.

Also I watched some Illini Club Hockey! It was cool, and I want to play street hockey again like I used to back in the day. That was awesome. Too bad the posse isn't really full of sk8ers.

We went to the new Radio Maria tapas bar, and that was very nice. I still like the Blind Pig better, though. The BP might be my new favorite bar with no pool tables.

This weekend

Delicious: three cups chicken

Exciting: Porn Chowder at the Iron Post

THIS WILL MAKE TRAVEL VERY HAZARDOUS OR IMPOSSIBLE

I am horribly entertained by this phrase.

"Oh man, I ate soooo much. This will make travel very hazardous or impossible."

"I am dressed so sexy today! This will make travel very hazardous or impossible."
"That guy is an asshole. This will make travel very hazardous or impossible."

(We are having a blizzard; school is canceled. I've been in college for 7 years and never seen it canceled because of weather.)

always never forget to check your references

This is the sticky cake recipe I like.
http://www.chiff.com/recipe/pages/10125.htm

Girlfriends are like house plants: you can leave them alone, but even house plants need water sometimes.

"In graduate classes you can just give the students the book and the homework and let them teach each other. I wish I could get my undergrads to do that."

I did something right today! I've been having issues understanding random processes, and with the math for my coherence class in general. On Monday I took a shot at the homework and got maybe two thirds of it shakily done. So this morning I got out the textbook (a textbook! What luxury!) and highlighted enough of the chapter we're covering that you'd think they just screwed up and used yellow paper. This afternoon I took my homework (which I considered a draft, fully intending to rewrite it later) and my copy of the coherence theory yellow pages to office hours to talk about what was going on. It turned out not to be as bad as I thought.
I'd solved one problem with a backwards method, which I fixed. I clarified the difference between time-average and ensemble average. I listened to a discussion of the one problem I hadn't done yet (the problem statement had a piece of information I didn't understand, and the solution turned out to hinge on it). Then I kicked the shit out of a problem I thought I'd done wrong. I wound up giving a mini-lecture on how I interpreted the Poisson distribution to apply and translated an ensemble average into something that makes physical sense. Then we got to the part where I thought I was wrong, and it turned out to be a sign error. Damn, I'm good.
Then I wrote up this little story for a class I'm in on college teaching, and related it to the readings for this week. In this class, since they are so big on active learning, they love it when you relate the readings to your own experiences. I have been thinking - other disciplines expect students to read before coming to class. Engineers give lectures that are basically what the students would be reading if they were reading before class. Why don't we require them to do the reading, and then just have discussions of example problems during class time? We could directly discuss the thinking process of problem solving. We could still lecture about concepts that need clarification, but we wouldn't have to lecture about everything. Maybe we are concerned that the homework plus the reading will take too much time, but: (a) people in other disciplines already do it, and (b) if we teach this way the homework will be easier because they'll have practiced. I am serious, folks. I am going to try this.

The Elements of Style

I think I'm going to change my haircut. I've had the same "long in front, short in back" style for a few years now, I think. I love it, but it's got a few problems. First, it takes time to make the hair stand up in the back, and I am very busy this semester. Yes, I am seriously considering sacrificing style for an extra 10 minutes in the morning. Very, very busy. Second, it's winter, and if I have a hairstyle that depends so heavily on standing up for its stylishness, hats are right out, and hoods are contraindicated except in extreme circumstances.
I fondly refer to my current haircut as a reverse mullet. It's cooler than that makes it sound, though, because it has a lot of razory spikiness built in. I hope to maintain the razor coolness, but move closer to a short-all-over strategy so I have an easier time wearing it. Maybe when I have fewer classes I'll grow out the front again. Why does anyone ever grow out the back of their hair? If anyone knows, please explain.

We got to carry each other, carry each other

Jack has been playing the same "best of U2" CD in for the past few weeks of jiujitsu. In each class we hear it at least three times. That makes six times per week. If I assume it's been going on for three weeks (I suspect it's more, but I am rounding down), that's 18 times in a row that we've heard the same CD. I like U2 too, but damn. Maybe I ought to bring Jack a mix. He'd probably be into some of that Brazilian stuff all the cool kids like. But would it be weird to Paulo, suddenly hearing a bunch of what are basically golden oldies to him?

Jesus Ray we got the chessboard out but you playin' Whac-A-Mole

Jesus Ray we got the tortas out but you makin' Qdoba

Jesus Ray we got the 客家豆腐 out but you eatin' fried rice

Jesus Ray we got our tuxes out but you wearin' a shirt with a name tag

gross.

In his most recent advice article, Cary Tennis suggested that a man should leave his cheating, unrepentant wife. So far, so good. But then he said the guy should get in touch with some fathers' rights groups for support. Uh. Those are the guys who think domestic violence happens as often against men as it does against women, right? The guys who think a man shouldn't have to pay child support unless he gets to see the kids, even if there are good reasons not to let him? These guys think women are always lying: at home about whether they're on the pill or not, and in court about whether their husbands were abusive. You recommend a guy get over his irresponsible wife by taking up hating women as a hobby? Bad form, Cary.

Also, I'm in a class with a discussion board, and one of the ongoing assignments is to post about the weekly readings. People often post about themselves and how the readings relate to their lives or past work or whatever. But one response was kind of weirdly defensive. It seemed like, confronted with scholarly works that challenge previous experience, this person's response to suggestions for improvement to existing methods was "but that's harrrrd" and the response to a description of various levels of cognitive development was "did you just call me dumb?"

I met S. this weekend, who seems cool. He's in a local band called Dress Code and teaches in the Anthropology department. I am going to try to go to the next Dress Code show. As one might expect, there is a dress code - some sort of preference exists for people wearing a dress. The band will also wear a dress. That's just this show, though - other shows' dress codes did not involve dresses.

为什么学中文？ 因 为 我 想 交 朋 友。

Today I tried ordering food in Chinese for the first time. I hadn't tried it yet because I am shy about speaking Chinese with strangers - I feel like I am wasting their time. But today I did, and it turned out to be kind of an adventure.

I went to the Chinese place across the street from my office and asked for some dumplings, and the owner was only a little surprised - I think I have probably said "xiexie" to him before or something.

While I'm eating my dumplings, a white guy comes in and has a conversation in Chinese with the owner, who tells him he has a new dish that's delicious, and also that there's another white person who can speak Chinese here (that's me). So I invite the guy to sit with me.

We had a nice conversation about how he has been to a lot of different countries, I should go to China, and the internet is a series of tubes. So I made a new friend using Chinese! Awesome!

fighting crime

Batman had it pretty good, overall.

shame

I have some friends who are lawyers. Sometimes when they talk about the situations they encounter in their jobs, I am overwhelmed by what happens in the world. One friend's job involves going to public hearings about the construction of a Hindu temple near town, to make sure none of the locals violates our state's religious freedom laws by saying something stupid like "well, this here's a Christian community." That sentiment is obviously still in their hearts, but instead the discussions center on their made-up concerns with the plan: drainage, irrigation, parking, anything they can think of to slow down the approval of a nice temple that will probably even bring them some business.

Another one who I met recently works on cases of abused and neglected children. Apparently prosecutors with that job are 3 or 4 times more likely to be [assaulted? killed?] than average people. I wonder if it's because people who abuse children just choose the children because they're easy targets, but really could mistreat anybody. Maybe the way they communicate with people is just broken. I feel sick about how much that dynamic is based on power, and how easy it is for a person to be trapped and powerless.

I am ashamed of humanity's sexism, bigotry, poverty and cruelty. Even pretty tame examples from our apple-pie corner of the world bring up all kinds of shock and anger and shame. I don't know what to do. Unfortunately, all I know to do with evil people is actual fighting, which isn't useful. It would be enough to drive me to violence, though, if only that would help.

Edit: I wrote this a long, long time ago and never published it. Now it's a little less fresh, and I'm ok with seeing it on the internet.

I love to eat

Wikipedia has a whole section about Chinese vegetables. I spent a lot of time at work last week reading about hollow vegetable and Chinese broccoli. It's exciting to me, because I love food. Bdon & I went to a new grocery store today and found some tiny, tiny all-green bok choy. They were delicious! You could put the whole thing in your mouth at once!

When I go to my parents' house for vacation, I need to remember to bring some things along that I don't want to look for or go without while I'm there. For instance, my brothers and I have a secret plan that will require some sweet rice flour. I also want to bring my yoga mat, in hopes that it'll be a portable way to keep working out regularly. And I should probably bring along some Chinese to review - maybe these children's books that I have. They look fun.