Monday, May 31, 2021

 Monday, May 31, 2021

             Today, I had my Zoom session helping volunteer tutors in the Step-Up Tutoring program. Two people were scheduled, but only one showed up. Karen is an elderly woman who had no experience teaching. She gave a vague description of her student's problem. She kept asking if the girl was dyslexic. I had no idea and didn't find it particularly relevant. We know that she's a sixth-grade girl who has trouble reading on a 2nd-grade level. I advised her to have her student identify all the letters in the words and all the sounds for a start. Karen was wonderful to work with. I have had several people who were responsive. However, none of them returned to see me again to report their successes and failures. I have to remember to tell them not to expect too much from themselves. I must tell the participants how I started. Of course, I had a background in linguistics already. I knew what phonemes were.

            I did some videoing today. I thought I would do a slide here and a slide there. I wound up doing the whole video over and over. I also make changes as I read more of Dehaene's book "How We Learn." His view of explicit versus implicit learning (discovery learning) is informative if biased. What makes it clear he's biased? His language changes when he talks about discovery learning. He switches to persuasive language versus informative. I find his informative language on how to help students learn explicitly helpful. He talks about the role of attention and curiosity. Attention isn't the sort a teacher demands in the classroom. That type of attention requires that the student be quiet, not disturb anyone else in the class, and keep their eyes focused on the teacher. That type of attention does not ask how the student processed the information internally; it does not address what it means to internalize information. Explicit instruction is necessary; we don't expect our students to rediscover the wheel. However, many children enter school reading without explicit instruction. One can say that reading can be discovered. We know this because we have evidence. 

             I started generating lots of negative thoughts about things going wrong. I produced little spurts of fear. I have no idea where this is coming from. It's not my usual way of thinking these days. This is an old pattern. I hope it doesn't come back to dominate me. That would be bad news.

            Katherine, the rep from Provision Solar, came by to turn on the ten panels they installed and show me how to use the Tesla app. She's an enthusiastic person. She has been living in Hawaii for something like thirty years. She owns five horses, thoroughbreds no less. She once owned something like fifteen. She used to breed them. Talk about an expensive hobby. 

            The Tesla app for solar is amazing. Elon Musk, like Steve Jobs, pushed for a gorgeous design. Watching the app is addictive. I can see exactly how much electricity my house is pulling, how much the sun is producing, how much is coming from the batteries, and how much is coming from or going to the grid. 

            I had two clients scheduled for today. Both canceled—neither thought to tell me. Only one apologized. I guess they assumed I would know since it was Memorial Day. I can't blame them. I'm the one with nowhere to go. Truth be told, if Mike were here, there wouldn't have been a radical difference in my day. It's not like we would have had an all-day event.