I overhead an exasperated parent the other day: “The kid just won’t stop asking ‘why’ all the time. Everything I say, she challenges. She’s driving me absolutely nuts.”
We need more kids like that.
I know, easy for me to say since I’m childless by choice, but I really do believe that the biggest danger we face as a society is a populace that doesn’t want to think for themselves. I am more than happy to have students challenge me about the material I teach. In reality, though, they spend a lot more time challenging me on my attendance policy, my lack of understanding that they missed class due to a hangover, my grading policy, and my refusal to allow ‘do-overs’ for tests that didn’t produce the desired scores. Most disppointingly, so many test answers are phrases regurgitated directly back from my notes with no evidence that the writer spent even a few seconds considering what those words meant and whether they were right.
…
As I tell my students over and over again: If you don’t understand something, the last thing you should do is repeat it.
via Cocktail Party Physics – i think that i shall never see / a carbon offset as lovely as a tree. I loved every little in nook and cranny she explored from just a couple of simple marketing statements.