The ultimate consumer

Definition of CONSUME

transitive verb

1

: to do away with completely : destroy consumedseveral buildings>

2

a : to spend wastefully : squanderb : use up consumed much of his time>

3

a : to eat or drink especially in great quantity <consumedseveral bags of pretzels>b : to enjoy avidly : devour consumes for fun — E. R. Lipson>

4

: to engage fully : engross <consumed with curiosity>

5

: to utilize as a customer <consume goods and services>

intransitive verb

1

: to waste or burn away : perish

2

: to utilize economic goods

I was thinking about the word "consume" and realized that it was an almost perfect definition for who I (or I guess any other human being!) was. From the time I get up in the morning, I start "consuming" food & water. I "consume" news and all sorts of info in my inbox. I "consume" the services of the public transportation later on while traveling to my college. There I "consume" knowledge [although I have a little trouble thinking of consuming knowledge but we can debate about that in another post :)]. I get "consumed" by my conversations with my friends and professors. If there's a party, I "consume" more STUFF Sometimes I also "consume" my time doing nothing! So more or less, I am a "consumer" of daily life...

But everything that I have just mentioned is all about me doing something with my life and I see people around me pretty much doing the same things. That's kind of selfish, isn't it? So, is being a consumer, an act of selfishness? We get so engrossed in our daily lives that we sometimes forget that we can be more than just consumers. We can give to people around us. But that generally comes secondary to our consumer nature.

As I am thinking about it more, I am beginning to question whether its really me who is the consumer or is it my life? Is my life "consuming" me? But how can that be different from me? I define what my life is and what I will do with my life. How can it be the other way round? I just feel that as we are going on with our daily life, our life starts controlling us more rather than the other way round. Take a very simple (and perhaps cliche) example - I work hard, earn lots of money and start traveling around the country just for fun (because I have money now!). Now I have defined what my life would be like. Now in order to keep that definition, my life makes me work harder so that I am able to visit more places and I try saving up more. I think about savings before spending money on anything. My consumption pattern is overshadowed by my life's consumption pattern. But is that a bad thing? I don't know. I like traveling but I'm not in favor of the idea of promoting my or my life's consumer instincts. Maybe if I couple the definition of life as a traveller with "giving" then it will be better. But then am I "consuming" (engrossing) myself in the act of giving???

Engineering v/s Hormones

It's funny to think that WE (yeah... the grand "WE" - me, you , the person in front of you, etc.) are expected to perform our best when our bodies & minds are least prepared to do so. I'm talking about the undergraduates - yup, the one in front of you or even the one you have left behind as your past. The have to deal with the hormonal craziness of a teenager and the emotional upheavals as a result as well as go through the undergrad drill and grill. Not being sure of what they want to do with life doesn't help either. All of us go through this stage and it's a weird feeling but no one seems to remember their experiences!

A typical Sunday morning start - quite atypical in US...

The darkness of the night has not yet passed by and the halogen lamps on the street are shining brightly. The silence of the pre-dawn hours is periodically broken by the call of the flying bats. The sky is trying hard to keep itself wrapped in the star-studded blanket as the sparrows and crows gradually announce the arrival of dawn. The 'dong-dong' sound of the temple bell hitches a ride with the gentle breeze. I hear more bells as the priest conducts the morning prayers. A distinct voice blows over the morning dew - 'Allah-o-akbar', announcing the first hour of prayers. The radio begins to crackle from one of the houses and an energetic female voice sputters the morning news. The sky has turned crimson red now. The sparrows start their day early and hop on the cemented road looking for worms, wary of the cat walking by. The crows are not amused by the feline presence either and make a rucus from their vantage position atop the cable TV wire crisscrossing overhead. Bang! Something heavy seems to have landed on the front verandah. I decide to jump on this morning bandwagon and pull myself out of the bed. The Sunday morning newspaper is lying on the verandah... it's quite a fat package! Looks like it decided to pick up a couple of Morning Glory leaves for me while it was on its arial route to the verandah. The newspaper bhaiya surely knows how to wish good-morning! I spread out the newspaper on the table and tune in to the happenings over the world. So much seems to have happened while the sky was trying to hold on to its star-studded blanket! The crows are still making a rucus about the cat so they obviously don't care about anything else that goes on in the world. As I flip through the first page of the newspaper, I wonder if the crows are really the wise ones. Knowing the misdeeds of a politician is not that much fun. The feline furry four legged animal is actually worth paying more attention to. I see it slip by the sunflower plants, eagerly looking for something to eat. I return to the cartoon section, chai and hot aloo parantha. There's nothing more wonderful than this trio.

Sitting on the 10th floor of a high rise apartment building in downtown chicago on a foggy cold morning makes me miss these things back home all the more. No sparrows, no crows, no cats, no temple bells, no 'Allah-o-akbar' calls, no fat newspaper with Morning Glory leaves, no morning dew, no cable TV lines... maybe its time to have some fresh aloo parantha and chai to make up for this loss!

Notebook v/s Computer

I have been thinking for the last couple of days on how computers have changed us and how we do things. I'll leave the benefits and disadvantages debate for someone else but what I am really talking about is what have computers taken away from us that using notebooks afforded? I remember myself (seems like a long time ago) taking notes and drawing while listening to the teacher or reading a book. It definitely took more time but now that I think about it, there was an organic feel to the whole experience. I was actually embodying the concept that I was engaged in. When you think of it, writing and drawing are forms of gesturing. It's just that the level of abstraction is different. You are translating what the teacher is saying or what you are reading into textual and graphical form with certain kinds of hand movement. Now take the same activity and think about doing it using computers (laptops included). You translate those sayings and readings into textual or graphical representation with a series of button clicks and key presses. This will also count as gesture but something has changed here. It's a different mode of translation and you are making different body movements.

I remember my mom telling me when I was in school to "write it down to remember". And when I wrote things down, I did remember them better. What was happening? Did writing help make a new pathway in my brain?

Consider this as well, handwriting analysis claims that a person's personality can be gauged by looking at his handwriting. Hence handwriting serves as a window into a person's emotions, thoughts, basic nature and overall personality. That means handwriting is a way of expressing these dimensions about oneself. When you take that medium of expression away, does something change about the person? I have seen people say that their handwriting is not good as it used to be because they have been using laptops for a long time. So that means their handwriting has evolved (or rather devolved) as a result of using computers. If we continue with our chain of thought that handwriting is a window into a person's overall personality, does that then mean that the person has changed as well over time along with his handwriting?

I want to get back to that issue of embodiment again. When we write, we "feel" the words. We "create" the words alphabet by alphabet. When we are small, we learn to "create" the alphabets by writing them repeatedly. We then write words until we get them into our heads. Certainly something happened as a result of that act of writing things down. The only thing I can think of now is that when I am trying to learn a word, I see the word first. My brain processes the visual information. If I then say the word aloud, my auditory senses add to the visual information and reinforce the learning. If I go further and write it down, my motor senses provide another feedback and I'm guessing that reinforces the learning further. Instead if I just press the button 'a' on my computer, I have performed a different kind of motor activity which sends a different kind of signal back to my brain - when you press this button, you type 'a' instead of the message that you can 'write' alphabet 'a' like this...

I strongly feel that there is something very important to the act of writing that is missing when we type on our computers. One might argue that typing on the computer is faster and lets us engage in activities which require higher cognitive abilities. I don't disagree with them but we also need to think about what we take away from kids when we replace their notebooks with computers in this increasingly hi-tech world...

(Thanks to Matt for brainstorming :) )

What if...

Drum beats, melodious music, wave of hands, rhythmic feet movement and perspiring yet happy faces... The floor was filled with people of all ages, race, and gender. There were a bunch of asian students occupying one corner of the floor while americans were distributed around the room and could be found with their Indian friends, trying to learn a move or two. Enthusiastic Indians were also scattered around mentoring their "students" diligently. Uncles and aunties were witnessing this amazing cultural exchange from the first row of the seats. Some of them even decided to jump right in the mix and show that they were still capable of shaking their legs... With loud bhangra music in the background, everyone was dancing to their heart's content. This was the first day of Incredible India musical fest in Chicago. Everyone was trying out new moves and new styles except for one girl. She kept on sitting there, right next to the dance floor, staring at all the people on the dance floor through her glasses. She seemed to be a student as she had a bag loosely hanging from the back of her chair. She had a faint smile on her face and her hands moved a little as if to follow the rhythm. She moved a little bit to get a better view of a new move on the dance floor but there wasn't much space for the wheels of her wheelchair to turn. Her fingers were crippled and her legs immobile. She moved the joystick on her wheelchair with the help of her index finger and moved to another corner to get a better view of the dance floor. She sat there the whole time people danced and rejoiced. She seemed to be rejoicing too but its very hard for me to imagine what kind of rejoicing that might be. She seemed content and satisfied with the fact that she could see people dancing at such close encounters. That seemed to be all she wanted. She might be visualizing herself dancing like that young girl on the dance floor. She might be moving her legs freely in any direction, absorbing the bhangra beats. She might be laughing and doing that head and leg move. But she might also be thinking "what if I could do that in real"... "What if I could get up now... What if I could jump up and down, run around, shake my legs, and wave my hands with the rhythm of the drums and the melodious music... "What if I could just get up and walk...". What if....

Hyeee peeeople!!

The last one year in Chicago has certainly been very eventful with lots of things happening (and not happening!). But what I cherish the most are the new friends I have made here. It is amazing how strangers walk into your life and then become friends in no time... or should I say a family!
As I walked back from my college every day I crossed a cozy pub (Rick's Bar) at the corner of Taylor St and Western. With its open door and bright neon sign, it was very welcoming and used to attract me. I could see people laughing inside, having a good time. It was generally late every day and although I wanted to go through those welcoming doors, I wasn't sure whether I should or not. I guess I hesitated because I have never been a regular bar person and there was a wall around me that stopped me from stepping outside my comfort zone and experience something new. Every day I saw people with drinks, playing pool or darts, smiling and talking. Just by walking past this pub and seeing those smiling faces made me smile and by the time I reached home, I used to feel very peaceful and happy. I used to see the same set of customers everyday. The person behind the bar changed everyday but I assumed that there might be rotations. So it was the same person every other day (approximately). For some reason, I felt that it was a family owned pub. These were the people I saw behind the bar and you can see for yourself why I made that connection - a cool tall guy in his early 30's, a young vivacious beautiful girl in her early 20's (although with girls you never know their age and should never guess!), a blonde lady with a not-so-cheerful face (or more accurately - with an artificial smile) in her late 50's, and finally a short grumpy man (must be Rick) with wrinkled face maybe in his late 50's too. So there I was, it seemed like a family! Anyways... so everyday I saw the "son" or the "daughter" of that grumpy man and occasionally their mother and the grumpy father himself behind the bar. Sometimes they would also stand outside near the open doors, sharing a smoke on a cold night, cheerful as usual. And as I walked past, once in a while I thought - Maybe they have lots of problems in life and that's why they come here... but then its good that they can find happiness in this family pub!

One day, after Neena came to Chicago and had started going to college here, as we were walking down Taylor St., we decided to stop and go through those welcoming doors! Neena was much more conversant with pubs and I felt confident going inside with her. I knew I wouldn't make a fool of myself with her as she knew a lot about drinks, etc. So there we were, INSIDE Rick's bar!! There were a lot of hilarious one-liners on the wall around us (e.g. "Never trust a man who is not drunk" - So you get the point right?). The place was dimly lit. On the far end was a dart board against the wall and another console game by its side. There was a door which I figured led to a small restaurant next door. On the far end, but against another wall was a "juke-box" (I still don't know what it is exactly called!). There were 4-5 tall round tables along the same wall that led to the door. The main door (yes, those welcoming doors!) were facing the bar. Behind the bar, there were rows and rows and rows (... and more rows!) of bottles (of course vodka, tequila, rum etc.) of all colors and shapes that you can possibly think of. Separating these rows in half was a not-so-new cash register and below the register there were some more exotic looking bottles. The wall behind the bottles had a huge mirror (running across pretty much the entire wall). There were a couple of drink-list of beers with their prices stuck on top of the mirror. A plastic notice board hung casually at the end of the wall below a medium sized TV. There were 3 TV's - 2 huge and 1 medium sized. One huge TV was facing us when we sat at the bar with our back towards the door while another one was stuck high on the wall next to the door. So I had to stretch my neck to the left side to see it... Oh I forgot to mention the dance floor and the pool table. So once you enter the pub through those welcoming doors, you have a huge window with all the neon signs on your left (facing Western) and another row of windows on your right (facing Taylor). Then you have the bar on the left, the tall tables on the right. As you keep on walking and once you go past the bar, you hit the pool table. To your immediate left is the dance floor and immediate right is that song-box. Go past the pool table and dance floor and song table, and you'll end up playing darts and some video game. If you feel like taking a piss then the door is right next to the video game console on your left (that's the male one bro!). Of course the female one is right next to it! There is a black and white picture of the Beatles group hanging between the console and the restroom. A sign hanging above the bar mentions that minimum credit card purchase is $10 and then there are all those funny one-liners all around. "How may I help you today?" (a female voice breaks my observation spree)..... I am still coming to terms that I am INSIDE the pub - "Uhhh?"... I didn't know what to order ("A Miller Lite please" would have been just fine .. but that's so boring!). And I had Neena with me... so I just looked at her and she quickly made her mind (and mine) and we were all set (I don't remember what we had the first time... must be some margarita or something... or maybe the Irish Creme?). And then we started chatting with "Rick's daughter". She asked us if we were new to the place and we started telling her about how we had moved from Atlanta blah blah blah... I saw the same faces that I had seen all these months and they were laughing as usual, cracking jokes and pulling each other's legs. There was an old man too in that group. he didn't seem to have any teeth but he was really enjoying his beer. There he was, sitting in his usual spot - one seat away from me on my left, happily sipping his beer. He poured his beer into a glass and then had it slowly. There was another late-50's man in between us and he had a small laptop in front. He was also drinking beer but directly from the bottle (wonder what the difference in drinking styles reflects about the person). He had the CTA (Chicago Transportation Authority) website open in his laptop and he was looking at the live-update for route #49. Let me put you in the right context here. Bus route #49 runs north-south on Western and there's a CTA website where you can check the exact time a bus is supposed to arrive at a bus-stop. The Western and Taylor bus-stop was right across the road. So by checking the bus-timing for that stop, one could predict when the bus would go past the pub. So.. my man was sitting inside this pub, checking the bus timing and predicting when the bus would go past the Western facing window and then looking outside to check if the website was actually reporting accurate task. What a wonderful way to spend your time!! The young girl was talking to the customers and always had a smile on her face. I realized from the way they were talking to her that they were long-time customers and knew her well.

Everybody seemed to have their own small world but also seemed to be a part of this pub. As we walked out of the pub that day after finishing our drinks, we saw that everyone was still sitting and drinking and talking. It seemed as if they didn't have any rush to go anywhere or do anything. The only person moving was that young girl. I felt that if I were to walk in the next day, I would see the same set of people in the same place doing the same thing... as if time had stopped inside the pub for these people. Rachael wished us goodnight and we wished her the same. So Rachael was Rick's daughter... hmmm... We became Neena and Chandan instead of 2 strangers who had walked into that pub for the first time. After the wall had been broken, I wanted to go there every friday! There was something about that place that attracted me a lot. Now when I walked past that pub and saw those familiar faces, I smiled at some, waved at some and they waved and smiled back at me. Neena and I went to that pub many more times after that but not as frequently as those other people. The girl behind the bar became Rachael - a good friend of ours (and NOT Rick's daughter!!!!), Rick's son became Dave (and he was NOT Rick's son!!!), the toothless man became Franky, and the CTA bus-tracker man became Richard. There were other people who sat at the tall tables but they were kind of in the background when you sat at the bar and I never got to know anyone well. The people at the bar were a part of one family (the bar-family) and the ones at the table were the table-family.

Whenever we walked past that pub, Frankie used to wave to us and say "Hyeee Peeeople". For him we were "people" :) I have never heard anyone greet like that so it was really unique. He had a distinct voice and very friendly demeanor. Although old (late 70's), he's still young at heart. We found out that Franky worked at the Lu-Lu's, a hamburger place on Taylor. He didn't seem to have a famliy.... ummmm.. I'll take that back... Rachael, Dave, Richard, and the people in Rick's Bar were his family.

Yesterday we went to Rick's Bar again after 2 months. It was Rachael's birthday yesterday and she was so excited to see us. We gave her a bunch of pink roses and 2 chocolates and then sat down at that familiar bar. We sat at the same place as always. Richard was right there on my left but this time he was playing with a small handheld video-game. I asked Rachael about Franky and she smiled at me. After a while, Franky walked in, smiling as usual and said "Hyeeee Peeeople". The same old style and distinct voice. The same love and affection. I looked at him and smiled. He came straight towards me and put his hand on my shoulder. I was sitting at the bar and so turned towards him. He asked me - "Where have you been?". I told him that we had gone to India to get married over the summer. I suddenly realized that I had become a part of his family too and he was missing us all summer. I felt like hugging him but didn't. He smiled again and patted me on my shoulder and waved at Rachael while pointing to us. Before I could realize it, he had bought us a drink to celebrate our return to the "bar-family". He did it with such flair and style that he should have been in his early 30's and not late 70's. Rachel was also quick to notice the gesture and asked us what we would like. We had a Blue MF (I don't swear in public :P). We thanked Franky for the drinks. I was still trying to make sense of the whole situation. I had not realized that we had become a part of those people in Rick's Bar who always used to laugh, have fun, crack jokes and relax. I was no longer looking at them from outside while walking back home from college. I was INSIDE the pub, within those welcoming doors with Franky and the rest of the bar-family around me. Rachael was her usual as well. She was very excited that we had come to meet her and brought her flowers. We felt that we were at home. Franky returned to his usual seat and poured beer into his glass and started sipping. I smiled at him and he smiled back... full of love and peace. Franky reminded me of my grandfather. That's right, Franky was the eldest in the bar-family and he must have got worried when two small kids (me and Neena) were missing for two months. Maybe I am just imagining too much but then that's what I was feeling at that time... We bought Franky one round of drinks too. He was very happy and gave me a toothless smile. As we walked out of that pub yesterday after wishing Rachel Happy Birthday again, we were feeling very happy and content. Maybe it was the Blue MF or maybe it was the bar-family... Who cares what it was actually. All I cared was that we were back and had become "people" again.... "Hyeee Peeeople" :)

(18th September, 2010)

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Fun Theory to change people's behavior

This is an amazing experiment. Changing people's behavior/practices/routines :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lXh2n0aPyw

Right to Education Act 2009 (India)

Sixteen years after the idea was first mooted, the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 has finally been notified, after receiving the assent of the President of India. Article 21-A, as inserted by the Constitution (Eighty-Sixth Amendment) Act, 2002, provides for free and compulsory education of all children in the age group of six to fourteen years as a Fundamental Right. Consequently, the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009, has been enacted by the Parliament. The salient features of the Right of Education Bill include free and compulsory education to all children of India in the six to 14 age group; no child shall be held back, expelled, or required to pass a board examination until completion of elementary education; a child who completes elementary education (upto class 8) shall be awarded a certificate; calls for a fixed student-teacher ratio; will apply to all of India except Jammu and Kashmir; provides for 25 % reservation for economically disadvantaged communities in admission to Class One in all private schools; mandates improvement in quality of education; school teachers will need adequate professional degree within five years or else will lose job; school infrastructure (where there is problem) to be improved in three years, else recognition cancelled; and financial burden will be shared between state and central government.

(source: http://www.digitallearning.in/news/news-details.asp?Title=Right-to-Education-Act-2009-in-action&newsid=16745)

To read the full law, click here - http://education.nic.in/Elementary/free%20and%20compulsory.pdf

Look within

A man feared his wife wasn't hearing well as she used to and he thought
she might need a hearing aid. Not quite sure how to approach her, he
called his family doctor to discuss the problem. The doctor told him
there is a simple, informal test; which he could perform and give them a
better idea about her hearing loss.



"Here's what you do," said the doctor, "stand about 40 feet away from
her, and in a normal conversational speaking tone, see if she hears you.
If not, go to 30 feet, then 20 feet, and so on until you get a
response."



That evening, when his wife was in the kitchen, cooking dinner, he was
in the drawing room, standing about 40 feet away from her. "Honey,
what's for dinner?" he asked in a normal tone. No response! So he moved
closer to the kitchen, about 30 feet from his wife and repeated "Honey,
what's for dinner?" Still there was no response. Next, he moved into the
dining room where he was placed about 20 feet from his wife and asked
the same question. Still further, he didn't get his awaited response. He
now walked up to the kitchen door which was another 10 feet away and
asked "Honey, what's for dinner?" Again no response! So he walks up and
whispers behind her "Honey, what's for dinner?" "Steve, for the fifth
time I've said, "Chicken". "Do you have some hearing problem?"



Sometimes, the problem may not be with the other person as we always
think; it could be within us.

Let's look within ourselves before we find fault with others...

(email from Uttishthata on 22 Feb 2010)

Looking beyond evidences

Scientific evidence certainly helps us in achieving the stated goal but often times we get so caught up in them that we forget to look at all the other possible outcomes. We stop looking beyond the evidences. In this context, I liked a dialog from Patch Adams (must watch if you haven't!) -

Arthur: How many fingers do you see?

Patch: There are four fingers, Arthur.

Arthur: [You are just] another idiot. No! Look at me. You're focusing on the problem. If you focus on the problem, you can't see the solution. Never focus on the problem! Look beyond the fingers. How many do you see?

Patch: Eight.

Arthur: Yes! See what no one else sees. See what everyone chooses not to see... out of fear, conformity or laziness. See the whole world anew each day.

So try to see what everyone else chooses not to see out of fear, conformity or laziness. Look beyond the problem and evidences.

Are assessments really required?

Are assessments really required? Who are they important for - students or teachers/researchers? Do the students really need to know what they "know"? When they are in the class interacting with their peers and teachers then they are obviously learning "something". Education researchers keep on saying that the agency of learning needs to be with the learner (e.g. Collins) but then when we think about evaluation, we find that the students are evaluated on what the teachers/researchers think they should know. Moreover, any kind of evaluation seems to be framed to ascertain how good the teacher was or the learning environment was, and this is known by the performance of the student on the evaluations. Does the student really need to know how good the teacher was? Let us argue that the student really gains from the evaluation as he/she gets a chance to measure his/her knowledge and then compare with others to determine relative knowledge or use the measurement to secure further educational opportunities (e.g. progressing through the grades, transfer from school to college, etc.). This notion of quantification of knowledge is disturbing because can the evaluator really know "everything" the student learned? The evaluations are mostly based on what the students "ought to know" by the end of the school year. So if the evaluators don't know what the students really learned and they evaluate the students on what they should have learned, is that a fair way of ascertaining which students are more intelligent than others (very often evaluation results i.e. marks are used to indicate the intelligence of the student)? Moreover, given that we know that every student is unique and internalizes knowledge in different ways, are standardized evaluations justified?

Suppose we do away with the complete system of evaluation, and let the students discover & internalize knowledge in their own unique way then how can we know whether that student can or cannot do a specific task later on in life (example write a letter to the boss)? Well, I would argue that this task later on his life also presents a learning opportunity and can be utilized as such. There is a constant push to prepare our students to face the "harsh realities of life" and we justify their schooling along that argument. Hence we keep on testing them to see if they are well prepared to move to the next stage in life and this goes on throughout the life. Maybe the "harsh realities" aren't that harsh if we stop thinking like that. But alas, the generation before the students were brought up thinking like that and so are the students now. They will do the same to their students and it will go on... Is it all in the mind? Are evaluations a way to know what's in the mind? Who's mind - the teachers or the students?

Make my child the most intelligent of all...

This thought came to me when our Learning Science cohort was discussing the research study where they found that US students were not at par with students from other nations (particularly China and India). This race to be the "best" has been going on since the launch of Sputnik which spurred the US govt to invest a lot of money into educating the "citizens of tomorrow" so that they were scientific thinkers and could compete with the Soviets. With time the competitor changed and now its the Asians who are leading the race.

I have been wondering since that class discussion whether who is at the top really matters. The US wants its kids to beat the Chinese and then ..... then what? We'll have one more study which will claim that US kids are now at the top (and of course someone will dispute that claim and there will be many more studies trying to prove/disprove that). Excelling in studies is definitely important and one must strive to gain as much knowledge as possible but one must not forget that every child is distinctly different. That doesn't mean that US kids are dumb or Indian kids are intelligent but what it means is that people from different cultures have different goals and needs and these influence the way the entire community thinks and acts. For example, in India, learning is given a divine status. There is a goddess of learning. So it is automatically put at a very high pedestal and is viewed as something that will enhance a person spiritually and help him/her lead a better life. One may not hear or say this aloud but I feel it is there within each one of us as a subconscious force driving us to gain knowledge. There is also a huge social value attached to education. Educated people are respected by the society and they automatically gain a high status in the community. So you see, the motivation factor to gain knowledge is completely different as compared to US where the stress is on beating the kids across the globe. Of course these are not the only ones and there are LOTS of other factors influencing the game but for the sake of argument I've used these couple. In fact now even the Indians are getting into the race business...

So all these examples are simply to stress that every community has its own "local" needs and goals. In trying to compete with the kids across the globe we are putting too much stress on our kids at home and that is getting reflected in disastrous ways (increased suicide rates, increase in diseases amongst kids, etc.). Why can't we just settle for goals that are meaningful to each community and structure the learning experience of the kids accordingly. Why do we need to make every child on the globe the most intelligent? Some of you might be saying globalization demands that. But like we saw, education is a complicated matter... it's not just schools, kids and curriculum. There's a huge socio-cultural aspect to it which is often neglected. Globalization can merge markets across the globe but can it also merge socio-economic and cultural values? People across the globe will remain different and their differences should be acknowledged and respected. The race to be the global first shouldn't take a toll on the kids... let them play and learn at their own pace.

What's the price of evidence?

For me this question is mainly situated within the context of research and hence my focus is on experimental evidence. Is spending billions of dollars and thousands of man hours worth the effort in trying to find evidence to support a claim? I was recently watching a National Geographic program where they were investigating the horrible 9/11 attack. There is a lot of controversy surrounding why the twin towers fell down - because of heat from the burning aviation fuel or because of the impact. Numerous agencies have investigated this controversy and have their stories ready for the consumer. Purdue even got a grant allowing them to model the whole incident in way that allows everyone to analyze each second of the impact from 360 degrees and find out what happened. They spent almost 2 years and (I am guessing) millions of dollars in addition to the thousands of man hours into building this excellent model from scratch. In the end they concluded that the building collapsed as a result of heat that melted the steel beams holding the tower upright. However, another agency dismissed this evidence claiming that it wasn't representative of what actually happened and started their own investigation.

There are two things that this program made me think. The first is that in cases of this magnitude, anything is possible. In fact it might be both the heat and the impact. That's kind of logical conclusion. But I don't claim expertise on that and hence won't comment on it further. However, the second point is the relevance of investing so much effort into finding evidences and then dismissing them. Evidences are definitely needed to substantiate a claim but my point is at what cost? Take another example, in education research, millions of dollars are spent every year identifying and analyzing problems and then designing solutions for them. We even spend a lot of time investigating issues which are kind of obvious (like if a kid studies in a quiet room then he/she would learn better). We also spend considerable research effort (time and money) into proving the value of a particular education technique (like learning by doing is better than rote learning... kind of obvious too huh?). My point here is not that finding evidence is not necessary or useless. It is absolutely needed but what I am asking is to consider the cost involved in the task. Is it worth the cost?

Designers as change makers

An interesting series of interviews:

http://www.designwala.org/2010/01/designers-as-changemakers-part-4-ritwik-dey/

Froebel - The concept of kindergarten

Froebel was a German pedagogue, a student of Pestalozzi who laid the foundation for modern education based on the recognition that children have unique needs and capabilities. He developed the concept of the “kindergarten”, and also coined the word now used in German and English.

Read more about them (pretty interesting):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_Fröbel

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Heinrich_Pestalozzi

but unfortunately, the concept of kindergarten was modified by most people (Dewey etc.) and the current form is a distorted version. Read more in this book (Chapter 3):-

Tinkering towards utopia - A century of public school reform

or a review of the book here:-

http://www.hepg.org/her/abstract/263

Taming the free spirit

When a child is born, parents wait for the day when he will run around the house and make noise. They encourage playful acts and help the child to walk on his own feet. The child grows up innocent and playful believing that everyone will appreciate the playfulness. But with the first step inside the school, a different world greets the child. He is confronted with a strange concept called discipline. This concept is hard to understand because it prohibits running around in this strange place called "classroom". In spite of the fact that so many other chubby little friends are also in that strange place, one cannot talk to them unless permitted to do so. "Permitted" what does that mean? The buck quickly passes to the parents who are summoned by the school only to be told how indisciplined their child is. The reason - he talks in class and does not sit still. Excuse me! Isn't a child supposed to "play"? How can you expect the child to sit still? But the school doesn't care. This is what has been the norm for god knows how many years (maybe lots of decades). If the warning doesn't bring any changes, the child is promptly labelled as hyper-active child or a child having come kind of attention-deficit disorder.

Poor kids... what dreams they had, what fantasies they cherished, nothing mattered anymore. All that mattered was what the grown-ups thought was best for them. Maybe what's best for them is to just let them be kids and not force discipline upon them. Won't they then grow up to be rowdy, good for nothing, cave-men like people? Maybe they will, maybe they won't; I don't have an answer... but why not try to think of an education system that doesn't try to "convert" every child into a fact remembering, number crunching, good-boy; like everybody else. When the child was born, he was yours special, an unique gift. Why try to mold that unique gift into something common? If only they could speak up, we could have known how much they really hated the "grown-up world" that they were being trained to face.

(PS: Replace he -> she, boy -> girl, etc. at will. )

eSingularity

http://mjtrout.blogspot.com/

"Imagine... A world where every kid participates on a level education system, challenging themselves and others, and achieving rewards and prizes for applying themselves, no matter what their social, economic, or geographic disposition. We can... and we will build it. "

Education 2.0, Media 3.0, blah.. blah.. blah.. sounds very nice and dreamy. Now imagine you haven't had food all day and you are hungry Mr. Trout, would you spend on /care about technology to access E 2.0 or M 3.0? And do you think teachers will welcome the idea of letting go their position of authority and becoming mere facilitators in classrooms who cannot exercise power over the students (that is what is the current state of Indian schools)?

The "American" way is not always the "right" way. Every nation has its own culture, its own tradition and a set of values that consciously/unconsciously drive the people. Before prescribing "solutions" these things need to be understood. Then only can the real problem be understood and characterized. Education is not a commodity and should not be treated as one.