Blogging on the Brain

Today was the first meeting of my Oliver Sacks reading group, and I actually think it went pretty well! We’re reading The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, which is one of my ALL-TIME favorite books. It was actually recently listed as one of Discovery Magazine’s 25 Greatest Science Books of All Time – a list that includes people like Darwin, Galileo, Einstein, and Aristotle (Freud didn’t even make the list – he was an honorable mention!). Not that we need a list to tell us this book is good, but still. It can’t hurt.

We have a great group of participants (several grad students from the neuroscience program, one from church-state studies, one from sociology, one from English, and the manager of the History department!) and they all seemed to be pretty excited about the book! Most of them had only read the preface and introduction (although several admitted to not being able to keep themselves from reading the first case – a good sign!), but really that’s all it takes to get a feel for the depth and genius of Dr. Sacks.

I’m also trying something brand new (for me) with this group: a wiki! That’s right, I actually set it up myself and invited members and hopefully they’ll get in there soon and start playing around. This is very exciting for me. As with most technology, I’m completely terrified to try it, but when I finally do, I realize it’s really  not all that difficult, and the rewards far outweigh the work it takes to learn it – oh, and thanks to all the super-smart programmers out there that actually make this stuff user-friendly!

So here’s to a semester of wonderful reading and (hopefully) great discussion!

I was recently given the task of writing a summary report for my work this last year at the ATL – a somewhat daunting task, given a 2-page limit. Anyway, I’ve been reflecting quite a bit on my experiences in 2009, helped along greatly by this blog. I think blogging has actually come to be the most useful tool I’ve learned to use in the last year – it serves many purposes for me:

1. I think most importantly, it allows me to organize my thoughts, and forces me to look critically at experiences I’ve had and try to make that into a narrative, or something like it, that another person could follow. This is something that I don’t normally do – especially if the experience happens to be difficult or painful for me (see posts on the NCORE conference). I very much appreciate the sort of therapeutic value of sitting down and making myself think about things.

2. I like the feeling of putting myself out into the electronic abyss – something I was originally terrified of. After doing this for a while, however, I’ve come to a couple of conclusions; first of all, seriously what is the worst that could happen? Someone disagrees with me? Thinks I’m a bad writer? Okay, well, that’s going to happen anyway, so why worry about it here, where at least you aren’t confronted physically to your face? Second, I’ve been very thankful for all the kind and encouraging comments I’ve gotten from readers – they aren’t terribly frequent, but they remind me that at least a few people “out there” think my thoughts are worth reading and considering, which is gratifying and humbling.

3. I love, love, love having a record of the last year! This was a benefit I didn’t even consider when I started, but now, when I’m being asked to write a review of my year with the ATL, I have the perfect place to go to remind me not only what I did, but how I felt about things, how they challenged me, etc. It reminds me of when my grandparents took me and my older sister to Europe after we graduated from High School – they bought us each a journal and told us we should really write in it every night to remember what we did. So, being a good granddaughter, I did as they said, even though I was exhausted most nights and didn’t really enjoy the process of writing that much, and let me tell you, I couldn’t be happier that I did! I wouldn’t have remembered a quarter of what we did that two weeks if I hadn’t written about it! (For instance, I was proposed to by a very friendly waiter in Brussels one evening!) So I’m beginning to feel very much that way about blogging. Often I don’t feel like it’s something I want to do, but I’m always glad once I have.

From my favorite web comic, xkcd - note the "blogipelago" at the bottom left...

The day start off with what turned out to be one of my favorite presentations of the conference – a talk by Steven Greenlaw of University of Mary Washington. He walked us through a course he taught last year on the 2008 financial crisis. The crux of the presentation was challenging us to think about (1) what learning environments should look/be like today, and (2) the possibility that we should be teaching the way we practice our disciplines. He spent this course (a seminar in international finance) teaching only a little bit, and mostly having students read on their own, then come into class to teach, interact, and discuss. Grades were based on engagement and insight, and some of the students agreed to continue the class project through the summer – after they had graduated! – so that they could produce the final outcome of the project (availiable at www.financialcrisis2008.umwblogs.org). Awesome stuff.

So my initial response (other than very much enjoying the presentation) was, as usual, something to the effect of “that’s great, but would it work in the sciences?” I think that it could, if not in the exact same format it was carried out in the economics class. There were several features of this class that I think we’d do well to apply to more of our courses regardless of the content:

1. Working on a current issue in the field (for economics, the recession was great; for neuroscience, maybe we could spend time working on a class project looking into the legitimacy (or lack thereof) of using fMRI “lie detection” as evidence in court cases)

2. Running class more like training for practitioners.

3. Creating a genuine product as the driving force for the class

There are some potential issues as well, including:

1. Assessment

2. Covering course content

3. Varying student motivation (especially in a community college setting)

But overall, this presentation actually gave me something I could consider implementing in my own courses! Yay!

Next up was the session I thought I’d like the best, entitled Computational Thinking, by Jeannette Wing, the asst. director of CISE and NSF, as well as faculty at Carnegie Mellon University. First of all, for a person as smart as she is, she was remarkably personable and clear, and, even better, she spoke with a lot of enthusiasm about a topic that could certainly have turned out to be dull as toast. Anyway, her “grand vision” is that by the end of the 21st century, essentially everyone will be engaged in what she refers to as “computational thinking.” She went on to (thankfully) give us some definitions; she defined “computing” as the automation of abstractions, and “computational thinking” as “the process of abstraction.” This all sounded, well, very abstract to me, but after lots of examples about computational thinking in other disciplines, I felt like I was getting it. Unfortunately, when I was asked about it later that evening, I found I had sort of lost it. Oh well.

So overall – favorite session of Wednesday: the Card Sort task (which I’ll most likely try to use/write about again in more detail at some point); favorite session of Thursday: Steven Greenlaw’s presentation I talked about above. I really enjoyed the time I was able to spend down there and all the lovely people I met!

My first day at EDUCAUSE 2010 was informative and illuminating, if a bit overwhelming. There was a LOT happening, and a lot of new information for someone like me – a relative newbie in the world of technology and education.

The day began with a session entitled “Born Digital” from John Palfrey of Stanford Law. The basic concept behind the presentation was what is happening with the up-and-coming cohort of kids that have literally been exposed to digital media/tools from birth. I thought John did a great job of noting the benefits as well as the potential problems for this generation – things like privacy concerns, intellectual property, and credibility. He also had some surprising stats to share – did you know the incidence of sexual predation has not increased with the widespread advent of social networking sites? Apparently rates have actually gone down a little (he made the point that online “public” places have replaces actual public parks, etc. as the main forum for predators). One negative area that has seen an increase – bullying. This, however, could just be because of the visibility/permanence of online bullying versus your typical playground scenario. Anyway, he did a great job talking about things like what kids don’t know about how they’re allowed to use downloaded material legally and our responsibility to teach them (although it seems from the litigation surrounding the HOPE Obama poster, we’re not so sure yet ourselves). The good news: these “born digital” students won’t have to deal with the (sometimes prohibitive) learning curve us old folks have to deal with. They’re already equipped to jump right in!

Next I went to a presentation on Stanford’s Wallenberg Hall (http://wallenberg.stanford.edu/about.html) – a completely gutted/renovated building now equipped with all the makings of an ideal learning space. My favorite part about their plan (the project began in 1999 and was completed in 2002) was that they weren’t trying to get the most advanced technology of the day and cement it into the walls, they actually tried to install technology (and tables, chairs, etc.) that would provide the most flexibility for the classes – whether that meant using the dual plasma screen displays and laptops for each student, or markers, whiteboards, and glass walls (sweet). I appreciated that they tried to build the infrastructure, not just that top-of-the-line 2002 technology.

The third presentation for the morning was on students’ mental models of information and using Card Sort to determine whether or not they’re learning information in the way you’re trying to teach it. It was pretty cool, as I was completely unfamiliar with the technique (students take cards with terms on them, sort them into piles that make sense to them, and label the piles). Not sure yet how I might be able to utilize it, but for more info I’ll direct you to the website the presenters provided. http://mentalmodelassessment.org/

After lunch I attended a relatively lackluster presentation on, well, using technology in education, I guess. It wasn’t really anything new. The day of presentations wrapped up with a new system Seattle Pacific University is using to help maximize class time. They’re doing what they call “flipping” lectures – they pre-record lectures and put them online for students to watch before class. The lectures are chopped up into topical chunks (about 15-20 min), so they students can watch all of them first, or just review particular topics they need help with. This obviously leaves much more class time for discussion, group work, or more advanced ideas. Unfortunately, the rest of the session was a sales pitch for the specific software they use, but I did think this was a good idea, especially depending on the class it’s being used in. My first thought was perhaps doing something like this for the BIC Natural World course that I’m going to be working with this semester. One of the major problems they face is when students come in with wildly variable backgrounds in science, so they end up teaching to the lowest common denominator. So what if they could post background lectures online so the students could all come in on even footing and they’d actually be able to get to more interesting topics? It’s something to think about anyway.

Well, that’s it for today (man, am I tired!). Had a lovely dinner complete with good food and good conversation, and just got back here to Waco to sleep for a few hours, then I” be heading back down in the morning! More tomorrow…

Caroline, my older sister; Angie - the bride - my younger sister; and me

So 2009 was a pretty good year – not nearly as productive as I would have hoped (as usual),but full of a lot of good things too. I’ve now been with the ATL for a full year – and what awonderful year it’s been! I also got to end the year by celebrating my little sister’s wedding out on the North Shore of Massachusetts on New Years’ Eve, which was a great way to ring in the New Year as well.

So after being absent here for FAR too long, it’s time to start, well, everything up again. Generally I try to keep some amount of productivity going over break, but this year I failed spectacularly at it.

Ah well, all I can do now is do it now…which brings me to the point of this inaugural post of 2010 – my to-do list for the year!

Far from being a way to depress myself with work I have to do, I find I work much, MUCH better when I can see what it is I need to accomplish, and then there’s also the added benefit of being able to cross things off once they’re done – which for some reason I find deeply satisfying.

So 2010 needs to be a big year. I feel like I’ve been in neutral for quite a while now, and it’s seriously go time.  So it’s time for the list:

1. Finish collecting my dissertation data. This should set me up to defend early in the spring semester of 2011…there is a very, very faint light starting to show at the end of this extremely long tunnel

2.  Run the Oliver Sacks reading group for the ATL. I’m very excited and also very nervous for this one, but it should be a good time, and at the very least a great learning experience!

3. Re-vamp the Behavioral Neuroscience lab. New instructor = new lab. We’re going to use primarily case studies to teach students about some general neuroscience as well as neuroradiology and diagnostics.

4. Work with the BIC (Baylor Interdisciplinary Core) on their “Natural World” course. This is the science course the non-science majors have to take. Interesting challenges everywhere in that!

5. Get at least one paper published. I am seriously behind the pub # I should be at at this point, and I’ve had a manuscript in the works for about 6 months now. I need to get on that!

6. Develop a new Seminar for Excellence in Teaching. I’ve given my “Neuroscience and Learning” one a couple of times now, and it’s time for something new. Maybe learning disabilities? Effects of technology on the brain? We’ll see what happens.

7. Present a poster at Society for Neuroscience. If I complete #1, this shouldn’t be a problem – and this year, SfN is in SanDiego – WIN.

8. Figure out what I want to do when I grow up. I’m currently thrashing back and forth about whether I want to look for a faculty position right out of the gate or look for postdocs, etc.

9. Start looking for a job. Clearly, this is contingent on #8.

10. Start my 3x a week blogging resolution again. It’s one of those things that I enjoy when I’m doing it, but as soon as I stop there seems to be some sort of a block from getting started again. Hopefully I can just stay in the habit this year!

Okay. I should get to work!