Oh, the spam, see how it doth multiply!
Aug. 3rd, 2007 03:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
auntiemeeshI had babysitting work last night. Three little kids, sister and brother (3 and 1 1/2) and their cousin (1 1/2). I've babysat for the sister and brother before and their normal bedtime is 8:30 and 8, respectively. I got there at six-thirty and the girl had already gone to sleep (an exhausting day at daycare with no nap in high heat and humidity will do that to a kid). All of the adults hung around for ages (close to an hour) trying to decide what to do and get ready, and by the time they left, the boy had already crashed and been put to bed, leaving me with one very tired little eighteen-month-old girl (age approximated), who fell asleep in my lap within ten minutes. Can't ask for much better than that!
Of course, one of the kids had been playing with the tv and the settings were weird so I could only get audio, no video. Which left me at loose ends. I scoured the bookshelf and found a Carl Sagan book, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark. I only got a little way into it but it was pretty interesting. I'll have to pick it up at some point.
The thing was, Sagan was sort of ranting against what he calls 'pseudoscience' in all its forms - mysticism, new age theories, astrology, transcendental meditation, etc. He felt, quite passionately, that all this stuff was terribly dangerous and prevented people from knowing any real science, and that if you know real science and are opened up to the vast and amazing mysteries of the universe, you shouldn't need any of that other stuff. Now, I don't actually believe in ghosts or new age crystals or the perfection of civilization as found on Atlantis (the sunken island rather than the tv show). On the other hand, I don't think it makes me a dumb or bad person to enjoy speculating about things that are fantastical and unrealistic, and it certainly doesn't keep me from learning as much as I can about 'real' science; I kind of enjoy putting the two things side by side and seeing where they connect and where they diverge, how one can take the seeds of reality and create something imaginative and new out of it.
I do agree with him, however, that people aren't taught enough about science and how it works and why it's cool, when they're in school. When I taught fifth grade, the science element of the curriculum was nearly non-existent and not mandatory the way language arts, math and social studies were. When I was in school, I hated/feared science class. God, Chemistry was a nightmare because I just didn't get it. Physics was even worse. By the time I was in college, I had made up my mind to stay well away from that sort of thing. I took the easiest science classes I could in order to fulfill the requirements to graduate and that was all. I've learned since then, though, that science can be made accessible by good writers like Sagan and others, who can take the most amazing concepts and present them in such a way that a total layman like myself can grasp the edges at least.
I was also thinking about this in terms of my earlier rant about grammar. Not only are kids not always getting a good solid grounding in the basics of science, they're losing a lot of other skills as well. It seems that the more the government tries to crack down on education and increase the consequences of poor results from the standardized tests, etc., the less kids actually learn. Seriously, I worry about the direction public education is moving in this country. It's not getting better, not even a little bit. Kids are coming out of high school and even college less and less well-prepared every year. It's discouraging.
Okay, enough with the ranting.
I could have gone to the History Center today but decided to stay home so I could clean my apartment and such. Which means I have spent the day playing on the internet. My mom's going to be here in an hour or so, I really should do some tidying at the very least. Today is just one of those days, though, where I don't have any motivation to do anything but vegge. And watch Mal, because he just never stops being entertaining. He's sleeping right now, stretched out on his back with his legs splayed wide, twitching. I wonder what he's chasing in his dreams. Whatever it is, judging by the jaw twitches, he's clearly doing some ferocious chewing as well.
Of course, one of the kids had been playing with the tv and the settings were weird so I could only get audio, no video. Which left me at loose ends. I scoured the bookshelf and found a Carl Sagan book, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark. I only got a little way into it but it was pretty interesting. I'll have to pick it up at some point.
The thing was, Sagan was sort of ranting against what he calls 'pseudoscience' in all its forms - mysticism, new age theories, astrology, transcendental meditation, etc. He felt, quite passionately, that all this stuff was terribly dangerous and prevented people from knowing any real science, and that if you know real science and are opened up to the vast and amazing mysteries of the universe, you shouldn't need any of that other stuff. Now, I don't actually believe in ghosts or new age crystals or the perfection of civilization as found on Atlantis (the sunken island rather than the tv show). On the other hand, I don't think it makes me a dumb or bad person to enjoy speculating about things that are fantastical and unrealistic, and it certainly doesn't keep me from learning as much as I can about 'real' science; I kind of enjoy putting the two things side by side and seeing where they connect and where they diverge, how one can take the seeds of reality and create something imaginative and new out of it.
I do agree with him, however, that people aren't taught enough about science and how it works and why it's cool, when they're in school. When I taught fifth grade, the science element of the curriculum was nearly non-existent and not mandatory the way language arts, math and social studies were. When I was in school, I hated/feared science class. God, Chemistry was a nightmare because I just didn't get it. Physics was even worse. By the time I was in college, I had made up my mind to stay well away from that sort of thing. I took the easiest science classes I could in order to fulfill the requirements to graduate and that was all. I've learned since then, though, that science can be made accessible by good writers like Sagan and others, who can take the most amazing concepts and present them in such a way that a total layman like myself can grasp the edges at least.
I was also thinking about this in terms of my earlier rant about grammar. Not only are kids not always getting a good solid grounding in the basics of science, they're losing a lot of other skills as well. It seems that the more the government tries to crack down on education and increase the consequences of poor results from the standardized tests, etc., the less kids actually learn. Seriously, I worry about the direction public education is moving in this country. It's not getting better, not even a little bit. Kids are coming out of high school and even college less and less well-prepared every year. It's discouraging.
Okay, enough with the ranting.
I could have gone to the History Center today but decided to stay home so I could clean my apartment and such. Which means I have spent the day playing on the internet. My mom's going to be here in an hour or so, I really should do some tidying at the very least. Today is just one of those days, though, where I don't have any motivation to do anything but vegge. And watch Mal, because he just never stops being entertaining. He's sleeping right now, stretched out on his back with his legs splayed wide, twitching. I wonder what he's chasing in his dreams. Whatever it is, judging by the jaw twitches, he's clearly doing some ferocious chewing as well.
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no subject
Date: 2007-08-03 08:05 pm (UTC)I'm not arguing with you at all though. I love fantasy. I can enjoy a show like Supernatural for the entertainment that it is. As well as all the books, comics, music and movies providing healthy doses of imagination in the forms of make-believe.
It is one of those vegge type days.
no subject
Date: 2007-08-04 02:10 am (UTC)Public schools are too concerned with teaching kids to do well on tests, not teaching them anything useful. Can't really blame them, though, since a lot of public school funding is determined by standardized test scores. It's a problem that goes all the way to the top.
no subject
Date: 2007-08-04 05:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-04 05:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-04 05:41 pm (UTC)