Archive for the 'learning' Category

Kitzmiller versus Dover Area School District (Intelligent Design)

Published by
gradster1
at December 4, 2007 in snow day, advances, starting, beliefs, snow, legal/illegal stuff, homework, controversial, December, intelligent design, humor, arguments, winter, facts, learning, school, religion, random, media, politics, high school, night, philosophy, education and Uncategorized. 4 Comments

It sounds like Super Smash Brothers at first (if you’ve ever played), as any good court case does - but this is the infamous discussion on the teaching of intelligent design in public schools.

What I know about ID (intelligent design) so far (PLEASE correct me if I’m wrong and feel free to add):

Intelligent design is a theory that came into use after the Kitzmiller vs. Dover Area School District case on the teaching of “creation science” alongside evolution. It is based upon how complex life is. People who believe in ID believe that something as complex as, for example, a protein pump wouldn’t be possible without an intelligent being to guide the development of such things. ID is currently a very controversial topic - while some people believe that ID is valid and should be taught, others believe that ID is completely untrue. There are also many people in between who have many different views - one of these may be that ID is not necessarily true however to get a complete perspective students should be taught ID as one option, in case they choose to believe it.

Personally I believe intelligent design is a load of hooey (gotta love that word). To survive, creationism evolved into intelligent design. On a more practical note, we can actually see evolution in action in many types of bacteria.

I can see it from the other point of view though. How could little cellular machines like this do so much?

But then again there’s the obvious. Where else could fossils and geology and all the other evidence that’s rock hard (excuse the pun) come from? It’d be impossible for “non-believers” to fake something like fossils on such a large scale as this planet.

Jesus lovingly cradles a baby raptor.

Jesus lovingly cradles a baby raptor.

Phoenix

Published by
gradster1
at November 1, 2007 in fall, teenagers, starting, advances, November, webcomics, series, night, writing, learning, poetry, philosophy, beauty and random. 0 Comments

Apparently, when I get emotional I write poetry. The mood of it explains the mood I was in when it was written - which is pretty much how I do that. Anyway, here’s a poem:

It dulls your senses
Makes your head throb
Makes you rage against one -
Someone?

No one.

Howling at the white moon framed by the black sky
Black like your pain.
Wings of hatred sprout, and you fly
Away from it all

Information floods your brain
Like that tall gray wall that is your pride has finally broken
under the relentless attack (cliché though it is)
of that hurricane of feelings

It never ends.

Only waits, watching.
And your soul dies, over and over
Reborn each time - a surreal phoenix, if you will - comprised of your thoughts, hopes, dreams
Emerges anew when the call of this phoenix is answered and the sun rises
And your eyes dry, yet still smart from the heat
Stinging and twitching with memory.

The human race is not forgiving, nor is it ever forgiven.
This is not said without good reason.

I’m going to be entering this into a competition soon since I thought it was pretty good. I wondered at how the words seemed to flow straight from my mind to the paper - the pencil only a gateway. Of course, see where it gets me? Now I’m being what I call “clichéd poetic” without even trying. Anyway, hope you like it, and there’s another webcomic coming soon (possibly a series soon too!).

K12 Online

Published by
gradster1
at October 8, 2007 in advances, morning, betaphor, K12, r.ompo.us, October, bored, teachers, random, internet, school, learning, education, computers and Uncategorized. 3 Comments

Now, I haven’t the faintest what’s going on here - but I do know that as an educatee (if that’s a word) I have having a lot of fun speaking to educators all over the world waiting for the keynote of K12 online to load. Some people in the live chat are already posting comments and quotes from David Warlick’s speech. Excuse this for being a very short post, but I’m going to go chat with educators all over the world, from Bangkok to Starbucks in New York - about how they can make my school career better for me and my teachers - before I watch this video (download already!).

And P.S. - Remember when I mentioned that Arthus had given me r.ompo.us? I’ll be switching over there very soon - no matter what it looks like. Just don’t go there now, it’s got posts that are starting to reek they’re so old (they still taste good though!).

Tip II

Published by
gradster1
at September 15, 2007 in September, metaphor, high school, fall, starting, r.ompo.us, homework, betaphor, series, writing, Wordpress, random, internet, blogging, school, learning, facts and Uncategorized. 0 Comments

With no further ado (you’ve waited too long already):

Tip II:

Don’t get behind.

Now, this may just be the most important of all the tips. It’s hard to do, what with remembering everything, from homework to friends to relationships to even blogging, but if you can stay on top of the slowly accumulating mountain of things to remember you will be pretty well off. Even if you don’t get that project done on time at least you remembered it, which brings me to an apology. I have not been blogging. It’s a fact. Also a fact, however, is that I have a lot of stuff to remember and sometimes “superfluous” things like blogging get pushed to the bottom, therefor while trying to keep up with schoolwork lately I have been putting off blogging a lot, sorry.

Back to the point, when you get “under the mountain” (to use a betaphor), it takes a lot to get back on top. This strategy works for pretty much everything in life, when you have a lot to do. All you have to do to succeed is stay organized and things just fall into place.

Other than that, how about a nice surprise? I now have my own domain! Visit r.ompo.us (no, I don’t believe rompous is a word (Firefox spellcheck just confirmed that…) but it’s only a test) for my new testing domain. This is (hopefully) only a step between Betaphor at wordpress and Betaphor at “be.jeez.us”, a domain I have recently developed a longing for. Just betaphor.com would be pretty boring, don’t you think? And besides, I like domain hacks. Any other suggestions? Just comment.

Learning for the Future

Published by
gradster1
at September 4, 2007 in lazy, arguments, bored, high school, series, September, beliefs, advances, betaphor, starting, fall, teenagers, night, teachers, blogging, school, random, internet, technology, facts, learning, education, beauty, computers, politics, writing and Uncategorized. 1 Comment

In preparing students for the twenty-first century we need to educate them in certain ways. Skills in certain areas will be necessary because of recent advances in technology, for example, the human race will need to accept that computers and robots may do our jobs better than we do. In other words we must learn humility. Other skills will become the norm as well, for example it will be necessary in day-to-day life to have basic programming skills in all the major languages, we will also need to be able to service the hardware side of things too.

I believe this video is the newest version, correct me if I’m wrong. It was originally made by Karl Fisch (see his blog at The Fischbowl) for a presentation on how his high school should be teaching kids. It has been remade so many times it’s not even worth mentioning who else helped.

I’ve always loved this kind of video - words that shock you along with some quiet music. This goes along with someone talking made into animations, such as Alan Watt’s videos. This was actually assigned to be watched, which is progress in our school system, however it was also assigned that we fill out a sheet and analyze the video, which totally ruined all the progress. The writing in the top paragraph is actually one answer of what I’m handing in! Even this is a connection to the video. If the right steps are made soon all classes will be on computers, and, even further along, blogs, which is why I like including my homework into something I consider fun.

This video makes me think. If a laptop available in 2049 will surpass the combined technological power of the human race put together, than what are we left to do? As much as anybody I wouldn’t like an “I, Robot” situation however this may be for the better. I choose to see these advances as an opportunity; with all the “menial” (think open heart surgery) jobs out of the way our kind will have all the time we need to express ourselves in ways we can’t program computers to; such as the arts. Think about it.

Tip II coming soon.