Tech Tip: Google Art Extension

Tech Tip: Google Art Project for Chrome

I love art, so this tech tip is totally up my alley. This chrome extension “Google Arts & Culture,” as it’s called on the chrome web store, is easy to install and adds an extra bit of flair with every new tab I open. I think these come from the same Google photos and art archive that is used for ChromeCast for tv. It really reminds me of another extension called Stumble Upon which I guess has now moved to Mix. I haven’t used this in years, but basically what I remember of it is with each time you reload a page it takes you to a new website- of which there are seemingly endless in number. I recall being a teenager and finding some very cool websites this way. Before I discovered sites like Reddit and before Facebook became prevalent where it incorporates links from other sources, this was how I accessed obscure sites. I recall one in which it had a ton of envelope icons, each different from the other, where if you click them it would open a random, out of context handwritten or typed letter. It was so fun to see the different fonts and styles of writing people had, and each seemingly used a different utensil. Some even had pictures or stamps. This was quite fun. Websites like that one and this one are great tools for exploring the internet. I’m happy to have beautiful photographs, paintings, and drawings before I access the internet site I intend to. The only drawback is the fact that the icons of frequently visited sites are no longer there to easily open my most used websites. This is a small disadvantage for the visual treat that this tool allows, though!

(Image Source: Screenshot by me, Google Arts & Culture Extension)

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Learning Challenge: Taking Up "Single-Tasking"

“Single-tasking Is the New Multi-tasking” by James Hamblin for the Atlantic

It is indeed becoming increasingly more complicated to “check out” or “go off the grid” these days, and somehow being seen struggling trying to satisfy many tasks at once is just a price to pay to be considered successful. I totally relate to the “my brain has too many tabs open” meme below the embedded video. Technology is such a double-edged sword. On the one hand, so much valuable knowledge is at our fingertips. On the other hand, so much irrelevant time wasters are too. Somehow, also, it’s impossible to separate yourself from these social media sites that drown so much time. Since even employers are using these platforms to reach their desired audiences, it’s almost like you’re expected to have a visible public online presence to be considered suitable for a position in a modern world that is so entrenched in these communication systems. I love the quote that “maybe this is life mimicking internet” to explain his observation of his inability to focus on one thing at a time. I’m not surprised at all with the statistic that overall negative college GPA’s are associated with students who use social media and text. It’s bizarre to think that the type of smart phone I had entering college the first time years ago had limited internet access and no apps, I can definitely vouch that my grades reflected this lack of distraction.

I think I might have to take up this man’s suggestion for “single tasking” or “tab-less Thursdays” as he calls it to remedy my overly stressed and overwhelmed brain. I think the problem with being so inattentive is the fact that we have so few moments to have thoughts of our own when the thoughts are being dictated by a thousand things in our environment. Sometimes after a long night of homework and my brain is blank I realize how much time had passed since I’d had an original thought that wasn’t for the purpose of engaging with some stimulus that I was obligated or coerced to engage with. Even in that moment, I’m still compelled almost against my will to continue to think about the thing that I was working on rather than “opening a new tab” for a space with my own thoughts! Also, as hard as it is I think I need to try to regain the discipline I had as a freshman the first time years ago before the modern smart-phone and try to not let this device dictate my attention span.

(Image Source: Pixabay Stock Photos)

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Growth Mindset: Giving Grades

“Why Do We Get Grades In School?”  video by PBS Studios

In this video by PBS Studios, it discusses the origin of what we students are so fondly familiar of: letter grades. According to our informative host, it seems that a professor named Ezra Stiles is behind this polarizing practice that has made students dread report card day for centuries. It’s interesting to learn that the system wasn’t standardized for widespread use for some time. I myself think it would make a world of difference if we were still assigned value to our academic efforts with “descriptive adjectives” instead of the number scale we are so used to seeing. I can see how systems for grading performance and improvement in school is important and necessary, but it is a shame that it holds so much weight in terms of someone’s mental health. Most intriguing were questions 3 and 4 in this short video: Do grades really matter? Are they actually effective tools for helping students learn? I think they are in a sense, a single paper blueprint for the type of student someone is, but as this woman states it tells a limited story about someone’s educational journey. A high GPA does, in theory, require a vigorous work ethic but I find it hard to believe that someone can deduce who a person is from a paper alone. I appreciate that this woman discusses the difference between those who succeed with and without having proved themselves in a standard classroom because as she notes there are those who “conform” and climb the ladders of a career and those who are “visionaries” who make their own ladder.

I am all about Alfie Kohn’s perspective on creating creative and critical thinkers through “qualitative accounts of student performance.” This concept of hands-on versus hands-off teaching with a goal of encouraging students to chase personal improvement rather than arbitrary grades makes me consider those progressive teachers and mentors in my life who have helped me to pin less of my self-worth on a standardized system. I think of progress reports from my childhood when narrative type breakdowns of a students progress was more prevalent, and one on one conferences with gifted instructors of mine who worked to target and correct where my work went wrong, and professors that give sufficient opportunity for making up academic losses with the intention that we actually go back and work on our weakest areas. There are advantages and disadvantages, but I think even if our schools are entrenched in a quantitative system so long as there are teachers that help their students in the ways listed above there will be students better equipped and more enthusiastic for their futures.

(Image Source: Pixabay Stock Photos)

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Reading Notes: Jakata Tales by Ellen Babbitt

These readings are very much like the last readings, barely differing at all in method and style. I like that there are so many short stories to read since some rather than others stick with me. What makes some more compelling than others is hard to say, but I guess if I find the content of the story makes sense and shares a moral message in a clever way I like it more. Otherwise, I guess small things make a story charming in its own way. For example, some choices the writer makes isn’t what I would do myself but I suppose it keeps it interesting. In the first story, “How The Monkey Saved His Troop,” I thought it was funny that the author would choose to describe mangoes like peaches. Something about this comparison seems a little unusual to me and I don’t know why. This story in general confused me a bit, since logically the conclusion seemed a little far fetched since the human was sure they would shoot the monkeys. It does feature animals as main characters though, which is something that I for some reason associate with the Jakata Tales and prefer the stories that use creatures instead of humans. I think this is why “The Brave Little Bowman” wasn’t one of my favorites. I liked the one about the lion and the wolf a lot, it was sad but it’s tragedy like this that makes you feel so sad for characters that like the wolf dream too big. Something about lions or monkeys or whatever as main characters I suppose takes me back to childhood when I read stories like this. If I were to write a story based on these Tales I would surely be inspired by these stories that I have read since I was little.

Bibliography:

Title: More Jataka Tales
Author: Ellen C. Babbitt
Source: Web

(Image Source: The Wise Goat and The Wolf, Web)

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Reading Notes: Jakata Tales by Ellen Babbitt

The readings this week, “More Jataka Tales,” are very much like those we read weeks ago that were written by Buddha. You can see how they were inspired by the original multiple mythologies we were introduced to in message and style, as they in a short number of simple lines had a moral lesson within. Each was unique but they had similar elements as far as method is concerned, with clever use of language and certain contexts that gave rise to an ethical conclusion. It’s a toss-up whether my favorite of these stories were more overt ad obvious or whether it is the more witty and obscure of these that left a more lasting impression.

For example, between the first two stories “The Girl Monkey and the String of Pearls” and “The Three Fishes,” the first created a situation in which the tables could be turned on the character that was trying to be caught for her moral turpitude. In this case, the crime that was trying to be brought to light was theft, and through a contrived situation the monkey in question was essentially a “victim” of entrapment in which she unknowingly confessed to her peers when she bragged that she had a necklace of pearls when they only had glass beads. Whereas, in the second “The Three Fishes,” the principle of the story is more exaggerated from the start and choice of character names literally differentiates them based on the characteristics these names elicit: thoughtful, very thoughtful, and thoughtless. This simple word (or name) choice drives the moral message of the story home from the very beginning this way by then building character profiles as the story progresses that made themselves apparent from the initial introductions in which the reader associated and inferred future events based on first impressions. Lo and behold, as was expected the fish named “very thoughtful” was as one could assume the hero of the story whose prudency saved himself and his fish friends.

I guess in the grey area would be the stories that are more obscure and whose messages aren’t so cut and dry as the author seemed to intentionally leave an air of uncertainty and confusion for the purpose of dramatization when in the finale the message unfolds. This is similar to the context driven technique I talked about above, but instead of the reader being I suppose “omniscient” or “in the know” (even if through a hunch that the author provokes) they are kept out of the loop until the “big reveal.” I think the stories that fall under this category would include but are not limited to “The Tricky Wolf and the Rats” or maybe “The Otters and the Wolf.” Some of these may fit in a number of these categories, or not in one indefinitely but these are some general similarities or procedures I can detect between the several of them.

Bibliography:

Title: More Jataka Tales
Author: Ellen C. Babbitt
Source: Web

(Image Source: The Three Fishes, Web)

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