Posts from the “Teaching” Category

Fiji Me

Posted on September 18, 2010

I’ve been blogging about my recent trip to Fiji on Fiji Guide–a trusted source on all things Fiji–so hop on over and check it out.

So far I’ve covered my arrival and posted photos of the land and sea creatures I encountered there (grr…if only I’d thought to bring an underwater camera), both in the Mamanucas and on Taveuni.

Here’s a sneak peek, but head here for the full story.

ps: Fiji Me is Fiji’s tourism slogan. Wonder what a similar one for Hawaii would be?

Qamea plate corals on a glassy day

Categories: Events, Teaching

Love Your Mindset (or, What’s Val Iwashita Reading?)

Posted on March 25, 2009

For the first time, the full interview with Iolani’s Val Iwashita, who lets us in on a fascinating approach to education and living.

What I’m Reading | Val Iwashita
Headmaster, Iolani School

Q&A with Christine Thomas
short version published March ’08
Honolulu Advertiser

Q. What are you reading?

A. The last book I read was “Mindset: The New Psychology of Success” by Carol Dweck. She’s a Stanford professor and has done 20 years of mindsets research and has come up with two: a growth mindset, about learning and being responsible for what you learn and what your success is or isn’t, and a fixed mindset, which is ability-based, not wanting to take risks for fear you might undermine the perception that you’re successful and competent. I found it very engaging and relevant to educators and parents, to anyone working with other people, to anyone looking at him or herself related to self-perception and well being. I found it a very good read.

The other book I just finished was “Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman’s Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia” by Elizabeth Gilbert. That was a wonderful tale. She’s obviously a very good writer, and it’s an easy read. It brought to life some of the emotion—the difficulties as well as joys—of all of our lives. I could relate to what she was talking about because she’s a very good writer, but also because it’s a very human story. She goes on a trek to find peace and happiness and feel good about herself. There’s a happy ending to the story but one that continues to be written. It’s one year in the life of a woman.

Q. How did you discover them?

A. Both books were recommended to me by friends. “Mindset” more because I’m the chair of the National Association of Independent Schools board, so the CEO of the organization recommended it to all of us as board members, and then we had a conversation with Carol Dweck on one occasion. It was everything it was purported to be and more.

Q. What did you take from Mindset?

A. I think it had relevance for anybody who is trying to develop young people and or work with adults in terms of trying to develop productive and positive mindsets for life. Again it’s never 100%–the two mindsets, fixed and growth, are two ends of a continuum so there’s a lot of grey area between the two. But it gives one a hook or benchmark in terms of how to react to life situations. For instance, when you’re talking with your child and say the child gets an A—it’s better to say ‘wow, congratulations, you did everything you needed to do to get a high mark—you earned it,’ rather than ‘wow, you’re smart.’ Both reactions to the same success have a different meaning for the child. One says it was caused by my work and I take full responsibility for the actions that led to that success, and the other was I was born into this situation and circumstance.

Q. How does reading about reacting to life’s challenges influence how you prepare students for the future?

“Mindset” is obvious but you know the other one was just enjoyable. I like books that are well written and engaging, so I do look to bestseller lists and recommendations from friends. But I also like books that open up worlds and experiences that I’ve never had. So things like “Eat, Pray, Love” was essentially—I can relate to this, though I’ve never gone to an ashram and contemplated [done what she did]. I like books that open up new worlds or new segments or slices of life. I find real value in that and I guess evolved to where I don’t read fiction anymore simply because I like nonfiction.

Q. So do you focus most on exposing students to different experiences, like with Iolani’s new online eSchool?

A. Professionally it’s important to continue to look for ways to benefit Iolani kids as well as the broader community. The stature of the institution in the community obligates us to look for ways to serve the broader community in different ways and not just be insular and serve our students. Something like the eSchool was intended to break out and expand our constituency and leverage the expertise that we’ve developed, so others could benefit from it. It’s important that we look at not only improving Iolani School, and that requires us to do things differently. So that’s some of what attracts me in my reading.

Categories: Hawaii People, Teaching, WIMR

Back to School

Posted on September 10, 2008

What I’m Reading | Val Iwashita
Iolani School Headmaster

Q&A with Christine Thomas
March 2008

-What are you reading?

The last two books I read were “Mindset: The New Psychology of Success” by Carol Dweck. She’s a Stanford professor and has done 20 years of mindsets research and has come up with two: a growth mindset, about learning and being responsible for what you learn and what your success is or isn’t, and a fixed mindset, which is ability-based, not wanting to take risks for fear you might undermine the perception that you’re successful and competent. I found it very engaging and relevant to educators and parents, to anyone working with other people, to anyone looking at him or herself related to self-perception and well being. I found it a very good read.

The other book I just finished was “Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman’s Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia” by Elizabeth Gilbert. That was a wonderful tale. She’s obviously a very good writer, and it’s an easy read. It brought to life some of the emotion—the difficulties as well as joys—of all of our lives. I could relate to what she was talking about because she’s a very good writer, but also because it’s a very human story. She goes on a trek to find peace and happiness and feel good about herself. There’s a happy ending to the story but one that continues to be written. It’s one year in the life of a woman.

-How did you discover them?

Both books were recommended to me by friends. “Mindset” more because I’m the chair of the National Association of Independent Schools board, so the CEO of the organization recommended it to all of us as board members, and then we had a conversation with Carol Dweck on one occasion. It was everything it was purported to be and more.

-What did you take from it?

I think it had relevance for anybody who is trying to develop young people and or work with adults in terms of trying to develop productive and positive mindsets for life. Again it’s never 100%–the two mindsets, fixed and growth, are two ends of a continuum so there’s a lot of grey area between the two. But it gives one a hook or benchmark in terms of how to react to life situations. For instance, when you’re talking with your child and say the child gets an A—it’s better to say ‘wow, congratulations, you did everything you needed to do to get a high mark—you earned it,’ rather than ‘wow, you’re smart.’ Both reactions to the same success have a different meaning for the child. One says it was caused by my work and I take full responsibility for the actions that led to that success, and the other was I was born into this situation and circumstance.

-How does reading about reacting to life’s challenges influence how you prepare students for the future?

“Mindset” is obvious but you know the other one was just enjoyable. I like books that are well written and engaging, so I do look to bestseller lists and recommendations from friends. But I also like books that open up worlds and experiences that I’ve never had. So things like “Eat, Pray, Love” was essentially—I can relate to this, though I’ve never gone to an ashram and contemplated [done what she did]. I like books that open up new worlds or new segments or slices of life. I find real value in that and I guess evolved to where I don’t read fiction anymore simply because I like nonfiction.

-So do you focus most on exposing students to different experiences, like with Iolani’s new online eSchool?

Professionally it’s important to continue to look for ways to benefit Iolani kids as well as the broader community. The stature of the institution in the community obligates us to look for ways to serve the broader community in different ways and not just be insular and serve our students. Something like the eSchool was intended to break out and expand our constituency and leverage the expertise that we’ve developed, so others could benefit from it. It’s important that we look at not only improving Iolani School, and that requires us to do things differently. So that’s some of what attracts me in my reading.

Categories: Hawaii People, Teaching, WIMR

WIMR: James K. Scott, Punahou

Posted on July 16, 2008

What I’m Reading | James K. Scott
President, Punahou School

Q&A with Christine Thomas
December 2007

-What are you reading?

Currently I have two books going. One is titled Encore: Finding Work that Matters in the Second Half of Life by Mark Freedman, and it’s about baby-boomers retiring and finding work that matters and finding work that matters in the second half of their life. I’m actually reading it with several other people who run non-profits about how the workforce is going to be changed—looking at possibilities for individuals but all also for companies. Every so often I get to read fiction so I’m reading a book called “Aloft” by Chang Rae Lee—it’s a book in common we’re reading with the English Department here, and it’s about a guy living in the suburbs of Long Island in a middle-age crisis. So a lot of adult males will relate to this.

There’s also a book called “A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future” by Daniel Pink and in it he talks about the rise of right brain thinkers–looking at patterns and systems and nuances—those are not usually the skills awarded in schools. And then over the summer “The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream” by Barack Obama. It’s been on my bookshelf for a couple of years and I finally got around to it. And a book called “Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game” by Michael Lewis. On the surface it’s a baseball book. It’s fun for me as a former baseball player, but it’s a new way of evaluating talent, or people resources.

-Where did you discover it?

When we new that [Lee] was coming I wanted to read his books. When I first met him at Princeton a year ago he gave me the book “Aloft” personally with his signature so I felt I needed to read it before he came. And “Encore” was sent to me by Robert Witt who is the head of the Hawai`i Associate of Independent Schools—we’re just reading it with a group of school heads and nonprofits. And the other person who recommended it was Calvin Takeda who is the head of the Hawai`i Community Foundation, and former head of The Nature Conservancy.

-What do you like about Freedman’s and Lee’s books?

“Encore” is just giving me a different way to view the demographic transitions in the faculty. So what’s happening for us in schools with the retirement of the baby boomers is you have this massive teacher shortage that’s upon us. This has given me ways to reframe this—maybe some of those baby boomers will be working longer but in a different way through mentoring or other ways. For those who are retiring it’s a way to reframe retirement. And most of my reading list is nonfiction so “Aloft” is a nice treat.

-Do these stories about people in transition help you envision how Punahou students and faculty can model and promote environmental sustainability?

I think 80 percent of our budget is the people costs of running the organization. And 80 percent of my time is filled with people issues. In my position I have to rise above the day-to-day and think more strategically and creatively about the issues, and as I do I can help force other people to do the same. I think even though sustainability is a thrust for us, something like “A Whole New Mind” actually fits into that. We’re trying not just to change kids’ behavior, but for them to see systems and the interdependence of systems and for them to become not just recyclers but more inventive and innovative and resourceful about how they might do things differently. We’re producing the next generation of change agents not just the next generation of consumers. If we can get from a 5-year-old to an 18-year-old to a 50-year-old faculty member to think about the interdependence of systems then you’re really changing how people conceptualize the world.

Categories: Teaching, WIMR

Simply Literary

A while back I got a note asking me to check out a new educational portal for students and teachers called Simply Charly. I finally had a chance to review this promising site, designed to complement what educators do in teaching students about literature and arts by stimulating their curiosity and creativity (and help them find research material) with a layman’s intro to each figure and subject, linking with the latest in multimedia interfaces (podcasts, videos, etc.), fishing up current news articles on the web that mention the subject/figure, short analysis of writing and a list of works, links to more information, and a discussion forum.

As the site explains:

“From the main site, you can click through to sites devoted to the great historical figures of art, architecture, science, music, literature, philosophy, politics, and economics. Everyone from Elvis Presley to Sigmund Freud, from Albert Einstein to Franz Kafka, will be thoroughly covered. … You don’t need to know physics or advanced math to explore SIMPLY EINSTEIN or SIMPLY GODEL, and you don’t have to be an English major to click on SIMPLY HEMINGWAY. Important concepts are introduced in terms everyone can understand, and the work of the individual is always placed in context, from Hemingway’s involvement in the Lost Generation group of writers to the state of physics when Einstein wrote his famous early papers.”

More portals will come online frequently (like Dickinson and Joyce coming soon), founder Charles Carlini assures me. For now there are: Chaplin, Dali, Le Corbusier, Einstein, Freud, Marx, Stravinsky, Yeats, Picasso, Hemingway, Godel, Hitchcock, and of course The Bard.

Check them out, and the vibrant caricatures here. I think many students and educators will find this a fun, helpful resources for themselves and students.

Categories: Reading, Teaching, Writing

The Great Story: Yours

Posted on November 16, 2007

When asked what they like to read, many people respond simply, I just want a great story. Knowing a great story when you read one is easy, but writing one can be elusive.

Though primarily a story consultant for Hollywood scripts, John Truby’s new guide to storytelling, The Anatomy of Story: 22 Steps to Becoming a Master Storyteller, has value for any storyteller, screenwriter and novelist alike. Practical but not dumbed-down, Truby breaks down classic films and novels such as Chinatown and The Great Gatsby, to explore plot and premise, theme, character, moral development, and endings that refuse to let the reader go.

From symbols to scene weaving, Truby’s 22 steps are designed to help writers avoid story mistakes and instead employ the best techniques in his experience:

“My goal is to explain how a great story works, along with the techniques needed to create one, so that you will have the best chance of writing a great story of your own. Some would argue that it’s impossible to teach someone how to tell a great story. I believe it can be done, but it requires that we think and talk about story differently than in the past.”

With such specific exercises and points of reference, literature instructors–especially at the high school level–could also benefit from using this guide with students.

Categories: Aloha, Nonfiction, Teaching, Writing

The Writer’s Voice Reading Series

Posted on October 2, 2007

The first in a new reading series called The Writer’s Voice, Punahou School’s scholar-in-residence Chang-rae Lee will give a reading Thursday October 4, 7-8 pm, at the Luke Lecture Hall in the Wo International Center on the Punahou campus.

A recipient of the PEN/Hemingway Award and American Book Award for his novel “Native Speaker,” Lee is taking a break from his teaching work at Princeton, working instead with would-be writers and students of literature at Punahou’s Academy.

Next up, on November 15 local writer Cathy Song (Picture Bride) will read from her new book.

Categories: Events, fiction, Teaching, Writing

Limn This Word

Posted on September 18, 2007

On Friday I posted about the Guardian Book Blog’s call for your favourite word. Without asking directly, as I’m doing now, Pickled Eel in Sydney added his to my post:

spiflicate [humorous]–to treat roughly or severely; destroy [OED]. Love it!

Whether it’s because it rolls off your tongue, stops it short, or puts the universe in order, a good word makes the difference, in prose and life. If you’re new to writing, make a list of your favorite words, get the Wordsmith word-a-day in your inbox, and begin by falling in love with diction. [One of my former high school students of course put antidisestablishmentarianism on his list. I made him use it in a poem.]

Here’s my short list of words of which I like the sound and/or meaning, to get you started and to which I hope you’ll keep adding–who knows, one day we might even compile the Lit Bloggers Word Dictionary.

epitome (yes, as a young girl I used to pronounce it ep-ih-tome)
mellifluous (James Earl Jones’s pronunciation not figured in)
chatoyant
legerdemain (as in ‘prose legerdemain’)
swivet (as in ‘in a’)
gloaming
knackered

Your turn.

PS_Two great word books I’ve found and often peruse:

Dictionary of Word Origins: A History of the Words, Expressions and Cliches We Use

THE WORD BOOK

Categories: Amusements, Language, Teaching, Writing

I Saw You Standing There

Posted on July 24, 2007

If we’re still considering music lyrics to be poetry, then that’s how this post relates. Last night I saw the Shin’s play, among other things, a cover of Depeche Mode’s “Dreaming of Me.” I guess I too am old, as the band offered their reasoning for those who knew the song, because I recalled my record (not cd, not tape) of that album back in the bedroom of my youth. This rendition was decidedly more upbeat than the rest of their songs, which were muted but pop-y, occasionally raw with a handful of grit. Overall it was a good night: I had a drink, ran into friends and the obligatory one person I didn’t want to see, and saw a live show (rare here) which was as good as could be had at the Pipeline Cafe.

So, are we still considering music to be poetry? I’ll leave you with the lyrics below to ponder and perhaps with which to answer that question. Back in my teaching days, I might have asked, as a place to begin: What do you notice about it? What stand out? What questions do you have? What do you like?

Dreaming of Me
——Depeche Mode

Light switch, man switch
Film was broken only then
All the night, fused tomorrow
Dancing with a distant friend

Filming and screening, I picture the scene
Filming and dreaming, dreaming of me

So we left, understanding
Clean cut SONG-we’re sounding fast
Talked of sad, I talked of war
I laughed and climbed the rising CAST

Filming and screening, I picture the scene
Filming and dreaming, dreaming of me

Quickly, I remember
Fused and saw a face before
Timing, reason, understanding
Like association whore

Filming and screening, I picture the scene
Filming and dreaming, dreaming of me

Dreaming of me (Oooh, la la la …)
Just dreaming of me
It’s only me
Just me

Source: http://www.sing365.com

Categories: Events, Music, My Events, Poetry, Teaching

WIMR Wednesday: Jim Dator

Posted on July 18, 2007

Writing as Mind Control?

Jim Dator, a specialist in futures studies—how changes or lack of changes today become tomorrow’s reality—was perhaps my most interesting interview to date for my What I’m Reading (WIMR) column. He views reading as a form of oppression and mind control, but scans the written word daily to generate ideas about the future. He agrees with the local focus of Hawai`i’s two daily newspapers, but thinks we are miseducating today’s school children. I couldn’t print our entire interview in the Advertiser July 1, 2007, so I’m posting it here so you can ruminate on the full scope of his responses–and your own vision of the future of Hawai`i and beyond.

What I’m Reading | Jim Dator
Professor and Director, Hawai`i Research Center for Future Studies, UH Manoa.

Q&A with Christine Thomas

-What are you reading?

I am primarily a futurist concerned about the future, so in order to get information about that I have to scan—I do a lot of environmental scanning, so in fact I read all the time. But I don’t read fiction. I generally don’t like fiction because I find it very boring. I read reviews about fiction so I know generally what’s being written, but I don’t spend any time at all reading fiction itself. I read poetry though, every day. I like words—it’s not that I don’t. In my general scanning I like to read the poems that are in the magazines I read. I also get “The Best American Poetry 2006 (Best American Poetry)” and that sort of stuff that gives me a collection of what somebody thinks is good poetry. Every day I start off reading the Honolulu Advertiser and after that I usually ready poetry for a while. Basically everything I’m doing—there’s no distinction between my work and my play. My reading is scanning for things to write about or talk about or use to help some organization think about the future. That’s one of the characteristic features of me.

Secondly, as a futurist I’m particularly interested, and have been for many years, in the relationship between what we know as individuals, as a culture and a society, and the way in which we acquire information about the world. Historically that means the evolution of speech…how that then enabled us to think and to organize knowledge and to organize society in ways that we couldn’t do before. And the next big breakthrough is writing, and that’s where civilization took off…that’s a huge change from the way of thinking in an oral society and the way of thinking in a written society. Then the printing press was a further transformation of that, and until then books were scarce…only those in control could read. … But now we live in a world where most people don’t read and write. They get their information from television and movies and each other. …You simply cannot get today’s students to read—they’re extremely informed about the world but for the most part they don’t like to read. …

For many years I’ve had a fight against teaching English. We are, as far as I know, the only society that teaches its native language at the University level and teaches it over and over and over. I think that’s absolutely ridiculous. … My criteria is: Can other people understand what you’re writing? If so, then you’re communicating and that’s all you need. The rest is style. … The emphasis on proper speaking and writing is really political oppression. … It’s a way to make thought conform to what somebody thinks is acceptable. It’s a way of intimidation. In many ways I’m ideological opposed to reading. People get their information not by reading but are still well informed, and until recently are still able to communicate. …. Schools miseducate by focusing on a dying art and not teaching them how to produce television shows and movies, and interactive games and all that. … But You Tube has begun to change that. Since technology has become so easy, people are learning how to communicate rather than being taught how to communicate. That’s something I really support.

-What kinds of poetry do you read?

Whatever I happen to have. For example in “The Best American Poetry 2006 (Best American Poetry)” I just start and read all the poems, and then read at the back something about the authors, and then go back and read the poems in light of what the authors say about them. I’m interested in ideas, and I use a lot of poetry in my writing and speaking. I read a lot of historical stuff, too. I like to go back and read a whole book of poetry from before Shakespeare’s time, for example, or during Shakespeare’s time, to see what people were writing and thinking about. … It’s a general interest in words and ideas that come from poetry.

-What does poetry offer that fiction doesn’t?

It’s the brevity, the conciseness. It’s agonizing over the right word. I don’t really like rhyme poetry for the most part, but the rhyme constrained what you could do which is part of the challenge of it—so that’s sort of interesting. But in so-called modern poetry, where you’re not constrained by rhyme or meter, I don’t know—it’s a mystical experience. I get goose bumps that go up and down and it’s a surprise. I basically think that the world is absurd and we run around trying to give meaning to the world in its absurdity, and poets do it so well in my opinion.

All writing is about the past because we’re stuck with these old words and worst of all people telling us how we can use them. … I just don’t like it. I’m a political scientist and I see it as politics.

-Are you getting your fill of it because in the future poetry and writing will be replaced by interactive audio-visual technology?

I spend a lot of time looking at the relationship between technology and social change. … It almost never vanishes entirely. It’s put in its proper place. It does what it continues to do best and doesn’t have to do the things it had to do simply because there wasn’t technology available to do it. … Writing emerged as labeling to tell us what was in an earthen jar that you couldn’t see through, or to mark a tombstone or a monument. That lasted for 1000 years before people began to use it to categorize things, and it sort of leads to thinking about how the world works and developing a theory and so forth. …. Then you begin to use language for poetry or laws; language is what destroyed spirituality and created religion. … All the problems that we’re in now were caused by writing in many ways. But we still speak even though we can write. So writing will remain but it will not dominate in the ways it does at the present time, I suspect. But I don’t really know the future.

Categories: Hawaii People, Teaching, WIMR

Literary Lotus

I travel. I read. I write.

Posts from the “Teaching” Category

Fiji Me

Posted on September 18, 2010

Love Your Mindset (or, What’s Val Iwashita Reading?)

Posted on March 25, 2009

Back to School

Posted on September 10, 2008

WIMR: James K. Scott, Punahou

Posted on July 16, 2008

Simply Literary

Posted on June 20, 2008

The Great Story: Yours

Posted on November 16, 2007

The Writer’s Voice Reading Series

Posted on October 2, 2007

Limn This Word

Posted on September 18, 2007

I Saw You Standing There

Posted on July 24, 2007

WIMR Wednesday: Jim Dator

Posted on July 18, 2007

Posts from the “Teaching” Category

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