Death and Life
TRIGGER WARNING: DEATH MENTION Yesterday I received news that an academic acquaintance dropped dead of a heart attack. He was in his early 40s and… Read More »Death and Life
TRIGGER WARNING: DEATH MENTION Yesterday I received news that an academic acquaintance dropped dead of a heart attack. He was in his early 40s and… Read More »Death and Life
This question is a tough one. (A little secret… I don’t have the answers to most of the questions I ask.) Here’s some context: In… Read More »How do you do that online thing?
I attended #OER17 with many different goals and hopes, but all were surpassed and I came away having learned a most valuable, topical, and poignant lesson about our world and how we interact. I met people. Meeting people is something that we do and teach, or at least teach about, in so many ways. In my Psychology of Learning and Teaching class I even teach about meeting people – the value of social interaction, social context, the self, how children develop, but this day was a landmark revelation for me. I was aware not of teaching through the rear-view mirror of McLuhan but of not realising we are riding bicycles while others are driving on the same road with us. It is challenging to verbalise. This is a personal reflection with pedagogical implications.
This morning I woke to a conversation on twitter that caught my eye, perplexed me, and concerned me all at once. It was about how someone was treated rudely on the phone. One person didn’t understand the other, and attributed it to an accent, but this wasn’t very tactful or helpful, and came across as downright rude. Now the thing is, I wasn’t there. I didn’t hear the conversation, but I heard the aftershock. What happened left a mark and caused upset (* see note below). This post is not about the actual conversation, but about the nature of learning and listening. It made me think of the curiosity of communication and teaching. Image CC BY by Double-M
If we only know by shadows, then what truth is there?
The conversation reminded me of the importance of perception, empathy, and a willingness to learn to understand.
In my classes I often talk about communication, as I work with people aiming to perform and teach music in various settings, including 1-to-1. It is a bit heavy going, but I start one class with this quote:Read More »I hear what you’re saying…
(3 min read) This one’s for Dave. Thank you for asking me to write it.
So this post? We were sitting next to each other in an airport cafe eating pizza before catching our flights to our respective homes after a conference and we were talking about different forms of communication.
I have always been curious about perception and connection, Read More »On communication and connection
(read time 2 min) That’s right. The sketches on the post it notes in the photo all represent the same object. They don’t look the… Read More »What’s the big cheese?