X post: redefining intelligence

[Guest]

Interesting alternative list of skills/ways of thinking about intelligence:

 

http://www.skylarksings.com/writings/partsisparts.php

 

I'm in the process of collecting these kinds of lists. Anybody have other ones to share?

 

There's one from the book Coloring Outside the Lines by Roger Schank, which is pretty darn similar to David Albert's at the link above:

 

redefining "kid smarts":

--verbal proficiency

--creativity (defined as the ability to come up with alternatives, think and experiment without censoring yourself from fear of failure)

--analytical ability (as with Albert, this centers on the ability to sum up real world situations and make conclusions)

--gumption (persistence)

--ambition (not solely defined in terms of pursuing job success or "achievements")

--inquisitiveness

 

Here at mid-school-year, what I really love about both these lists is that they are SHORT, and that they are eminently practical -- not exclusively or rarified academics.

--

[Nan in Mass]

Sigh. I've looked at lists like this from time to time. All three of my children are like these lists. And yet, they do poorly in school and on tests. It leaves me wondering what I'm doing wrong that other people are managing to do right, since I know plenty of people like this who do well at school, also. Or what makes my particular children not good at school.

-Nan

 

ETA: If my children struggled more, or were less average, or if I had more doubts about their intelligence, I probably would find lists like this very encouraging instead of the opposite. I've concluded that we are odd birds.

Edited December 27, 2010 by Nan in Mass

[Guest]

I think both authors would agree that institutional school and tests do not deal with extensively with the types of "intelligence," or the abilities/skills, they are talking about. David Albert, in fact, would argue pretty categorically (he's that kind of guy) that institutional or conventional ideas of school and his list have absolutely nothing in common, and in fact that school suppresses precisely these types of abilities which are necessary for functioning in the post-school world.

 

I think probably Roger Schank would say the same. He has a large section of his book devoted to talking about how memory and learning really work (he's a cognitive scientist, linguist, and/or computer guy; I forget which combination of things he researches) and argues that it all is precisely what is damped down in school.

 

David Albert's kids were homeschooled; Roger Schank's were conventionally schooled, but he talks quite a bit about how he encouraged his kids to learn outside those boundaries, and in fact outright told them at points that they shouldn't bother about particular classes (his daughter's high school writing class was one that sticks out in my mind) because the teachers weren't the know-all and end-all writing authorities; his daughter should just write the way she personally liked best, take her middling grade from her teacher when the daughter didn't write what the teacher wanted, and just pursue her own way.

[laughing lioness]

Sigh. I've looked at lists like this from time to time. All three of my children are like these lists. And yet, they do poorly in school and on tests. It leaves me wondering what I'm doing wrong that other people are managing to do right, since I know plenty of people like this who do well at school, also. Or what makes my particular children not good at school.

-Nan

 

ETA: If my children struggled more, or were less average, or if I had more doubts about their intelligence, I probably would find lists like this very encouraging instead of the opposite. I've concluded that we are odd birds.

 

 

There are intellectual abilities and performance abilities. It there is a disparity between them -even if one falls into "gifted" on one area and "normal" on another- it could create challenging scenarios.

My dh falls into gifted on intellectual tests and normal on performance tests. Managing this disparity is one of his greatest frustrations (and probably mine- I score much higher on performance, but lower on I.Q. than him)

[Guest]

Yes; I am wondering as I read these lists if they apply to "standard" people -- the ones whose abilities are fairly evenly distributed, who don't have processing or learning disabilities, however mild, or neurological differences, or even different ways of thinking -- or if they apply more to the outgoing, creative types, or what.

 

I wonder what a list would look like for my dd, for instance, the Aspie. I know the lists I make up in my head all the time only bear a glancing and periodic resemblance to these, or to the lists in the WTM. Yet I am also fascinated by the lists, probably partly because I was Ms. Standard in adolescence, yet have moved so far away from that type of thought since I've been teaching dd.

 

There's yet another kind of list in The Buccaneer Scholar, a book by a drop-out-turned-computer-expert; the book is on the qualities needed for self-education. I read it but was turned off the guy's tone, so I don't have it on my shelves any longer. But there were some similarities to the other two lists I cited. All these people are interested in bucking the system to some extent -- throughout high school they encouraged their kids in noncoformity to the public school system, although both Albert's and Schank's kids went to college and grad school.

 

This is the kind of conversation I hoped the list would spark!

[Nan in Mass]

I have tried through the years to spark conversations about the balance between encouraging one's child to develop natural talents and insisting that one's child put time into becoming mediocre at the parts of the standard academic skills and content list that the child is naturally bad at, and about various other balance points. I haven't been very successful. Perhaps it is too personal. Perhaps people are too timid about admitting that they aren't doing something conventional. Perhaps people feel they are betraying their children when they talk about their children's failings, or that they are bragging if they talk about their successes. Perhaps people would prefer to stick to academics, or the people who post here who would be likely to have a conversation along these lines are fairly talented academically and hence haven't thought much about the problems of intelligent children who aren't. I don't know. Perhaps you will have better luck. I hope so.

 

At some point, I read The Myth of Laziness and that answered some of my questions. It said that every child deserves to be taught to write, even if it takes massive amounts of time and effort, because not being able to do so is such a handicap in our society. That helped me to define my homeschooling goals. I made a list of what I thought "write" meant and then added other things that I thought important. This was mostly a matter of deciding where I differed from TWTM, since TWTM discusses all this pretty thoroughily. Good spelling was not in my definition of able-to-write. Good phonetic guesses were. (It took lots of effort to get my son to spell phonetically when he didn't know, rather than create a word that bore some resemblance to the proper spelling visually - round letters where there were round ones, tall letters where there were tall ones, etc. He would guess themuoylihg for thoroughily and spellcheck was totally baffled.) So was the ability to write by hand in cursive.

 

I would have liked having your list of talents when I was hashing all that out.

 

This post is meandering all over, but perhaps something here will help push your converastion along.

 

My youngest is a bit of a puzzle. I think if he had been in a good public school (we have one) and someone had succeeded in convincing him that he wanted to succeed there, he would have been good at academics. I haven't succeeded in convincing him of this at home, so he is missing some rather key skills and isn't very successful academically. I also have been lazy or tired or uninterested. And I can't say anyone has been very supportive when he has mentioned wanting to study for and do well on standardized tests like the SATs. He has occasional competative spells where doing something like that sounds appealing to him. My husband and I say, "Fine, that is a good idea!" but then don't exactly follow up with helping him to accomplish the goal the same way we have followed up on helping him accomplish the goal of going to Japan, for example, or getting his own sailboat, or building a set of insect legs.

 

As I said, I'm not sure what my point is, here. Oh well.

 

-Nan

[JennW in SoCal]

Hey there Nan!

 

How's the snow in your neck of the woods?!

 

I could have written a similar paragraph about homeschooling my youngest the last year and a half. Getting the oldest launched into the real world was exhausting, and I can admit to the burn out affecting my attitude. My youngest is a natural academic who would also have done well in a good traditional school setting, but he is also hugely introverted and creative so that wouldn't have been a good fit, either. I have fretted quite a bit over him, feeling guilty but not really motivated to push him. The answer seems to be community college. He figured out how to study, loved being challenged by someone, anyone other than mom, and will start as a full time student in January -- crashing classes with the rest of the throngs to get everything he wants and needs.

 

You have produced wonderful and interesting young men, no matter if they fit into the standard acadmic mold. They know how to sail -- how cool is that? They travel with peace walking -- unique experiences and a demonstration of strongly held convictions, unusual in young people. Not to mention fully embracing their geeky sides. They fit Jane in NC's definition of a "well educated" person in that they would make for very interesting dinner companions!!

 

To add to the general thread. I'm with Nan in that I had certain basics academic disciplines that had to be mastered, no matter the innate skill set of my kids, such as writing and logic.

 

There are a couple of women in So Cal who published a book and teach seminars on learning styles. They have been a fixture at many area homeschool conventions. They even have a program for schools to train teachers on how to reach students with different learning styles. Their list is:

 

Think/Create -- artistic

Perform -- which isn't so much acting as it is being physical

Produce -- people who like to fill out work sheets just so, dot all the i's and such

Innovate -- the engineer/tinkerer kind of people

Relate/Inspire -- your basic people skills

 

The funniest thing. When my kids took the test designed by these women to figure out their learning styles profile, they BOTH scored -8 on Producer. No wonder my kids didn't want work sheets or to show all their work in math!! My dh and also took the test, and we, along with our kids scored high on think/create. My dh is the only one who had a high "produce" score, which totally fits!!

[Nan in Mass]

In my clan (the bit of my extended family that lives in neighboring towns and does almost everything together), the cousins, going down in age from 23 to not quite a year, are four boys, four girls, and two boys. The oldest girl, 14, gave her older boy cousins (plus the Ukrainian college friend) small newspaper packets filled with little marshmellows and toothpicks). Then she held up two movie-sized boxes of candy and announced that her Christmas present to them was a contest: they had three minutes to make the highest freestanding tower. The result clearly showed everyone's abilities and personalities. It was great fun. My youngest (the youngest boy) won by ignoring the idea that the tower ought to be a good tower (in other words, he almost cheated). My oldest began by building what would have been the most engineeringly sound tower, realized there wasn't time, abandonned that idea, and adopted my youngest's policy (in other words, he is like my youngest but not quite so quick). My middle one ignored the time limit and carefully built what he remembered from all those countless Nova programs and National Geographic magazines as the strongest structure, half an egg, finishing after about ten minutes (in other words, he played only on his own terms, very slowly). The girl is the brightest, most creative, most productive, most everything of the bunch, just as the creativity of her gift shows. What on earth does a 14yo girl give cousins in their 20's?

 

I can just see the reaction of the public if schools tested learning styles with marshmellows and toothpicks.

 

-Nan

[Jane in NC]

In my clan (the bit of my extended family that lives in neighboring towns and does almost everything together), the cousins, going down in age from 23 to not quite a year, are four boys, four girls, and two boys. The oldest girl, 14, gave her older boy cousins (plus the Ukrainian college friend) small newspaper packets filled with little marshmellows and toothpicks). Then she held up two movie-sized boxes of candy and announced that her Christmas present to them was a contest: they had three minutes to make the highest freestanding tower. The result clearly showed everyone's abilities and personalities. It was great fun. My youngest (the youngest boy) won by ignoring the idea that the tower ought to be a good tower (in other words, he almost cheated). My oldest began by building what would have been the most engineeringly sound tower, realized there wasn't time, abandonned that idea, and adopted my youngest's policy (in other words, he is like my youngest but not quite so quick). My middle one ignored the time limit and carefully built what he remembered from all those countless Nova programs and National Geographic magazines as the strongest structure, half an egg, finishing after about ten minutes (in other words, he played only on his own terms, very slowly). The girl is the brightest, most creative, most productive, most everything of the bunch, just as the creativity of her gift shows. What on earth does a 14yo girl give cousins in their 20's?

 

I can just see the reaction of the public if schools tested learning styles with marshmellows and toothpicks.

 

-Nan

 

Nan--what a great holiday story! Thank you for sharing this, my friend.

 

Jane

[Nan in Mass]

Oh - I forgot - snow!

We got some. Two of mine set off at the beginning of the snowstorm in search of good snowboarding. They arrived safely, thankfully, and just had a fantastic day in the mountains. We were a bit worried by the only partially understandable cell phone call mid-morning, but it turned out to be a super excited call with them both speaking into one phone to tell us thank you, all the lifts were open and there was a foot of powder. We were lazy and hadn't gotten around to putting the storm door on the back door and the bottom is rotten and it snowed in quite a lot, but other than that, we did very nicely. We walked down the street to go sledding this afternoon and saw that someone in the neighborhood had a tree come down on a row of parked cars. It is very windy. The offshore buoys are reporting things like 23 foot seas every 11 seconds and 54 knot gusts. My parents had some flooding and the wind is blowing the dock system around pretty badly, but the chains held. I hope everyone else is doing ok. We didn't get too much snow. Mostly, it is the wind.

-Nan

[Corraleno]

I wonder what a list would look like for my dd, for instance, the Aspie. I know the lists I make up in my head all the time only bear a glancing and periodic resemblance to these, or to the lists in the WTM. Yet I am also fascinated by the lists, probably partly because I was Ms. Standard in adolescence, yet have moved so far away from that type of thought since I've been teaching dd.

This would be my list of things I want my kids to be able to do well:

 

Skills

Find information

Analyze/assess/interpret information

Organize information

Communicate information

 

Traits

Approach problems in a calm and focused way

Look for creative and efficient solutions

Persist in the face of adversity if it's something they really want/believe in

(and yet...) Know when to cut their losses

 

I think if my kids leave home being good at those 8 things, then they can be successful at anything they choose to pursue, and it won't really matter what chemistry text they used or whether they read War and Peace. I first read David Alpert's story a couple of years ago, and was really inspired by reading how his daughters set up a snake-breeding business as kids, and worked at a wolf sanctuary, and did all kinds of incredibly interesting and fabulous things, with nary a textbook or worksheet in sight. And now the oldest is doing a PhD at Princeton (graduated with honors from Smith) and the other is at the American School studying International Relations, and they managed to do it without the standard AP-packed HS transcript. I do think they were very very good at the 8 things listed above, though, because those are exactly the kinds of things that their dad instilled in them.

 

As to the resemblance between that list and the WTM lists.... I do think TWTM provides a strong focus on the skills listed, with its emphasis on logic (analyzing information), outlining, and writing, and I think the content suggestions provide good resources for practicing those skills for many kids, especially those who are more "generalists," without strong interests or passions in a particular subject. But I also believe that for kids with specific interests, those interests can be used as the focus in teaching the important skills, and other subjects can be covered in other ways and at different depths (perhaps at more of a "cultural literacy" level for subjects a student has no real interest in). So in that sense I think the list applies equally well to "standard" kids (if there is such a thing!) and "quirky" kids (Aspie, ADD, visual/spatial, etc.).

 

Jackie

[Nan in Mass]

Yes, but my experience with taking a child who hasn't been exposed to a textbook and giving them textbook questions to answer has not been good. Perhaps because I failed to teach them to do the first four things on your list? Or perhaps because there are many assumptions behind those questions that my children are unfamiliar with? Or perhaps because my children are bad at judging the scope of the answer needed? Did the Alpert children practise skills like outlining? Or not? Practical life experience did not prepare mine to do high level academics in a school setting, unfortunately. This is another example of how we seem to be different from everybody else sigh.

-Nan

[Corraleno]

I don't know about outlining, but I know the kids did a lot of research. When they started breeding and selling cornsnakes, they had to research the genetics and the different "morphs" (colors/patterns), calculate their costs and profits, and everything else involved in running a business. From what I've read, most of what David did was to facilitate whatever the girls wanted to do — e.g. drive the wolf-obsessed daughter to the wolf sanctuary and let her convince the director to let her intern there (she was really young, IIRC — like upper elementary or lower middle school). Whatever they wanted to learn about, he would help them, but they had to do the research and the work and tell him what they wanted from him. The kids were very ambitious and self-directed — which I think is a crucial component if one takes that approach.

 

I would consider the ability to read/use a textbook as part of the "finding information" skill, along with online research, searching professional journals, designing and carrying out experiments and field research, interviewing experts, etc. I think one of the problems with mainstream/PS education is that this skill is almost entirely lacking — the only source of information is often textbooks, and those are so pre-processed, pre-digested, pre-highlighted, etc. that kids end up not even knowing how to use a college textbook, let alone any other sources.

 

Analyzing/assessing/interpreting information would include (for DS) the ability to analyze and interpret the data in his own and others' research, to assess the validity of someone's research design, and to recognize logical flaws not only in academic work, but in politics, news reports, advertising, and so many other components of daily life. This is another skill that seems to be totally untaught in most schools.

 

I do plan to teach DS how to organize information, but the way he does it may not look much like the way I do it. (I'm definitely an outliner; DH claims I even argue in outline format. :tongue_smilie:) DS is very visual/spatial, and seems to like more of a "mind-mapping" approach. (In fact, DH is working on a 3D mind-mapping software program because he finds even the 2D programs, like Inspiration, too restrictive). So the way DS organizes information may not be outlining, but as long as it's organized and accessible to him, that's fine.

 

In DS's case, "communicating information" will include drawing as much as writing, because as a paleontologist he'll need to be able to accurately draw specimens as well as describe them. Mathematical modeling and statistics need to be part of his communication skills as well. For a different child with different goals and interests (e.g. law, medicine, literature, dance), the specific skills that fall under "communicating information" might be very different. In most schools, communication skills (if taught at all) seem to be limited to producing a 3-5 paragraph essay, or some form of "journaling" or creative writing.

 

I think for most kids those four skills need to be explictly taught; I know there's no way DS would just "absorb" those skills while following his interests. For some kids, though, those skills do seem to come naturally — I know I picked up most of those on my own, with perhaps the exception of recognizing logical presuppositions and fallacies in theoretical/academic work (a skill I credit to my college philosophy prof).

 

I do believe, though, that if schools focused far more on those skills, instead of specific "state standard" content, there wouldn't be such a huge gap between HS and college, because those are specifically the skills that students need in college — and real life, for that matter.

 

Jackie

[Nan in Mass]

That was helpful. Thank you.

 

How is 3D mind-mapping different than outlining? At least, outlining if one is willing to forego the limitations of I-A-1-a and add other numbering systems? It is disconnected, I know that, but otherwise, isn't it multidimentional? Harder to visualize, though.

 

I taught mine to draw. I thought that was just as important as being able to write.

 

How are you planning on teaching logic?

And how does one search professional journals?

 

-Nan

[Corraleno]

My favorite logic resource is Nonsense: Red Herrings Straw Men and Sacred Cows: How We Abuse Logic in Our Everyday Language, by Robert Gula. From the Foreword:

...it is a short course in nonmathematical logical thinking, a form of thinking that is especially important for philosophy and economics, but also that all of us use and often horrendously abuse every day. In substance, the book is a remarkable tour de force of scholarship, yet in style is unexpectedly relaxed, informal, accessible, a pleasure either to read or to consult.

<snip>

But what is most impressive and fun about Nonsense is all the specifics, all the myriad ways that human beings go about being illogical, all the variations and permutations, each itself covered in an orderly, organized, consistent, clear, relevant, and complete way. One of Gula's students at Groton said... the book "taught me to think," and another said "It changes your life."

 

As for searching professional journals, DS is only 12 (and not eligible for a student membership/subscription to Vertebrate Paleo until he's 14), but so far I've shown him how to search online by figuring out the best combination of terms to search to give him the most direct hits, how to read abstracts in the various pub databases to see if the information is relevant to him, how to search our Natural History Museum's database for museum publications, and things like that. When he's found something he wants to read (for example a new article published by one of the paleontologists whose blogs he follows), I help him figure out how to get a copy of the article. Once he's a little older, he'll join some of the professional organizations (Society for Vertebrate Paleo, etc), attend the conferences, view the paper and poster sessions, etc., so by the time he's in college full-time, he'll be familiar with those things.

 

Jackie

[Corraleno]

Sorry, I forgot to answer the question about 3D mind-mapping. If you google "3D mind mapping" there are lots of existing applications, but they're (in DH's opinion) clumsy and inelegant; they tend to use stick-&-ball models, or cones, pyramids, or other opaque shapes. DH works in real 3D (with stereo glasses), and he's working on interfaces where semi-transparent layers are nested within each other, and can be rotated in 3D space.

 

Jackie

[Nan in Mass]

Ah. I see. That was the only way I could make 3D not be the same thing (more or less) as some sort of outlining. If it is a tree, even a 3D tree, it can be outlined. I think. LOL. The only problem I see with your husband's method is that I should think he would fairly quickly become dissatisfied with only three dimensions and wish for more, in which case one is back to a chopped-up-version. For example, for garden planning, 4D mind-mapping would be very nice.

 

And thank you for the other info. I need to find a better source of research for materials for my son. I expect my husband can help with that. He has a CC id, which I think gives him access to various databases. I will investigate. Materials seems to be the thing he is playing with the most consistently. Well, that and games, which I don't count as school not because I don't think he is learning tons from it, but because he just wants to do it for fun, not study it.

 

And I will check out your logic resource. The blurb sounds like something he would love. I am about to order that book that is about the most un-great-books. They would go nicely together.

 

Thank you very much!

 

-Nan

[Miss Marple]

And I will check out your logic resource. The blurb sounds like something he would love. I am about to order that book that is about the most un-great-books. They would go nicely together.

 

Thank you very much!

 

-Nan

 

Nan, what is the name of the book of un-great books? It sounds interesting.

[Corraleno]

Ah. I see. That was the only way I could make 3D not be the same thing (more or less) as some sort of outlining. If it is a tree, even a 3D tree, it can be outlined. I think. LOL.

The key difference between an outline and a "mind map" type of organization (whether 2D or 3D) is that a mind map allows for multiple links between items. I think "mind mapping" is much better for remembering information, because the "facts" become like nodes in a web of connections and ideas — plus there are some people whose minds just inherently work that way, and imposing a linear type of organization on their learning processes is pretty much a lost cause. The problem, however, comes when you try to express what you know in writing, because writing is inherently linear, so you have to then take that web and reduce it to a single strand, or at least a series of individual strands linked end to end.

 

DH is a terrible writer, despite his IQ, because he just cannot wrap his head around the idea of putting concepts in a linear order. In his mind, everything relates to everything else, so his writing ends up being like a tangled ball of string where the reader keeps crossing points and topics he already read, because they also relate to this part of the discussion as well as the three previous parts of the discussion, etc. When I've taken DH's technical "papers" (more like verbals splats, really) and managed to convert them to linear, logical, coherent papers (a frustrating and time-consuming process that has, I admit, often reduced me to tears), DH looks at me as if I've performed some kind of miracle of transubstantiation.

 

So my goal with DS, who thinks just like DH, is to try to train him to turn a web into a line. He truly can't just write into an outline, he needs an intermediate step. So I have him take notes on index cards — one fact/topic/concept per card. Then he arranges them on a table and we use pieces of colored yarn to "link" them. Then we decide which facts & ideas "go best" with which other facts and ideas and group them together in clumps, then we link the "clumps" together by connecting one or more cards in one clump with one or more cards in another clump, and those are the "transitions" between sections. Eventually I hope he'll do this sort of thing on the computer, but the tactile, hands-on nature of it works for him now. And in fact, it's basically how I organized my own research in grad school, except without the colored yarn; I used colored index cards and spread them all over the floor, and went through pretty much the same process.

 

Jackie

Edited December 30, 2010 by Corraleno

[Storm Bay]

Nan, what is the name of the book of un-great books? It sounds interesting.

 

I'd like to know, too. I just ordered that logic book even before I made it to your next reply.

[Nan in Mass]

Multiple links between nodes... that makes sense. I have the same trouble. I think in a mishmash and my writing, if I am lucky, is circular. If I'm not lucky, it comes out mishmashed. It's wonder that anybody can understand me. I'm better in writing than speaking. My family gets most impatient with me. I can see people's eyes glazing over whenever I open my ,mouth. Sigh.

 

I have had similar problems teaching my children to write. They write nice sentences, but organization was a big problem and writing an outline to write from doesn't really work for them. I use the make-a-list-then-number-it-then-write-from-the-numbered-list system, which helps, provided I use fractions, but not for my children. I hate outlining because I can see multiple ways to organize the outline and I wind up reorganizing it constantly. Writing one winds up being a matter of writing one piece, then rewriting it to add the second, then rewriting those to add the third, etc.. Ug. I like your nice movable yarn system.

 

I'll have to check on the name of that book, everyone else.

 

-Nan

[Nan in Mass]

Ten Books That Screwed Up the World: And Five Others That Didn't Help It

 

"You've heard of the "great books"? These are their evil opposites. From Machiavelli's The prince to Karl Marx's Communist manifesto to Alfred Kinsey's Sexual behavior in the human male, these "influential" books have led to war, genocide, totalitarian oppression, family breakdown, and disastrous social experiments. And yet these authors' bad ideas are still popular and pervasive---in fact, they might influence your own thinking without your realizing it."

 

I have no idea at all if this is any good. I saw the title, read the blurb to my son, and we've ordered it from the library for him to read. We'll see. So read at your peril GRIN.

-Nan

[Miss Marple]

Ten Books That Screwed Up the World: And Five Others That Didn't Help It

 

"You've heard of the "great books"? These are their evil opposites. From Machiavelli's The prince to Karl Marx's Communist manifesto to Alfred Kinsey's Sexual behavior in the human male, these "influential" books have led to war, genocide, totalitarian oppression, family breakdown, and disastrous social experiments. And yet these authors' bad ideas are still popular and pervasive---in fact, they might influence your own thinking without your realizing it."

 

I have no idea at all if this is any good. I saw the title, read the blurb to my son, and we've ordered it from the library for him to read. We'll see. So read at your peril GRIN.

-Nan

 

:lol: Well we've already read 2 of the 3 listed. Not sure I will try Kinsey especially with a houseful of boys:D. That sounds like a book I'd enjoy reading. I'll check our library.

[Corraleno]

Ten Books That Screwed Up the World: And Five Others That Didn't Help It

 

"You've heard of the "great books"? These are their evil opposites. From Machiavelli's The prince to Karl Marx's Communist manifesto to Alfred Kinsey's Sexual behavior in the human male, these "influential" books have led to war, genocide, totalitarian oppression, family breakdown, and disastrous social experiments. And yet these authors' bad ideas are still popular and pervasive---in fact, they might influence your own thinking without your realizing it."

 

I have no idea at all if this is any good. I saw the title, read the blurb to my son, and we've ordered it from the library for him to read. We'll see. So read at your peril GRIN.

-Nan

He also includes Descartes, Rousseau, Darwin, and Margaret Mead among his purveyors of evil, so I think I'll skip this one, lol. It's clearly a very polemical book — it has 35 one-star reviews and 31 five-star reviews on Amazon.

 

Jackie

[Miss Marple]

:D

He also includes Descartes, Rousseau, Darwin, and Margaret Mead among his purveyors of evil, so I think I'll skip this one, lol. It's clearly a very polemical book — it has 35 one-star reviews and 31 five-star reviews on Amazon.

 

Jackie

 

:lol: love it or hate it :lol: Would probably make some excellent fodder for lively discussion:D

[Nan in Mass]

I'm using it as a cautionary tale, buyer beware, you can't believe everything in books, and as an introduction to what some people think of some of these other books that we won't be reading. Sort of. GRIN. My son wanted to look at the book, so we are looking at the book. If it isn't about gaming strategies, I doubt he'll do more than skim it, anyway. Discussions will probably consist of "Wow! Have you seen this?" "Yes, pretty wild, huh?" What would there be to discuss?

-Nan

[Storm Bay]

He also includes Descartes, Rousseau, Darwin, and Margaret Mead among his purveyors of evil, so I think I'll skip this one, lol. It's clearly a very polemical book — it has 35 one-star reviews and 31 five-star reviews on Amazon.

 

Jackie

 

:D

 

:lol: love it or hate it :lol: Would probably make some excellent fodder for lively discussion:D

:iagree: People aren't going to agree on which books are evil, not even on these forums:). There are still people who think that Karl Marx was correct; I have and aunt and uncle with a picture of Mao Tse Tung (sorry, cant think of the newer, better way to spell that) in their hallway. I even met someone who is still upset that her home country of Bulgaria is no longer communist (and yes, she lives here, but I don't know why). I do think that Marx's manifest was on the evil side, fwiw, and for those who like to ask, I've read it.

Edited December 30, 2010 by Karin

[Storm Bay]

Ten Books That Screwed Up the World: And Five Others That Didn't Help It

 

"You've heard of the "great books"? These are their evil opposites. From Machiavelli's The prince to Karl Marx's Communist manifesto to Alfred Kinsey's Sexual behavior in the human male, these "influential" books have led to war, genocide, totalitarian oppression, family breakdown, and disastrous social experiments. And yet these authors' bad ideas are still popular and pervasive---in fact, they might influence your own thinking without your realizing it."

 

I have no idea at all if this is any good. I saw the title, read the blurb to my son, and we've ordered it from the library for him to read. We'll see. So read at your peril GRIN.

-Nan

 

I went to order this, but not only does my library network not have it, the virtual catalogue is down until next week. Will I remember this title? If I write it down, will I lose the note? I don't know which part of the state you live in, but your area might be in our virtual catalogue. Well, catalog in the States;).

[PeterPan]

To pick back up with the pondering of textbooks and alternative education, I don't think it's at all reasonable to assume that a dyslexic or very different learner (whom we could politely label VDL for sake of discussion?) is going naturally to jump into traditional learner expectations without extra teaching. A VDL inherently thinks differently and may need to work through the process to get there. So that's cool if Albert's kids raised snakes and bunnies and did whatever and went to college and were fine, but that doesn't mean VDL's schooled that way will. Case in point, my dd: I can teach her with eclectic science stuff all I want, but until I sit down with her and actually teach her HOW to grapple with a textbook (one she's not interested in, one that's not as well written as LoTR or CS Lewis), she's not going to have that skill. Some people could figure it out on their own or have natural skills that compensate. Maybe Albert's kids were like that. That doesn't mean OURS will be. Some I don't mind if she raises snakes (or whatever she wants), but I'm still going to teach explicitly the skills I think she needs.

[PeterPan]

Karin, both PC and Mac computers can have a thing called stickies (post-it notes) on the desktop. I keep a running list with the books I'm looking for.

[Storm Bay]

Karin, both PC and Mac computers can have a thing called stickies (post-it notes) on the desktop. I keep a running list with the books I'm looking for.

 

Hmm, something to check out, and this would be a good use for it.:D:thumbup1:

 

ETA I found a sticky note, but am not sure if that will be there next time I turn the computer on, but will find out. I don't have Outlook on this one.

Edited December 30, 2010 by Karin