609. Measuring

There’s something about the printed word that impresses people. When something is written well, and people read it, it’s a little harder to disagree with it than when it is spoken well. When a person speaks, you can watch facial expressions and body language. You can listen to the tone of voice. All your senses…

As we teach children to read, we try to get them to do so independently. We teach them various strategies they can use to figure out words they don’t know. They can use context or phonetic clues. They can take words apart, figure out the parts, and then put them together again. Some teachers have…

To some children, winning games is very important, and they’ll do whatever they need to do to make sure they win. I used to think that parents were always to blame for that – that some parents stress winning too much. And some parents are and do. I also blamed society as a whole. Society…

Some professionals who don’t feel good just stay home. I’ve already written about the difficulties involved in deciding to stay home if you’re a teacher. Because of those difficulties, and/or because of the joy of teaching, teachers frequently go to work when they don’t feel good. They may take medications that control symptoms. They may…

Modern society does things to make children feel that it’s not okay to be children. Children are quick to pick up whatever messages society seems to be giving them. Some want to be “cool,” and it doesn’t take long to learn that it isn’t “cool” to be a child – that being an adolescent is…

Mathematics is a language and way of thinking that intimidates many people. Whether you’re in second grade trying to figure out how to deal with the subtraction of two-digit numbers, or in high school or college trying to figure out what calculus is all about, it can be hard because it doesn’t seem to have…