Professor records made public on Sangmyung site - INSIDE JoongAng Daily

Professor records made public on Sangmyung site - INSIDE JoongAng Daily

Well, I guess my record is going to be there, but I have no clue how to find it yet. Not sure what they are going to rank me on during my first semester. I'm going to guess I won't make an appearance there until next year.

I'm not sure how I feel about this. As I still don't completely understand how these rankings are made, it's tough to comment. However, I can say that I'm not too enthusiastic about the idea of a university ranking its professors. Actually, I'm not really into rankings in general. I don't see them as useful.

The stated purpose of this policy is to provide prospective students with information on the quality of professors at the university, which currently seems to only be available with student/staff ID and login, so I'm not sure how prospective students will access it. I can see how one would be tempted to rank faculty for this purpose, but what does ranking really tell us? It tells us only how these professors ranked (on yet unknown criteria) against other professors at the school. The only reason I can see to do this is to increase competition and to shame non-performers into action. And this, in the end, is not going to increase overall quality.

What this type of ranking system will do is encourage professors to play to the numbers. Student evaluations low? Give less homework. Need more publications? Push out low-quality research to boost your numbers? This reminds me of the overall education system, geared towards ever-better test scores. Quality be damned, just get a good score. When the tail wags the dog, we should all be scared.

What I would like to see is not a ranking system, but simply a public reporting on professor performance in the same areas that they measure for the rankings. In my opinion, that would be much better. Let people determine for themselves the overall quality of the faculty. This method would also allow people to better compare faculties between schools. A ranking within a school, does allow for this.

In the end, this post may be all wrong. Like I said, I haven't seen the rankings and I don't know for sure how they are calculated and presented. However, any use of rankings is not only an affront to academic professionals, it is a cold, meaningless measure of a professors worth.

Locking down your Facebook account

Online social networks were not really created to protect information.  They were built to share as much as possible.  This has become problematic for many people who find their information oozing out of their accounts in ways that they didn't anticipate.  Most often this is a human to human problem, in other words, gossip.  This is never going to be solved by technological means.  However, the inadvertent loss of control of ones data can be managed to an extent with privacy tools provided.

First, I'll give you advice that my father gave me long ago..."Never put it in writing" :-)  Maybe a strange thing to say to your young son, but it's served me well over the years.  Never record, in any way, things that you wouldn't be ok with the world seeing.  However, I do understand that there are things that you would rather not broadcast to the world if you can help it, so modifying privacy settings in your online social network is a good way to address that.

Below is a quick and dirty text tutorial on locking down your Facebook account. If you do all of the following, your account and information will be as private as possible.....however, your Facebook experience will be quite limited too.  That's your choice.

Regardless, good to see you're here.

If it's a problem of too much information available to the world, you can set your settings to essentially share nothing.  However, you would still be able to send/receive messages (internal email) and comment.  Of course, there is nothing stopping your "friends" from tagging you in pictures, notes, and such, but if that's the problem, unfriend them (which, it seems, is what you did before).

Here's how to go about locking down your account.

1. Click on "Settings" in the upper, right of the page.
    
2. Find "Privacy" and click on the "manage" link to the right of it.
    
3. First, you can block someone from even being able to see you in searches. You can do this by Facebook account or by email.  If you're having problems with particular people, use this.
    
4. Click on the "Profile" link on the privacy page (the blue link, not the white one across the top). Next to each of the categories, there is a drop-down list. From this list, select "Custom".  Each of the categories will give you slightly different options here.  Select the most restrictive ones.  "Only Friends" is an obvious choice, but some allow you to specify "Only Select Friends" or even "Only me".  Additionally, you will have to select which Networks have access, choose "None of my Networks". The networks setting is the biggest privacy hole in Facebook.  People often don't realize that their entire network (say, Joliet) has access to their info.  Lastly, you can set exceptions for some categories.  So, you can specifically add peope who you want to, for example, see photos that are tagged with your name.  This is good for specific family and friends who you want to see these things.  When you are finished, click "Save Changes"
    
5. Click on the "Contact Information" tab and make the same choices as in #4.  I'd suggest being a little freer with your email address and a little more restrictive with phone, address, and so forth.  When you're done, click "Save Changes"
    
6. Click on "Privacy" again to get back to the main privacy settings page.  Then click on "Search".  you can restrict who can see you in a search.  In most cases, you probably want to keep this as open as possible, but you may have reasons to restrict it.  Below that, however, is a section that describes what people can see when they search for you.  I usually suggest leaving these checked: picture and a link to add me as a friend, at a minimum (otherwise people won't be able to find you.  Lastly, there is an option to have public search.  This means that your Facebook account will show up in a search like Google.  Good if you want people to find you, bad if you don't :)  When you are finished, click "Save Changes".
    
7. Click on the "Privacy" link again to get back to the privacy setting page.  Click on the "News Feed and Wall" link.  Uncheck all of these for maximum privacy.  This stops, to an extent, your activities from being posting on yours or your friends' news feeds.  When you are finished, click "Save Changes"
    
8. Click on the "Privacy" link to get back to the main privacy settings page.  Click on the "Applications" link. You can read the info on this page to get a better idea of what this is for, but to change settings, click on the "Settings" tab.  The first set of settings essentially tells you that you are sharing your name, networks, and list of friends with applications that you are using in Facebook.  The only way to turn this off is to delete those applications (I'll tell you about this later).  Do make sure that you aren't sharing anything extra.  Uncheck any checkbox that is checked.
   
   The next setting that you can change is Facebook Connect.  This is the program that lets you log into other websites with your Facebook login.  It also tracks you to a great degree.  Make sure to uncheck that box.  It doesn't turn this off, but it does make sure that "friends" don't know what sites you use it on.
   
   Finally, the next setting is about Beacon.  This is Facebook's social advertising platform.  Definately check this box.  You do not want your network notified when you buy your wife's Christmas present or other, more sensitive things :)
   
   When you are done, click "Save Changes"
    
9. We're done with the privacy settings, but there's one more place to go to really lock down your account.  We need to manage applications.  Go to the settings link on the upper, right of the page.  You will see a drop-down list of options, click on "Application Settings".  On this page, you will see another drop-down list of items that dictate what "Show" in this list.  Choose "Authorized" to see the best list of applications.  The easiest way to control these is to delete all applications that can be deleted.  These have X's on the right side of the listed application.  By deleting the applications, then can do nothing on your behalf in Facebook.  Of course, you can no longer use them either.
   
   With the remaining applications, you can adjust some (not many) options by clicking on "Edit Settings".  I'd suggest limiting who can see it as much as you see fit.  At least, "Only Friends" but even "Only Me" might be a good idea. 

That's all.  Your account is locked down as much as possible now.  You can always go back and open settings up a little as you become more comfortable or see more of a need to do so.

Please, add your advice below.

Google Wave - Easy List of Bots and Gadgets

The real power of Google Wave is not in the basic collaboration that it provides, but rather the bots and gadgets that live on the platform.  I don't know why, but I couldn't find a nice, easy list that would enable to to quickly add these to my Waves.  So, I went through all that I could find and listed them here.

Please feel free to add more to the comments and I'll add them to the list.

1. The list of Bots are ones that you have to add to the Wave in order to work.
   
   


2. The list of Gadgets are two forms. Most are ones that have to be installed. They end in manifest.xml. These have to be installed through the down arrow next to the "New Wave" button. The others (gadget URL) can be added using the green puzzle piece that appears in the toolbar when editing a blip.

Gadgets

• Chess Gadget (http://gerculanum.appspot.com/gadgets/com.example.chessgadget.client.ChessGadget.gadget.xml )


• Magnetic Poetry (http://wave-api-dmo.appspot.com/public/fridge.xml )


• Bidding Gadget (http://wave-api.appspot.com/public/gadgets/bidder.xml )


• Rating Gadget (http://pesta.appspot.com/gadgets/ratings/ratings.xml )


• Opensocial Templates (http://wave-api.appspot.com/public/gadgets/wave.xml )


• Progressy (http://hafstroms.net/wave/progressy/manifest.xml) Adds a progress bar to the wave that can be used to show how far a projekt or checkpoint has to go. Live public wave


• Pick Several (http://www.randomhacks.net/gadgets/pickseveral/manifest.xml) Pick one or more choices from a list (aka approval voting).


• Voicy (http://wave-gadgets.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/voicy/manifest.xml) A voice recording/messaging/sharing system. A new way to share greetings, thoughts and brainstormings with real voice communication. Shows tabs, flash integration, identifying the current viewer and customizing the gadget accordingly (between Host and non-host, giving the host more options), Shows retrieving participant information (name) dynamically, shows communication via postMessage to/from external page in iframe, use of set/get state to dynamically update everyone's message list in realtime, shows the use of persistent data through gadget's prefs.


• Mind Map Gadget (http://cactus-wave.appspot.com/mindmap.xml) A Mindmap gadget which allows for collaborative editing of hierarchical data and ideas, including icons, import and export to freemind, voting and drag & drop.


• MyTweet on a Wave (http://haru1ban-wave.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/twitter/manifest.xml) A gadget to collaboratively browse twitter streams.


• Wave Dice Gadget (http://wavedicegadget.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/manifest.xml) Simple dice rolling gadget that supports standard PnP dice types. Full wave support, so other users can see your rolls immediately.


• Nimbb Gadget (http://service.nimbb.com/GoogleWave/installer.xml) Sample gadget to add webcam video recording to any wave.


• tic-tac-toe (gadget URL: http://tic-tac-toe-for-wave.googlecode.com/files/tic-tac-toe.xml) A pencil-and-paper game for two players, O and X, who take turns marking the spaces in a 3×3 grid.


• Google News Gadget (gadget URL: http://hosting.gmodules.com/ig/gadgets/file/112392185100245511748/newsgadget.xml ) Search and share google news in real time with your friends. You can search in private mode as well.


• Brainstorming (gadget URL: http://www.madin.jp/gadget/index.xml) A simple brainstroming tool to collaborate on an idea tree. Participants can add, edit and move nodes.


• Cards (http://wave-cards.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/manifest.xml) Play card games in Wave. Almost any game is possible!


• Pongy (http://playpongy.appspot.com/manifest.xml) is a real-time 2 player Pong game written to run as a Google wave gadget.


• Piano Gadget (gadget URL: http://wave-instruments.appspot.com/gadget/piano.xml) Piano in your Wave.


• Plus One (gadget URL: http://www.elizabethsgadgets.appspot.com/public/gadget.xml) Add this gadget to a blip to allow viewers to vote "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" on it. The gadget keeps track of the number of votes for each.


• Wave Blogadget (gadget URL: http://hosting.gmodules.com/ig/gadgets/file/116844733254275818014/blogadget.xml) Use this configurable gadget to easily embed any wave into any site that supports gadgets.* (i.e. iGoogle, Orkut, Ning, Blogger, or any FriendConnect enabled site). Simpler than using the Embed API, and offers configuration options.


• Canvas (gadget URL: http://ichikawa-public.appspot.com/wave/canvas/canvas.xml) You can draw picture and other people can see it and modify it in real time.


• Coin Toss Gadget (http://cointoss.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/cointoss.xml) Use the Coin Toss gadget to decide who buys the next lunch or who should bring donuts to the next meeting. Heads you win, tails you lose. 1. Fill out a title for you "contest" 2. Select who will be "heads" and who will be "tails" 3. Click "Flip Coin" and let the Coin Toss Gadget determine the winner.


• HTML Gadget (gadget URL: http://wave-ide.appspot.com/html.xml) Allows you to add any piece of HTML inside a wave.


• Napkin (gadget URL: http://my-wave-gadgets.appspot.com/wave/NapkinGadget.xml) Adds the ability to do quick "back of a napkin" sketches to a wave - collaborative doodling!


• Click Me (gadget URL: http://wave-api.appspot.com/public/gadgets/hellowave.xml) Shows a button with a counter. Each time the button gets clicked, the counter is incremented by one. 

BOTS

• The Wikify bot (wikifier@appspot.com) adds links to and definitions from Wikipedia to your waves for a given topic. When you add Wikify to a wave, it provides instructions on how to add a link to Wikipedia for a topic, or a definition of that topic.


• The CleanTXT bot (cleantxt@appspot.com) is an automated janitor for a wave, especially helpful on active waves with lots of participants, like public waves. When CleanTXT is participating in a Wave, it automatically deletes empty blips, reduces repetitive blank lines in a blip, automatically corrects common typos (such as a mistyped "teh" for "the"), and inserts missing spaces after commas and semi-colons.


• Polly the Pollster (polly-wave@appspot.com) lets you create multiple choice polls with custom questions and answers


• The TwitUsernames bot (twitusernames@appspot.com) inspects the content of any wave it's participating in, and converts any word that starts with an @ sign to a user link to Twitter.


• The XMPP Lite bot (wave-xmpp@appspot.com) sends you notifications of a wave's changes via XMPP (an instant messenger protocol).


• Madoqua Wave Bot (blog-bot@appspot.com). When added to a wave, this bot provides customizable JavaScript code you can copy and paste into any web page to embed a wave.


• The Emoticony bot (emoticonbot@appspot.com) converts textual smiley faces into smiley face images.


• To embed an image that's already online, add the Inbeddable bot (inbeddable@appspot.com) to your wave, and simply add the URL of the image to it. When you click Done (or press Shift+Enter), Inbeddable will turn the link image into the image itself


• The Easy Public bot makes waves public without public@a.gwave.com's disappearing act. Add it to any wave to give everyone on the Wave server access to your wave. What Easy Public does is add the public@a.gwave.com contact to your wave for you.


• Eliza the Robot Shrink (elizarobot@appspot.com) is a programmed therapist who chats with you in Wave.


• The Swedish Chef bot (borkforceone@appspot.com) inserts "Bork bork bork!" into your waves.


• Flippy (flippy-wave@appspot.com) flips the text of your waves upside down—great for some April Fool's Day fun.


• Grauniady (grauniady@appspot.com) searches the latest items from The Guardian for a given phrase.


• Cartoony (cartoonybot@appspot.com, Java source code) - Should replace the text of every submitted blip with a cartoon balloon that contains the text instead.


• Yasr (wave-api-dmo@appspot.com, Python source code) - It replaces emoticons in the wave with smiley images.


• Complety (wave-complete@appspot.com, Python source code) - Replaces “???” in a blip with a suggested word.


• Bloggy (blog-wave@appspot.com ) adds wave to blog.


• Stocky (stocky-wave@appspot.com) automatically detects stock symbols from a wave and updates it with the live stock price.


• mywaveid (mywaveid@appspot.com ) adds wave id to the wave. not sure what a wave id is.


• Craig's List Search (craigslist-searchy@appspot.com ). Search Craig's list.


• Messy the Wave Robot (messy-robot@appspot.com ) integrates with the Ericsson Labs API "SMS Send & Receive" and makes it possible to have a 2-way communication via SMS in a Wave. After entering a special syntax in a Wave, a participant can trigger an SMS delivery to another user, e.g. to someone not currently online. The user that receives the SMS can reply to it and the reply gets posted to the conversation in the Wave.


• Norton SafeWave (nortonwave@appspot.com) This robot will validate any links typed into a wave conversation. The links are validated against the Norton SafeWeb API (http://safeweb.norton.com). This will keep waves safe from phishing links, malware sites and infected sites.


• Translabot (translabot@appspot.com ) Translation bot.


• Dr. Musical Wave (dr-music@appspot.com) Dr. Music will tell you: 1. What a last.fm user is listening to you (includes you) 2. Music compatibility between people 3. Similar artists to an artist you like All of this with pictures to make it colorful. Once you add Dr. Music he'll tell you how you can get him to do things for you.


• Ego Robot (kimalvetti@appspot.com) A simple, but entertaining robot designed to stroke your ego. It will reply to all your blips with 'praise phrases' like "You're Very Talented".


• Row of Four (rowoffour@appspot.com) Connect Four bot


• Drubot (ethos-drubot@appspot.com) Post Wave to Drupal.


• Notify (wave-email-notifications@appspot.com) Google Wave Email Notifications it's a wave robot that sends an email to the participants of a wave whenever the wave is updated.


• Tagdef (tagdef@appspot.com) This wave looks for #hashtags in your wave/blips, and uses the API at http://tagdef.com to look up definitions for these tags. It then adds a reply to the wave with the definitions.


• Tuxaios (tuxaios@appspot.com) is a dice rolling robot for Google Wave written in Python.


• Skimmy (wave-skimmy@appspot.com) change text to emoticon.


• WordPress Bot (wp-bot@appspot.com) add wave to WordPress.


• Starify (starifybot@appspot.com) allows you to star waves and load the list of starred waves later. Visit http://wave.to/robots/starifybot/ for more information.


• Rssybot (rssybot@appspot.com) lets your watch RSS feeds from Google Wave. Just add it to a wave, enter the link to the RSS feed you want to subscribe to and wait for new posts to appear in your inbox as unread blips. For more information, visit: http://www.wave.to/robots/rssybot/


• Treeify (treeify@appspot.com) Multi-wave robots are agents that in some way operate on more than one wave. Treeify is a multi-wave robot which lets you connect waves into tree structures. With it you can build and navigate trees of waves.


• Wave Live Messenger (wavelivemessenger@appspot.com) allows you to log in to your Windows Live Messenger account from within Google Wave and have conversations with your messenger contacts right from within a wave. Even if you leave the wave and start reading a different wave, Wave Live Messenger will keep your conversation up to date so you can return to it at any time and continue chatting. For more details, visit: http://www.wave.to/robots/wavelivemessenger


• Google Calendar Robot (calendar-robot@appspot.com) Robot recognizes date pattern in form YYYY-MM-DD ('.' or '/' can be used for separator also) and updates it to link to add an event to user's Google Calendar.


• Wave Alpha (py-robot@appspot.com) Wolfram-Alpha query.


• Buddy as Service (buddyasaservice@appspot.com) Buddy as a Service is a wave robot, using Yahoo YQL API, Google API and other services to do searches and some other stuff (translations, weather forecast, etc) for you.


• Regexey (regexey@appspot.com) This is a simple find-and-replace robot. After you add it, it will display an introduction message. Then any blip you create should be of the format: seach string replace string text to process It will search for the "search string" in the "text to process" and replace it with the "replace string." Then it will append the results in a reply blip.


• Graphy (graph-wave@appspot.com) extends Google Wave with the ability to collaborate on flow charts and graphs. Graphy searches for a marker (#!dot) at the top of a blip, and when found, adds a gadget to the bottom of the blip which presents an image of the graph. Graph edges are expressed with simple statements like a -> b


• Reddit (wave-reddit@appspot.com) This robot is able to post the top articles from Reddit.com and any sub-reddits. Simply reply to a wave for which it has been invited with the word "reddit" followed by a colon ":" and then the name of the subreddit (or "homepage"). You can specify the number of articles to return by appending an additional colon ":" followed by the number of articles. Examples: reddit:wave, reddit:pics:15, reddit:technology


• Posterous (posterous@appspot.com) Post wave to Posterous.


• Blogbot (blogbot-wave@appspot.com) Organizes related waves (blog posts, FAQ, etc) in a central Table of Contents wave.


• Magic 8 Ball (magic-8ball@appspot.com) Sees and Knows All. Just add this Robot to your wave and ask the magic 8-ball any question and receive your answer.


• Piratify Robot (piratify@appspot.com) Turns whatever you type into "Pirate Speak" .. Arrrr.


• Google Wave Drupal Integration (drupalembedbot@appspot.com) A Drupal module and corresponding robot that enabled the embedding of Google Waves embedding, robot.


• BotURL (boturl@appspot.com) Replaces FULL URLs with hyperlinks whose title are the domain names. Replaces TinyURLs/ bit.ly URLs with original URL domain names and links them to the original URLs.


• Censorship Robot (censorshiprobot@appspot.com) Google wave robot, that filters specific words from dictionary and then replaces with random chars. The dictionary can be updated from any blip with two commands: censor:someword - add someword to dictionary uncensor:someword - remove someword from dictionary


• Converts-y (convertsy@appspot.com) Convert units from one type to another. 1.23km (?miles) -> 1.23km (0.76 miles).


• Embeddy (embeddy@appspot.com) Embeds Wave into Web.


• Embedded Search Results (wave-sandbox@appspot.com) This simple robot allows you to quickly and easily perform a search and have the results embedded in your Wave. Currently supports Google & Flickr Searches. Support for more search providers will be coming soon. For full information visit http://wave-sandbox.appspot.com.


• Anti-swear Bot (invectivedeleted@appspot.com) A simple bot in Python that stops people being rude on a wave it is added to. Note: The rude words have been blocked out in the screenshot to avoid offending anyone.


• Complety (wave-complete@appspot.com) Uses the Google Search API to replace "???" in a blip (after it's submitted) with a suggested word. 

7 Bad Writing Habits You Learned in School | Copyblogger

7 Bad Writing Habits You Learned in School | Copyblogger

Some good suggestions for writing instruction/learning.

As teachers of the written form, we have to make a decision. The decision is on the level of structure our class takes as well as the level of structure we teach. Do you have a class that has very precise, explicit grammar instruction, prompts, rubrics, and so forth? Or do you have a class that is more fluid, creative, and subjective?

I'm not saying that we have to choose one, the art is really in the mix.

Google Books - Exporting Citations

Google Books is becoming one of the most useful tools for researchers out there. Pair this with Google Scholar and, if you are lucky, network authentication from a university that has deals with the publishing companies and article databases and many of us can avoid the physical library entirely (especially if you include document delivery service and interlibrary loan). This is fantastic news for scholars living away from their university, namely distance education students and master's/doctoral students finishing up their theses/dissertations (me, for instance).

Anyway, with more and more searches leading to Google Books I was going nuts trying to figure out how to export citations. I knew it had to be there. I don't know why this was so difficult to figure out or why Google doesn't directly have it on their page (not really geared toward scholars). Here is what I finally found (thanks New Mexico State University Library for the tip)

Once you find a book in Google Books this is what you do.

1. On the left side, under the "Get this book" category, click on the second to last link, "Find in a library"
   
2. Clicking on "Find a library" opens the book's information page on World Cat.
   
3. On the upper right, click on "Cite/Export"
4. In the window that opens, you can choose to copy a citation (cool function) or export.
5. Click on the export option that best works for you, "RefWorks" or "EndNote"

Of course, this doesn't make the process grabbing citations for edited chapters, but I guess they can't do all the work for us, can they?

Social promotion and the direction of schools

The following was a response to a comment on my posting about Ombama's education agenda (at the time of publication). Given the length (it wouldn't completely publish in the comments), I thought that I would just make it a post.

It reads a lot like a comment. The organization could use a lot of work, but this isn't a paper now, is it? :)

The original comment was criticizing social promotion (age-based grouping) in schools.

I agree that age-based tracking is the wrong approach. The justification is that students who are in classes with younger OR older students have affective issues. This is certainly possible (and even likely), but I feel that the greater good will be served by ability-based tracking. This is also an issue of socialization. When this becomes the norm, those affective issues with fade to a large extent.

Of course, we could just do nothing, just stay the course. We can continue to sail straight into the abyss :)

I'm not one of those people who scream 21ST CENTURY SKILLS down the halls of the schools. I don't really believe that 21st century skills are fundamentally different than 20th century skills. The tools are certainly different, but the skills of critical thinking are the same now as they always have been. The greatest difference is the ability to filter out all the junk. However, I do believe that 21st century schools should/will be significantly different than 20th century schools. This view comes from the landscape of changing technologies, societal needs, and global competition/resources.

Changing technologies enable, and even promote, decentralized learning. 20th century schools were about aggregation of staff, resources, and students. This model was based on logistical realities of the time. Resources had to be localized in order to interact with them. Great teachers in Paris couldn't serve students in rural Illinois. Schools, therefore, had to do their best to bring the mountain to Muhammad.

The costs and skills necessary to do this required increasing amounts of money and education's version of mergers and acquisitions. Districts (School Corporations) grew increasingly larger and more complex to manage these items and issues. At this point, we are seeing the fallout from this model. Districts are finding that they cannot continue to fund everything that they need to do to keep going. These massive organizations are finding that they are top-heavy, but there is nothing that they can to to solve this. It is the natural progression of the business model. You can restructure the business as much as you want, but aside from completely systemic change, the business will never recover.

21st century schools will be about accessing the widely distributed knowledge and abilities of the global populace. Information is no longer scarce and, thus, schools are no longer the owners of that information. Schools will be more about decentralizing education, thus localizing education. This localization, however, comes in the context of access to global information and interaction.

So, what does a 21st Century school look like? I don't know. Why don't you tell me.

My vision would be a flexible space that is both virtual and real. The "classroom" would cease to be a room and more of a concept where people gather to share information. Classes in this view are more about collections of diverse lessons, tasks, projects, and so forth. The class then becomes an aggregation of activities than address standards as well as steps to achieving short and long-term goals.

The greatest change, though, must be the change in social expectations of what education is. For instance, standardized assessment and social promotion must die. As long as these exist, the above changes can never succeed. These are the tail wagging the dog. Standardized assessment is not inherently problematic. The implementation is the problem. Standardized assessment encourages educational systems to strive for improvements on test performance. Therefore, you get test effect on curriculum. When this occurs, the freedom of exploration necessary in my vision is not possible.

As for social promotion (age grouping), this approach assumes that learners benefit most from learning with their age grouped peers. This is certainly possible in my vision and could even be implemented in some ways, such as "homerooms" or classes that focus on making sense of the learners' places in society. These kinds of age-based striations could be beneficial for establishing a sense of community and for socializing students (still a role for schools). Aside from these, strict, curriculum-wide age-based grouping stifles flexible learning initiatives by effectively requiring that age, not ability/interest/goals/etc drive grouping.

This is much more than I intended to write and the organization is terrible as it is largely stream of consciousness, but my thoughts (in a rudimentary form) on the direction of education are here. Let me know what you think.

Acquittal hardly absolves "Minerva Phenomenom"

Congratulations Dong-A Ilbo! You receive the dumb &%@ editorial award for the week.

To summarize, people should be punished for publishing anything that results in "negative" outcomes for society. This editor seems to believe that the Internet is a super-special forum where the audience has no responsibility to judge the accuracy of information.

So, if I say here, on this blog, that aliens will visit the Blue House tomorrow and take over the government and there is a subsequent social disturbance, I should be responsible. Well, I say to you, Mr. Anonymous editor--yeah who are you?, that the people (those mass of innocent fools in your perception) need to take on more responsibility for their actions. It is their fault that they are so easily misled. I'll also cast blame on governmental and media outlets that play on these sentiments to advance their own agendas (considering that these institutions should be sources of reliable information--though they certainly are not).

GOD! These editorials drive me nuts!

유라 - Yura - "Meat" Buffet at the Novotel Doksan

I went to dinner tonight with my family to a great buffet. It's a little depressing that I seem to only be writing about buffets lately, but those seem to be where we've been going :)

유라 (Yura) is a "Meat" buffet at the Novotel Doksan (SW Seoul). This is a relatively small restaurant (public tables), but does have a large number of private rooms. The tables are great, stylish grilling tables (Korean-type with round grill in the middle). If you go, try to get one of the marble tables...really nice.

This is really a meat buffet. There are about 12 different kinds of meats available. All the usual suspects (inc. beef/pork ribs and bulgogi), plus some. I liked the "tenderloin," thick, tender, and juicy. Good stuff. We were also able to get the hanwoo (Korean) beef, which was fantastic. Obviously, not part of the buffet, but worth it for anyone looking to splurge.

The rest of the buffet is primarily sides and not very extensive. They have some different soups, rices, and jeon. There is also a small fruit and ddeok section, with traditional drinks. If you haven't gotten the picture yet, it's really very Korean :)

I really do recommend this place if you are in the mood for a good meat-fest. It's really good quality meat, a great atmosphere, and great service. The price is reasonable, I think. I hedge there because my wife paid and I can't remember whether it was 31,000 or 39,000. You could certainly get Korean BBQ for less, but there's no way that you could get it for less in this amount, with this quality.

Professional Networks in China and America

Professional Networks in China and America

Great interview discussing differences between how executives perceive and use their social networks in China and the US. For much of the discussion, you could replace "China" with "Korea" and come to similar conclusions.

For years Americans have be pushing a view of business as disassociated from the rest of one's life. Work is work and home is home, the two shall not meet. However, in a world where the lines between work and personal life have already blurred so completely, how long until we see that the two are not separate, nor have they ever really been.

The next generation of successful business leaders will be those who live their work (for better or worse) and do not distinguish between the professional and personal in the ways that we do today.

Does this mean that you are going to send public love notes to your romantic interest? Possibly, but likely not. It is going to meet that purposeful distinctions between the two worlds will be the exception and not the norm as it is today.

5,000 Korean English Teachers to Be Recruited This Year

5,000 Korean English Teachers to Be Recruited This Year

There has been a surprising amount of backlash against this in the Korean blogosphere. I can see why some would be against it do to low expectations of implementation and/or fear of being replaced. However, this is a good thing for Korea to aspire to. There is no downside to a long-term plan to staff schools with Korean teachers of English.

As I mentioned, some have noted that implementation might be the real problem. This, I agree, is the real issue. Teaching in Korea is a job of stability, not pay. They are only providing half of this equation (the "not pay" part). Why would qualified teachers choose a low-paying, contract job over better paying options at institutes and offices without long-term prospects of stability? The simple answer is that they won't. You'll get those who can't cut it in those more competitive areas.

Not only will you see the dregs of the EFL workforce taking these jobs, you'll see the few good ones drop out after getting a year of experience. These jobs will be temp jobs held while looking for real ones. Any whiff of a better offer and they'll be out the door. English classrooms will either be staffed well-qualified short-termers and mumbling misanthropes long-termers (wow, sounds just like the foreigners there now :)

What can they do? First of all, give them the same pay that the foreign teachers are getting now. That's still not a great paycheck in Korea, but it is better than they will get in most institute positions and even more than they will get as starting salary in an office. Secondly, include some security or, at least, a path to future job security. Make this something that they do not for a year, but for the foreseeable future.

Obama Lauds Korea’s Education of Children

Obama Lauds Korea’s Education of Children

AAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

NNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Are you kidding me?! Who the hell is informing this guy. While I do admire the drive to educate students (young and old) here in Korea, I do not admire the way it's done and most Korean don't either. Kids learn almost entirely in after (or before) school programs. Do we really want U.S. education to be outsourced to institutes? I'd home school rather than subject my kids to that.

Additionally, he's a fool to think that education is will or should look the same in 10/20/30 years. I don't want my kid in school longer. Schools can't fix the problem, schools ARE the problem (to paraphrase Reagan). I want more efficiency and flexibility in education. I don't want 2 months a year of testing and test prep.

I want my son to have an excellent foundation in maths, sciences, history, civics, and English as well as have the opportunity to pursue interests and healthy living through electives such as art, autos, phys ed, and more. You say that takes more time than they have in school now....DUH! Be a freakin' parent and participate in your kids' education. Do it yourself or get them help. BUT, DO NOT extend the school year. I don't want to give the school more time to mess up my kid's education.

The real problem with American education is that society and families only pay lip service to it.

This video tempts me to give up coffee

The song is in French, so pay attention to the captioning if you don't understand French. It starts out really tame, but devolves into complete madness--I love it!

Good place for Mandoo guk

Went to a good place for Mandoo Guk (만두국) today with my wife, near her workplace.
합흥에 겨울냉면 has really good Mandoo Guk with huge, tasty mandoo for W7,000, but the Nangmyun (in the restaurant's name) is not very good, at least the bibim nangmyun.

It's a short walk from Danguk University station (line 3). I can't remember the exit number, but it's the exit next to #1 (should be #2, but not sure). Walk about 300 meters and it's on the left side.

'Money Determines Happiness'

'Money Determines Happiness'

I guess money DOES buy happiness...at least on one measure in Korea. I can't say that I'm surprised. Lower-level jobs (those that don't pay as much) require slave-like obligations to the job and job security is nill in many cases. That would make for a stressful life, I'd guess.

Why Sleep Is Needed To Form Memories

Why Sleep Is Needed To Form Memories

I guess this is just another reason why I should get more sleep (said around 3am). Just add this to reams of other articles advocating sleep for health reasons. It seems to me, the best thing that we can do for ourselves and our children is to establish good sleep habits.

This is tough for me to do now. I've had such terrible sleep patterns for so long that I don't think that I can change. Add to this a non-standard, alternating schedule and a child that dictates when I sleep and when I wake and you get a man who is always tired. I'm sure that this is true of many people (for similar or completely different reasons).

Obama's Latest Pick for DOJ is RIAA Lawyer Who Killed Grokster and Sued Jammie Thomas - ReadWriteWeb

Obama's Latest Pick for DOJ is RIAA Lawyer Who Killed Grokster and Sued Jammie Thomas - ReadWriteWeb

The question was never whether Obama was in someone's pocket, the question was whose pocket. Now we know. With his moves regarding DOJ picks, Obama has placed himself squarely in the entertainment industry's pool of goons.

It was so stressful not knowing when he would disappoint me. I wondered where it would manifest itself on a daily basis. It's like walking down a street and worrying that a killer hides behind every shadow (except that I knew there was at least one killer in one shadow).

This isn't a major problem, but it certainly concerns me. These guys have shown ZERO concern with the rights of the people. They have supported malicious lawsuits that ruined the credibility of the RIAA (what little there was). What will become of the already pathetic DOJ?

Korea Beat › “One Teacher Changed A School”

Korea Beat › “One Teacher Changed A School”

The real title should be, "One teacher changed a school by guilting other teachers to donate 25 hours a week overtime."

I posted a long comment on the KoreaBeat site, so I thought I'd just paste it here.

I applaud Ms. Kim for the changes that she's brought to these schools. By any means necessary is a good mantra for education.

The problem here is that this change initiative is not scalable. This is localized change that is unlikely to promote large-scale change. Additionally, and most importantly from a teacher's perspective, what about the teachers'? What about their right work a reasonable schedule? What about their right to spend time with their own families? What about their right to be paid for optional overtime?

Simon is right. This plan robs Peter to pay Paul (not monetarily, of course, but in terms of study hours). However, this isn't necessarily a bad thing. I'm coming from the point of view that there is nothing that can be done in the short term to limit the amount of study time Korea students have to put in. It is a socially derived necessity when you life path is essentially determined by the university you attend rather than the skills and knowledge you bring to the table. You have no choice put to do all you can to get an edge. This educational arms race will continue for the foreseeable future. With this in mind, day-long education could be a method of equalization that Koreans always appear to be looking for. It wouldn't completely work (those with means can always find a way), but it would seem to work for the many.

Of course, I return to my previous point of scalability. For this to work Korea-wide, teachers would have to "volunteer" to work 65+ hour work weeks for the same or similar pay that they currently receive. If payment were required, this would increase payrolls in the neighborhood of 40% country-wide. This would result in a ballooning of the DoE budget and necessitate tax increases or movement of funding to cover the difference. The growing number of childless and empty-nesters would be in an uproar and likely route any politicians voting for this. Not to mention the parents who would still complain, because the money they are saving on weekday hagwons has just been moved to pricey, intensive weekend programs :)

This was much longer than I planned, but I'm procrastinating and this is a good way to do so. Thanks.

Dan

Court: No right to shout "douchebag" in a crowded blog - Ars Technica

Court: No right to shout "douchebag" in a crowded blog - Ars Technica

I see the school officials side of this. This speech does tend to impede on the educational process. However, if we allow schools to suppress students, even at a distance (and off of school machines), this is not a slippery slope, it is an outright violation of our citizens' first amendment rights.

I think of this as I think of all laws. People reach, stretch, and expand the purview of the law (or it's exceptions) until it ceases to resemble the original intent. I believe in the exception regarding the disruption of the educational process. However, this doesn't mean that we should be using it as a group control mechanism. This shouldn't be something that we hold over students saying if we don't like what you say (no matter where you say it) you will be punished.

Schools are soon to be subverted in ways that we haven't seen in over a hundred years. If we allow non-educational spaces to be used for suppressing free speech, learners in any educational setting won't be safe to speak freely anywhere, anytime.

Dad impersonating son in exam arrested - CNN.com

Dad impersonating son in exam arrested - CNN.com

I suppose our comrades in education on the other side of the sea of J....East Sea aren't much different. I hope this guy was one baby-face papa. Do you think that he got his hair colored before going? :)

Do it the old-fashioned way, pay someone. It works wonders. Wonder how easy/difficult that is in Korea? Could you make a good living off of it for a few years? I know that this is still quite popular, and relatively easy to do, in the states for things like the SAT. However, the cost involved might just be better served to re-furnish the President's office.

The Citizen: Skorea police propose decriminalising secret dancing lessons

The Citizen: Skorea police propose decriminalising secret dancing lessons: "“The revised Minor Offences Law will forbid the act of harassing a person with persistent phone calls, emails or letters, even if the victim is not physically threatened or has not been assaulted by the stalker,” a police official told Yonhap news agency."

This is pretty fantastic. This means that harassment is finally going to be illegal. This can address a lot of issues that foreigners have with nasty neighbors and even bosses/ex-bosses.

Now, of course, there is still the issue of getting police to enforce the law. So, in the end, you're still screwed.

Why do so Many Korean Children Wear Glasses? « The Grand Narrative

Why do so Many Korean Children Wear Glasses? « The Grand Narrative

Cool look at this issue. I've asked this question to many of my classes in the past. I always chalked it up to the fact that Americans are more likely to wear contacts.

I wonder what people notice who live in rural areas. They certainly have more exposure to the sun. I've seen kids in these areas with a strange tint that might be called a sun tan :)

Of course, these areas might also have less intake of dairy products, thus vitamin D.

Anyway, read both the Grand Narrative's take and the original if you're interested.

End of Year Post

Christmas

I have to admit that the holiday season really depressed me this year. Starting at Thanksgiving, I think that it was knowing that I wouldn’t be home (Chicago) for Christmas this year. However, the depression peaked around Thanksgiving and then diminished through December. This corresponded with the ramping up of my Christmas spirit.

For those of you who don’t know, I am crazy about Christmas. I play Christmas music from Thanksgiving to New Year’s. I decorate (as best I can). I take special interest in gifts, holiday cooking, and holiday parties. Most of all this year, I wanted to provide all this for my son.

I don’t think I did a great job of it, but I tried. Here is what we did for Christmas this year.

Holiday movies

Much to the chagrin of my wife, I spent quite a bit of time introducing my son to Christmas cartoons. We watched Frosty the Snowman, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, a couple of Charlie Brown Christmas specials (and he watch the Charlie Brown Thanksgiving over and over and over again). I tried to get him to watch National Lampoons Christmas Vacation and the Christmas Story, but he wasn’t up for either of those.

Food

We did a few food projects this season, some he really did help with and others he didn’t (some I didn’t even really do). We did cookies a couple times. He always loves helping with this. He gets covered in flour, so we add a little extra to compensate.

I made egg nog for the first time this year to great success. It was a cooked egg nog (I don’t mind raw, but I’d hate to poison anyone else). For those of you in the States, you take this for granted during the holidays, but egg nog is certainly not available here in Seoul. I made one of the easier recipes that I saw. It consisted of a cooking portion similar to making custard and a lot of blending. It was a really simple and tasty recipe. It probably would have been better if I had nutmeg (really missed that) and bourbon (or other liquor). I could have gotten the latter, but I was rather sick during Christmas and tried not to add too much alcohol to my diet J

Lastly, I didn’t feel like cooking this year, because of all the running around I would have to do to gather ingredients, so we decided to hit one of the Christmas dinners around town. We decided to go to Suji’s for Christmas dinner. I’ve heard Suji’s recommended numerous times over the last couple years and this seemed to be a good opportunity to check them out. It was my first time at Suji’s and I liked it for the most part. We were warmly greeted at the door; they had really good service, which is unheard of in Korea; and the atmosphere was nice.

Suji’s had a Christmas dinner buffet for W55,000, though they only charged us W50,000. Let me first say that the food they served was very good. They had a great medium-rare roast beef with horseradish sauce and juicy turkey with cranberry sauce. They had passable mashed potatoes with really good turkey gravy and good beef gravy. They had green beans, which is amazing. I love and miss green beans and I was so happy to have them here. On the bad side, they mixed them with corn (why not separate the two?). The “brownie” for dessert was really good; however, it was certainly not a traditional brownie as the hostess earnestly professed. Brownies are at least slightly cake-y, depending on the recipe that use. This was more like many of the “death by chocolate” desserts that I’ve had at restaurants over the years. It was like a very thick mousse.

Now for the negatives…The “stuffing” was really just cubed French bread that may have been cooked in the turkey or just sautéed with the turkey gravy. Moon hated it, not because it tasted bad, but because it was so far from the traditional stuffing that she was expecting. I thought that it tasted great, but I have to admit that it was half-assed. Moon also hated the mashed potatoes and, while I thought they were ok, I agreed that they really lacked cream and could have used more butter (now we’re being picky). The spread was lacking to say the least. For W50,000 (think $50+ depending on exchange rate) you’d think that they would have some more, at least the basics. How can you have the above items an NO bread? They offered to sell us some, though. For 50,000 you’d better give me some %$#@ bread! The buffet was tiny. How about some more choices? They only had 6 food items on the buffet (not including sauces) and 1 of them I can’t even remember what it was because it was gone and never refilled by the time I took a picture. That is the biggest problem that I had with the buffet, it ran out fast and they never refilled. I understand that we were there late, we had the 8:30PM sitting, but THEY scheduled it and they should have assured that they buffet remained stocked. The great service that I referred to above dried up about the time the food did. It seemed that they were afraid to engage at that point.

I could forgive them breadth, if they only had depth. The food that they had was really good, but I can’t forgive them for running out.

Next year (if we don’t go to the States) I’ll spend about the same amount (maybe a little more) and do the dinner right. Christmas is no time to take the lazy way out. I’ll cook up a storm and have leftovers for a week.

Christmas Events

Thanks to video conferencing, we were able to connect with family in the States for our many family Christmas parties. We joined the Craig Christmas for about an hour, with people cueing to say hi and Merry Christmas; my family joined us on Christmas morning to watch us open presents and to open the presents that we had sent them; we joined them on their Christmas morning to watch the same; and we joined the Dickinson Christmas (Mom’s side) for a short time as they miraculously regained power just in time to hook up. While nothing replaces being there, these were great substitutes.

Back to Christmas morning. Sammy woke up to Christmas surprise. Santa had not only loaded the living room with presents under the tree and in Sammy’s stocking, but he also rearranged the furniture and boxed up most of Sammy’s old toys and put them in storage (Santa’s great in that way). A well-rested dad, who didn’t have to do any of this work, brewed a big pot of coffee and cooked a big breakfast casserole (not his greatest) to get him through the morning.

Sammy particularly loved a car set that he got (track with battery-powered cars) and a doctor set that he used to give examinations to everyone, including his new Curious George doll. Moon and I really enjoyed this Christmas, as it was the first in which Sammy could really enjoy it himself. While the concept of Christmas and even that of Santa haven’t really gotten through, he is old enough now to participate fully. I really look forward to next year when he may be better able to learn a Christmas song or two.

The rest of the day was spent relaxing, sleeping, and playing. Truly a wonderful Christmas.

Thanks

Thanks to everyone for making this a great holiday season (not that it’s totally over yet). Thanks to my family in the states, both immediate and extended. Working with us to set up the video feed and working around our schedules really helped to make this Christmas better. Of course, this probably means the most to me, but I know that both Moon and Sammy enjoyed it as well. Thanks to Moon’s family for taking on that family role here in Korea. And, of course, thanks to Moon for putting up with my moodiness and insane holiday requests throughout the season.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all of you out there from the Craigs in Korea!