Author Archive
Monday, August 17th, 2015
Wired to Care: how companies prosper when they create widespread empathy by Dev Patniak with Peter Mortensen ©2009 explains the importance of empathy and how to spread it around. While written for businesses, this is a book that all school leaders should read and act on. Click at the bottom of any page to by copies for leaders you know.
Dev Patniak and Pete Mortensen
- DEV is the CEO of Jump Associates, a strategy and innovation firm. Jump helps companies create new businesses and reinvent existing ones. Jump works with some of the world’s most admired companies, including GE, Nike, Target, and Virgin. Jump has become particularly well-known for its pioneering culture. Dev is a frequent speaker at business forums and his articles have appeared in numerous publications, including BusinessWeek, Forbes, and Fast Company. He is an adjunct professor at Stanford University, where he teaches a course called Needfinding. Contact Dev at dpatnaik@jumpassociates.com and follow him on Twitter at @devpatnaik.
- Pete is the communications lead for Jump Associates. A journalist by training, he has written for and edited numerous monthly, weekly and daily publications, including Spin Magazine, nyou, the Holland Sentinel, the Windsor Times, and Wired News.
Part I: The Case for Empathy Introduction
- As the title says, we are wired to care. Unfortunately, that instinct seems to get short-circuited when we get together in large groups. Real empathy can ensure more ethical behavior in a way that no policies and procedures ever could. The trick is to encourage everyone to walk in other people’s shoes. This book is packed with great stories that demonstrate how some companies strive to really understand their customers and meet their needs. If you want people to be interested in you and what you do, you should be genuinely interested in the people you are dealing with.
2. The Map Is Not the Territory
- Reports are abstractions and often lose touch with reality. A plan is only a map that doesn’t know the territory. In organizations, decision makers often find themselves working with simplified data that lacks context. This makes it easy to digest but can’t tell the whole story. There is a great story here about how Lou Gerstner turned IBM around by sending his people out to meet with customers and develop more empathy. As a result, support and service became a major growth area for the company. His mantra was “what are you hearing from our customers?” Empathy helps people see the world as it really is, not how it looks on a map. (Doug: I have long thought that it is important to view parents and students as customers, listen to them, and try to meet their needs. As a principal, I also viewed teachers and other staff members as my customers.)
3. The Way Things Used to Be
- The longer a team knows each other, the better they tend to do. This is something Dev discovered while teaching at Stanford. For thousands of years people made things for people they knew. Thanks to industrialization, a rift grew between producers and consumers. Is something lost when snowshoes are made by people who have never seen snow? Dev believes that it is much harder to succeed when you create things for people you don’t know. I love the story of the Zildjian Cymbal Company used to reinforce this concept. Their secret was keeping close relationships with drummers. Unfortunately, most companies don’t work this way and lose the ability to meet face to face with ordinary people. Such face to face meetings forms empathic connections.
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Wednesday, July 29th, 2015
Four Easy Steps to Touch Typing by Adam Fort offers tips to improve typing skill for adults and children alike. In a day when efficiency can make the difference between success and failure, you can ill afford to be a less than proficient typist. With these tips, all you need is the commitment to practice.
Adam Fort
Introduction
- Fed up with how long it takes you to type an email or a document? Does your amateurish typing leave a lot to be desired? If typing efficiency is costing you valuable hours in productivity, maybe it’s time you start working on improving your touch typing efficiency. Computers or laptops have become an integral part of day-to-day life. From emails to presentations, from college assignments to office presentations, everything requires the skill of typing. Typing fast and accurately is a skill that proves absolutely invaluable for nearly every job. Follow these four easy tips to boost your touch typing speed and become a typing whiz.
Use correct techniques and position
- The first step is to use correct sitting position and keyboard positioning. It goes without saying that you work better when you are in a comfortable position. The same thing applies to typing. Choose a comfortable chair and sit straight with your back upright, and your eyes firmly fixed on the computer screen. If you slouch, you will get fatigued easily. Also, make sure the room has sufficient lighting and ventilation. (Doug: Also consider standing up like I do. You can now buy desks that go up and down so you can change positions while you work.)
- Position your keyboard in the correct position and use both of your hands for typing. Position your fingers on the home row keys. You should be able to move your fingers across the keyboard. With proper finger placements, you should be typing with all ten fingers including your pinkies. The goal of this proper hand placement is that you do not have to move your hands while typing. This way you can focus more on your touch typing accuracy and speed.
Avoid looking at the keyboard
- After you have positioned yourself comfortably, start typing. Assess your current typing skills so as to understand your typing speed and accuracy. This will also give you a fair idea about how much effort and time you need to put in improving your typing speed. The next step is to resist the urge to look at the keyboard while typing. While riding a bicycle, do you look at the pedals or road? Initially, it is hard not to look at the keypad. But, no matter how difficult it is, you need to eliminate the habit of looking down while you type. Adopt military level of discipline and look at the screen. Familiarize yourself with finger placements and let your mind guide your fingers to type correct keys.
Practice, Practice and Practice
- Just like in any other field, practice is the key to success. You need to remember that you can’t excel your typing speed in just one day; but you can definitely improve it drastically. However, it is important to practice in the right way. Practice as much as possible and do it with extreme patience. Make your practice more interesting by writing emails, chatting with your friends, or playing interactive typing games on internet. By the way, average typing speed is only 41 words per minute.
Use online typing tests
- The best way to practice your typing speed is by taking online typing tests. These tests are developed by typing experts and professionals for making your typing process smooth and fast. Some of these tests add extra remedial measures based on your assessments. These remedial lessons are individually tailored to focus on learner’s individual progress, and therefore speeding up and focussing the learning process. These online tests can be taken according to your comfortable timings. Ratatype.com, TypingTest, and TypingWeb for iPhone typing offer convenient ways to test your touch typing speed and accuracy. They also offer extra remedial measures that are tailored to individual’s progress and performance. These remedial measures are easy to understand and also help in keeping a track of progress. This allows the learner to speed up and focus the learning process.
Acquire the Skill
- Typing is not an inherent skill. It is an acquired skill, and with proper techniques and tools, one can improve his typing speed as well as accuracy. Apart from saving money and time, fast and correct typing offers several benefits. When your typing speed is good, you stay in a state of flow. This allows you to focus your energy on words and message, rather than on typing skill. Your mind works faster when you are typing without interuption. So, try the above mentioned four easy steps and you too can type like a professional.
- Doug: I may be hard to shift from the hunt and peck two finger approach, but it will pay off in the long run. An added benefit to typing faster is that you will end up writing more, which will improve your writing skill. The only other thing you will need is a skilled editor who gives honest feedback. This is the best way to lose bad writing habits. Thanks Adam.
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Monday, July 20th, 2015
Technology Today: the Virtual Big Brother by Vaishnavi Agrawal offers a warning of how one’s Internet activity can result in negative consequences for anyone intent on even minor mischief. Her Big Brother metaphor is as scary as it is accurate. The good news it that the Internet has allowed me to collaborate with someone on the other side of the world (India).
Vaishnavi Agrawal
- Vaishnavi loves pursuing excellence through writing and has a passion for technology. She has successfully managed and run personal technology magazines and websites. She currently writes for Intellipaat.Com a global training company that provides e-learning and professional certification training.
Caring for Your Digital Fingerprints
- For last couple of years, it has often been suggested that you should not lie about yourself or your intentions online. You are not only leaving digital fingerprints on your device, but also on the device of every individual involved in the conversation. This also includes a number of other servers on the Internet. Considering the immorality of lying, one may argue that this particular advancement is not for the good. Under the veil of recreation, you may see information pertaining to a particular individual in immense quantity, which is more often than not voluntarily broadcasted. This means that we must consider the fact that our digital existence can supersede our organic one in many ways.
- For many of us, our digital lives make us seem better looking, more popular, better qualified, have a better profession and even a better lifestyle. This can make one wonder if it’s possible to fathom the relevance of this relatively redundant activity. I see that it is not just a matter of tangibility, but also of concentration and focus. Now the amount of time and energy that is dedicated to creating, maintaining, and sustaining a digital life eats away at the basic necessity of doing the same for the real one.
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Tuesday, July 7th, 2015
Why Don’t Students Like School (© 2009) by Daniel T. Willingham answers questions about how the mind works and what it means for the classroom. Daniel’s nine principles are still fresh and can guide teachers to become more effective. The chart in the last chapter summarizes the principles and belongs on every teacher’s wall. Click at the bottom of any page to get copies for any teachers you know.
Daniel T. Willingham
- Daniel has a B.A. in psychology from Duke and a Ph.D. in cognitive psychology from Harvard. He is currently professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, where he has taught since 1992. His research concerns the application of cognitive psychology to K-12 education. He writes the Ask the Cognitive Scientist column for American Educator magazine. Check out his website and follow him on Twitter at @DTWillingham.
1. Why Don’t Students Like School
- The big question is: Why is it difficult to make school enjoyable for students? The kind of thinking that is required to solve problems is difficult. To understand why, Daniel explains how thinking happens in a part of our brain called working memory. Working memory draws on two resources to solve problems. The first is information from the environment such as sensory information or facts presented by another person or some kind of media. The second is information and procedures stored in long-term memory. In order to solve a problem, it has to be not too difficult. It also helps keep things interesting if the problem is not trivial. If problems are in this Goldilocks Zone, student curiosity will thrive. It helps if the content in question is interesting to the students, but that is not enough as Daniel demonstrates by telling of a middle school teacher who made the subject of sex boring.
- With this in mind, it’s easy to see why the teacher’s job is daunting. Problems just right for some will be too easy for some and to hard for others. This implies that it is self-defeating to give all students the same work. It is also necessary to make sure that students have the necessary background knowledge in long-term memory. You also need to avoid overloading working memory with multistep instructions, lists of unconnected facts, long chains of logic, or the application of a just-learned concept. Ideally the problems can be made more interesting by being relevant to the students’ life outside of school.
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Wednesday, June 3rd, 2015
Creative Schools: The Grassroots Revolution That’s Transforming Education by Sir Ken Robinson and Lou Aronica ©2015 offers advice for educators and policy makers that can bring rigorous, personalized, and engaged education to everyone. As a leading voice in education, it’s vital that anyone interested hear what Sir Ken has to say. If you haven’t seen his number one TED Talk check that out too. Click at the bottom on any page to purchase this necessary book.
Sir Ken Robinson, PhD and Lou Aronica
- Sir Ken is an English author, speaker, and international advisor on education in the arts to governments, non-profits, education, and arts bodies. He was Director of The Arts in Schools Project (1985–89), Professor of Arts Education at the University of Warwick (1989–2001), and was knighted in 2003 for services to education. He is the author of The Element, Finding Your Element, and Out of Ours Minds. His 2006 TED Talk How Schools Kill Creativity is the most watched in history with over 33 million views. Originally from a working-class Liverpool family, Robinson now lives in Los Angeles with his wife Marie-Therese and children James and Kate.
- Lou Aronica is the author of three novels and the coauthor of several works of nonfiction, including the national best sellers The Culture Code, The Element, and Finding Your Element.
Introduction: One Minute to Midnight
- The current reforms are being driven by political and commercial interests that misunderstand how real people learn, and how great schools work. As a result they are damaging the prospects of countless young people. The standards culture is harming students. In response, Sir Ken continues to push for a more balanced, individualized, and creative approach to education. Instead, schools take children with voracious appetites for learning and see to it that their appetites are dulled as they go through school. Current efforts focused on raising standards through competition and accountability do not work, and compound the problems they claim to solve. If you design a system based on standardization and conformity, you suppress individuality, imagination, and creativity. Schools that were designed to produce factory workers resemble factories with their assembly line approach. Current reforms stick with this approach only to be less in tune with the circumstances of the 21st century. Sir Ken thinks that schools need to be transformed not reformed, and that we know how to do it even though we aren’t.
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