You Become What You Practice

A few days back, I wrote rather mournfully about an opportunity that three year-old No. 3 had lost because, well, she’s 3. It seemed a bummer to me that 3 wasn’t allowed to continue what she’d done so well, (participating in a class involving a museum tour and a related project).

I was thinking about the entire issues as 3 being able to do things that her same-age peers couldn’t. Mostly I’d been led to this thinking by the museum staff who were concerned that other kids 3’s age couldn’t function in the class. (Plus it’s kinda fun to think that your kid is stellar.)

Then, it occurred to me. What if all kids could do this? What if we just don’t expect it of them as a society, and so, of course, they don’t. 3 was pretty much raised in the museum of which I speak, (and in a whole host of other locations). She learned how to walk there. Most Saturdays she could be found—at first in the wrap strapped to me and later on foot—following along with the museum tour and project class before it became age limited. She got to do this for two blissful years before the rules changed. Parents, and teachers alike remark on 3 following along with the tour, doing what all the other kids aged six and up do. But, really, what else would she do? She’s experienced this class throughout her life. She knows how it works. She enjoys it. What else would she do?

Maybe that’s the key, and maybe that’s what we’re really losing by programs being age limited. Maybe 3 isn’t particularly gifted, (even though I of course like to think she is), maybe every single kid that went to this class at the same age would have had the same experience. Isn’t it more rational to make that assumption?

What about kids that just don’t want to be there though? Won’t they disrupt the class? There were days 3 didn’t want to be there when she was younger. We simply left the class early, went downstairs, got a beer (for me) and an apple juice (for her) and had a delightful time. Before that, there were times she was hungry. Mom-person and 3 wandered to a quiet corner of the museum with a bench. These were not insurmountable issues.

What are we losing as a society and as families by not making the assumption that of course our kids can? I’m going to try to sell 3’s attendance to the museum again, because otherwise, as I mentioned before, I have to find a new opportunity for 3 to partake in. Why? Because if you don’t use a skill, you lose it.

Comments

The Valentine's Day Magnetic Monopole

There's an assymetry to the form of the two Maxwell's equations shown in picture 1. While the divergence of the electric field is proportional to the electric charge density at a given point, the divergence of the magnetic field is equal to zero. This is typically explained in the following way. While we know that electrons, the fundamental electric charge carriers exist, evidence seems to indicate that magnetic monopoles, the particles that would carry magnetic 'charge', either don't exist, or, the energies required to create them are so high that they are exceedingly rare. That doesn't stop us from looking for them though! Keeping with the theme of Fairbank[1] and his academic progeny over the semester break, today's post is about the discovery of a magnetic monopole candidate event by one of the Fairbank's graduate students, Blas Cabrera[2]. Cabrera was utilizing a loop type of magnetic monopole detector. Its operation is in...

Cool Math Tricks: Deriving the Divergence, (Del or Nabla) into New (Cylindrical) Coordinate Systems

Now available as a Kindle ebook for 99 cents ! Get a spiffy ebook, and fund more physics The following is a pretty lengthy procedure, but converting the divergence, (nabla, del) operator between coordinate systems comes up pretty often. While there are tables for converting between common coordinate systems , there seem to be fewer explanations of the procedure for deriving the conversion, so here goes! What do we actually want? To convert the Cartesian nabla to the nabla for another coordinate system, say… cylindrical coordinates. What we’ll need: 1. The Cartesian Nabla: 2. A set of equations relating the Cartesian coordinates to cylindrical coordinates: 3. A set of equations relating the Cartesian basis vectors to the basis vectors of the new coordinate system: How to do it: Use the chain rule for differentiation to convert the derivatives with respect to the Cartesian variables to derivatives with respect to the cylindrical variables. The chain ...

More Cowbell! Record Production using Google Forms and Charts

First, the what : This article shows how to embed a new Google Form into any web page. To demonstrate ths, a chart and form that allow blog readers to control the recording levels of each instrument in Blue Oyster Cult's "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" is used. HTML code from the Google version of the form included on this page is shown and the parts that need to be modified are highlighted. Next, the why : Google recently released an e-mail form feature that allows users of Google Documents to create an e-mail a form that automatically places each user's input into an associated spreadsheet. As it turns out, with a little bit of work, the forms that are created by Google Docs can be embedded into any web page. Now, The Goods: Click on the instrument you want turned up, click the submit button and then refresh the page. Through the magic of Google Forms as soon as you click on submit and refresh this web page, the data chart will update immediately. Turn up the:...

Copasetic Flow

Search This Blog