Eden's Post on 20th Century and Information

20th Century and Information: A Mystery


I loved this post, and how Eden tied in both information and 20th Century (those are my two groups too). 

A thought about the last comment Eden made: Nearly everyone I have spoken to about SOPA (outside of this class of course) has no idea what is going on. This is insane! People need to be more informed. Ashamedly, I place myself in this category as well. One reason why I took this class is so I can learn to be better informed on current issues by utilizing the huge store of knowledge we have at our finger-tips. It is important to become more involved, and I wish more people could see what is going on. 

Improving our Educational System-Starting at the Beginning

To introduce this, let me first say that I am an Elementary Education major, and I learned a lot about our current school system and some helpful innovations it could use through one of my classes. If you are interested what I am about to say, please read Breaking through the Learning Barrior by George Nielson because that is where my inspiration came from. 

In the way schools are set up now, a teacher lectures in front of the class and hands out homework where you are supposed to work quietly and write the answers you think your teacher wants you to know. Then you regurgitate the information for a test, and you forget everything at the end of the year. This is a very inefficient process because students never actually learn anything, and any child who does not work well with lectures and quiet work lags behind. These children are labeled as “at risk” learners and believe themselves to be stupid. Everyone else thinks they are the most intelligent beings on the planet and learn just as much as the “stupid” kids, absolutely nothing.

What I propose is this. We should teach in such a way that students practice newly learned skills as we are teaching them. We teach them why it is important to learn about the topic, teach them basic information, and have them discover on their own through practical, hands-on activities. For those students who prefer activities to lectures (who doesn’t?) this will help them to learn and succeed by learning about the same topics in new ways. This also helps all students to retain information after the year is over and actually use their knowledge in the real world.

I personally have had experience changing lesson plans from lecture style to this style of hands-on learning, and it is not that difficult. Some may argue that it is more difficult to manage a classroom this way, but I think it would help students by engaging them in learning while getting out their wiggles in productive activities, so in reality, this helps to manage a classroom. This is not that difficult. We just need teachers to be on board with this and be willing to change their ways slightly to accommodate more students and make their learning matter.

Thoughts on Censorship

When ever I think of the government deciding what you say when, I am tempted to post all kinds of anti-censorship thoughts. However, I also think censorship is really important, and I think the internet needs more regulation on this subject. We all know how easy it is for pornographic websites to enter our homes. Even if you have a filter, things can slip through. What I hate is that a lot of pornographic sites are labeled in such a way to attract the most innocent audience possible in order to get them hooked. They are labeled with names like "Disneyland" and "Pocahontas" or things spelled in a very similar way. Most filters can detect this problem before a child views something that is anything but innocent. However, a lot of filters have no way to distinguish a lot of other pornographic material. I have a strong filter on my computer, but I am always wary of looking up something on Google images because odd things have popped up before. The same goes for you tube videos. I do not know a lot about how filters work or who is supposed to censor this material, but I think something needs to be done about it.

20th century from the view of Metamorphosis

As I was studying the historical context of Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis, I came to the conclusion that I should post about it on my blog since it was written in the 20th century. As a Jewish man in Germany during World War I, Kafka was certainly in on the action and contributed to literary history of the time as well. He was a big part of the Existentialist movement. This was also at the time of the Feminist movement (which was shown though Gregor's sister, Grete, but I will try not to analyze literature in this post). Women starting trying to fight against the belief that a woman's sole purpose was to care for men. I think I might ramble on that on a later post. That's about all I have from my background section of my Metamorphosis paper. It's not much, but it got me thinking about future posts.

Digital Divide has Invaded My Apartment!

I thought it was interesting that after I learned about digital divide in class, I saw it in the real world. One of my roommates was really nice to her brother and let her use her cell phone for a couple weeks. I never noticed any change, but she told me that she felt disconnected because she was the only one who was not texting or talking to someone of a phone. She felt unplugged, and she liked not feeling a sense of freedom from technology. However, this lack of attachment to technology was creating a bit of a digital divide.

I know this is only a small portion of what people with very little access to technology are experiences. Those impoverished people who have no access to the internet are falling more and more behind in our society. If something does not change this digital divide is only going to get worse and worse.

Civil War: The real beginning of America

Before the Civil War, America was a collection of states. Instead of having a sense of nationalism, there was a pride in own's state. After the war, America became a country. At first, there was definite division between North and South, but this was the beginning of states being united together. I do not think it is a coincidence that America did not become a world power until after the Civil War.

America's view of WWII Germany: evil, merciless soldiers or victims?

As I said in my earlier post, WWII seems to be a time when people did not try to understand foreigners, and there seemed to be a lot of nationalism, which is interesting because nationalism was at the root of Hitler's arguments. Interesting that both sides had this common root. What does that say about our views of WWII? Maybe we weren't the heroes most Americans think we were. Also, I think Germany deserves some empathy, or at least, most of the population does. After WWI, Germany was punished severely. Poverty was everywhere and hope was scarce. This was the perfect opportunity for a new leader to take over with new ideas that seemed to promise prosperity for the country. It was a way for people to feed their families and fix their economy. No one had any idea what terrible things would ensue. If I was in that situation, I would be tempted to support anyone who could offer hope. Unfortunately, this new leader for the people was Adolf Hitler. Before the German people knew it, children were brain-washed, and everyone lived in fear. I would like to propose that some of the greatest victims of Hitler's tyranny were his own people. Granted, I am not putting down anyone's suffering in WWII (mainly the Jews). Those poor people in concentration camps were more victimized than anyone who was brain-washed in Germany. I am just saying that American citizens should not have labeled Germans as evil. Once more, we need to watch ourselves because we could very well end up in the same state if we do not think critically about everything we are told and explore all of the information out there. I think this is a great idea that relates to digital civilization.