Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Raging Bull: Workshop Day 2



At 3 p.m. today I crawled out of a toxic sea of eduspeak and lay shivering on a grey beach of tedium and death wish. Day 2 of my educational technology workshop brought us Bloom's system of learning categories, just one of many education inventions to stifle creative thought and kill the spirit. In the photo above you see some of this Bloom guy's raging bull, which we were forced to use in our own thinking for 6 hours-- an outrage and a waste of good mental energy.

Lytha had suggested that I shake things up by, for example, switching the beverage labels around or some such. I did move 'decaf' to the cookie platter but no one noticed or cared. I believe we are already too broken for merriment of this graceful sort. We need fart jokes or pratfalls at this critical stage.

I received a grade of 'minus' on my homework from yesterday, with this comment:

"I didn't see any of the ratings of "baseline, effective or exemplary" from the rubric as applied to the criteria."

Gah! Take me out back and whip me with a 2x4.

I did manage to make it to the barn since we ended early, and there was still some daylight which revealed this odd snow formation on the run-in roof:


The snow slid down just so far and then has been hanging on for days, like little even strips of lace. Here it is viewed from inside the run-in, and you can see the moon somewhere in the middle:


I did get to ride a horse today, and all the barn girls were as sweet as molasses, so it's a good day that ends well as my mom used to say. I only have 5 more days of the workshop from hell and I have to admit I've met some nice new people, including an education professor from Kenya who said "If you pray God for a Jeep and he sends you a mule, ride the mule!" which is good advice for me in my Jeremiah mode.

7 comments:

sue said...

I'm happy that you at least had "horses in your day"... I remember doing things like that... I wonder now how I made it thru... but, it will soon be done, and you can check it off your list...hang in there

Flying Lily said...

Sue, thank you for the encouraging words! I will either hang in or hang myself before it's done.:)

Grey Horse Matters said...

The classes sound very boring, but hopefully they'll be over soon.
At least you got a ride in and that snow looks so odd hanging like that. Hang in there.

LatigoLiz said...

Love the hanging snowcicles! Bright spot in an otherwise dismal day it sounds like!

lytha said...

Where's SYNTHESIZING?

Did anyone bring this up?

And do students receive a powerpoint presentation better if it doesn't use the Microsoft default template? (I've wondered this in the past as I was guilty of using it too.)

Here's a better Taxonomy Evolution:

"Fear leads to Anger
Anger leads to Hate
Hate leads to Suffering"

(Yoda, on the dark side of the force)

At least you can enjoy your fellow students' company, when the class is unbearable.

~lytha

ezra_pandora said...

lol. I think I would have fallen asleep. You poor, poor thing. Probably zaps the energy right out of you. Those pictures of the snow on the roof are pretty cool though. And your grumpy points with the girls must have at least temporarily gotten across. Thankfully, our little barn bratz have been suspiciously missing. I'm hoping it's a more frequent occurrence. I think they don't like the cold. Or rather their mothers don't, heheheehe.

Flying Lily said...

Greyhorse: Thanks; it is only 4 more full days and then the follow-up work; I am going to stop my whining.

LatigoLiz: Winter sometimes offers these little oddities of beauty and yes, they were a cheerful sight. :)

Lytha: Synthesizing was not featured in this day's taxonomy; I like yours & Yoda's much better. the MS default PowerPoint template is in disgrace currently, in this circle at least. We are supposed to optimize our templates...in emotionally appealing colors.

EzraPandora: Hope your barn bratz continue to stay away in force. It's so nice to have a quiet time at the barn, sigh.