and i want to add a bit to this - especially beginning with thanks to
Paul and Bill B. and Bill P. for their responses to my last postings from
last weekend. as it turns out, this year i'm teaching third grade, which
means lots of intensive specific instruction so that the students can pass
the state reading assessment - which is no small task for the students.
and so i find that during the week i have very little time to compose my
thoughts and write something coherent.
however, thinking about xmca as community as Eva had earlier written
about this week - i considered again my sense of indignation - i think
it showed - about the postings regarding Mary Daly - because my
assumption had been that xmca was a friendly place for feminism and
gay/lesbian and ethnic/racial issues and questions about diversity - so
that i expected that even if one would disagree with Daly's position, one
would also demonstrate feelings of support and sympathy.
that didn't happened, and a felt a sudden loss of community - as well
as a sense of betrayal - there we are, Vera, with that pesky affective
domaine again.
so i behaved badly - mockingly towards Paul (and I apologize) - and was
also rebuked. but there we are.
so, as Mike mentioned earlier about the posting about the woodstalk (pun
intended) debacle, there are multiple reasons for anger on occasion.
still - i'm also wanting to respond to Bill Baroway's question - what
are community members doing with chat.
for the last year and one half i've been working on my own practice as a
teacher, focusing on the question, what do my third grade students needs
in terms of cultural capital in order to pass the colorado reading
assessment? especially i'm focusing on tool use as Wertsch writes about
in Mind in Action - and the question of prolepsis as described by Mike in
Cultural Psychology. for my students too, reflecting on Jaan Valsiner's
notion of the student participating in her own development
(learning/change) with the anticipation of a different future condition.
this work is still on-going - and in fascinating because my students are
in part learning english, as well as predominantly of low economic ses -
and i'm becoming very interested in how working class folk understand risk
taking and change.
also, i'm doing an autoethnography to understand my own adult development
trajectory.
i think of mary bryson's comment that about development "there's no there
there" - which is what i initially began to think - and now i think
i'm mistaken - mostly because of reading such howlers as Erick Erickson
stating that the only mature sexual behavior is to be found in marriage.
i'm sure the pope will be encouraged to read this!
and i'm fascinated by Victoria's postings - and mulling them over and
i'm so glad others have the time to respond.
phillip