Re: [xmca] Can the Right Kinds of Play Teach Self-Control?

[mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com>]

Not to discourage this line of discussion at all, but a couple of notes from
several hours of teaching today.

One class I am teaching is an "integrative senior seminar" to communication
majors who are graduating this year. One of the activities they engage in is
reading a text that they have, in principle, encountered in earlier class,
another is bringing in a poem and explaining why it is important to them.

Two issues. Reading the intro to berger and luckman on social constructivism
they encountered the term "virtigo of relativity" in connection with issues
of cross-national differences. One student of the 24 could work up to saying
what virtigo was.... and we linked it to the movie by Hitchcock. For
relativity, e=mc**2 and Einstein. NO ONE admitted to every hearing the
phrase, cultural relativity before. One remembered hearing about cultural
capital. None could interpret that part of the text.

They have been educated in a university by a department that takes great
pride in its educational achievements and commitment to diversity.

Write that up in the NY Times?
mike

On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 9:58 PM, Jay Lemke <jaylemke@umich.edu> wrote:

> Perhaps a second, more serious response.
>
> Critical thinking, I believe, is a "habit of mind". That is, it's not
> something one turns on and off, or something that we can stimulate in a
> single class or around a single issue or text. It inhabits a longer
> timescale, it is more of an acquired disposition, and once you acquire it
> it's there with you in relation to pretty much everything.
>
> How we acquire it is a big, important question. I think we know,
> epidemiologically, that those who are marginalized in society are more
> likely to acquire it spontaneously. I always found Freire a useful text with
> Brooklyn College pre-service and new teachers, initially to talk about how
> to stimulate critical thinking in others who were already living in
> conditions that limited their human potential. But it always wound up being
> about how these students/teachers themselves were being limited by
> institutions, biases, power inequalities, etc. (even those in our own
> college classroom). They, too, were living in conditions that made them
> ready to discover critical stances. It took a while, and I don't know for
> sure how long the active critical disposition lasted in the face of the pain
> of seeing the pain around us, and the ease of easing off from a critical
> stance in life.
>
> One critical breakthrough can catalyze a more generalized critical
> disposition, but "transfer" is often as much a learned capacity in regard to
> critical thinking as in regard to any other higher intellectual function.
> But the deeper, the wider, and the longer it sinks its teeth into us, the
> more likely we will be looking and feeling critically for the rest of our
> lives.
>
> I know that you and your students will keep at it!
>
> JAY.
>
> Jay Lemke
> Professor (Adjunct)
> Educational Studies
> University of Michigan
> Ann Arbor, MI 48109
> www.umich.edu/~jaylemke <http://www.umich.edu/%7Ejaylemke>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Sep 30, 2009, at 7:23 PM, Beth Ferholt wrote:
>
>  An interesting twist as I used this paper in a class of student teachers
>> here at Brooklyn College:I was excited to bring in Bodrova from the New
>> York
>> Times.  I thought I could encourage critical thinking about the
>> troublesome
>> 'frame' in which the article presented this exciting work with play.  I
>> overestimated my abilities to encourage critical thinking about the piece
>> ... but comments from the students after class made me think that these
>> teachers-to-be may included more dramatic play in their classrooms because
>> they read these ideas in the Times.
>> Beth
>>
>> On Tue, Sep 29, 2009 at 7:23 PM, Jay Lemke <jaylemke@umich.edu> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> David and all,
>>>
>>> Briefly, the dynamic, in the sense of the mechanisms at work, may be much
>>> the same, but the degree of residual choice, or freedom-in-practice,
>>> remains
>>> considerably greater. Call is power-within-the-system as opposed to
>>> power-over-the-system, which, I agree, individuals in general, regardless
>>> of
>>> social class lack. That's why collectives are more formidable in
>>> resisting
>>> or changing the system. A deep question I think is whether the
>>> marginalized
>>> or the middle class in fact play this role. The former, I think, find it
>>> harder to organize and participate in collective action over longer time
>>> spans, but if they do are more likely to initiate major changes. The
>>> latter
>>> aggregate in search of their interests more often and easily, but are
>>> less
>>> likely to do more than negotiate relative advantage within the existing
>>> system. Here too one sees, I think, the implied powers of burgher and
>>> pauper. (Genuine princes are in a much more paradoxical position!)
>>>
>>> JAY.
>>>
>>> Jay Lemke
>>> Professor (Adjunct)
>>> Educational Studies
>>> University of Michigan
>>> Ann Arbor, MI 48109
>>> www.umich.edu/~jaylemke <http://www.umich.edu/%7Ejaylemke>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sep 27, 2009, at 10:36 PM, David H Kirshner wrote:
>>>
>>> But there is a world of political difference among controlling
>>>
>>>>
>>>>>  yourself, carrying out commands, and controlling others.
>>>>
>>>> Jay,
>>>> Not to dispute the critical stance of your concerns re self-regulation,
>>>> I wonder to what extent the politicization of the issue obscures its
>>>> dynamics. Even the wealthy scion inheriting position and power has to
>>>> learn to navigate in an existing system "he" (most likely, he) hasn't
>>>> created. The rewards for self-control undoubtedly are much greater and
>>>> much more readily forthcoming for the prince than the pauper. But isn't
>>>> the dynamic the same?
>>>> David
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu]
>>>> On Behalf Of Jay Lemke
>>>> Sent: Sunday, September 27, 2009 11:26 PM
>>>> To: lchcmike@gmail.com; eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
>>>> Subject: Re: [xmca] Can the Right Kinds of Play Teach Self-Control?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> As a footnote to my worries about the politics of teaching "self-
>>>> control", and in response to Mike's note about re-framing in cognitive
>>>> psych discourse, a thought or two about "executive function".
>>>>
>>>> There is a value connotation in this term, from "executive" in its
>>>> sense of high-status individual in a managerial role (cf. "Executive
>>>> MBA program" or "Executive Summary" not to mention "Executive
>>>> Washroom"!).
>>>>
>>>> And it's not so semantically distant from the putative denotative
>>>> meaning of the term: the function of executing decisions. The history
>>>> comes, I believe, from computer programming and computer processor
>>>> design, where the executive function carries out the commands of the
>>>> program.
>>>>
>>>> So there is a sort of root cultural meaning-message here: "it's good
>>>> to be in charge" conflated with "self-control is good". But there is a
>>>> world of political difference among controlling yourself, carrying out
>>>> commands, and controlling others. Or as I argued in my other post,
>>>> learning how to control yourself to act your part in someone else's
>>>> drama.
>>>>
>>>> It may be obvious but perhaps still worth noting that there's also a
>>>> difference between the meaning of "self-control" or "self-regulation"
>>>> as the basic and necessary ability to focus your own attention and
>>>> action in order to get something done beyond the single instant vs.
>>>> their meaning as conforming to the norms of behavior set by others. In
>>>> free cooperative or collaborative activity, where group norms are
>>>> agreed and remain subject to challenge by all and to revision, this
>>>> latter difference fades. But how often does that happen in schools? or
>>>> any late capitalist institution?
>>>>
>>>> JAY.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Jay Lemke
>>>> Professor (Adjunct)
>>>> Educational Studies
>>>> University of Michigan
>>>> Ann Arbor, MI 48109
>>>> www.umich.edu/~jaylemke <http://www.umich.edu/%7Ejaylemke>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Sep 27, 2009, at 9:22 AM, mike cole wrote:
>>>>
>>>> I am pushed to get ready for classes monday, Ageliki.
>>>>
>>>>> I would be glad to discuss the issue I referred to as re-framing
>>>>> within the
>>>>> context of the discussion of learning sciences and vygotsky just to
>>>>> keep it
>>>>> in the bounds of time constraints-- have you read that discussion?
>>>>> Otherwise
>>>>> my comments will make no sense.
>>>>>
>>>>> Within that context, I might start with executive functioning as a
>>>>> "neuroscience term," the discourse on 0-3 and ways to make babies
>>>>> brains
>>>>> develop more quickly (see xmca discussion of brain and
>>>>> education),and the
>>>>> linkages to no-child-left behind. Seems a long way from Kharkov in
>>>>> the late
>>>>> 1930's, or 1990's, or the recent (to the NYTimes) discovery of
>>>>> Vygotsky.
>>>>>
>>>>> mike
>>>>> Sun, Sep 27, 2009 at 9:15 AM, Ageliki Nicolopoulou <agn3@lehigh.edu>
>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Hi Mike,
>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Can you explain a bit what you mean by re-framing and why you see
>>>>>> it as an
>>>>>> issue of re-framing?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Thanks,
>>>>>> Ageliki
>>>>>>
>>>>>> --
>>>>>> **********************************************
>>>>>> Ageliki Nicolopoulou
>>>>>> Professor
>>>>>> Department of Psychology, Lehigh University
>>>>>> 17 Memorial Drive East
>>>>>> Bethlehem, PA  18015-3068
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Personal Webpage:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>  http://www.lehigh.edu/~agn3/index.htm<http://www.lehigh.edu/%7Eagn3/index.htm>
>>>>> <http://www.lehigh.edu/%7Eagn3/inde
>>>>>
>>>> x.htm
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>  Departmental Webpage:  http://www.lehigh.edu/~inpsy/<http://www.lehigh.edu/%7Einpsy/>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>> nicolopoulou.html<http://www.lehigh.edu/%7Einpsy/nicolopoulou.html>
>>>>>> **********************************************
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> mike cole wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Thanks Peter-- I was just about to forward this story. Apart from
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> its
>>>>>>> considerable intrinsic interest to members of this group, it seems
>>>>>>> relevant
>>>>>>> to the prior discussion the origins of learning sciences and the
>>>>>>> ways in
>>>>>>> which re-framing can operate to change the terms of discourse.
>>>>>>> mike
>>>>>>> On Sun, Sep 27, 2009 at 7:36 AM, Peter Smagorinsky <smago@uga.edu>
>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> September 27, 2009 The NY Times Magazine Section
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> The School Issue: Preschool
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Can the Right Kinds of Play Teach Self-Control?
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> By PAUL TOUGH
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
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