Brushes with Fame and History

I went to the National Gallery of Art yesterday. It wasn't a planned visit-- Josh and I wanted to try the hamburgers at Top Chef contestant Spike Mendelsohn's place, Good Stuff, on Capitol Hill, because we'd seen him on TV the night before. After a pretty good lunch, (during which we watched the Senate vote to confirm Sonia Sotomayor as the next Supreme Court Justice on one of the several flat screens in the upstairs dining area, AND I spotted my neighbor, who works for the Senate, standing right next to Al Franken) we headed to the National Mall, agreeing that we would go to the museum closest to any parking space we found. As luck would have it, we found a space right away outside the East Building, so in we went.

We liked all the Calders, especially the wire sculpture of the head, and there was lively discussion about Presidency I–V Photographs by Thomas Demand as well as Barnett Newman's Stations of the Cross. It was after we took the moving sidewalk through Leo Villareal's light sculpture and past the fountain cascade that we found our way to the exhibition called The Art of Power: Royal Armor and Portraits from Imperial Spain.

Honestly? It was awesome, in that European museum way. (I only wish I'd gotten the audiotour, but maybe next time.) There was all sorts of armor, and historical information about the Spanish dudes who owned it, and old paintings of them wearing it. Seeing the actual armor in front of me that was also in that 350-year-old painting on the wall was really cool-- it made such a concrete connection to the past for me. The guy was dead, but his armor was right there. Wild. (I also appreciated the Spanish history refresher... I hadn't thought of Phillipe Guapo and Juana la Loca in the over twenty years since we visited their tomb in Granada.)

Later, we went for ice cream in Delrey. We were on our way out of the store when Josh noticed that one of the chairs was stenciled on the seat: President Barak Obama sat here on June 20, 2009. Of course he sat right down.

What's the Offense?

Yesterday I learned that a friend of ours does not like the Life is Good brand. Now, we are all about Life is Good around here. Not only do we own several t-shirts each, but we frequently give them as gifts, and we own plenty of other Life merch as well. For those who may not be familiar, the signature LiG character is Jake, a jaunty little stick figure who really knows how to live. Jake is drawn with a black body and white face. It's not too much of a stretch to connect Jake to images of minstrel show actors in white face, and that offends our friend, who happens to be African American. I'm not sure if it offends me too, but my consciousness is raised.

Which is why I had to scratch my head this morning, reading a lengthy piece in the Washington Post about some posters of President Obama that have been turning up in LA. In them, he's got on the smeary facial make-up that Heath Ledger wore as the Joker in The Dark Knight with the caption of "socialism" beneath. The writer of the article made a rather far-fetched argument about the underlying racism of the image. He went way around the barn to connect the urban anarchy in Heath Ledger's portrayal of the Joker to a mainstream subconscious association of such anarchy and violence with African American people. I guess the depiction of the president as a psychotic comic-book villain, not to mention a black man in white face, just isn't offensive enough?

The Prodigal Consumer

I never understood the parable of the prodigal son. My sympathy was always with the son who stayed faithful to his father all along; to me his resentment was valid. As a teacher, I sort of get it... maybe I do celebrate the kids who turn it around a little more than those who have had it all along, but I also try to be pretty sensitive to any offense the others might take-- it always seems kind of justified.

The last couple of days, I've been thinking about the cash for clunkers program. (Forgive me, I live inside the Beltway.) I read somewhere that it would take, on average, 5-6 years of driving the new, more fuel-efficient cars in order to offset the carbon footprint of manufacturing them and transporting them to their point-of-sale. So, in many cases, owners would better serve the environment by keeping their old cars longer. I also heard the opinion expressed that the people who purchased these so-called clunkers did so with full knowledge of the harm they would do. Others, who bought more fuel-efficient cars at the same time, are not eligible for the rebate, and so, in an oh-so-prodigal-son approach, the policy effectively rewards those who ignored the environment when they bought their last car, while offering nothing for the environmentally faithful. I guess we should just be content with driving our cars for the next five or six years to be sure we cancel out that new car footprint.

I Had a Great Idea

for this post. It was around 4:30, I had spent some time in my classroom (in the summer it reminds me of the interior of those haunted houses in movies, all dusty and covered up) working on the Adolescent Identity thing, but I was on my way to the grocery store. Zipping along on a pretty busy stretch of road, (what happened to the merge lane?!!) it hit me, a great title and all. I wondered if I should drive one handed and fish around for a pencil and notebook, but the concept seemed so clear to me that it was almost haloed in golden light in my mind's eye. I opted to operate my vehicle in accordance with state and local ordinance. Got to the store, concept still there, parked, picked up a cart, started checking the origin of the produce-- Is it organic? Is it local? Impressed by the price of peanut butter, I bought two, as I did with the dishwasher tabs that were on sale, too. Over at the wine aisle, I was completely engaged in choosing one that paired with our dinner and a couple others that I liked having on hand. And on I went through the grocery store, leaving well satisfied with my active shopping. I have since cooked that dinner and enjoyed some of the wine, and all along I've been racking my brain for that perfect idea I had, but I can not recall it.

Identifiable Crisis

Okay, so let's say you're conversant with Erikson and Marcia's models of identity formation. What'll that get you? Imagine you are a teacher participating in a conference for a student who isn't performing academically. Perhaps you recognize that this child, formerly foreclosed and 100% on board with her parents' values of hard work, organization, and academic success is now quite obviously diffused or perhaps in moratorium. What's your approach?

My friend and I kicked this question around a bit this morning (and glad I was to have the chance to do so, because talking to her about school always helps). We agreed that the obvious implications of identity formation models are in forming personal relationships with students and establishing a safe and caring classroom climate. Certainly both of those things are easier to do with the empathy that results from an understanding of the flux and turmoil that kids must face as a matter of development. She also reminded me that this knowledge should rightfully shape our expectations in terms of student behavior and what attitude an 11, 12, 13 or 14 year old is actually capable of sustaining. Let's face it, "Because I said so," is no longer a compelling reason, but a sensible alternative can sometimes be a stretch.

But I feel that in order to fully convince teachers of the value of this information there must be an application beyond classroom management. What about our instructional practices and student acievement?

Identity Crisis

I'm taking myself out of the expert category of adolescent identity formation. I'm still having a hard time pulling all my research together. Here's what I know so far:

Most identity formation theories are based on Erikson's model of human development. According to him, we go through eight stages, each of which roughly corresponds to a certain age range. The primary task of adolescents, age 12-18, is to determine who they are and who they will be. In pursuing this self-concept, kids have three things to contend with: sexual maturity, occupational skills and talents, and their social context.

James Marcia further refined the model by identifying two key processes that adolescents use in forming their personalities: actively exploring their options and making deliberate choices about those options. The use of these two tools, either separately, in combination, or not at all, describes four phases of identity development. The adolescent who has adopted his or her opinions on sex, a career, and society from a parent or institution without conscious exploration or choice is foreclosed. The teen who is neither exploring nor choosing, but rather living day to day without consideration of the future is diffused. A kid who is actively struggling with these issues is in moratorium, and one who has resolved them has achieved identity. The process is recursive: people can cycle through all the phases several times. A stable identity is not necessarily unchanging; it is however continuous over time.

What does all of this mean to the classroom teacher? Good question.

Platinum

I have a Wii, and I'm not afraid to use it. I like all the games, but I especially like American Idol Karaoke. For some reason, I find it extremely relaxing to grab that mic and belt out a few songs-- the tension just melts away. I'm no slouch at it either; I consistently score above 95%, even on advanced difficulty. That's actually kind of funny to me, because I really can't sing. I feel sorry for anyone within earshot of my "performances", but still the platinum records pile up. A little while ago, as I was delivering a particularly shattering rendition of My Heart Will Go On (think of the extra cheesy emotion and those looooong high notes in that one, and you'll be glad that you are there and I am here), I wondered about the electronic scoring, and it reminded me of an article I read recently about how diligently ETS is working to write a computer program that will be able to score expository essays. I had to laugh; I really can't imagine any substitute for human evaluation. Say what you will about Paula, Randy, and Simon, but they would never let me through.