Dear WinkWorld Readers,

Once upon a time in a far, far away place, I was a university professor.  Not only that–I loved research.  Still do.  However, I learned early in my career that not everyone loves research.  The minute I told a group of grad students, “Research shows…,” I could see the eye-rolls.  However, I also noticed that everyone seemed to love stories, so if I could bury a new idea (a.k.a., good research) in a good story, the students would pay attention, and remember the story.

Lots of time, new learning feels like it is up-side-down to our  previous learning.  Often new learning is not intuitive.  Sometimes new learning is down-right annoying.

Recently, I read a review of a big body of research (Shapiro, 2021) on how we process information, or how we learn.  It confirms what I used to get to learn and relearn every year in every classroom from students: People don’t care about research. 

Shapiro shares what he learned:

•emotions over facts – thus, when confronted with new information, we use feelings over facts;

•feelings are mistaken for facts – and, if someone doesn’t share my feelings, they must be wrong or even bad;

•skepticism is good–but, it requires deep, disciplined thinking;

•facts do not necessarily cure misinformation.

Sheesh. I told you that new knowledge is counter-intuitive and very annoying.

One answer: a good story.  People remember a story and even think about it and draw their own conclusions. 

When I was a prof, my area of specialty was language acquisition, where much we know from research is not intuitive.  So, I made up stories.  For example.

Teaching Passionately – My People Made It

See that image of The Power of Story at the top of the page?  It is not sold with that spiral binding on the side. A grad student took it to an office store and asked them to put that where the book binding was.  I had no idea you could do that. Sometimes new learning is cool.

If you want to see what is inside the book, The Power of Story, you can enjoy this visual Table of Contents, which my friend, Missy, made for me.

Or, you can look at this cool, little tri-fold, which my friend, Susan made for me.
Click on image to see larger view.

Or, you can go to the book icon at the top of my joanwink.com and click on it.  Some of the links are live in the Table of Contents.

Or, click below.

The Power of Story

I see Amazon is selling it for $30 right now, instead of the $45 it used to cost. 

Shapiro, G. (2021, Jan. 26). Studies on how we process info are eye-opening. Arizona Daily Star,  p. A4.

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

As many of you know, I have long been a fan of Eulalia Bourne, a.k.a., Sister, since I bumped into her work at The Singing Winds bookstore in the late 70s while living on the Cascabel Ranch and teaching in Benson, AZ.  I could not read her three books fast enough to please me.  And, I loved hearing the stories of her decades of teaching at tiny little schools on the Sonoran Desert in southern Arizona. The purpose of this WinkWorld is to create an overview of who Sister was, and her impact today on a little two-room school on the prairies of South Dakota.

My beloved copies of three of Sister’s books.  Just the titles of the books tell us a lot about Sister Bourne.

Nine Months is a Year, Ranch Schoolteacher, and Woman in Levis

Several decades later I shared my treasured Sister books with Missy Urbaniak, the teacher of a  two-room school on the prairies of South Dakota. Missy was as captivated by the woman, as I had been earlier.

Missy fell in love with Sister also, and thus began a special bond between Missy and the students of Atall School and myself.

Read the following (click here) for a historical peak into Sister’s life, The University of Arizona library and local museum maintain and preserve all of Sister’s papers.  Many may believe that the tiny little one and two-room school is a thing of the past–not true.  Atall and others are as dynamic and central to the isolated ranching communities today on the prairies, as Sister’s were in the early to mid twentieth century in AZ.  Through the last half dozen years Missy and I  have attempted to save this history and to share it with others.

Below I am posting as few of the photos of the kids through the years.  In the first photo one of the students is now a sophomore at the state university; and four others are in the local (50 miles away) high school.

The photo above shows the students after I donated a few of my books to their school library. The following three photos were all taken during different years.
(Click on a photo to see a larger view.)

Little Cowpuncher was the name of the students newsletters, which Sister’s students often produced on old mimeograph machine.  When Missy and the Atall students learned of this, they, too, wanted to write and publish their own newsletter, which they named, Prairie School Post (PSP).

More about these student newsletters from Sister’s students and also from Missy’s students is available at the end of this paragraph. Many miles stretch from AZ to SD, but these students are the bridge which joins the desert and the prairies. Click here.

You have probably guessed that we are working on a book, and we have our work cut out for us.

More Atall kids and photos here.

Latest Archives – Page 14 of 27 – JoanWink.com — JoanWink.com

https://www.joanwink.com/category/latest/page/14/

 

South Dakota Magazine, September/October 2019:

Continue Reading

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

A friend just received her second new knee and is recovering.  She is an avid reader and asked for a few suggestions. Primarily, these are just books, which popped into my head.   In addition, I dug out some photos of recent books, which I have read. I have another friend, who consistently wants me to write about the books I am reading.   Michelle and Cissa, this WinkWorld is for you.

First, Michelle, I suggest fast, easy, compelling books during recovering.  I remember when I was on chemo, I read The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency  (a series) by Alexander McCall Smith. I discovered beautiful Botswana. After I finished the series, I continued to read any book I could find about elephants. 

Thank you to Harvey Sapir of Pexel for sharing this free photo.

Of course, you could re-read the Harry Potter series.  Elizabeth Gilbert might be a good fit right now. The City of Girls was great fun.  How about American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins?

At the moment, I am reading and enjoying Peter Likins’ A New American Family: A Love Story.  It is the story of their family life with their six adopted multiracial children.  Amazing.  Likins was also the president at the University of Arizona.

You might prefer podcasts until you get off the painkillers.  I am thoroughly enjoying both series of podcasts by Brené Brown.  Or, you might just want to read (re-read) all of her books.

Alexandra Fuller might interest you. I loved reading of her free-range childhood in Africa.  I suggest reading her books in order.

The Giver of s Stars by Jojo Moyes will be a very healing book, I am sure.  And, you will find yourself cheering for the librarians.  The same is true for

Or, maybe you could just jump right into any of the series of the prolific JA Jance.

Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng is a great read, too.  I really enjoyed …and His Lovely Wife by Connie Schultz.

In Finding Dorothy by Elizabeth Letts, I thoroughly enjoyed reading of Frank Baum, author of The Wizard of Oz, and his amazing wife, Maud.  In this book, you will learn of their life in South Dakota, too.

Red sparkly shoes

Or, dare I suggest that you might want to read one of these? Just click on the book icon at the top of the webpage.  Click on Home below:

Home

Hello WinkWorld Readers,

I am often drawn to questions regarding the generations: The Greatest Generation to The Silent Generation to the Baby Boomers to the Gen X to the Millennials to Gen Z.

As a former professor, a former teacher, and as a current parent and grandparent, this subject fascinates me.  Now, as a member of the South Dakota Board of Regents, I find that the unique characteristics of each generation shape how and what we teach.  For example, are the needs and interests of the Millennials the same as those of the Gen Z? Nope. The university students of the last few years were Millennials, but now our classes are filling up fast with the next group, Gen Z.

Previously (2011, in Critical Pedagogy: Notes from the Real World, pp. 176-177, Fig. 5.1), I shared a chart of my understandings at that moment.  This originally came from Jim Burke, and I reproduced with permission. Click here to see the generations and their characteristics and years.

However, time keeps marching forward, and I wanted to update my understandings.  I read a bit (see Resources below), and I went to one of my grandsons, Luke, to update my knowledge of the generations.

Luke Wink-Moran

Meet Luke.

As some of you know, Luke contributed to two previous WinkWorlds.  Click here and here. In these two posts, we summarized some current writing regarding our post-COVID needs of students and society.

Luke captured his present understanding in the image below.  He omitted the World War II generation, which is often referred to as “The Greatest Generation.”

How To Make Sense of This

Think of your own family members–at least that helped me.  

Dawn and Bo:  I started with our own two kids, as I sure do know their birth dates:  1968 and 1971  They are both Gen X. Very much so.

Next, I thought about our grandkids: Wyatt, Luke, Wynn, Austin, and Garrett.  Wyatt and Luke have many Millennials characteristics, and I can see that Wynn and Austin have more characteristics of Gen Z.  For now, Garrett is a Gen Z, but it will not surprise me if he eventually falls into a Yet-to-be-Labeled Generation.  And, whatever that generation is named, I will bet that Garrett will be leading the parade.

Wink and I are a part of the Silent Generation, although we did not know it when we started down this family path together.  We graduated from undergrad (Yankton College) in 1966, and left immediately for life in the Philadelphia area.  I started teaching at Great Valley High School, Malvern, PA, and in 1968 Dawn was born.  Wink and I looked back at our college friends, only two years younger, and saw that they had totally different life experiences. While we had a mortgage, diapers (pre-Pamper days), and careers—they had the Sexual Revolution, marijuana, and a trip to Woodstock.

We often laugh that we missed the Sexual Revolution by two years. We’ve been catching-up ever since. 

1968 was a pivotal year for our nation and for us. In 1969, I realized that I was morphing from a nice Goldwater Girl to a mom who questioned everything.  I remember dressing Dawn in little bell bottoms, a little leather fringed vest, and a headband. I jumped on a bus to go to a protest in Washington DC, Dawn in a blue Johnny-Carry on my back.  I have no idea now exactly what we protested, but I clearly remember that she was the cutest little “beatnik” there. I remember the personal and national pain of the assassinations of that time: John Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King.  The Silent Generation suddenly was replaced by the Baby Boomers.

Now our family and yours are all experiencing a similar national and personal pain.  It will change us all. 

Resources used in this article

Dabney, Courtney. (2020, March 26). It took a global pandemic, but Generation X is finally getting love. PaperCityMag. https://www.papercitymag.com/culture/generation-x-earns-respect-conronavirus-pandemic-stay-home/?fbclid=IwAR0k83T1LVV1BBduh5QWQtpQektT7s1Gc6WDffNT9GfBQNb57yhanBEonHc

Guillén, Mauro F. (2020).  2030: How today’s biggest trends will collide and reshape the future of everything. St. Martin’s Press: New York.

Salingo, Jeffrey J. (2018).  The new generation of students: How colleges can recruit, teach, and serve Gen Z.  The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Wink, J. (2011, p. 176 & 177).  Critical pedagogy: Notes from the real world. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc. Used with permission from Jim Burke, jburke@englishcompanion.com.

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

In the previous blog post, I shared a review of Harari’s 21 Lessons for the 21st Century and Zakaria’s 10 Lessons for a Post-Pandemic World.  Click here, if you want to glance at that short blog post.  After reading these two books, we predict five categories which reflect the needs of students and society in our post-COVID world. 

Since that time, we created two new images which demonstrate the five categories.

See larger versions of these images

I did this review with our 2nd grandson, Luke, who is an avid reader/writer/thinker.  Meet Luke.

Since that time, I have received suggestions of other related books, which also focus on the future and higher education.  Thank you.

My colleague sent these two titles which she had just ordered.  Hope we hear more about these books, Janice.

Academia Next: The Futures of Higher Education by Bryan Alexander

and

The Small College Imperative: Models for Sustainable Futures by Mary B. Marcy and Richard Ekman

Sharon, a long-time friend and colleague suggested that we check out The Social Dilemma on Netflicks.

6 Things to Know about the Documentary Before You Watch It

More on The Social Dilemma

Yikes, I knew nothing about this series, but I can see that it will be time to call in help from the millennials and/or Gen Zers:  Fortunately, our 5 grandkids fall into one of these two categories, and are more than willing to explain things to us. My reading tells me that the millennials and Gen Zers are very different from each other–something I sure have noticed.

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

As some of you know, I am on the South Dakota Board of Regents, and in that role, I read and think a lot about the rapidly changing needs of society and higher education.  Our future seems to be accelerating.  Fast change is inevitable.

In the last 6 months I have read lots of articles about the future, but two books, in particular, really ring true for me: First, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century by Yuval Noah Harari, and second, Ten Lessons for A Post-Pandemic World by Fareed Zakaria.

Our grandson, Luke, age 22, is an avid reader and has read much on this topic also. In fact, he has been reading Harari for months and encouraging me to do so, too.  I finally took his advice. I am now a new fan of Harari, as I have been of Zakaria.

It’s true: Luke and I really do not know the future, but in what follows we attempt to capture our learning by highlighting 5 categories of change, which will affect universities, students, and all of us.

First, DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION, and to be ready,  universities need to focus on:

Artificial Intelligence (AI)

Sciences

Machine Learning

Engineering

Biotech – Bioengineering

Agriculture – Precision Ag

Machines which augment humans

All things cyber and digital

Math – Chemistry – Physics

Business/Economics/Entrepreneurial

Second, HEALTHCARE, and to be ready, universities need to focus on:

Preventative Medicine

Medical Devices

Medical AI

Telehealth

Nurses and Doctors

Third, the ENVIRONMENT, and to be ready, universities need to focus on:

Climate Sciences

Environmental Engineering

Sustainability

Fourth, EDUCATION, and to be ready, universities need to focus on:

Readers/writers/thinkers/educators for the future

Emphasize STEM and STEAM

Relearning

Arts – History – Humanities

(STEM = Science, technology, engineering, math)

(STEAM = Science, technology,, engineering, arts, math)

Fifth, SOCIAL SCIENCES, and to be ready, universities need to focus on:

Diversity/Inclusion

Social Justice

Demographic Changes

Title IX/Feminism/Cultures

Thank you, Luke Wink-Moran.  What a great time we had reading, thinking, and writing about these two books.  We look forward to your input on our delicate, fragile new ideas.

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

If you are not in a classroom very often, you may not realize it, but teacher observations are always a part of even the most active classroom.  Often times, it feels like teachers are teaching in a fishbowl with everyone peaking in to see what is happening.  Classrooms are often busy places with active learning. The drawing below (free from Pixaby for educational purposes) captures what classrooms used to look something like.

Often times, there is someone with a clip board standing quietly in the back of the room taking notes for an evaluation or a peer review.

Now classrooms may look like the image posted below.

My question is: How in the world do principals, supervisors, professors do their teacher evaluations? 

My friend/colleague, Dr. Chris Roe, recently conducted an observation of a teacher, Carol, who is now teaching virtually. Dr. Roe spent the morning in Carol’s TV room in her home (a.k.a., classroom).  Carol’s computer sat on a TV tray and projected on her big screen TV, where 26 second-graders’ faces were looking at the teacher.  Dr. Roe sat off to the side in her living room, as he observed and took notes.

As Chris told me, after his observation:

What a tremendous amount of effort went into this session. As an observer and former school administrator, I took notes as I would have if I were in a teacher’s brick and mortar classroom. I needed to see what teachers are going through right now so that I could better respond to new teachers’ concerns and questions regarding virtual instruction. The teachers and mentors I support in the teacher induction program are all amazing, stressed, and persevering.

 

My three focus areas were:

1. Instruction

2 Classroom Management

3. Technology.

 

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

Periodically, I share the books I am reading. Here we go…

I just received this treasured book from Profe Beto, my all-time favorite teacher. He wrote this to capture his family memories for his younger siblings. One of his colleagues, Armando Miguélez Martínez, had it published for Profe. What a treasured gift for me. Below here is something which I previously wrote about Adalberto M. Guerrero. I hope you enjoy.

Coincidentally, yesterday I unexpectedly received another treasure–this time from a former student, who had the kindest things to say about his memories of our time together.  See the cool card which he sent.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart to this student who is now a fabulous teacher, too.

Teachers, are you, too, taking a moment to tell your former teachers how they enriched your life?  Just a thought.

How is it that I did not know her work?  The books are filled with true stories of her life in Africa and now in Wyoming.

One of my book clubs is reading the Chernow book below.  We begin the sharing on Wednesday this week.

One very big book: Only 300+ pages to go.

I loved reading the two books below. I will never forget the Ng fictional characters. I so hope that she is writing a sequel, as I need to know what happened to Mia and Pearl.

The Connie Schultz book, …and His Lovely Wife, was loaded with truth for many women.  I hope she writes another book, too.

I have only been sneaking peaks into the Guillén book, as Wink is reading it.  I am anxious to read it, as it tells our future.  Hang on.  I love reading futurists.

This author, who now lives in Aberdeen, SD, is new for me.  But, I notice that the more discouraged I become with the world, the more I slip away and read.  Maybe this book will help me crawl out of my cave.

I am so grateful that I love to read.

I hope that I also do a WinkWorld on all of my podcasts.  So fascinating.

Okay, languages/literacies folks on the WinkWorld readership list, this one is for you and for me.  I often use WinkWorld as my own little library, so I know I will have it when I want it.

Here are two of my favs: Noam Chomsky and Stephen Krashen visiting with each other. 

I first heard of Chomsky in 1965-66 from Yankton College’s dear Dr. Ehrensberger (Dr. E). I took every English class Dr. E. taught, as he was such a fabulous instructor and gentle human being, and he had white hair and blue, blue eyes, just like my Grampy Dave Clark.  Dr. E told me that I should keep my eye on this guy named Noam Chomsky from MIT–so that is exactly what I have done for almost 55 years. Syntactic Structures (1957) was one of my first treasured texts–wonder where my copy is now?

It is my understanding that Dr. Chomsky is now retired, and spending a lot of time on the University of Arizona campus.  I think of Dr. Chomsky now as sort of a free-range emeritus professor, and I continue to look for him in the main library and/or on the grassy mall.  Heaven help the man, if I should bump into him some day!  I hate it when I gush.

Those of you who know me as a professional know the impact which Dr. Stephen Krashen has had on my life’s work.  The first time I ever heard Dr. Krashen speak was in Phoenix, AZ, circa 1977.  In his lecture, I learned that the way I was teaching my Spanish classes  was all wrong.  I drove back to Benson and told middle and high school students that we were going to toss the conjugations and verb tenses and start using real Spanish for conversation.

I also remember the day I learned that Dr. Krashen followed Dr. Chomsky, just as I did.  I have since learned a bit more from both of these men, but that is another story for another day.

I love this photo of Steve and me.  I don’t have a photo of Chomsky and me–yet, but I will return to the UofA campus and continue my search.

In this WinkWorld, I am going to share a video clip of Krashen and Chomsky in conversation. This WinkWorld is probably not for everyone, but it sure is for me forever and ever.

This was posted in 2020 on YouTube.

A quick search on the internet will  early provide you many more video clips of these two scholars.