October 10 - Psychology and school
Some things I learned (and thought) today.
So today in class (Psych 100) that abusing a child literally shrinks a part of the brain called the hippocampus associated with memory and learning. Mothers/parents who are depressed (post partum or PTSD - also affecting the hippocampus; there's many types of depression) can pass on their depression to their children, especially infants. Depression is comminicable! My teacher (out of date, Freudian, senile and untrustworthy as she is) says that a mother with depression has a child, the child is removed from the mother's care and given to a non-depressed caregiver - the caregiver will pick up the child's learned depression. Children immitate and the mother is/was not responding appropriately with smiling and happier more normal behavior.
Parents who nurture their children's emotional responses increase their child's/children's hippocampus by 10% as opposed to parents who yell and tell their child to "shut up" when faced with something exciting. (The example given was testing families by offering the child a gift if the parents would sign a lot of paperwork. Obviously the child grew excited - the experiment was to see how the parents reacted to that). Children who are not nurtured in their emotional expression tend to grow up to have anxiety because they have not learned how to self-calm. I can attest to this - I had to *learn*, as a teen, how to calm myself down back when I suffered from breakdowns because I couldn't calm myself. My mother was post-partum, unhappy with her marriage/life (she still is), my father worked and didn't help much with the kids (he still does/doesn't) and I think I learned a lot from her - not good stuff, either.
Another interesting thing was that children are exposed to four hours of TV (and TV's loud, colorful, in-your-face, impossible-to-ignore advertisements) left on in the background when no one was watching. The example given was that children are playing a board game with the TV on in the background and it distracts children - more importantly, it is teaching ADHD or ADHD-type behaviors in children by splitting their focus and attention via their interest. Children in ethnic/poor living conditions are exposed to more than four hours of background TV as the device is usually left on constantly. So no more TV Nanny. Imagine what happens when you give that kid a cellphone, Facebook/Twitter page or a game console.
I had none of those growing up (even in the '90s). I had a roommate in college who couldn't live her life without the Simpsons or Family Guy on in the background - even when she left the room. The TV was situated right before my bed (where I studied and, duh, slept). While it bugged the hell out of me, it otherwise desensitized me to my previous behavior towards TV when trying to focus: everything else would fade away until all that was left was the TV - I would get sucked in because I didn't watch much TV growing up (movies are different, I watched plenty of good, child-appropriate ones). But, wow, when I had to study and that thing was on...I hated the shows, too, so I was being blasted with something stupid, annoying and useless. Focus was a chore. Sometimes I still struggle but its mostly when I don't want to be focused on whatever, for example, homework. I'd rather watch TV (just not Family Guy or Simpsons).
Also, I took an unreliable test (it was from my psych teacher, the loon who reminds me of my grandma) to see which brain hemisphere (left or right) is dominant for you, or in this case, me. I'm strongly right brained or so I assumed, however, I have some odd cross-overs to my left brain. If 1 is 100% left brain and 9 is 100% right brain, I am a 4; a 4! That means I'm "whole brained" or very close to it - smarter, too, because I have nearly equal access to both sides of my brain! I'll take "whole brained" over left brained or even right-brained any day. I've never taken a test, that I can recall, anyway, to see which side of the brain I lean towards - I've only ever looked at what attributes both have and picked which one described me best. For all the writers out there, the left brain (not the right) is responsible for words and language processing. I usually assume writing is creative and therefor it belongs to the right brain - not so. The test had some questions that really spoke to me (I've almost never had that happen) so that leads me to think it might be a better test than I thought. Hoever, like most tests, the answers were yes/no, A/B format. I'm a "grey" person, disliking the black-and-white way of thinking so it's very difficult to pin myself down to an answer because I try to give an *exact, accurate, 'this occurs __% of the time'* answer which...I can't do in yes/no, A/B. I found that annoying.
Also abused children have more health issues, that much should be very obvious. Their heart rate is twenty-four beats per minute more than a non-abused child or a child of non-depressed/non-nurturing parents. I particularly enjoy the feeling of high blood pressure (sarcasm): the fun part is having had it since I was probably six years old. I know its tough, but I think its important for parents to be careful how you present yourself and what life lessons you're teaching your kids because they will, at first, want to grow up to be your carbon copy and learn from your every move.
In Math (algebra), I learned that, yes, fractions, postive/negative numbers and variables (ugh! the variables!) *still* officially stink because that's basically all algebra really is.
I have my first big math exam - math is not, never has been and probably never will be anything resembling a "strong suit" for me. I prefer science - still has exact answers, memorizable formulae with less math. Oh, and my math teacher is a miniature (Italian - he yells) Steve Martin! He's quite cute and funny, not at all in the Steve Martin way; just very straightforward. I can't help but smile. He's a fantastic teacher, too, though quite negative. I could spend all week on my psych teacher and still not be finished - she's that crazy and useless. Suffice it to say, she's clueless, set in her ways (the ways of the penis - I mean, Freud) and I almost was late with an assignment because her syllabus (a shitty one) and her calendar (hey, cool!...if it worked) don't match up. *I* would have been late and not been able to turn in an assignment (one that was WAY more difficult than she claimed, of course, it took me something of 3.5 days, people - a fucking reference page!) because of HER errors. Yes, there's more than ONE error on her handouts.
The last teacher I had like her? I got in her face, in a polite yet very direct, hinting-at-aggressiveness way, scared her so badly she told me to sit down and clutched her book to her chest to calm down. If you can't teach, get the eff away from my field. You've lost my respect, attention and effort. But no, you have a Ph.D in "how students learn" apparently, so you keep on...fucking with your poor students.
Who's DUMB idea was it for college (community in this case, I'm almost sad to say) to be DAILY attendence??? Do they know how EXPENSIVE (read: $$$) that is? Even for teachers? Guys, its really sad when I have to hear how the teachers have to take 3% cuts to their salary every year (never mind that I think my psych teacher needs to RETIRE ASAP). There's not enough parking ever. It's such a lemming, me-first environment, I don't appreciate it one bit. I went to art college which was a weekly class (admittedly of FOUR hours each) but you had a whole week to do an assignment or project - which are physical projects, btw, like making a dress or a presentation board. You can guess which is more effective.
I heard the song "Locked out of Heaven" today. I'd heard the title (and probably the song) before but I liked it. I think that's what it was called...It seemed older than Bruno Mars or it sounded different than the ones I found on YT (YouTube). Oh, well.
The Gangham Style song - and motto "Dress up nice and dance stupid" something I can get behind - amuses me. Particularly this. Go, boys! (Totally made me think how hot Nathan Petrelli would be in his uniform and the kinds of trouble he surely got into while in it...or out of it).
I've also since updated my favorites on YT favorites here. There's some funny stuff there.
So today in class (Psych 100) that abusing a child literally shrinks a part of the brain called the hippocampus associated with memory and learning. Mothers/parents who are depressed (post partum or PTSD - also affecting the hippocampus; there's many types of depression) can pass on their depression to their children, especially infants. Depression is comminicable! My teacher (out of date, Freudian, senile and untrustworthy as she is) says that a mother with depression has a child, the child is removed from the mother's care and given to a non-depressed caregiver - the caregiver will pick up the child's learned depression. Children immitate and the mother is/was not responding appropriately with smiling and happier more normal behavior.
Parents who nurture their children's emotional responses increase their child's/children's hippocampus by 10% as opposed to parents who yell and tell their child to "shut up" when faced with something exciting. (The example given was testing families by offering the child a gift if the parents would sign a lot of paperwork. Obviously the child grew excited - the experiment was to see how the parents reacted to that). Children who are not nurtured in their emotional expression tend to grow up to have anxiety because they have not learned how to self-calm. I can attest to this - I had to *learn*, as a teen, how to calm myself down back when I suffered from breakdowns because I couldn't calm myself. My mother was post-partum, unhappy with her marriage/life (she still is), my father worked and didn't help much with the kids (he still does/doesn't) and I think I learned a lot from her - not good stuff, either.
Another interesting thing was that children are exposed to four hours of TV (and TV's loud, colorful, in-your-face, impossible-to-ignore advertisements) left on in the background when no one was watching. The example given was that children are playing a board game with the TV on in the background and it distracts children - more importantly, it is teaching ADHD or ADHD-type behaviors in children by splitting their focus and attention via their interest. Children in ethnic/poor living conditions are exposed to more than four hours of background TV as the device is usually left on constantly. So no more TV Nanny. Imagine what happens when you give that kid a cellphone, Facebook/Twitter page or a game console.
I had none of those growing up (even in the '90s). I had a roommate in college who couldn't live her life without the Simpsons or Family Guy on in the background - even when she left the room. The TV was situated right before my bed (where I studied and, duh, slept). While it bugged the hell out of me, it otherwise desensitized me to my previous behavior towards TV when trying to focus: everything else would fade away until all that was left was the TV - I would get sucked in because I didn't watch much TV growing up (movies are different, I watched plenty of good, child-appropriate ones). But, wow, when I had to study and that thing was on...I hated the shows, too, so I was being blasted with something stupid, annoying and useless. Focus was a chore. Sometimes I still struggle but its mostly when I don't want to be focused on whatever, for example, homework. I'd rather watch TV (just not Family Guy or Simpsons).
Also, I took an unreliable test (it was from my psych teacher, the loon who reminds me of my grandma) to see which brain hemisphere (left or right) is dominant for you, or in this case, me. I'm strongly right brained or so I assumed, however, I have some odd cross-overs to my left brain. If 1 is 100% left brain and 9 is 100% right brain, I am a 4; a 4! That means I'm "whole brained" or very close to it - smarter, too, because I have nearly equal access to both sides of my brain! I'll take "whole brained" over left brained or even right-brained any day. I've never taken a test, that I can recall, anyway, to see which side of the brain I lean towards - I've only ever looked at what attributes both have and picked which one described me best. For all the writers out there, the left brain (not the right) is responsible for words and language processing. I usually assume writing is creative and therefor it belongs to the right brain - not so. The test had some questions that really spoke to me (I've almost never had that happen) so that leads me to think it might be a better test than I thought. Hoever, like most tests, the answers were yes/no, A/B format. I'm a "grey" person, disliking the black-and-white way of thinking so it's very difficult to pin myself down to an answer because I try to give an *exact, accurate, 'this occurs __% of the time'* answer which...I can't do in yes/no, A/B. I found that annoying.
Also abused children have more health issues, that much should be very obvious. Their heart rate is twenty-four beats per minute more than a non-abused child or a child of non-depressed/non-nurturing parents. I particularly enjoy the feeling of high blood pressure (sarcasm): the fun part is having had it since I was probably six years old. I know its tough, but I think its important for parents to be careful how you present yourself and what life lessons you're teaching your kids because they will, at first, want to grow up to be your carbon copy and learn from your every move.
In Math (algebra), I learned that, yes, fractions, postive/negative numbers and variables (ugh! the variables!) *still* officially stink because that's basically all algebra really is.
I have my first big math exam - math is not, never has been and probably never will be anything resembling a "strong suit" for me. I prefer science - still has exact answers, memorizable formulae with less math. Oh, and my math teacher is a miniature (Italian - he yells) Steve Martin! He's quite cute and funny, not at all in the Steve Martin way; just very straightforward. I can't help but smile. He's a fantastic teacher, too, though quite negative. I could spend all week on my psych teacher and still not be finished - she's that crazy and useless. Suffice it to say, she's clueless, set in her ways (the ways of the penis - I mean, Freud) and I almost was late with an assignment because her syllabus (a shitty one) and her calendar (hey, cool!...if it worked) don't match up. *I* would have been late and not been able to turn in an assignment (one that was WAY more difficult than she claimed, of course, it took me something of 3.5 days, people - a fucking reference page!) because of HER errors. Yes, there's more than ONE error on her handouts.
The last teacher I had like her? I got in her face, in a polite yet very direct, hinting-at-aggressiveness way, scared her so badly she told me to sit down and clutched her book to her chest to calm down. If you can't teach, get the eff away from my field. You've lost my respect, attention and effort. But no, you have a Ph.D in "how students learn" apparently, so you keep on...fucking with your poor students.
Who's DUMB idea was it for college (community in this case, I'm almost sad to say) to be DAILY attendence??? Do they know how EXPENSIVE (read: $$$) that is? Even for teachers? Guys, its really sad when I have to hear how the teachers have to take 3% cuts to their salary every year (never mind that I think my psych teacher needs to RETIRE ASAP). There's not enough parking ever. It's such a lemming, me-first environment, I don't appreciate it one bit. I went to art college which was a weekly class (admittedly of FOUR hours each) but you had a whole week to do an assignment or project - which are physical projects, btw, like making a dress or a presentation board. You can guess which is more effective.
I heard the song "Locked out of Heaven" today. I'd heard the title (and probably the song) before but I liked it. I think that's what it was called...It seemed older than Bruno Mars or it sounded different than the ones I found on YT (YouTube). Oh, well.
The Gangham Style song - and motto "Dress up nice and dance stupid" something I can get behind - amuses me. Particularly this. Go, boys! (Totally made me think how hot Nathan Petrelli would be in his uniform and the kinds of trouble he surely got into while in it...or out of it).
I've also since updated my favorites on YT favorites here. There's some funny stuff there.