Historical Periods

A few weeks back I went to a talk by a Western scholar of Japanese art history. He is doing a series of talks in English at my university. I had met him once before, when he attended a conference and gave a talk at my old university. When I was contemplating switching from history to art history he was the person I wanted to work with for my PhD. I ended up switching from history in a whole different direction, however, and felt like I was in some weird time slip at the talk.

In his talk he spoke about history and periodalization, about how different historical periods are defined, described, and delineated. To demonstrate his point he asked us when the Edo period began. The most common date is 1603, when Tokugawa Ieyasu was named shogun. But really that was just a formality, as he was acknowledged as ruler after winning the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600. But, there were still challenges to his rule until the Battle(s) of Osaka in 1614-1615. As is common in Japanese history, the period is named after a city, however, so the argument could be made for starting the period in 1590, when Ieyasu became ruler of Edo and the Kanto area. The 1630s saw the solidification of many of the laws that are now seen to symbolize the Edo period and the last large armed dispute in Japan for centuries, so this could also be the said to be the start of the period. The golden period of Edo period culture and art wasn't until later, however, and is markedly different so a date of somewhere in the 1650s wouldn't be strange either. The professor then reminded all of us that such a discussion, while usefull, is fundamentally anachronistic for none of those dates would have meant anything to the Japanese at the time. The contemporary Japanese calendar was based on era names that were chosen by the emperor and could be (and were) changed regularly. Nobody in 17th century Japan would have articulated that they were living in the "Edo period."

The professor further joked that nobody woke up and said "Yesterday it was the pre-modern period. Today it is the modern period!"

It got me thinking. It occurred to me that I had first met this professor in a different period of my own life. I was in my Boston period. I'm now in my Tokyo period. There was a Pune period in between. From the historical standpoint, all three have clear start dates and, with the exception of the current one, end points. The more I thought about it, however, I realized that this periodalization represents no more than my location. It just doesn't quite satisfy. Somewhere in between then and now I changed. I can't look back and pick out one specific date when it all changed. There was no revolution or imperial restoration, there were no bloody battles, but there were losses along the way. Its been a gradual process, built on each new experience and discovery, on thousands of little things that all add up leaving me looking back as if at snapshots in a photo album...

Flying the Unfriendly Skies

I just got back from a whirlwind business trip for the museum. The director, one of the curators, and I spent two days at meetings in the US Midwest related to an upcoming collaborative exhibition. The exhibit is trilateral - with us, a museum in the US and a Chinese institution but at the last moment the Chinese delegation had to pull out of the meeting as the government rescinded their travel permits citing the need to focus on reconstruction after the earthquakes. Despite only having two out of three of the institutions present, the meetings were very productive. I did a bit of simultaneous interpretation, took notes for the minutes, and even raised a few points of my own during the meetings. It was a great learning experience and as an added bonus I even got a quick tour of two local museums from one of the American curators (and a quick trip to the Walgreen's to restock those things that I just can't get in Japan).

When we arrived in the US the director of our partner museum asked us if our flight had been uneventful, and thankfully it had been. That said, I still found myself writing down my thoughts on the state of air travel these days...

What is it with air travel these days? When were the friendly skies replaced with new rude and inconsiderate skies? There are the big issues, like when I flew home at Christmas and the lady at the boarding gate saw no problem with snapping at me to "sit down now and wait." When I finally got her to listen to my question she then yelled at me for not having the issue dealt with sooner. Granted, it was the holiday season, the most stressful time of year, and there was bad weather playing havoc with air travel up and down the US western seaboard. But yelling and snapping at passengers before they have a chance to even say anything? Passengers are delayed because of weather issues and there are no gate staff to answer their questions. Then a single staff appears and starts yelling at people to go away and stop asking questions. Then you wonder why you have a waiting area of angry and cranky passengers?!

Really. Customer service 101. Basic human politeness. The Golden Rule. You treat somebody rudely, they'll get pissed off and treat the next person they meet rudely, and its a snowball out of control - the evil twin of paying it forward.

There are also the little things, the ways in which flight attendants and passengers show their consideration (or lack there of) for other passengers. I try to remember to always pull up my seat back when eating, so that the person behind me can actually see the meal on their tray. I remember when if you were asleep at mealtime, the flight attendant would leave you a note telling you to push your call button and ask for your meal. On my most recent flight, however, no such notes were in evidence.
"Eggs or noodles?" - asked once in a normal voice. No response?
"Eggs or noodles?" - hollered loud enough to wake the dead. No response?
poke-poke-poke (jabs in the shoulder) "Eggs or noodles?" - No response?
shake-shake (grabbed by the shoulder and shaken back and forth) "EGGS. OR. NOODLES?"
This normally caused some version of "mwfarmw mfwfarm??" from a sleepy and befuddled passenger, to which the flight attendant repeated, again "EGGS. OR. NOODLES?" with as much eye-rolling and sighing as a moody teenager.

There was also the flight attendant who wasn't thrilled to be asked to fill up the water glass of the girl sitting beside me, so he did so without really looking at her or her glass (held above my lap). When he dripped all over and dumped an ice cube on me he simply said "oops!" and without apologizing, he disappeared into the cabin to refill the water jug. When he came back out he walked right past me as if nothing had happened and didn't offer me anything to help mop up.

Nothing major, I suppose, but still. Welcome to air travel in the 21st century. Sigh.

It's Thursday again...

In case you couldn't tell, I am really enjoying my Intro to Ed course on Thursday mornings (and I'm not just saying that because I made the mistake of mentioning my blog to my prof and he asked me for the address...)

Class today was on teaching styles. The professor started by asking us to raise our hands and express our preference for either one-on-one style teaching or one-on-mass. I abstained since he hadn't specified if we were to answer from the point of view of a university student or a potential teacher, or what type of class/subject/etc... yes, yes, I know, my father always complains when I do this splitting hairs thing! Anyways, so it turns out the prof was basically setting us all up. You see, he asked the question expecting something along the lines of the 3:1 in favour of mass teaching response that he got. (disaffected university students want as LITTLE individual contact with their profs as possible, after all!) Then we watched video clips of innovative math classes in a US private school and a large but cutting edge public school in China. Both teachers used various teaching method, including games to keep the kids interested and small group activities to involve everybody at once. While there were obvious differences, the similarities between the two classes were quite striking given social and cultural differences between China and the US.

The Chinese kids started their lesson by chanting their times tables up to five, and then singing a song with the same. The more I thought about it the more I realized that the games and activities that followed were all checking memorization - quite often focused on getting the child to give the correct answer as quickly as possible. Numbers were expressed in abstract terms - words, numerals or traditional hand gestures (not simply holding up that number of fingers).



Until asked by my professor, it didn't occur to me just how different this was to the American classroom, and to how I had learnt math in Canada as well. When I went up to hand in my weekly comments sheet he asked me if I had been taught math through physical representations of numbers. My immediate response was (in my own head) "Of course so! One apple is one apple, two apples are two apples and the easiest way to explain 1 + 1 to a 5 year old is to give them two apples." But apparently they don't teach that way in Japan (or China either, for that matter). Huh. I have a vivid memory of a first or second grade math class where the teacher handed us REAL money (woo hoo!) and had us count it out individually. Why do I remember one specific class from over 20 years ago? Well... they say we remember the bad things the longest, right? I can't for the life of me remember any of the games we played at lunch time or recess, but I remember this one math class very vividly. You see, I got mixed up between time and money, and decided that there were 60 cents to the dollar (and no I'm not talking exchange rates on the Canadian dollar!). So I counted it up and decided I had $1.05 When I announced this to my teacher she did a double take and squawked "I didn't give you THAT much money!" Sure enough, I had only $.65 My entire class laughed and I was left with a life-long memory of shame...

Right, so where was I? Ah, yes... Thursdays are for Education...

So what about your elementary school math classes? Did you learn basic math through physical representations (money, blocks, etc) or did you memorize it by rote? I'd love to hear feedback on this one!

My professor already knows what his comments are going to be. After watching the videos and seeing the American and Chinese classrooms and how basic math was being taught, most of the university students who raised their hand in support of mass lecture-style teaching would be doing an about-face, supporting inclusion of individualized teaching and other forms of learning as important teaching tools. Not simply telling us the answer, but giving students the opportunity to "come up with it" on their own? In teacher-speak I think that's called "guided discovery."

Education Thursdays

My Intro to Education Theory course on Thursday mornings is proving to be a thought provoking class. The prof ends class 5~10 minutes early and has us write down and hand in our comments/responses to that week's class. (this also serves the purpose of taking attendance, which in many courses comprises part of the final grade)

This past week we ran a bit late and I didn't have enough time to martial my thoughts and get them all down on paper, so I left class with a full mind and an almost painfully strong need to sit down with paper and pen and WRITE.

This week's theme was academic ability - in particular its relation to an individual's personal traits and cultural differences. We looked at a number of studies that tested 5 year-olds and linked their results to their academic test scores in grades 5 and 6. The first was of a matching test, where the little kids were asked to pick the matching image out of 6 similar choices.

(don't worry if you can't find a pair - I spent a good 5 minutes searching
before I realized this is just the ANSWER, the question - with the one you are
supposed to find the match for, was not included in our class handout)

In the second test, kids reached into a box and (without looking) touched a wooden shape and then had to pick out the shape they had felt from four diagrams on a piece of paper.

The study showed that in Japan there is a strong correlation between how a student did on the matching test, and how they did academically later in elementary school. In the United States, however, while there was no correlation for the matching test, there was an even STRONGER correlation between how a child did on the shape-feeling test and how they scored academically years later. In short, in Japanese schools it is the students with patience and attention to detail who excel, while in the US it is free-thinkers with good imaginations.

No surprise there, I suppose. Isn't that the stereotype, after all? Hammering down the nail that sticks up, versus the sacredness of the individual. I'm not one to agree with something just because that is what "everybody says," however, in fact I'm just contrary enough to want to believe the exact opposite! So, I began to think...

I started with my Brownies. After all, I first became a Brownie leader 10 years ago (we are NOT going to discuss the fact that that means my very first Brownies graduated from high school last year and have just finished their first year of university, making them the same age as the "kids" in my education class!! But I digress...) In the intervening decade I've worked with 5 different troops in Canada, the US and Japan. Culturally, the North American and Japanese Brownies are divided by uniform. While in Canada and the US girls are required to wear no more than their scarf and enrollment pin, and can choose from more uniform options such as t-shirts, sweatshirts, blouses, skirts, shorts, sweat pants, full headscarves... In Japan, on the other hand, girls are required to wear uniform hats, blouses, skirts belts and socks. For formal occasions black shoes (of your own choosing) are also required. This is a cultural difference (I can't imagine trying to tell the parents of my girls in Canada that their daughter must wear totally black shoes with her uniform, they'd think I was mad or controlling or both!) but is also at least partially due to a desire in North America to make Guiding/Scouting accessible to a wider (specifically lower income) audience. So the first image that came to mind was the uniformity of my Japanese Brownies versus the individuality of my North American Brownies.

Score
Stereotypes: 1
Sarah's contrariness: 0

I started thinking more superficially about the troops I've worked with and the girls in the troops. I was rather surprised to realize something that has never hit me before. My Brownies are all in the 8-10 age range but unconsciously I had been thinking my Japanese Brownies were older. While this could be partially due to the fact that in both Canada and the US I also worked with the pre-Brownie age group as well, the more I thought about it the more I realized that my American and Canadian Brownies seemed younger, more kid-like, my Japanese Brownies much quieter and more reserved.

Score
Stereotypes: 2
Sarah's contrariness: 0

I decided at this point to think of other examples, so I turned to my prison sentence time as an English teacher. My favourite memory is of the Halloween craft project I did with all my students under the age of 16. I cut out pumpkin-shaped templates in orange construction paper and gave each student a pair of scissors and black paper. They were not allowed to write or draw pictures, but could decorate their Jack-o-lantern in any way they desired. Most of them looked at me dumbly as I slowly and simply explained (miming when needed) what I wanted them to do. I had made a basic example myself and was half expecting to have dozens of similar Jack-o-lanterns. While it took them a few moments to get warmed up, however, my students COMPLETELY AMAZED me with their creativity and individuality. No two Jack-o-lanterns were ANYTHING alike, and not one single one looked like mine or any other "traditional" Jack-o-lantern either!

Just a few of the unique creations my kids came up with.

Score
Stereotypes: 2
Sarah's contrariness: 1

The craft had originally grown out of a desire to make decorations for the school when my manager couldn't find any decorations she liked at the store. The kids LOVED having their handiwork up for all to see, and many of the cram school teachers and students asked if they too could make a Jack-o-lantern. I had been a bit worried that the parents would complain of a valuable lesson hour having been largely "wasted" on a craft project. I was not, however, prepared for the reaction I got. The parents were overwhelmingly positive in their reaction. They LOVED the artwork and enjoyed trying to guess which face belonged to which child. I also had a number of parents individually thank me directly or through my director for having done such a project with their child. They felt it was an important creative opportunity, one their child didn't have outside of the English classroom.

Score
Stereotypes: 3
Sarah's contrariness: 1

With this type of score, I was forced to take a step back and think about the bigger picture. I thought too about kids programs I helped out with at the museum, and about the experiences of my friend who is Japanese but worked in the US as a museum educator. Gradually I began to see a picture that largely agreed with the studies. Culturally, Japan is a country that encourages similarity and order. Children, when encouraged, are just as imaginative and energetic and individual, but they are much less likely to be encouraged to do so, especially not in a classroom setting.