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This week, I did my best to stay away from the termites, while revisiting the conversation Dave and I had about showing up online. I also share an article that Lance Eaton recommended on LinkedIn about AI metaphors. Finally, I ask you what word or phrase you've retired from your teaching. |
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Episode 640
Show Up Online With Your Values Intact
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Dave and I explore showing up online without compromising our values, including how to engage in various platforms, connect using email newsletters, and establish a website as your hub. Here are just a few of the many inspiring people and websites, as we reflect on how we're showing up:
Rebecca Pope-Ruark's LinkedIn Presence
Teresa Thompson's New Website
The New Teaching in Higher Ed Website
Dave reads a short excerpt from James Lang's Write Like You Teach, as Jim stresses the importance of having a website that reflects your expertise, the ways in which you're available to engage with people (speaking, doing interviews, etc.), and articulating "the best pathways to continue their learning journey with you."
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About Metaphors
Melanie Mitchell Tells Us What to Fear from AI Agents
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I was thankful to see Lance Eaton's suggestion on LinkedIn that we read a piece from Melanie Mitchell:
Misleading Metaphors and Real Risks
From her bio:
I appreciated how she pushes back on the metaphors people have been using to describe the recent AI news surrounding safety.
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Staying Away from the Termites
Happy to Report the Image is a Stock Photo from Unsplash
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A few years back, I was teaching online in the evening, and wound up having five termites show up during the session. I didn't realize what they were, at first, never having any up-close experiences with termites, prior to that. We have a great relationship with a local termite company now. They've been out to see us annually and things have been going great.
It's been so hot here in California that the termites are swarming. The other day, I had two termites pop by my office to say hello and I was out of there. Dave immediately called the termite guy, who is on vacation until next week. I've been working from our downstairs family room, a place they tend not to want to hang out in anywhere near as much as my third floor loft office. Termites love heat and light, something that location has an abundance of, compared to any other spot in our home. I should also state that it is possible that there were only a couple of them and my alarm is imaginary.
I think often of Anne Murphy Paul's The Extended Mind, whenever I am unable to work at a spot where I can connect my laptop to a big screen monitor. Paul explains the ways that working off smaller screens limit our cognitive abilities:
The use of a compact display actively drains our mental capacity. The screen’s small size means that the map we construct of our conceptual terrain has to be held inside our head rather than fully laid out on the screen itself... a small screen requires us to engage in virtual navigation through information—scrolling, zooming, clicking—rather than the more intuitive physical navigation our bodies carry out so effortlessly. By the time you read this, I suspect our termite person will have already visited our home and I'll be back to working in my favorite spot for deep work. For now, I'm definitely experiencing a hit to my productivity and also wanting to go back to revisit other ways that The Extended Mind has shaped my thinking and practices.
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What Satirical Suggestions You Have
What is a piece of satire that you've enjoyed, lately?
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Last week, I asked for satire recommendations. You did not disappoint. Let's start with Emily's ideas: |
Emily Baxter
Regarding satire, I would recommend novels that were written over 200 years apart. I was recently inspired to jump back into the works of Jane Austen. Pride and Prejudice is a well-loved classic that mocks the 19th century marriage market. Bonus: there are multiple adaptations for the screen!
For a more darkly funny take on the "tradwife" influencer movement, you might choose to read Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke. There is a major plot twist that keeps you riveted until the end!
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Susan Bramlett Epps
Satire - anything by The Onion!
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Eric Jensen
I really enjoyed Richard Russo’s Straight Man, another academic satire. I can still remember the classroom discussion that pushes the exasperated professor over the edge (though I won’t spoil it here).
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Note from Bonni: I was fortunate to receive a second email from Anna Mills and just had to include it in this week's Field Journal, because it is just too good to leave for only me to read...
Also, for those close-reading this email and worried about my termite situation, all has been resolved, as of Friday, September 18, at 2:08 PM. And yes, I am waiting until the clock reaches 208 to mark the termite-free milestone, just since that number has such significance to me. See episode 208 for the backstory.
Anna Mills (part 2)
Loved this podcast announcement from Kevin Roose and Casey Newton: "My friends, the time has come to reinvent talking from first principles, and give the world something it's never seen before: two men talking about AI."
And then there are these fake AI ads that are cracking me up (covered in The New Yorker too).
I think humor is underappreciated as a way to engage with the overwhelming realities of AI today. Janelle Shane led the way with her AI Weirdness blog.
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This week, I'm wondering:
What's a word or phrase you've retired from your teaching vocabulary?
Hit reply to let me know. I'll choose a few to include in the next Field Journal. Let me know in your reply if you prefer to remain anonymous, as otherwise, I'll assume it is ok to include your name.
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A Quote
About offloading information
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While I was looking up the quote for an earlier section from Annie Murphy Paul's The Extended Mind: The Power of Thinking Outside the Brain, I came across another gem:
...whenever possible, we should offload information, externalize it, move it out of our heads and into the world. She's got so much good advice in there, which feels quite evergreen, all these years later.
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Teaching in Higher Ed Podcast
Listen with us each week.
The Teaching in Higher Ed podcast brings together over 25,000 followers to conversations about the art and science of facilitating learning.
Get your ears on for the conversation. Listen through to the recommendations.
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Bonni Stachowiak
Committed to human flourishing through learning + teaching
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