Dear WinkWorld Readers,

A special THANK YOU to Jaime Volmer for sharing this story about blueberries with us.  It might help you understand the differences between a business and your local public school.

The Blueberry Story

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

Recently, I read several articles about tech companies searching to hire humanities graduates. I will post a few of these at the bottom of this blog post. 

Then last week, the president of Dakota State University (DSU), our South Dakota cyber security/tech-centered university, posted a brilliant short essay on the humanities. 

Turns out that thinking deeply matters.

Dr. José-Marie Griffiths, the president of DSU (a.k.a., small school/big science), shared this post in her weekly President’s DSUpdate, May 4, 2018. The essay was written by Dr. Joseph Bottum, a philosophy professor at DSU.  I hope you enjoy the one-page post, as much as I did.

The Humanities from Dr. Joseph Bottum of Dakota State University.

I encourage you all to explore the DSU webpages: Small, but mighty. Previously, I had posted the article below here.

DSU: What does a cyber attack look like?

Other articles about tech companies valuing the study of humanities are posted below.

Google

Washington Post and Google

Forbes and the “useless liberal arts” degree (with tongue firmly placed in cheek)

If you search with your browser window, you will find many more articles related to this topic. Happy reading.

Thank you to Katie Knox for the images.

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

I am playing with several new ideas (ok, researching) for a couple of new writing projects. This is just a peek into the direction I am planning. An annotated bibliography is attached here, also, for those who are interested. I welcome your comments as my ideas feel delicate and fragile.

What In The World is Research Rapture?

“I don’t want to catch you in the library again,” I heard myself saying to the graduate student, who looked at me with a knowing, guilty grin, and then we both laughed at the ridiculousness and the truth of what I had just said. You see, the graduate student, Sharon, loved to go to the library and, well, learn. She would read and think and doodle and scribble for hours, days, and months.

However, now, it was time to write. It was time for Sharon to stop researching and begin writing. Sharon had a bad case of “research rapture.” She loved learning anything new about her topic; she loved preparing for her literature review.

Research rapture has nothing to do with the biblical notion of rapture, but rather it captures the concept of loving to learn so much that you keep reading and reading, and you fail to stop and write.

What In the World Is The Kid Din?

Kid din happens when you love a kid or a group of kids so much you just think about them constantly. When you are with them, you lose track of all time. I know what it means, as I have experienced it, and I made up the term; however, it does come from a well-established body of research of the din in the head (Barber, 1980). Barber first noticed it when she was in Russia using her intermediate Russian. She began to notice that “a rising din of Russian in my head: words, sounds, intonations, all swimming about in the voices of the people I talked with…. The constant rehearsal of these phrases of course was making it easier and easier to speak quickly (Barber, 1980, p. 30; Krashen, 2015, p. 7).

If you have traveled, you may have noticed the same thing. For example, when I am away from Mexico or any Spanish-speaking country, I can feel my Spanish slipping away from me, and I hate it. But, when I have a few days in Mexico or Spain, I feel my Spanish coming back and flying around in my head.  Next, I hear it coming out of my mouth, and I am relieved that I have not lost it. It really is a thrilling process for me.

Krashen (1983) wondered about Barber’s (1980) idea and even speculated that this din in the head experience might be when language acquisition is taking place, and thus is more common with those who are still in the process of acquiring language and receiving lots of comprehensible input.

I remember this early work well, and Krashen (1983) has a great little synthesis of further research, for those of you who are interested. However, what is fascinating to me now, is how the notion of the din in the head has expanded.

Other scholars just kept playing with the idea, too. Now, we have the reading din (McQuillan and Rodrigo, 1986; McQuillan, 1996); the melody din (Murphey, 1990); the visual din (Murphey, 1990, citing Ruth Weir 1962); the kinesthetic din (Murphey, 1990); and the intellectual din (Krashen, 2015).

However, I do not find in the literature anything about the kid din, which is the ecstasy I feel when I am with the 14 students of a small rural school on the isolated prairies. Those kids, their smiles, their giggles, their struggles, their books, their writing, their art projects, their days (like today) of suffering through top-down, mandated tests, their running and playing: It all just swirls in my head all of the time. I lose track of time. Murphey (1990) even makes connections to infatuation: Guilty.

In the new projects, which I am focused on, my plan is to connect the kid din (Wink, 2018, May 2 – you heard it here first, folks) to stories of these 15 prairie kids and what they are teaching me: We will call it, Prairie Pedagogy.

The first story is about one boy, who in the spring of his 8^th grade year suddenly broke through a reading barrier, and within a matter of a few weeks went from being a reluctant reader to an avid reader. He started by grabbing Moby Dick one day, but soon he jumped to The Hobbit, which he devoured. From there he jumped right into Lord of the Rings. The previous year, his mom read three of the Harry Potter series to him, and now he finished the series on his own. This boy had a school cum file filled with words like special ed, non-reader, IEP: This all vanished one beautiful spring week, as his parent had the courage of patience–no small feat. They read to him, and they provided access to books.  Mostly, they were very patient.

WinkWorld readers, in my 2 new writing projects, I will connect research rapture with the kid din with ‘real’ and ‘fake’ reading. I am not yet ready to share my definitions of real reading and fake reading, but you really do know them already.

Even Pinterest has anchor charts of real reading and fake reading.

What In The World Is “REAL” Reading?

Wink, J. (2018), p. x.

What In The World Is “FAKE” Reading?

Wink, J. (2018), p. 104.

Here is the bibliography I have been developing.

Research rapture din in the head bib – 5-1-18

Dear WinkWorld,

Readers, you know that my blog tends to be whatever is hanging out on my desktop or in my head. I am very interested in teaching, learning, languages, cultures, literacies, stories, and people: Mostly people–for example, Kelly.

I am fascinated by the lives of modern young women who live  on isolated ranches. In this issue of WinkWorld, I will tell you a little about one young woman, Kelly, whose life is reflective in many ways of how other young rancher women live. They seem to live in 2 different worlds or 2 different centuries.  I see that some of their challenges are not too different from those of my Grandma Grace, who homesteaded this ranch where we live. And, other times, I see these young women on social media on their phones, and I am amazed at their skills.

I remember several years ago, when Kelly’s clothes dryer stopped working. She had small children playing outside in the dirt, a husband whose clothes were often covered with dirt, manure, and wheat shaft, and there was no one around who could help her. So, she jumped on YouTube and figured out what the problem was and learned how to fix it.  Soon, her dryer was whirling again.  I know many people solve problems this way today, but Kelly was the first person I saw do it.   Now, I am convinced that she can, and often does, learn any skill needed by getting on the internet. For example, recently I know she learned how to make butter with cow’s milk and how to give an IV to a sick cow by watching YouTube.   

On the surface, this might appear to be a blog post only for prairie people, but I think this story is really for my friends, who live in cities, and have no idea about country life.  Many in cities have romanticized, nostalgic notions of life on a ranch, which have nothing to do with the reality of some of these young rancher women.

Meet my friend, Kelly.

Meet Kelly’s 5 kids. (and, yes, I am  crazy about each of them)

Kelly loves her family and her wild assortment of pets which include:

1 pony, Apple, 19 years old; 8 goats Richard, Mavis, Sheila, White Momma, Black Momma, and Luna + 2 baby  goats without names; 3 dogs, Gus, Bruce, Bodie; 3 cats, Henry’s Cat, Kinley’s Cat, and Casper; 12 chickens; 5 ducks (one duck only has one eye, because the other peck her, so she lives with the pigs);  2 potbelly pigs, Frank and Daddy; 1 nurse cow, Janice (who presently has 2 bum calves on her), plus she is pregnant; and 80 pregnant cows.  Kelly, Jesse (her husband), and their 5 kids spend many hours each day just feeding and caring for the various animals.  Their kids think that mom has her very own petting zoo.

Meet Henry spending quality time with one of his pets.

Kimber is soothing the mama milk cow, Carol.  Sadly, Carol died later of milk fever.

Here is Kelly with Janice, obviously another nurse cow who accepts the bums. Bum calves are those whose mama did not make it through birthing in a blizzard.

Recently, I noticed that Kelly and her two little boys had stopped at our Little Free Library. Incidentally, their ranch is 40 miles from ours.  This is considered all part of the community on the rural prairies.  She had to hurry home as she had a calf, who had lost its mama, in the back seat of her Blazer.  

Below, you will see Kelly with a calf in her car.  When a mama cow loses her baby, Kelly jumps in her car and drives 100 miles (one way) to pick up a calf, who has lost its mama in birth.  Kelly takes the new little bum calf home and skins the hide from the dead calf, and ties it on the new calf.  By doing this, the mama cow thinks the new calf is really the calf which she birthed and will then accept the new calf. Without that smelly hide, the mama cow would reject a new calf.  

Henry and Holden at our Little Free Library (LFL).

Here is Holden reading later that evening.

Here is Kelly oldest daughter, Kodi, dancing at the spring prom with her dad, Jesse, for the father/daughter dance.

Here are all 5 kids watching a movie.

Kelly loves her family, and when I read the following study about the benefits of hugging babies, I thought immediately of her.  Based on this study, and what I have seen, it is safe to guess that Kelly’s kids are very smart.

Study reveals: The more you hug your kids, the more their brains develop

Of course, the real story of Kelly is not what I am writing, but rather what I am not writing.  Her real story is hidden between my lines.  Maybe one day, she will tell her own story.  If we don’t tell our stories, they die.

Dear WinkWorld Readers, 

TESOL 2018 friends, this one is for you.  Dawn and I will be sharing during PreK-12 Day.

Rm E265 Lakeside Center at the McCormick Place

10 to 11:15, Sat., March 31, 2018

Our purpose is to create authentic biliteracy in dual language, mainstream, or ESL classrooms.

Click the link below to open our 2 page handout.

Joan & Dawn Wink Biliteracy handout TESOL 2018, PreK-12

Here is the powerpoint, which we will use.

Hope to see you there.

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

It is humbling to read this 2nd review by Dawn Wink of my new book, The Power of Story.

Here is her 1st review, which I previously shared. 

And, here is her 2nd review, which demonstrates the power of reading books and more books.

#oneluckymom

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

What in the world is Kisisi? It is an invented language between two little five-year-old boys, one, American and the other, Kenyan.  It is based on the Swahili language, and only the two of them understood it.  They created their own language as they ran and played in Kenyan.

Here is a review of the book, which Dawn Wink contributed.  Perry Gilmore is the author of the book. 

Book Review_Kisisi_Perry Gilmore_Dawn Wink

Perry will be sharing in Alaska on her book, March 6. Lucky Alaska!

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

So yesterday morning, I got up to this surprise on my Facebook (FB) feed. 

#speechless #humbled  

And, I know now that she will begin a series of posts on my book.  How lucky am I? 

FB Friends, forgive the double-post, but I have a lot of WinkWorld readers, who are not on FB.

Happy Reading Dawn’s blog, Dewdrops.

Click here.

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

This week I am in Las Vegas, working with colleagues at a school and also presenting at a conference.  It has been a very productive and inspiring week.  One of the ideas, which we explored is efficacy in teaching and learning.  What makes an effective teacher, learner, and/or principal?  And, then today I was able to watch an effective principal, Connie, in action as she worked her magic.

The Problem

The problem at this school is that the intermediate students (6^th and 7^th graders) are not reading well. This group is the most vulnerable in a school which focuses on the needs of low-income and at-risk students, and speakers of other languages. In others words, this particular class is filled with students whose social, emotional, academic needs are many and complex.   These students are the most-challenging group of reluctant readers.

The Principal’s Plan

Enter Connie, the principal, with a plan to support the students’ reading, while at the same time to model and mentor the teachers in the school. Her plan was to create learning groups and to use high-interest novels. Her goal is to make these stories comprehensible and compelling for the students. In addition, she led this transformative process, and brought in other teachers to take part and others to observe.

We entered the classroom, and the students were seated quietly waiting for her. She greeted them and immediately went to the white board and drew a large quadrant. The students drew a large blank quadrant on their blank paper on their desks, which indicated to me that they knew from past experience that this would be their graphic organizer for the day.

Today (View)

Next, Connie moved into the lesson of the day. She asked the groups who knew what an acronym was. She and the students agreed that it is an abbreviation formed from the initial letters of other words and pronounced as a word. Connie explained that her acronym of the day is HERO, and she filled in the quadrant with the letters.

The Book

Connie held up her copy of Lois Lowry’s Number the Stars, the classic story of a Danish girl and her family’s dangerous struggles to smuggled Jews our of their Nazi-occupied homeland to their safe haven in Sweden.

Looking Back (Review)

Connie began by asking the students what they had read the previous day, and a brief whole-class review of the book followed.

Today (View)

Next, Connie moved into the lesson of the day and the three chapters which each group would be reading.  She gave hints of what was to become of the characters and the plot in today’s reading–she made me want to grab the book and start reading. 

Please notice the teacher in the background, who is carefully watching what Connie is doing as she reads with the students.  In addition, note how the students are listening intently.

Teachers, here is what I saw Connie, the principal and instructional leader, doing.

•Model: She went to the classroom and demonstrated one way of teaching reading.

•Mentor: She invited other teachers to take part and learn with her and from her.

•Scaffold the students’ learning: When you forget what scaffolding is, always think of how kids learn to ride a bike: Gradually a family member slowly releases the support, and the child is suddenly riding alone. I have posted here some other ways of scaffolding. If you want more materials on scaffolding, just go to my home page, scroll to the bottom right, and find the SEARCH bar; type in scaffold.

•Review/View/ Preview: Teachers often (a) review the previous lesson; (b) talk about what will take place today; finally, (c) teachers share what students will learn tomorrow. 

•Readers and Writers Workshop

Readers/Writers Workshop is a very effective method, which teachers often use.  Connie was using her variation of reading & writing workshop. 

CARE Conference

We presented at the CARE Conference (Conference on Academic Research in Education), which is paired with EQRC and AABBS. The three conferences run concurrently, and all three focus on ethnographic and qualitative research.

Le Putney, who was once my graduate student at CSU Stanislaus and who is now a full professor at UNLV, is lead researcher on our focus on efficacy.

Chyllis Scott was also one of my grad students in CA and is now an assistant professor at UNLV.  Chyl, Le, and I shared our understandings of mentoring.

And, of course, I loved the flamingos in Las Vegas.

And, look, I found an avid reader at the CARE conference! He was waiting patiently for his parents, who were at the conference, as he read All The Light You Cannot See by Anthony Doerr, which is a book for adults about WWII and a young blind French woman and a young German man.

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

Forgive all of my back-to-back burst of blog posts.  You can probably tell that I am getting ready for 3 back-to-back trips, and I will need some of this information to use with my colleagues.  If it is all on WinkWorld, I won’t have to do so much digging around in my computer when I get where I am going. 

Two of my friends (Dr. Le Putney & Dr. Chyllis Scott) from UNLV and I will continue our exploration of mentoring from a Vygotskian perspective.  We have published and presented on it numerous times.  

~Original image from pixabay.com, free. Edited and adapted by excellentwebs.com. Thank you, Susan.

Here is a journal article in which several of us connected teaching with mentoring.

Teaching as Mentoring

We will use the following image of a tree as a metaphor of how mentoring grows larger and deeper with each student (mentee), who will eventually go on to mentor others. 

(Pixabay.com, free image)

Often in my teaching, I have used the metaphor of a tree to help students reflect  on their own learning.  The following two images were created by Areli Dohner Chavez, and used to reflect on her own learning & teaching (pedagogy).  Thank you, Areli.

First, Areli drew this tree.

Next, she reflected on what she knew and where her knowledge originated.  Areli is one of the branches on my academic tree, and I am confident that she now has mentored many students, and has her own academic family tree filled with mentors and mentees.

I suspect that when we are finished with our sharing at UNLV,  Le, Chyl, and I will have a new tree which captures our academic genealogy.

Tip of the hate to Lindsay Vonn, the Olympic skier: Am I the only person to notice that she is also a fabulous mentor to many other skiers (mentees)?