We have all had to learn something, like walking or talking, but how we physically learn has interested many people. The problem is that we ask, “How do we learn?” The actual thing we should ask is, “How does my brain learn?” This mistake, it seems, is why we do not learn the way we should – the right way – but we learn the way we want to, ignoring how our brain does its best work.
How do we learn wrong? Why is our brain mad? Well, a problem with the way we learn is that we usually have a schedule, a pattern. Our brain likes changes, ones of doing things in a different order or amount. Studying is a problem in this way, because that pounds information at the brain, which does not like being ordered around. School does the same thing. It is just like driving 90 MPH on a 50 MPH road – you get slowed down eventually. As Benedict Corey, author of How We Learn, said in that book on his mistake, “So, after dropping out, I made an attitude adjustment. I loosened my grip. I stopped sprinting. Broadened the margins, to paraphrase Thoreau.”1 After this, he lived life. School wasn’t his life anymore. He lived life as if school was a part of it, not it itself. He “never let go of [his] studies, just let them become part of [his] life.” Then, as an adult, he started studying how the brain learns. He found that distractions and naps aid learning. Schools, in this case, do not do very well in letting your brain open the door – they kick that door wide open. Do we need to do things to learn? Yes, but thinking, that is something we truly need. “The most necessary task of civilization is teaching people how to think… [our education system] does not encourage original thought or reasoning,” said Thomas Edison. Thinking helps understanding, and without it, do we truly know and understand?” Thinking does use more brainpower; so why not think so that we do not have to use as much? How does doing enter the equation? Doing helps us learn because we are using more senses. There are examples of how video games teach kids things that are – supposedly - important. How about making the games? “The Constructionist mind is revealed… imagining children making the games instead of just playing them.” And, also in Minds in Play, Papert mentions that we can learn from this. This action puts thought and knowledge to use, and this begs the question of what, seemingly just there, can teach us? The answer? Many things can and will teach us. The problem – only certain types of these teaching work. What types of teaching do and do not work? Imagine you are a new college student and walk into the science classroom on your first day, and there stands a professor. How will you understand what he says? Experts talk differently than novices, and so you would not understand a good amount of their jargon. Who you really want to see when you walk into that classroom is someone who has been in class for several years, so that he or she understands the topic and what students think about when they are learning these things. Then, the next year, you would want someone with a little more knowledge to teach, and so forth. This step-by-step process is good for our brains, and for overall knowledge of the community. How does our brain physically work? This is the hard part to understand, and of course, the basis of learning overall. So, the brain is made of neurons. These 100 billion neurons allow electrical impulses, or action potential, to pass through them. Dendrites, kinds of points between neurons, grow based on how much you use them in which way. Spiny Arbors then grow on these, adding information to your knowledge. But how is the signal protected from interruption from other neuron signals? This is protected by Myelin, a white and fatty substance that insulates the neurons. This also speeds up the time it takes for the signal to go where it needs to. Our brain goes on to use its Reticular Activating System – RAS - to filter information. It first puts actions like breathing and heartbeat control. This all goes to the Hindbrain, which controls everything you need to survive – unconsciously. The RAS then places “processing of senses” into the Forebrain, which we also unconsciously use. The Midbrain is what controls sight, alertness, motor control, and hearing. This is the part we consciously use. How do we use this to learn? The Hippocampus – kind of its own type of structure, located in the Forebrain – is the brain’s Google. When we learn something, it keeps it there, but more stuff we learn is stacked on top. It is easier to remember how to text then what your 7-year-old birthday cake looked like! Learning, of course, is not the easiest thing – the average attention span is about eight seconds. That is why learning is difficult – but worth it. The brain is basically a computer. When you read this, you are probably putting information into you Hippocampus. That is storing what you keep – if you keep any – onto a stack somewhere. You are learning. This is not, of course, from an expert. I am a curious someone telling you how it makes sense to me. If you are still curious, please look at the sources on the following page.
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The stories that families tell are always great to hear, and my stepdad has many a story to tell of his times as an IT, or computer, guy. One very memorable one is from when he worked at a very serious place. They would hire hackers to find what was weak in the system, but to first get to this system, they would have to get inside the buildings, which were very much the same as doors in a hotel: enter the right card and it unlocks. There was a rule about how everyone must close the door so the person behind him scans his card, and so on. The hackers would get a conversation going and get into the building, and could hack into most computers, as people would still use recognizable names, words, and dates in the pass-code – even though they were not supposed to. They would then get to the higher up systems from that single low-positioned computer. That is to say, they found many a flaw in the system of the company, and not just the computer system.
This story seems to always have a personal feel of a story that you cannot forget. Every time he mentions hackers, I remember this story. Why? Well, I have found that when you remember things, God puts them there for you, so that there is a learning experience. As in how the men would sneak into the building, it might remind you to pay more attention to everything around you. It might also remind you that more then a single pair of eyes can be needed to find a problem, and that is because of your viewpoint. The people who hired the hackers knew that the different point of view now would help them from a cyber-attack later. You may ask: “Why do you tell us how to use it? Have you?” I wish I could say yes, but really, the answer is no; I follow the advice, just the advice is from a different location when I use it. A more common example might be the many times I ask for help in finding something – and it usually gets found unless it is in a different place we never suspected it would ever be. Paying more attention to the people around me has almost made me crazy, though, and what some call paranoid. I just look around at everyone sometimes, and that does not always help relationships either. It started in a large cavern of Mars, where a large civilized people lived under the surface. On one row of rock seats, on column nineteen, sat a boy. He was about as mature as me, my age of 13, and even white skinned – uncommon for those peoples, who are all shades and hues. He shared a common religion of Christianity, for no space can keep those peoples from hearing His word. He was so like me, he seemed – though you might argue – human. His name was Fiskano Hqoai.
The boy had one major difference that made him not belong, however – he was a mute. Not speaking made him almost an outcast in the Hqoai family, an alien being that does not belong. “Ignore him if he raises his hand, he cannot speak anyway,” the teachers say when – and where – he should not hear. He heard it all, however, for that was the only sense that was abnormally great, though nobody knew or would ever know. He was on a mission to find somewhere he would belong, though it might be a single person group. Searching brought nobody like him to light. He was alone in his own world, words swirling in his head like a trapped blizzard. He could not even grunt, and he thought, what if He forgot to give me vocal chords? It was possible, there were some of the aliens that had no ears, or no nose or eyelids. Does He exist or care? He did not, could not, live like the others, and that brought him to many a different points on the joy scale. I am more unique than others, special, His own child – if He is there. Am I alone? All he wanted was one person that could not speak, as he could not, so that he may not be the only one, as he would have been a very talkative, friendly person – if he could have been. That is selfish to wish it on others, this he knows – but if God gave it, or did not give it, to him, was God not wishing it upon him? This all went through Fiskano’s electric lump in his head they call brains. Now, not that you would dis-believe me, but Fiskano stayed in his own group for a long time, and even learned to write when a writing system emerged into society. He got a family, where he mostly belonged, though parts of him always felt excluded. Sometimes, that is the best that can be done – being in your own group, for searching never helped, family even gets exclusive around you, thinking, “are you an erroneous being?” Communism, also called Socialism, is a belief system, and it can be regarded in many different ways. It is a system in which the government controls everything, from labor and transportation to banking and private property. The thing you need to know is that the term communism is derived from the Latin communis, meaning “shared” or “common”. This sounds like it means that everyone is equal in a communist country, right? Well, from the book Year of Impossible Goodbyes by the author Sook Nyul Choi, the communist countries Japan and Russia during the Korean War are oppressors. The Japanese make the Koreans feel like nobodies. The Russians, who took control of North Korea, did a couple nice things, which basically brainwashed the Korean people into joining them. This is what Communism looks like in real life, and we are going to dive in and see what it is like deeper in its beliefs.
Communism beliefs are in two large, main sections. These are Government Control and Private Property. The government controls six aspects of a citizen’s life in the first section; the parts the government controls are the Banking System, Education, Labor, Transportation and Communication Vehicles, Agricultural Means and Factories, and Corporate Farms and Regional Planning. The banking system is controlled in such a way that all money and credit is based in one bank under government control, causing there to be no private banks, like Wells Fargo, USAA, Citi, and many more that we have here in America. Education is organized by the government, which teaches Communist ideals; the book had an example for how education was done, and it was that the Japanese, having Korea in their hands, taught them propaganda. Labor was done in a way that one working class (the proletarians) all worked for the government and its commodities. Everyone was paid the same for the work they did. The book’s illustration of this is that the Russian government told everyone what to do and how to do it; the Russians were in full control. Transportation and communication vehicles are not given to the people, as communication and transportation is controlled by the government, and this forced them to walk wherever they went. A representation of this in the book would be that they had to have passports to move about. The government’s control of agricultural means and factories causes the factories to not be privately owned, but owned by the government. The book shows this by having this Korean family get forced to make socks for the Japanese army, the Korean enemy. Control of corporate farms and regional planning makes the government control production and the economy’s development. The second main section, Private Property, has four parts to itself; the four parts to the main section Private Property are Total Abolition of Private Property, Property Rights Confiscation, Heavy Income Tax on Everyone, and Elimination of Rights of Inheritance. The first part, total abolition of private property, means that you get taxed on your inheritance. Property rights confiscation is when the government confiscates possessions of all emigrants and people who rebel. Heavy income tax is done in order to eliminate private property. Elimination of rights of inheritance causes everyone to inherit equally. These are the aspects of Communism, and now we are going to look at it through the eyes of the Christian religion. Communism is, in my beliefs, a way to steal from people. I see the system as a sin itself. Have you ever asked yourself, “Does Communism have Biblical references?” I have found, thanks to Dr. Art Lindsley’s Article, Does Acts 2-5 Teach Socialism?1 that verses that many people mistake for pointing to Communism do not actually do that. The verses kind of point away from it. In the article, there are six points that say why the Bible does not teach Socialism. It also points out that “Wise teachers have maintained that it is not good to base an important doctrine on a single passage of Scripture. But if you do so, surely in that passage the doctrine should be taught. Not only is Socialism not taught in Acts 2-5, it is impossible (without meeting the above conditions) to show that it does so.” Those conditions, below this, are as follows: “1. All believers in Jerusalem sold all their possessions and put them in a communal pot which was then controlled by the state (the distinctive mark of socialism); 2. Private property rights (upheld through the rest of Scripture) were abolished by this passage; 3. The voluntary giving demonstrated by individuals in this passage gives the state the right to coerce people to give up their property (socialism); 4. The pattern shown here was not temporary but permanent. It was the rule in the rest of the New Testament; 5. That you can get “ought” out of “is,” the imperative from the indicative, a necessary mandate from a historical example; 6. There is clear teaching that entails government ownership of the means of production, coercive taxation and wealth redistribution (Socialism) in the rest of Scripture.” Reading this article would explain the whole list for you, and I have to say it is a well done article. Back to business, we can see that the Bible would not point towards Communism after we see this. What about it and Christianity? Well, found in a document on the web, is something thought to be written by Martin Luther King Jr. called Communism's Challenge to Christianity. It states, “Let us begin by stating that communism and Christianity are at the bottom incompatible. One cannot be a true Christian and a true Communist simultaneously. How then is Communism irreconcilable with Christianity?” It further explains this by listing some reasons why. I will explain it for you. It says that other religions are not Christianity’s worst enemy. First, the speech says it is because it is an atheistic belief system. In the system, as Martin Luther King Jr. said, “there is no Divine government, no absolute moral order, there are no fixed, immutable principles. Force, violence, murder, and lying are all justifiable means to the millennial end. Said Lenin, ‘we must be ready to employ tricking, deceit, and lawbreaking, withholding and concealing truth.’” The Communists’ evil deeds is the second problem. The third point of his is that they restrict everything you do. To me, Christians seem to believe in making their own choices, to make their life their own, not allowing people to force them to do something wrong. Christianity and Communism are two opposing sides. Nothing is the same. I find it to be like the Republican and Democrat parties here in the United States. To the point, Christianity and Communism do not go together. Communism is an interesting belief system, and the book The Year of Impossible Goodbyes really shows what life is like in a Communist country. I recommend that you read the book and the two articles, for they will explain this topic much more. Thank you for reading. 1 Dr. Art Lindsley, Does Acts 2-5 Teach Socialism, https://tifwe.org/resource/does-acts-2-5-teach-socialism/. Accessed April 27, 2021. 2Martin Luther King Jr., Communism's Challenge to Christianity, https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/king-papers/documents/communisms-challenge-christianity. Accessed April 27, 2021. Have you ever wondered how the name Number the Stars came to be, or why Lois Lowry did not pick a different name for it? This name was picked in a way so that it goes with the story; The following verses are from where it sounds Lois Lowry may have gotten the name.
“2The Lord builds up Jerusalem; he gathers the exiles of Israel. 3He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. 4He determines the number of the stars and calls them each by name. 5Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit. 6The Lord sustains the humble but casts the wicked to the ground. (New International Version, Psalm 147:2-6, emphasis mine)” If you look at verse two and compare it to the book, you would find that, just as the Lord gathers the exiles of Israel, Henrik gathers the Rosens and several other Jews and takes them to Sweden, where war did not affect the people. In verse three, it seems to symbolize the broken hearts of the Jews, but that their broken hearts were not as bad as they could have been if their families had been held prisoner or tortured. The fourth verse is where the name of the book appears, and it sounds like it would mean what is says literally. It hints that it might also have a hidden meaning, as if He was calling them to Sweden. Verse five suggests that God knows what troubles people go through. God is mighty in power, and he may use this power to help us through our troubles, helping us in ways similar to putting the idea that “Great Aunt Birte” had died of typhus into Mother’s head. The final, sixth verse suggests that the Jews, or the humble, will survive and win while the Nazis, the wicked, are cast to the ground. The book contains a lot of hidden meanings, causing this title to seem to fit the book great. It is in this way that I can say Lois Lowry has written a masterpiece, and I recommend that you read it if you have not read it yet. This book takes you into the life of the Jews during the war, and you will know that God takes care of his people through this book. The aged man was helped into his temporary room. “It is going to be okay, sir,” said the nice young man that was taking this wise, elderly man into his home. “Just rest now, do what you need to later.”
The aged man laid down on the bed, thinking. “I do not know anything of this world. These so-called cars with wheels and such things, everything is so weird.” This man, as you should know, was stuck on a remote island for fifty years, and during that duration of time, the world had changed a lot. He was trying to figure it out. “Well, I will get everything sorted. I am not tired.” A second later, he saw a tubular object that was a little larger than his center-most finger. He looked at one end. Seeing a small hole, he wondered, “What is this interesting item’s purpose, and why is it here?” Then he accidentally dropped the article on the floor, and heard a click. “Alas, I must have broken it,” he thought. He picked the body up and, to his surprise, it was not actually damaged. One end got pushed in some, and the other got pushed out. “Well, is this doing what it is supposed to do?” The man considered the idea, and concluded it with a yes. He tried the end that had pushed in by pushing it more, and then he let go because of the great pressure it caused. It clicked back to what it was at first. He pushed some more. It clicked, and the other end popped out again. He then felt the needle like end, and found that some liquid was on it. The interested man felt it with his fingers, smelled it, and finally tasted it, concluding that it was oily. He saw some paper on the desk that the tube was first on. He started to rub the tip of this thing on the paper, and heard a soft scratching sound as some black appeared on the paper. The elderly man, still confused, gave up and went to bed, thinking he was too tired to figure things out. The king of Argos, King Acrisios, did not care for his daughter, Danae. He wanted a son to succeed him, so he sent a messenger to the oracle of Apollo to ask about having a son.
“Dear Apollo, I have one question. Is King Acrisios to have a son?” blurted out the worried messenger. “No,” responded Apollo, “but Danae, his daughter, shall. Danae’s son will kill King Acrisios, as determined by the Fates.” “But please, god Apollo,” whined the upset messenger, “couldn’t you please change that for the whole kingdom of Argos? Everyone loves him.” “You know that the thread of life and death the Fates spin can’t be altered,” growled Apollo grimly. “I can’t help your pain much, but at least he has a while longer.” When King Acrisios heard the news, he madly put Danae in an underground chamber lined with brass. After the child was born, the king put Danae in a chest with brass bars on it and threw it into the sea. Zeus came, though, and made the wood swell, so that no water got into the chest. Danae then landed on an island, and Dictys, a fisherman, found her. He took her to the king of the island, Polydectes, soon after. Danae was made a servant in the palace, while both Dictys and Polydectes fell in love with the girl. By then her handsome son, Perseus, was grown up. Polydectes wanted Danae to be his wife, but Perseus was in the way. So he pretended to want to marry someone else. The tradition was that everyone brought a gift for the marriage. Perseus did not have anything, so Polydectes told him as follows. “Perseus, for the gift, get me the gorgon’s head, for you don’t have anything to give me.” Perseus must obey, but he asked Athene, the war god, first. “Athene,” cried Perseus, “please come. I am deeply worried and I need you now, more than ever.” Immediately she came. “Perseus,” yelled Athene, “I know of you and Polydectes and what you need to do with the gorgons. I have many things that will help you, so listen. Go to the sisters Phorcides in their cave and find out where the nymphs who guard the hat of darkness, winged sandals, and knapsack to hold Medusa’s head are at. I will give you a silver mirror-like shield and a sword made out of the hardest rock, because mortal swords are eaten away and dissolve. You shall look into the shield and see what you are doing, but not be turned to stone by Medusa. Since Medusa’s sisters are immortal, pass by them. They will have scales and be like dragons, but Medusa has a woman’s face and snakes for hair. Cut off her head, put it into the knapsack by holding the snakes, and run like the wind.” “You have helped me know what to do so I can succeed.” thanked Perseus, ending the conversation. Perseus did as he was told and brought back the head of Medusa. First, though, he met Atlas, who has been holding up the sky, and turned him into a mountain. Perseus later met a girl that was to be a sacrifice to a sea monster. Perseus then turned the monster into stone because he had the evil head of Medusa and married the girl Andromeda who he had rescued. Perseus next went back home and confronted Polydectes, showing him the head which turned him to stone. Perseus left Dictys to be king of the island, heading towards the Grecian midland to find his grandfather. First, he gave back the gifts and Athene got the head so she could hang it around her neck. Acrisios ran to the town of Larissa, where a king was holding some games for a dead father. Perseus threw a discus high and far, where it went into the stands and killed Acrisios. Then Perseus reigned and lived with Andromeda happily ever after. Many spheres lay in the dark, light-less sky. They were lonely, not knowing that there were others except themselves. Suddenly, a voice spoke out, and a finger pointed. He pointed as he talked, naming the spheres. “Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto – My children, bear what you will. You shall all follow my son. Do not go away from him, or you will be an outcast in the middle of a city.”
The Sun smiled in return, talking to the others, “I am known by this fire – My fire dictates me as sovereign over all other planets.” Pluto questioned the Voice, ignoring the Sun, “So you want us to follow your favored child? Aren’t we all the same age, I would guess? Are we just servants, to obey you?” The Voice was angered, “I made you all. My name is Father, and you will do what I say.” Earth backed up Pluto, “So what? You made us to be your slaves?” Pluto returned a faint smile of thanks, and Earth returned the gesture as Father started up in a rage. “You both shall be punished, and I will be punishing you both until the end. Earth, hot weather will await your middle, freezing cold at your tips. Pluto, you shall be cold, and banished to the edge of this system, not called a planet by Earth’s inhabitants.” Earth gasped, “I will have life on me? So everyone will?” Father stared at her, “You are the only planet with life. All the others are either too hot or cold. Too bad that you are punished, so you will have to endure torture from these humans until the end.” Earth suddenly screamed, as suddenly the Sun’s light vanished. A silvery sphere, whom called himself the Moon, appeared glowing. “Sun wants light to be where he is not – he created me for you, Earth. Know that Father loves you no matter what in the same way, as you are being punished as to be taught a lesson.” “He punished me until the end, Moon. I am not to be the same. Obeying will not help anymore, as I am already punished greatly.” “You would be punished more – until you obey.” Moon could tell that Earth had heard, but yet did not get a reply. The silence was great for a long while, and Earth listened to the life on her. Adam opened his eyes. Where was he? Who was he? He looked at the sky and suddenly knew, as a voice had spoken to him. Adam, son of man, you will rule all of the Earth, and name all of my animals. He knew his name, and what his duty was. As he stood up, many beasts came forth, and he named them all. Father, pleased at his servant Adam, blessed him. He put Adam to sleep that night, and taking half his ribs as he was sleeping, made a woman, whom was named Eve. Thus, the world began, and continued on to the present day. “That which doesn’t slay me, strengthens me.” This statement basically says that losing to people better than us makes us stronger. Interestingly, this statement is true in real life. Do you agree? I agree, and here is why.
We lose games, and what do we commonly do? We want to play again. Is there a reason for such a reaction to a loss? You work harder and get better at it, and it makes you stronger for the next fight. Instead of giving up, we need to continue working on the challenge until we are better than our opponent — this is why you will get stronger every time you face a person better than you. This goes with fighting, cooking, gaming, writing, coding, engineering, making art, and even making music. You cannot have a job where you don't have this come up in real life. We need to find that battle in our lives and try to learn from the opposing side. You cannot learn without someone or something, so make your opponent your unknowing teacher. Be humbled, and you will be able to humble others. You should always learn, and anything you know now that you did not know before is something you learned. So, let us go out into the world ready to become more knowing! “Adults have it easier than kids.” What does this mean? Well, this phrase includes ideas such as kids have to work harder, have more to do, and that kids don’t have as much free time. This phrase is untrue in many ways, which we will discuss in the following paragraphs.
First and foremost, adults have to work for income, and may have things come in unexpectedly. For a second thing, Kids only do school, which is from 7 to 3:30 or 4 O'clock, and then homework lasts about an hour. Adults have to work from about 7:30 to 5 O’clock on average, and then have very little extra time with cooking — Kids would have about an hour of fun time before dinner. As for the third and final thing, adults would also be more tired at the end of the day — age might be a tad bit of it, but the amount of work would be the main cause. Kids wouldn’t be near as tired with the same amount of sleep, saying that adults have to use more brainpower usually. This should prove to you that “Adults have it harder than kids,” as they have a harder thing to do for longer, and this would make them more exhausted than the kid. So, should us kids complain when we have the easier job? Probably not, but we do — adults at least would have a reason. |
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