Category Archives: presence

computers, compassion

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Kia Ora ladies and gentlegeeks,

If you are in NZ, I hope the school hols are treating you kindly.  Today has been a great day for a warm fire, baking and puzzles.  Soon I shall get serious about creating a delicious dinner for my crew.  Till then, I gotta lotta quality links to share.

Shall we?

First, I’m a little into the whole notion of Technology Shabbats, brainchild of Tiffany Shlain.  I heard about them via promotion for the upcoming webinar from the Children’s Screen Time Action Network.  Those webinars tend to be pretty awesome.

There are a great many reasons to try something like a tech shabbat, to declare yourself a member of the resistance.  We are part of a mass experiment and our brains are changing as a result …. or should we say, our brains are being changed.  There is something intentional and manipulative at play, although many will deny it.  Like Google.  Jeez, Google. You do WHAT?  Profit from pedophiles with your crazy recommendations and asymmetric algorithms?  Taste the shame. 

What to do?  If you’re New York rich, you might hire a coach to help raise phone-free kids,  which would be lovely, because all sorts of suboptimal outcomes are associated with too much tech … like these things in this blog post by Rae Pica, and read about diminishing physical skills in that there Australian article.  Pals, tech insiders don’t use the stuff like we’ve been coerced to.  Children are being predated on by the tech companies as well as the weirdos on their platforms.

Sigh.  Too much tech gets in the way of lots of other important things that children need to do.  They have WORK to do (they need “love, attention and plenty of free time”), if they are to be allowed to be thought “ready for school” at the appropriate age.  They gotta figure out how to make sense of emotion, they need adults helping them to process trauma before it gets lodged in their bodies, and they gotta climb trees.

I mean, we all gotta get outside more, preferably to dig in the dirt.  We are going to have to continue to raise a little hell, like this mama in Maryland who I salute from afar as she advocates for saner screen use in her school.  Put books in all waiting rooms!!

a little light reading

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Photo on 28-05-19 at 1.08 PMKia Ora e hoa ma,

This picture shows me holding a few of the books I’m kinda simultaneously reading.  How’s the attentional bandwith, you may ask?  Yeah, well you oughta see my piles of papers … and the electronic files all over my desktop (the ones awaiting printing!).  Does your brain ever feel itchy with the awareness of it all?  At least I have the blessed luxury of this website as a place to clean up the jumble of my tabs!  Let’s do that now, eh?

First, a comprehensive report from our cousins across the Tasman, about the first 1000 days and the opportunities for investment, support.  Brought to my attention by the good peeps at ARACY: the Australian Research Alliance for Children and Youth.  Kia Ora!

Next, a few links about early childhood education.  This is a report emphasising the importance of ECE from a financial perspective, here are a few goodies from the awesome Evolutionary Parenting website (ECE as allocare … when it’s done well, I say “hell, yeah!”), and here is a piece about play based learning in Nova Scotia, Canada.

Now … this is a small but important piece about the problems with using food as a play material in ECE settings.  I’ve had this debate – I distinctly remember a training in San Diego, CA, in about 1999, where I explained that kiwi early childhood teachers hadn’t been using food in play since I could remember.  And friends, I trained in the early 90’s, not yesterday.  BUT… full disclosure: I have never been able to reconcile my effortless acceptance of removing rice/pasta etc from collage areas AND my deep, abiding love of play dough.  I am a work in progress.   Speaking of food: random link here from Harvard Medical School: new findings in praise of broccoli.  Yum!

Now, some links about play … here is an article from the New York Times about the adventure playgrounds that seem to be coming back into vogue (right on!) … reminds me of the one I long to visit in Tokyo, featured in the book Savage Park (which I devoured).  Whilst on the topic of adventurous play, the NY Times article references some research done here in NZ, and you can read about it HERE.

Oh, while we are thinking about international research … this piece from the awesome Conversation website is about talking to babies all over the world, and included the shocking stat that 95% of the world’s developmental science research is done on only 5% of the world’s populations.  Holy ding dong!

Now, from Psychology Today … it’s about letting toddlers help.  While we are talking about toddlers, I humbly share a piece I wrote a few years back for my pals at OHbaby! mag.  I adore toddlers and will defend them, always.

Hey … I talked about the Evolutionary Parenting website back there?  Here is a link so you can listen to her founder, Tracy Cassels, interviewed by Australian breastfeeding advocate, Pinky McKay.  I seriously rate Pinky, I just wish she didn’t encourage mums to include their phones and tv remotes in their breastfeeding support package, alongside their water bottles and (awesomely named) boobie bikkies. What’s my beef?  I insist that we must all Beware the still face of parental phone use! 

For now, I am going to hurl a slew of tech related links at you, then do some non-computer stuff my damn self!  My shoulders insist!  

Right ho, so this is a piece I wrote for the fine folk at Tots to Teens, here is a piece from the Guardian about how people’s lives have changed since they got phones for their kids (the good, the bad …) and here are a bunch of links to reports from the 5rights peeps in the UK.  I was wowed by their “Disrupted Childhood” report, about persuasive tech.  And now (irony!) I want to stay online and read all the others!

THIS is a good read, from Forbes, about the push toward ‘personalized learning’ (ie, tech in classrooms) and here is something about tech in the home from a dad’s point of view, from the San Francisco Chronicle . While we’re thinking of dads, here are some interesting findings about paternity leave in Spain.

What else?  A cry for more time being barefoot, some interesting findings from Australia about elitism, sexism, and the size of your school’s sport’s fields, and just because it’s been ages since I linked to the Talaris Institute and they’re awesome … check out these language links.  Speaking of language(!!), with thanks to the Distinguished Professor who shared this blog (Discussion is the Food of Chiefs), enjoy.

Getting harder to type now, cos my fingers are crossed … why?  Because I’m sincerely hoping the Wellbeing Budget will bear awesome fruit.  Now gird your loins as you read this li’l something from the Spinoff about the problems with Plunket’s founder.  Now, I adore Plunket as a supporter of families in NZ, but I don’t think it hurts to acknowledge that historical figures are flawed, and for contemporary biographies to describe more than one side of a person.

I don’t wish to end this post on such a downer note, so instead, here is an inspiring snack (I’m obsessed with that stuff!), an item I covet shamelessly, and finally …  a lovely guided meditation.

Blessed be the geeks!

screen free week aftermath

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Kia Ora lovelies,

I would have begun this post sharing the tales of joy that emerged from our week offscreen & offline (ie, LIVING LIFE!) but instead I must grouse about having spent the entire morning troubleshooting the problems with my referencing software.  Little Girl only has a half day of school today (therefore I can only count on a half day of productivity today!) and I have done NONE of the work I intended doing.  And she’ll be here in less than an hour!

SO FRUSTRATED.  But trying hard not to stress out.  Breathing in, out, in out.

The disconcerting bit is how the problem appears to be resolved, but I am not confident that any of my fixes worked the magic.  It seemed to inexplicably right itself, just as I commenced crying/yelling!

I cannot help but think that the screens are retaliating to my joyful rejection of them during Screen Free Week?  No, not possible!  Does AI exist in word processing/referencing software?  Surely not!  And if so, did the sight of my sobbing form elicit some kind of compassionate reaction?  I don’t know what to think!!

Anyway, friends, let’s share some links.

Here is a little something about how too many structured events can limit kids’ executive functioning.  Let ’em play!

This is a link to join a free online summit about mindfulness & compassion at work, and this is another online conference, about parenting a spirited/high needs child, and featuring the magnificent Dan Siegel.  Things we love about tech … right there.

The Center for Humane Tech has released some important info, this week, about the shared definition of “human downgrading“.  Love.  Not a moment too soon, my friends, as there are definitely downsides to our love affair with devices, and the hardware designers don’t seem to really want to support our paths to healing.  SHAME on you, Apple!

At least there’s Moment.  

Also, speaking of healing, I LOVE this approach from British doctors, prescribing real life stuff that’s good for the soul (I know I love my dance class and need it like medicine!).  Thanks, Smithsonian Mag, for sharing.  Unrelated goodness: using humour to share an important message about world overpopulation … endangered species condoms.

Here is an important article from “the conversation” about the loss of personalised school cleaning services, and the losses for children.  I’ve witnessed this outsourcing and I say “Boo!” (as in: thumbs down, not trying to be scary!)

To close: I humbly share something I wrote a while back, and may I urge you anew to eat your greens.

Happy Screen Free Week, y’all

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Screen Shot 2019-04-29 at 1.03.54 PM Here are Little Girl and I promoting Screen Free Week 2019 in our local paper.  The Week’s begun here in NZ, so I’ll make this snappy and save the multitude of awesome new links till next time!  Enjoy your week offline, I know I will.  Arohanui x x

work and play

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oh, self discipline.  I love how you’re getting me to stay at my desk and burn through my work, but it saddens me how this leaves us less time for joyful exercise!  And when we are getting our workout groove on, the desk work feels utterly protracted!  What to do?

Questions for the ages.

Here are some links for my pals …first … a link sourced from today’s webinar by the Children’s Screen Time Action Network (thanks, friends!) … please read this from the Atlantic … an article about distracted parenting.  This is what my research is about, and it is reeeeeeeally real.   We watched a short version of this documentary, and I defo want more.  The session also reminded me of this excellent article by Richard Freed, which we’ve linked to before but WHAT THE HECK, here it is again.   Digital detox, you say?  Here is a how-to.

Now, here is a link to the site of a group called Defending the Early Years (sheesh, someone’s got to …) and OH here is another article from the Atlantic, this one about whether we should trust Alexa  (which I think of as beginner AI … so the answer to the trust question is: of course not!).  Even so-called safe education based platforms wind up exposing inappropriate stuff  to kids

If you are not already subscribed to the excellent Evolutionary Parenting newsletter, check out some of their juicy goodness here and this is a chirpy little article about sexism in childcare (what comes first?  The undervaluing of children, the mostly female workforce, or the low wages and status?)

If you’ve the strength, read this article from Scientific American, it’s about downplaying competition and upholding growth mindsets in education, and finally, here is an article I wrote a few years back for OHbaby!  It’s humbling, because I have taken on more extra-curriculars than I had on my plate even then, so I reckon I am super un-fun-mum most of the times these days.  Join me in a deep sigh, will ya?

vive la France!

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Salut mes amis,
Kia Ora e hoa ma,
G’day mates,  hey y’all, hello my friends.

The resistance is rumbling.  There have been courageous law changes in France meaning that the children and adolescents there are being given mandated time away from the persuasive design of the tech companies that live in all our cellphones and feed off our attention.

Speaking of which, I enjoyed this trifecta of articles about Yondr, which is a simple and exciting option for creating tech-free oases.  Yes, schools are a perfect place to be phone-free, (may I remind you of this report from the London School of Economics) but also at live shows (we should all be allowed to be one with the music without fear of some meanie uploading our gyrations & undulations without permission!)

Meanwhile, the Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood have sent this open letter to Mark Zuckerberg (if you know him, give him a nudge will you?) the Children’s Screen Time Action Network are continuing to advocate and agitate, which is just as well; because there are multiple layers to the weirdness of tech in kids’ lives, like how our distracted parenting can lead to bonkers patterns of child misbehaviour (and subsequent avoidance … the downward cycle of technoference, just like McDaniel told ya), OR like how our tech habits at bedtime are robbing our children of sleep.  

(ah, Sleep!  I love you so!)

Other stuff: crazy finding reported here by Scientific American, about the likelihood of women with heart problems dying/not dying upon admission to an emergency room depending upon the gender of the doctor on duty that day, HERE is a transcript to a wonderful interview with Ashley Montagu, and this is a link to an article I wrote aaaages ago, for my pals at OHbaby!.  Love y’all!

Finally: new podcast obsession this week … Song Exploder.  All hail Jonathan Van Ness, whose Getting Curious podcast led me there.

Podcasts.  They are amazing.  Put them on the list of things I do quite like about tech.

 

 

raise your hand if you’re fed up

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Screen Shot 2018-06-11 at 12.35.10 PMKia Ora my friends.  Here is the image that accompanies the Proceedings of the 2nd International Neurosequential Model Symposium from 2016.  Y’all, I was there!  I presented (and sobbed.)  And guess whose scrappy l’il piece closes out this auspicious document?  Can you even stand it?  Because I’m not sure I can!

Now I need to share some links, before my cranky old bones prohibit any more computer work.  First, get ready for outrage, and then please share it with at least a half-dozen of your pals in education.  This is an article about the way that Google has infiltrated schools and is making loyal clients of children, and praps it’d be a good time to brush up on the ways that a Google search is not a neutral beast.  How many of the children googling away in their classrooms today know this?  How many of their teachers have even considered it?

NOW, then: check this out … from PC Mag, no less, making the case for less tech in classrooms.  It exposes that same notion: that tech in schools is for the benefit of advertisers and companies, not children.  UGH.  And LOOK at the lengths that tech companies will go to, distancing themselves from the idea that they have a part to play in child wellbeing: “Our children’s apps aren’t directed at children.”  PARASITES.   We simply must share the truth about the ways that we (and worse, our kids) are being manipulated!  Love you, Tristan Harris!!

For resources, info, inspiration and community in the fight against such nonsense, please behold the proceedings from the first Children’s Screen Time Action Network conference.  I know, you gotta get online.  Irony is a funny gal.  And ALL HAIL Maryland, who seems to be leading the way in having legislative challenge to the “all-tech, all-the-time” school landscape.

Instead, we gotta emphasise what children need.  They need time with their family (mate, I LOVE this article ….) They need actual humans to read them stories.   They need adults to pay attention to what they actually need!  And they need schools that do more than just market to them.

Meanwhile, we need to spend time offline (quiet time alone, every day!  SWOON!) we need to resist the pace of the on-demand lifestyle, we need a bloody good night’s sleep, and we need community.

An article here from Mothering with a new take on the ACE study, and this is a link to an article I wrote aaaaages ago, for our pals at OHbaby! mag.

a wildly satisfying life!

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What’s up party people?  Kia Ora te whānau!

I have just committed an act which could be described as mildly rebellious OR exceptionally sensible, depending upon yer point of view.  When I could have (should have?) been hitting the books I was, instead, undulating my spine with the exceptional Kelle Rae Oien, who has been in NZ teaching.  How lucky am I!?!  Such joy.  So sweaty!

I adore her language when she expresses her desire for her students to live lives that are wildly satisfying.  Wildly satisfying!  I dig that contrast.  It’s like … passionately content.  Enthusiastically calm.  Playfully satiated.  Wildly satisfying.  Yeah, imma keep that one!

What else?  Just had mother’s day … probably a good time to share this excellent article from Harper’s Bazaar about emotional labour (aka invisible labour, aka mental load, aka kin keeping).  Oh, young women, study before you procreate!  The mental and practical energy that it takes to keep the home fires burning while you’re committing the audacious act of betterment is something that you cannot possibly know, yet.

Casserole, school trip, reference list.  Dishes, flu shots, literature review.  Wha …?

Now, some links.  Let’s clear a few tabs before I do battle with the referencing software.  I know, I know, that is NOT the attitude.  Not doing battle with, playing with!  I’ll play with it…

First … here is an article that freaked me right out.  It’s about the ways that millennial parents are raising their children.  I could weep.  The needs of human infants have not changed, just cos our technology has.  Interesting that the writer acknowledges the longing that “parennials” (millennial parents, apparently) have for simpler times.

Meanwhile, from the Atlantic, another look at the tech habits of parents.  This deserves multiple and repeated reads, cos I tell you what, it’ll take you to some terrifying places.  Like this and this.

And you know the bit that kills me, crazy baby lady that I am?  There is this cyclic thing going on, where new motherhood seems “boring”, and sure enough the literature points to women going online (eg during the intimate act of breastfeeding) because they are bored and seeking distraction.  But by succumbing to the distraction, mothers aren’t practicing SEEING their babies.  Really seeing them.  And we know that with older kids, the distraction leads to child misbehaviour, which leads to parental dissatisfaction, which makes a big’ol’ downward spiral of technoference.

Boredom? What would happen if we could sit quietly with that, and even lean into it.  Incredible things happen when we let ourselves just go with the tricky things that motherhood offers us – even exhaustion!  (My struggles with describing invisible labour – what do those struggles offer me?  I’ll report back!)

I remember when my girls were babies, (1 pre-, 1 post- smartphone) people would confess to being bored/lonely at home with their infants, and I would think that if they could only see their babies as the exceptional scientists, sociologists and artists that they are, and if we honoured the power of home visiting as transformative in the lives of families, then mamas would be neither bored nor lonely.  There is something afoot with our culture that we deny so many people the chance to KNOW babies before they become parents themselves, then we physically isolate new mothers (now with a damaging tool for adult communication/distraction at their fingertips) and all the while we radically undervalue infants (and therefore parents).

Anyway, I gotta get dinner sorted before school pick up.  We do a Meat Free Monday, and I try and make it extra delicious, so my omnivorous family won’t grouse.  Also, it’s swimming lesson day for little girl, so time’s a-wasting.

Quick round up of the tabs I need to clear … an article from NZ’s Stuff website about the Modern Learning Experiment.  I’m far from convinced, especially about the “screens for all!” attitude of it all.  A couple more things about schools: this from Sir Ken Robinson (oh, hell yes!  Dance is as important as mathematics!) and I would also like to share a quote that has been rocking my world:

“We’ve bought into the idea that education is about training and “success”, defined monetarily, rather than learning to think critically and to challenge. We should not forget that the true purpose of education is to make minds, not careers. A culture that does not grasp the vital interplay between morality and power, which mistakes management techniques for wisdom, which fails to understand that the measure of a civilization is its compassion, not its speed or ability to consume, condemns itself to death.”


― Chris Hedges, Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle

LOVE THAT.

For no good reason, read about an inspiring, alternative method of farming, here.  Here is a gorgeous blog post about childrens’ spontaneous singing , and finally, an article from Mothering magazine, about missing your mother.  I posted a comment at the end of the piece which I’m kinda disappointed the author hasn’t acknowledged.  Maybe she doesn’t know how to.  I will keep a compassionate heart.  But only just.

 

Tuesday cruiseday

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I’ve been working on a collaborative writing project, but today I’ve been stood up by my writing partner!

Instead of fretting, I’m embracing.  Feels like an unexpected day off, to catch up on stuff like updating the ol’ bloggity blog (Kia Ora!) and I just might fold some washing and do a bit more work on an article I’ve been slogging away at.

Oooooh … or I could unroll my mat and indulge some sneaky online practice: Yoga with Adriene, I love you.    What would you do with some unexpected hours to yourself?

First, please enjoy some links from your geeky friend (that’s me).

First, another angle on the importance of relationship.  This is from the folks at Harvard Medical School and it touches on the value of existing relationships between patients and doctors.  You don’t say … !

Here is a link to a piece by the Scientific American summarising some interesting findings from (their descriptor, not mine!) a Giant Brain Fest.   And even though they shouldn’t have to, here is some info about the ways that the American Academy of Pediatrics is advocating for children to have access to recess (we’d call it ‘playtime’).

Here is a li’l something from Mothering mag, about the ways that loving touch can alter an infant’s DNA,  and HERE is a piece from the Atlantic about Tristan Harris, who I love.  He founded the “Time Well Spent” movement, and he is like Jamie Oliver promoting healthy eating to fast food lovers … except the fast food is addictive technology, and his name is Tristan, not Jamie.  But still … you get my analogy, eh?

I love how they use WMD – not as “Weapons of Mass Destruction” as that abbreviation has historically been used, but as “Wireless Mobile Devices”, with the destructive potential implied.

Also, same but different, this from the Guardian … a piece about a rehab in Washington State for those addicted to tech.

Finally, a sweet video from the lovely outgoing editor of OHbaby! mag, Ellie.  Enjoy x x x

things I get to do …

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Alrighty … so the power of language is well documented (*never more enjoyably than in THIS EPISODE of the podcast “On Being”) and just lately I’ve been playing with “get to” instead of “have to”, or “should”.

I have to feed the calf.  I have to organise an early dinner for my kids tonight, so we can go out.  I should weed my veggie garden.  I should write that essay.

I get to feed the calf.  I get to organise an early dinner for my kids tonight, so we can go out.  I get to weed my veggie garden.  I get to write that essay.

Reminds me to have gratitude for the blessings that are wrapped up in those sentences.  Reminds me to look for the blessings.

Quick link dump, then.

Fab article here about the many and unexpected benefits of teaching kids philosophy in schools (YUM!!)  Even pro-business publications are making the case for it!

Parents want some life skills in schools, too, apparently.  Could we categorise philosophising as a life skill?  Man, teachers are going to be busy.

Good paper here, balanced and calm writing about adolescents and tech.  FLIP.   We gotta set some limits.

(OH MY GOODNESS it works here too.  Instead of “We have to set limits on our kids’ and our own tech use …We get to set limits on our kids’ and our own tech use.  Empowering.  Yeah!)

Anyway, This is a quote from that aforementioned paper:

The Pew Internet and American Life Project Foundation synthesized results from their survey of over 1000 technology stakeholders and critics in a report with the less-than-decisive, but I think ultimately accurate, title of “Millennials will benefit and suffer due to their hyperconnected lives”

 

Here is a list of scary things about the internet (with an outdated Halloween theme.  Sorry.)  And here is an article by a doctor from Harvard about what parents need to know (*Get to know!!) about children and mobile digital devices.  Kids and cellphones.  Y’know.

I read this some years ago, but it’s still great … and for some reason, this week it recrossed my path so, SHARE I shall.  Wild Play.  God, I loved the book Savage Park.

In other news, I was super proud of the kiwi doctor who has had self care put in the medical oath.  Is it called Hippocratic?

Finally, for joy’s sake:

Flower beards: I love them SO MUCH.