A small victory today had me reflecting on a syndrome we all know and have experienced.
Small minded and spiritually stunted people sometimes manage to find a position where they can exercise little moments of power. In the grand scheme of things, these moments are nothing, and yet experiencing them can be frustrating and annoying.
Common examples are the secretary in charge of stationary at the office, a doorman or receptionist at a hotel, or a waiter at a restaurant. Their modus operandi lies in finding a regulation, preferably badly worded, and then sticking rigidly to one or two of those words – while ignoring the intent of those regulations.
If someone argues with them, they indignantly justify their actions with “I am just obeying my instructions/the regulations.”
Another classic is the spotty faced kid employed as a speed cop. Standing tall and proud, he adopts the attitude of a teacher addressing a small school child. Two standard opening gambits are “Do you know what speed you were doing?” and “Do you have a good reason for breaking the speed limit?”
Facetious questions, because no answer will avoid that ticket.
Then will follow a lecture on how speed kills.
Funny, after you were doing 105 in a 100 zone and he just did 130+ to catch up with you. (Justification, this is a zero tolerance area).
It is tempting to say that they are just dumb, but as their victims depart you can hear these people smile.
I am reminded of an acquaintance that once gave me a lift in his car. With a giant truck behind him, he kept stomping on his brakes and then accelerating away. “The clown will just think that I’m having engine problems.” He found this game highly amusing.
In my “What we do to them” blog page I discussed levels of attention, which explains why these people do as they do – their place in life is to be a pain in the arse.
How do you deal with them?
Answer, you don’t.
If it is worth the effort, you simple go above their head – and talk to someone with real power.
Without boring you with the details, that is the nature of my victory today.
Addendum:
When a cop asked me those facetious questions, I replied “I have this silly approach to driving. I keep my eye on the road instead of staring steadfastly at my speedo. So, yes, my speed might marginally increase or decrease once in a while.”
He had no answer and silently continued writing the ticket.
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Thursday, May 6, 2010
The Power of a Single Voice
This deserves its own blog page, and I just wish that I had far more people that would read it.
I have rushed it, so I apologise, but I wanted to capture the incident while still fresh in my mind.
Every once in a while, someone does something that blows you away – their intelligence, their sense, and their courage – and they restore your faith in the human race.
What I am about to recant may seem a small issue, small potatoes, yet it relates to one of the largest issues in this world today.
First – the background:
A local professor runs a breast cancer clinic, but in recent years the clinic has been having its government support drastically cut. She therefore set up a private charity to create more funding.
Though she is a Malay Muslim, the charity board consists of all three Malaysian ethnicities – Malay, Chinese and Indian.
Decades of hard work and fighting for support has worn her down, so she is retiring from both the clinic and the charity.
Therefore a new chairwoman was selected for the charity, and she is another Malay Muslim. Her taking up the post happened towards the end of a new fundraising scheme. Part of her ‘campaign’ to become chairwoman consisted of listing her husband and friends and the influence they could bring to the charity.
The Event:
Every year, the board organises a fundraising charity dinner. This year they had several potential venues to choose from, but one stood out – it could provide more tables and had a substantially lower cost per head. For the charity, this meant it could raise far more funds.
The event consists of both food and entertainment.
The Trouble:
The new chairwoman objected to the venue – or rather, she demanded that they choose another.
“The restaurant does not have ‘halal’ certification. We must not ask Muslims to go there. My husband can arrange for us to use a government hall.”
Such a change of venue would radically reduce the number of tables available – hence reduce the funding they could gain.
‘Halal’ is an important term in Islam, though the emphasis has slowly become restricted to the way food animals are slaughtered. I both understand and respect this requirement of Muslim life.
The charity board were bowing down to this woman’s demands, not wanting to offend Muslims.
The Stand:
Then just one woman, a Malay Muslim, stood up and gave one of the most important messages this world needs to hear.
“You are using this aspect of our religion as a bludgeon, part of a power play. You are exercising bigotry and intolerance. This event is not about religion and it is not about eating. If we, as Muslims, decide that none of the food is suitable, we can choose to not eat! We can still attend to support the charity and to support our fellow charity members of all ethnicities. Your objection is a non-issue.”
The board saw the sense in what she was saying, and the original venue was re-instated.
My Point:
My point in this blog is not about one religion, and it is not a condemnation of Islam. It is certainly not about suppressing any religious beliefs that an INDIVIDUAL chooses for THEMSELVES.
The extremists in most religions are also the most vociferous. They make claims of representing everyone of their faith.
This claim is a LIE.
They forget the tenets of their religion and they preach intolerance and bigotry. They use their voice to gain power, and they browbeat the rank and file through fear – usually quoting out of context and dubiously interpreted extracts from their holy books.
It brought tears to my eyes when one of the rank and file stood up with the courage to oppose this.
That this example occurred in Malaysia is amazing.
To put this in perspective:
Once famous for its religious tolerance and blended ethnicities, the government that has been in power for over fifty years is now in trouble. They are hence drawing more and more on religion to stay in power. 60% of the population are Muslim, and if these people can be cajoled by unfair ‘gifts’ and bullied by religious intolerance, the government hopes to win the next election.
The other two Malaysian ethnicities are being relegated to second class status, and the extremist right wing Islamic religious leaders are being given more and more powerful voice.
If more Muslim Malays had the courage of this woman, the trend could be reversed.
I stated that this blog was not about any single religion, though I have used this example.
The same issues have dogged this world for thousands of years, and are blatantly occurring in both the US and the UK right now – extremism always expands in times of financial and economical crisis.
This woman demonstrated how a single voice CAN fight back.
I have rushed it, so I apologise, but I wanted to capture the incident while still fresh in my mind.
Every once in a while, someone does something that blows you away – their intelligence, their sense, and their courage – and they restore your faith in the human race.
What I am about to recant may seem a small issue, small potatoes, yet it relates to one of the largest issues in this world today.
First – the background:
A local professor runs a breast cancer clinic, but in recent years the clinic has been having its government support drastically cut. She therefore set up a private charity to create more funding.
Though she is a Malay Muslim, the charity board consists of all three Malaysian ethnicities – Malay, Chinese and Indian.
Decades of hard work and fighting for support has worn her down, so she is retiring from both the clinic and the charity.
Therefore a new chairwoman was selected for the charity, and she is another Malay Muslim. Her taking up the post happened towards the end of a new fundraising scheme. Part of her ‘campaign’ to become chairwoman consisted of listing her husband and friends and the influence they could bring to the charity.
The Event:
Every year, the board organises a fundraising charity dinner. This year they had several potential venues to choose from, but one stood out – it could provide more tables and had a substantially lower cost per head. For the charity, this meant it could raise far more funds.
The event consists of both food and entertainment.
The Trouble:
The new chairwoman objected to the venue – or rather, she demanded that they choose another.
“The restaurant does not have ‘halal’ certification. We must not ask Muslims to go there. My husband can arrange for us to use a government hall.”
Such a change of venue would radically reduce the number of tables available – hence reduce the funding they could gain.
‘Halal’ is an important term in Islam, though the emphasis has slowly become restricted to the way food animals are slaughtered. I both understand and respect this requirement of Muslim life.
The charity board were bowing down to this woman’s demands, not wanting to offend Muslims.
The Stand:
Then just one woman, a Malay Muslim, stood up and gave one of the most important messages this world needs to hear.
“You are using this aspect of our religion as a bludgeon, part of a power play. You are exercising bigotry and intolerance. This event is not about religion and it is not about eating. If we, as Muslims, decide that none of the food is suitable, we can choose to not eat! We can still attend to support the charity and to support our fellow charity members of all ethnicities. Your objection is a non-issue.”
The board saw the sense in what she was saying, and the original venue was re-instated.
My Point:
My point in this blog is not about one religion, and it is not a condemnation of Islam. It is certainly not about suppressing any religious beliefs that an INDIVIDUAL chooses for THEMSELVES.
The extremists in most religions are also the most vociferous. They make claims of representing everyone of their faith.
This claim is a LIE.
They forget the tenets of their religion and they preach intolerance and bigotry. They use their voice to gain power, and they browbeat the rank and file through fear – usually quoting out of context and dubiously interpreted extracts from their holy books.
It brought tears to my eyes when one of the rank and file stood up with the courage to oppose this.
That this example occurred in Malaysia is amazing.
To put this in perspective:
Once famous for its religious tolerance and blended ethnicities, the government that has been in power for over fifty years is now in trouble. They are hence drawing more and more on religion to stay in power. 60% of the population are Muslim, and if these people can be cajoled by unfair ‘gifts’ and bullied by religious intolerance, the government hopes to win the next election.
The other two Malaysian ethnicities are being relegated to second class status, and the extremist right wing Islamic religious leaders are being given more and more powerful voice.
If more Muslim Malays had the courage of this woman, the trend could be reversed.
I stated that this blog was not about any single religion, though I have used this example.
The same issues have dogged this world for thousands of years, and are blatantly occurring in both the US and the UK right now – extremism always expands in times of financial and economical crisis.
This woman demonstrated how a single voice CAN fight back.
Monday, May 3, 2010
What We Do to Them - 2
How we are failing children in our education systems.
Part 1 - Some basic facts:
1. Children learn better in a reward based system. Those rewards do not always have to be praise or presents as such. Reward = “They see something in it for themselves and can get it.” One such reward – they actually enjoy what they are doing!
2. Children learn better contextually. E.g. Teach them Pythagoras’s theorem with diagrams on a blackboard, some will get it. SHOW them how it is used, e.g. in calculating the height of a mountain top, most will get it. That is “Get it”, not just “Memorise it”.
3. This is the twenty first century, with computers and the Internet.
“What is the Capital of India?”
Old way - err, I’ll try to remember.
New way “Let’s check with Encarta or Google.” - on my cell phone!
Trying to store away a mass of facts is both useless and redundant:
• There are far too many for any human to gather in a complete lifetime
• Most are up there on the Internet.
We do not need to teach how to memorise, we need to teach how to search, understand and extrapolate. Using something in a practical way actually tends to plonk the ‘facts’ into memory with far less effort.
4. Yes, there are some basic skills we need to teach – yet these are the very ones that are becoming weakest in children now. Communication, social interaction, initiative, TEAM WORK!
5. Teaching in a categorised way prevents cross-fertilisation of ideas.
E.g. This lesson is Chemistry, or Physics, or History. It is in total contrast to our world, which is rarely so neatly categorised.
Most of the greatest advances today are coming from combinations of very differing fields. E.g. Computer graphics concepts are being used in cancer research and have sparked an amazing new approach and understanding.
6. We haveTIME, but we introduce specialisation far too early! This is the result of mixing two concepts:
• So much to memorise!
• If you haven’t made it by 30,20, 15?, you are a failure.
We misuse time, choosing to abuse it and create needless pressure/stress. “Only two months until the exams, get to work!”
7. Exam based learning is USELESS!
Oh, it provides stats for Education Ministries, helps rank schools in competition with each other, makes ’A’ student’s parents feel proud, and gives us some superstars to praise and write about in the newspapers.
They’re a great KPIs (Key Point Indicators) for the supposed success or failure of the latest implementation of an education policy. Note the word I used – “Supposed”.
And – hey – we get results every year, that’s almost instant gratification.
Truth is, each new set of exams supersedes the previous, effectively negating them.
e.g. In my school days: Eleven plus passed? Forget that, you must get O’Levels. Forget them, it’s A’Levels. Forget them, it’s a degree that counts.
Then, at the job interview, “What experience do you have?”
We use these stages for one simple reason – few of us actually learned how to assess someone. Look at the plethora of “Personality Test”, “Interview Techniques”, “Personal Assessment”, etc tools being sold. All with check boxes and computer calculated results.
As someone who has had to interview and recruit literally many hundreds of people over the last three decades, and had to work with people selected by others using these “techniques”, I can’t emphasize enough how crap these systems are.
8. Children, despite the strength of the Myth, do not develop at the same rate or in the same way. Yet schools generally lump them all together based on age bands. So one six year old is bored to tears amongst the others, while one eight year old struggles to keep up with the others.
Although, in many countries, there are pockets of people that understand these facts - I know of only one country as a whole that is applying them and changing the way they deal with education.
Singapore.
Unlike most of the other “Let’s make changes” we’ve seen over the decades, they also understand the need to phase in their approach – with a carefully worked out transition plan.
Part 1 - Some basic facts:
1. Children learn better in a reward based system. Those rewards do not always have to be praise or presents as such. Reward = “They see something in it for themselves and can get it.” One such reward – they actually enjoy what they are doing!
2. Children learn better contextually. E.g. Teach them Pythagoras’s theorem with diagrams on a blackboard, some will get it. SHOW them how it is used, e.g. in calculating the height of a mountain top, most will get it. That is “Get it”, not just “Memorise it”.
3. This is the twenty first century, with computers and the Internet.
“What is the Capital of India?”
Old way - err, I’ll try to remember.
New way “Let’s check with Encarta or Google.” - on my cell phone!
Trying to store away a mass of facts is both useless and redundant:
• There are far too many for any human to gather in a complete lifetime
• Most are up there on the Internet.
We do not need to teach how to memorise, we need to teach how to search, understand and extrapolate. Using something in a practical way actually tends to plonk the ‘facts’ into memory with far less effort.
4. Yes, there are some basic skills we need to teach – yet these are the very ones that are becoming weakest in children now. Communication, social interaction, initiative, TEAM WORK!
5. Teaching in a categorised way prevents cross-fertilisation of ideas.
E.g. This lesson is Chemistry, or Physics, or History. It is in total contrast to our world, which is rarely so neatly categorised.
Most of the greatest advances today are coming from combinations of very differing fields. E.g. Computer graphics concepts are being used in cancer research and have sparked an amazing new approach and understanding.
6. We haveTIME, but we introduce specialisation far too early! This is the result of mixing two concepts:
• So much to memorise!
• If you haven’t made it by 30,20, 15?, you are a failure.
We misuse time, choosing to abuse it and create needless pressure/stress. “Only two months until the exams, get to work!”
7. Exam based learning is USELESS!
Oh, it provides stats for Education Ministries, helps rank schools in competition with each other, makes ’A’ student’s parents feel proud, and gives us some superstars to praise and write about in the newspapers.
They’re a great KPIs (Key Point Indicators) for the supposed success or failure of the latest implementation of an education policy. Note the word I used – “Supposed”.
And – hey – we get results every year, that’s almost instant gratification.
Truth is, each new set of exams supersedes the previous, effectively negating them.
e.g. In my school days: Eleven plus passed? Forget that, you must get O’Levels. Forget them, it’s A’Levels. Forget them, it’s a degree that counts.
Then, at the job interview, “What experience do you have?”
We use these stages for one simple reason – few of us actually learned how to assess someone. Look at the plethora of “Personality Test”, “Interview Techniques”, “Personal Assessment”, etc tools being sold. All with check boxes and computer calculated results.
As someone who has had to interview and recruit literally many hundreds of people over the last three decades, and had to work with people selected by others using these “techniques”, I can’t emphasize enough how crap these systems are.
8. Children, despite the strength of the Myth, do not develop at the same rate or in the same way. Yet schools generally lump them all together based on age bands. So one six year old is bored to tears amongst the others, while one eight year old struggles to keep up with the others.
Although, in many countries, there are pockets of people that understand these facts - I know of only one country as a whole that is applying them and changing the way they deal with education.
Singapore.
Unlike most of the other “Let’s make changes” we’ve seen over the decades, they also understand the need to phase in their approach – with a carefully worked out transition plan.
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