A bunch of stuff, including some boring generalizations and a wonderful contact.

Being from Alaska I have a sense of seasonal change built into my way of looking at life. There is always a sense of preparing for and anticipating winter. I find that even in Thailand I am aware of the winter. Yesterday Jit's family was all inside and I found myself saying to myself, "This is what it will be like in winter.". When I think about the Jit's families new house I am, in that back of my mind, wondering how it will work in the winter. Of course there is no winter in Thailand, only the hot, wet, and cool seasons. We are moving from the wet to the cool season now. In the past I have only been in Thailand during the hot season. I guess the wet season is sort of like our winter, you put up with it, learn to appreciate it, but would not be too disappointed to avoid it. This year I will be avoiding winter. When we return to Alaska in February the worst of winter will be over.

One of my goals of my sabbatical was to see how the Linux operating system is being used. The "news and analysis" that I read in the United States indicated that Linux and Open Office would be a threat to Microsoft because of the People PC program. Well, during my trip so far I have not seen an instance of Linux or Open Office running. I have asked and people are aware of the option, but prefer to use what they are familiar with. This conservatism is the same in the United States. I think you need to be a geek to willingly learn a new operating system or a new productivity application. There must be a major improvement in function or price to drive new use. I suppose your work required a change it would drive learning new skills, but I do not think it happens voluntarily. In fact I think we learn new versions of Windows because they come on the computers we purchase. In the old days I loved learning new operating systems and applications, but I was a geek. Now I need a functional reason to learn new tools. I still love learning new web tools, but operating systems make me feel tired!

Today we met Dr. Sumalee who is an expert in adult education. Her doctorate is in Adult Education. She was giving a planning seminar for the Counseling section. Jit took notes. From what I could make out, from the sprinkling of technological terms, the subject was intensely interesting. I wished I knew Thai. Anyway Jit took notes and will summarize the meeting for me tonight or tomorrow morning.

Dr. Sumalee is aware of the Wi-Max project in Lampang province. Jit and I will be able to meet with her, and some of her students, this Friday. It was a joy to talk with her, she speaks excellent English. I believe that I will be able to make contact with both Non-Formal Education and Community Colleges through her knowledge.

I want to thank Dr. Warapa and Nednapa Intong for allowing us to attend the meeting today.

While listening to the meeting my mind drifted to various topics about education. I will share some of my thoughts briefly.

Teaching is interactive. The essence of teaching is an interactive exchange with students. I am thinking of interactive in a broad sense. For instance, active reading, reading with questions and a purpose, is interactive.

The joy of teaching adults is that, as students, they have a clear purpose and desire for the course being taught. Adult students also have a life of experience to bring to a subject.

That new educational technology must have an incremental advantage over previous technology or of no technology at all. If there is not sufficient incremental advantage the tool should not be adopted. We are not teaching technology, we are teaching subjects. Technology is a means to creating an interactive encounter, not the end.

Paper is a successful tool. Any replacement for paper, such as a PDA, must have a clear advantage that justifies the effort of using and applying the new tool. When thinking of technology remember the advantage of simple tools.

Confusion is a necessary pre-requisite to knowledge. If there is not confusion there are no questions. A teacher of adults must earn the trust of the students to allow the creation of confusion. Confusion is uncomfortable and if the students do not trust the teacher they will not want to experience confusion. Confusion also must ultimately result in clarity. Confusion that remains confusion is demoralizing and undermines educational confidence.

Having a clear organized structure of course delivery, the course syllabus, the reading list, the assignment expectations, reduces anxiety and gives students the freedom to question and doubt.

Educationally you must have questions to appreciate answers.

The individual trumps the general. A specific experience or a specific person trumps a general principle. Years ago I was taught in workshops that Alaska Native people where shy, or were non-verbal, or a hundred other generalities. What I learned is that such general descriptions were always less important then the actual person in front of me. In fact some general principles and assertions could blind me to the real person I was talking with. Scientifically one tested counter example puts a theory into doubt. For me, I always try to make the specific experience the highest priority.

None of these observations has anything to do with the meeting I experienced today, but it did catalyze these thoughts.

Today I had a wonderful surprise, on my desk was a dish of flowers floating in water. The flowers were Dok-Phut which are related to Jasmine. There was also a small glass bird and an elephant also. Aor, put them there. I will post a picture.

Tomorrow I will work on Access and Thai language lessons. We will not go anywhere. Friday we will return to STOU. I am excited about the possibilities.

Oh yeah, I thought I would lose weight in Thailand, but no, it is not happening. I have not had Pizza since I left. Actually Pizza is the only food that I miss. There are plenty of opportunities to get Pizza, we just have not eaten any. The food that I have had is wonderful and varied.

I have been taking pictures the last two days through the taxi window. I just set the camera to its widest angle, manual focus, and hyperfocal distance. The depth of field of small digital cameras is amazing. I do not see why they need to focus at all at wide angles. I see so many pictures from the taxi, but I can not yell stop, so I just decided to take them as we go along. After all the worry about focusing, the quality of a lens, the value of adding filters and all that technological stuff, I just said forget it, lets see what the pictures look like. I like them, they capture what I am seeing.