Teaching-Learning-Sharing of Zena/Xena Crystal LC Huang (黃昶): June 2020

Krystal Xena LC Huang

June 28 at 6:49 AM ·

Facebook friends asked a little bit about my background and life experiences. So I listed some info on the left-hand side of this page (on facebook). Some schoolings (ya, to meet with Credentialism... my mother who could not read nor write, used to say "一枝草,一點露. 天無絕人之路", which is similar to "上天有好生之德: "Nature nurtures everything silently without inviting credits", or " Every dark cloud has a silver lining; there is a will, there is a way") chewed up my hard-earned savings/debts from teaching to keep on surviving. This is a fun-life journey. I am luckily endowed with enough interesting-twists-n-turns, so far. (Friends asked how I got money to study in the US. Aren't you rich and privileged? I think I was just lucky to win a big scholarship that pushed me here to study and ended up teaching.)

Krystal Xena LC Huang

Krystal Xena LC Huang

Just found a creative, Positive Stereotyping on Wisconsinites.

Krystal Xena LC Huang

--------------------------------------------------------------
Krystal Xena LC Huang

Why does Arizona hit a PEAK?

Give me happiness, or give me death?

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-usa/crowds-pack-arizona-river-as-u-s-posts-record-covid-cases-for-three-days-running-idUSKBN23Z0IW

Marcie Bakker

Krystal Xena LC Huang Poor education system and severely underfunded. Notoriously red state—they think they are “cowboys” without knowing the true definition of cowboy .

Krystal Xena LC Huang

Ya, call them "innocent people" - uninformed, misinformed, and the less informed (worse than the uninformed, oftentimes, not by choice, but designed by the system). The US. is the top spender on education but falls behind in many aspects of learning outcomes...
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/se…

THEGUARDIAN.COM

The US spends more on education than other countries. Why is it falling behind?

Marcie Bakker

Thanks. Interesting! I remember in EC, educators would say the lower scores in national tests at EC North High School were due to the “immigrant “ population. Canada’s migrant citizens aren’t behind!

Krystal Xena LC Huang

My response disappeared?

Krystal Xena LC Huang

I retyped it. Just some observations (nothing to do with serious academic research at this juncture).

The elitist/private education in the US is spectacular.

Here are some other well-known facts:
The super-capitalist economy makes the lower social classes' employees chasing paycheck by paycheck, deprived quality time, and extra resources to invest in their offspring. Not to mention, some of the newer immigrants come from less fortunate countries suffering from instability and poverty; learning English can be a huge hurdle, just to name a few.

Then, the techie digi-taining and super-commercialism in promoting overconsumption distract learning.

This one is well known: Parents engaging in children’s education along with schools can be found in most of the Far-eastern countries (can be my bias.)

Now touching on the Tsunami trend in online learning: An elephant in the room question:

Why do many edu-institutions push harder and harder in online learning (I mean, the pre-covid19 epoch), because of the one-way ticket, being thoughtful to the busy people who deadly need the online education, or providing high quality, authenticity, promoting deep learning? The following phenomenon is less likely to happen in the 4-year colleges and can be anecdotal: why some administrators/supervisors use online courses to reward those favorite/obedient instructors and punish the "special" or "recalcitrant " teachers (during Walker-era. Before that, senior faculty swept through all the online classes with 14 students per class, and after Walker, 27 students per online)?

This is my personal story: every semester, why do faculty, students fight for online teaching and learning opportunities/seats (based on my teaching experience in the US.) It happened one semester when I was on sabbatical leave, one of my officemates who, in fact, one of my best friends. We, 8 faculty, shared one tiny cozy office) requested the new ONLINE course - Social Problems which I developed after a couple of years’ f2f teaching, as her extra earning loads. I let her copy all the curricular contents, syllabus, learning activities, worksheets, videos, and the rest of the teaching resources that I created and collected (I thought only a semester when I was on leave). When I came back, she insisted that she owned it because of the seniority rule ( ya, the pecking order during the pre-Walker era) for she did not need to be in the classroom to teach this very tough course (and she did not major in sociology).

In fact, I was intrigued why I got great online teaching evaluation every semester, much better than that of my f2f, hybrid/blended, and teleconferencing classes, while I spent much less time which I constantly felt guilty with, compared to the f2f teaching which I always double-triple down my teaching efforts because of my love in f2f teaching while recognizing the convenience and benefits of online facilitation. Indeed, time spending on each student and course might not have a high correlation with the learning outcome. Still look into more academic studies focusing on this topic.

Sidebar info: I have an ambivalent feeling in teaching online: joy and guilt. But I also found several instructors turned into administrators/supervisors who were marvelously completed Ph.D. within a couple of years through online degree programs. Indeed, sone online advanced degrees are not only nice-to-have, but have-to-have, and enriched many people.

The popular learning management system/LMS software CANVAS has a better tracking on the online time spending and interaction feature of both students and instructors in various utilities (hopefully, also "administrators" who supervise), but not without controversies.

And don’t get me wrong that I am an online Luddite; ya, nothing to be bragged about this f2f program (driving a trip of 3 hours to Twin Cities to take one or two classes per semester during nights or weekends, which took me 10 years attached with a $60,000 learning debt to complete while teaching 18 to 21 credits Per Semester. This program is called "Learning Technologies, previously, Instructional system and technologies)." I added a minor in computer science as a learning enhancer with my dissertation titled" Preferences, Pedagogical Strategies, and Challenges of Instructors Teaching in Multiple Delivery Formats within A 2-Year College Context".

Krystal Xena LC Huang

I think Online teaching and learning is a superconscious and CONSCIENTIOUS or heavily ethics-loaded job to all stakeholders. Oftentimes, it is more an economic-political issue than the pedagogical ones.

Krystal Xena LC Huang

Regarding different types of immigrants to the US., some well-to-do immigrants pursue even better life chances for their offspring. They tend to be privileged groups in their respective country to venture into the Land of Free and Home of the Brave in bringing in super BIG money. "Welcome- to USA.!"

Those from less fortunate countries fighting for basic needs won't be treated the same as immigrants from the monetary countries. Do the reading, writing, and arithmetics testing scores reflect their immigrants' socio-economic status as well?

William Buell

cant make a silk purse out of a sow's ear

Krystal Xena LC Huang

I am horribly opinionated at this point: It takes at least 3 Ph.D. degrees' time, money, energy, and other resources to raise a child, heavier than a whole village's because some villages can be poor, lacking resources to nurture a child, Children can be born rich/resourceful or trapped in poverty. Anyway, no more elaboration on this topic, I am never qualified to raise one.

Human babies are precious and shall not to be ruined by rough hands and dire conditions.
No child should be brought to this world to suffer from man-made poverty, violence, injustice, and in particular, irresponsibility.
Ha, serving feline majesties doesn't need 3 Ph. Ds', because growing up to be a tax-payer is not their life purpose

! Hope my majesties don't get mad at this anger-provoking statement.

Krystal Xena LC Huang

By the way, congratulate Anderson Cooper who spent tons of money on hiring a surrogate woman for his child. Then another, perhaps million dollars to raise and invest in this rich kid to be a "silk purse"? Can this be an outlier-case?

What will the 28th Amendment look like?

mmm

Krystal Xena LC Huang

Thanks, Beth Humphreys.

Krystal Xena LC Huang

Is the citizenry the echo chamber of their adorable political leader?

- Like
  
  Reply
  
  8h
  
  Edited
- Krystal Xena LC Huang
  
  I thought I was the only one who suffers the wrong-spelling-prone ability ! (Ya, English is my 3rd language, and learn to survive in the US...) Hope the above photo was done by the gentleman inadvertently, which happens to me quite often (misspelling not by purposes - but for fun!)
  
  Like
  
  Reply
  
  8h
  
  Edited
Krystal Xena LC Huang

Again, repeat a previous story: Upon knowing the Wuhan virus during late January, Taiwan revises the anti-viral protocols, rules-n-regulations; organizes the medical personnel; and stockpiles PPEs, facial masks, ventilators, and the rest of anti-viral materials and resources. To prevent the facial mask from hoarding and panics, the Taiwanese government creates a ration-distributing system, free for all residents based on ID of each household. Each infected case was attached with a medical file in the data bank for research documenting, tracing, tracking, and treatments.

To live, or not to live, that is the question!! All the nice civil liberties are not infringed, and so far, 447 intended cases with 7 deaths from outside travelers are confirmed and reported. It is the only country that enjoys normalcy in education, businesses, and the rest of daily activities.
- Like
- Reply
- 7h
- Edited
Krystal Xena LC Huang

Song for tonight. How to sing a military lullaby (a popular good-night song of the Bootcamp):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xV7ZsgNxT-E

YOUTUBE.COM

今宵多珍重 Good Night, Dear. 010318. By Xena LCH #93c

今宵多珍重 Good Night, Dear. 010318. By Xena LCH #93c

1
- Like
- Reply
- Remove Preview

Teaching-Learning-Sharing of Zena/Xena Crystal LC Huang (黃昶)

Pages

Tuesday, June 30, 2020

June 30 (T), 2020 Random thoughts amid the peak of the pandemic

Saturday, June 27, 2020

June 26 (F), 2020 What causes a massacre ?

Wednesday, June 24, 2020

June 24 (W), 2020 Can't breathe, in different ways

Tuesday, June 23, 2020

June 23 (T), 2020 What will the 28th Amendment look like?