Government language study released (fwd)

[Rolland Nadjiwon]

Mia...your comments on this, perhaps:

I forwarded the news release on this study in standard black and white to
most of my online 'skindian' friends. Some wrote back saying they could not
see it. I then sent it around in brown(earthtones). I spoke a bit later with
my son and asked him what he thought of it being in brown. He said, "I'm
color blind so it looked all the same to me. I did wonder why you posted it
twice."  I told him it must have been pretty rough trying to find a Mexicano
when he lived in Oaxaca.

Second thought: On your mention of "clues to how learning happened"
(paragraph 3 line 2), and "build[ing] visual models
 in my[your] head, in full color...."(last para),  I was very interested in
what you might respond to the question whether there is a Chomsky(Syntactic
Structures (1951)) difference between learning and language learning, or,
any comment you might have. And, how would you see this in terms of
orality(primary orality) vs. literacy vs. full color visual modeling and/or
their juxtaposition in any order...I guess this last one is number three :)

-------
wahjeh
rolland nadjiwon


----- Original Message -----
From: "MiaKalish at LFP" <MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Wednesday, December 15, 2004 1:04 PM
Subject: Re: Government language study released (fwd)


> The response to this report reminds me of a response I saw in one of my
> classes when I referred to a book that talked about a longitudinal study
> that was able to count the number of words children had heard (total
> volume,
> not unique words) and showed that the more words children had heard, the
> better they were able to learn. Based on cognitive research that shows
> that
> the more connections you can make when assimilating new information, this
> makes total sense.
>
> Because the writers were supposed to identify their participants, they
> found
> themselves in the unfortunate position of having to say that people in
> different SES groups spoke different volumes and different forms to their
> children.
>
> So my professor Totally Ignored the Good Information about neuron density,
> activation of prior knowledge, clues to how learning happened, and
> referred
> to a listserv where people where having similar responses to that shared
> with us by Taiaiake Alfred. Certainly he can take that position.
>
> However.
>
> My research shows that people In General don't learn well in black and
> white
> if they have no prior knowledge. Lit reviews show that people don't know
> how
> to teach language. And finally, other cognitive research shows that people
> respond best to things about themselves and their friends. So, if you show
> the colors of the vegetation around the Colorado river, especially in
> winter, to the people who live there, they will respond more positively to
> it than to black and white. Why? Because it is deeply familiar to them.
> Does
> it matter if they are Tribal? Nooooo, not really. Unless of course the
> colors you choose just happen to be the Tribal colors. So, quiz: In this
> case, will the Tribal people respond more? Or less? Than people who don't
> have deep cultural significance for the colors?
>
> It's really too bad that the results of these studies are published in
> terms
> of the People INSTEAD of the Materials.
>
> Guess I was on a soapbox, but this sort of thing really irritates me.
> I-Mia
> don't learn well in black and white. I take the time to build visual
> models
> in my head, in full color, and I dream the same way. If someone discovered
> that about me, I would say, Gee, does that mean you will be building
> materials that facilitate learning for me? Instead of going around howling
> that it is racist against Irish-Jewish women with green eyes who tend to
> get
> cranky.
>
> !
> Mia