How to get students to cheat less and hike more

Thinking Chapter 4: The Associative Machine

As I was reading Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow, I realized that it's not just a book about how the brain works and makes decisions. It's about teaching. In every chapter, there is at least one revelation about what goes on in the brains of all those classroom characters. And so, I'll try to make some connections, to ponder recent psychological and neuroscientific findings in order to become a better teacher. Sometimes I'll be wrong. Sometimes I'll miss something important. But hopefully I'll hit on something important or interesting from time to time.

To begin the exploration of priming students to succeed, look at the following words:

homecoming         standardized exam

A lot happened to you during the last second or two. You experienced some unpleasant images and memories. Your face twisted in an expression of disgust, and you may have imperceptibly moved away from the computer. Your heart rate increased, the hair on your arms rose a little, and your sweat glands were activated. In short, you responded to something disgusting with an attenuated version of how you would react to the actual event. All of this was completely automatic, beyond your control.

OK, sorry, I basically copied the opening of Kahneman's chapter, except I changed his words (banana, vomit). This is a blog about teaching after all, and nothing is more disgusting and vomit-worthy than standardized exams.

This is one of the more exciting early chapters with potential implications for the classroom. First, Kahneman explains a little how the association of ideas works. If you come across an unpleasant idea, such as standardized exams, your mind and body react both consciously and in silent, hidden ways. He then explains the marvels of priming: if you were asked to complete the word fragment SO_P, your response would be different depending if you were first primed with WASH or EAT. From here it gets complicated, but also really intriguing.

Kahneman describes one experiment that got college students to walk slower because they had first been primed with words associated with the elderly. Just being exposed to words like Florida, forgetful, and bald got young people to slow down. That got me thinking, can students be primed for some long-term actions? For example, could they become interested in hiking if classroom walls were covered in pictures of beautiful forest trails? Could they be convinced to volunteer with pictures of orphanages or soup kitchens? No words, no messages, just pictures. And then a random announcement: we're planning a hike; sign up in the office. Could it work?

Kahneman continues by explaining that reciprocal priming effects produce a coherent reaction. By thinking about old age, people act old, and acting old reinforces thoughts of old age. The same is true with being amused and smiling: one reciprocates the other. Even nodding your head makes you more likely to agree with a message. These ideas point to the use of humor in the classroom. By laughing, students are more likely to be amused by a lesson, which in turn makes them feel positive about it. This is all common sense, but I wonder if it would be possible to trick students into being more agreeable. What if, for example, throughout the lesson, I tell students to nod if they hear me? Just that. Every ten minutes or so, nod if you hear me. Of course they'll nod (because I speak loudly), but by getting them to do that, can I alter their perception of whatever the lesson is actually about? It's worth a shot; at the very least, all the nodding will keep them from nodding off.

Kahneman presents other examples of priming effects. For example, people who have money on their minds (perhaps they saw a dollar-bill screen saver or a stack of Monopoly money) become more selfish, help less, and want to sit further away from strangers than people who have not been primed with money. This makes me wonder how various primes in a classroom might affect students. If there are posters of various universities, will students connect every task to their goal of getting into a great university? If so, would they be more or less likely to cheat on assignments and tests? Would they be more or less willing to help other students? Obviously I don't know the answers, but I think it's important to be aware that even the most innocent messages might have a profound effect on students, whether or not they are aware of it.

One possible way to reduce cheating is posters of eyes. Kahneman explains an experiment that changed how much people were willing to pitch in for coffee in an office: on alternating weeks, large pictures were hung in the room, either of flowers or eyes. There was a big increase in the amount people left during the weeks with pictures of eyes. Subconsciously, people thought someone was watching. I wonder if this would work in the classroom. Students want to peek at a neighbor's paper, but they sense eyes watching ...

The fact that primes work is not up for debate, according to Kahneman, who says, "You have no choice but to accept that the major conclusions of these studies are true. More important, you must accept that they are true about you" (57). If so, then it seems important that schools are set up in ways that would prime students to succeed, whether that's studying harder or volunteering more or simply getting out into the wilderness for a hike.

Why schools shouldn't eliminate junk food

Thinking Chapter 3: The Lazy Controller, part 2

One of my former colleagues used to meet her advisory group students before they headed in for dreaded standardized exams. She'd hand each a packet of snacks -- candy bars, a juice drink, maybe a piece of fruit. Needless to say, her students loved her. She said she wanted to make sure each of them had some food, knowing full well that students freak out on exam days and forget things like breakfast. Turns out she was also probably helping them get higher scores.

According to Kahneman, research has shown "conclusively" that tasks like the SAT and ACT drain people. "[A]n effort of will or self-control is tiring; if you have had to force yourself to do something, you are less willing or less able to exert self-control when the next challenge comes around. The phenomenon has been named ego depletion" (41-42). If you think about it, sitting in place for many hours bubbling in Scranton pages is an unbelievable effort of will and self-control for most teens. Furthermore, "[a]fter exerting self-control in one task, you do not feel like making an effort in another." This explains why many students start strong and noticeably slow down during an exam (proctor one of the exams and you'll see). It turns out that the nervous system, especially when involved in effortful mental activity, consumes glucose: "When you are actively involved in difficult cognitive reasoning or engaged in a task that requires self-control, your blood glucose level drops" (43). Researchers have also confirmed that "the effects of ego depletion could be undone by ingesting glucose."

The implications of this go beyond having students eat a candy bar during a break in the exam. Teachers marking papers also suffer ego depletion. A study found that judges were most likely to grant parole immediately after a food break and least likely immediately before a break. Were the judges simply being nice because they felt content after a meal, or were they harsh because they were hungry? In either case, these findings point to the importance of taking many breaks while marking papers.

Maybe being glued to a computer screen late into the night isn't a bad thing

Thinking* Chapter 3: The Lazy Controller, part 1

There are many reasons why electives such as Journalism and Yearbook are so important ... and fun to teach, which is why I think all classes should be more like them. For one, these are two classes that create products that are distributed to the school and wider community, that become records of the school year. How many classes require students to do real work that is then seen and critiqued by an actual audience? Not enough. Speaking of being seen, publications get everyone in the school actually reading, hopefully getting the young and old into the habit of picking up professional newspapers and magazines. Another reason is that everyone loves to talk about the importance of critical thinking skills (without ever really defining them), and producing a school newspaper or yearbook requires those skills -- students don't discuss critical thinking in some abstract way; instead, they discuss, debate, investigate, and make decisions about big ideas. Student leaders get a chance to practice real leadership, staff members get a chance to collaborate and stretch their creativity, and administrators get taken to task for decisions and policies. What I love best about teaching these courses is what is known as flow.

Several years ago, on the day before deadline, students decided they would stay in the computer lab after school until they were done. They were working on issue 1 of the new year, and the new editors vowed to improve on last year's group who had missed the monthly deadline a couple of times. The design editor hooked up his computer to the projector so that others could see what he was doing. The editor in chief alternated between her screen and the classroom's big screen, snapping instructions for headline sizes and photo placement. The copy editor, curled up in a corner of the room, shouting occasional frustrations at articles submitted earlier that day: "What's the matter with these people? Don't they know how to use quotation marks?" The photo editor, oblivious to the hustle and bustle around her, sat with headphones on, patiently cropping and improving images. Hours passed, and work continued. When it all appeared complete, everyone gathered around the big screen, carefully examining each page and rushing to their own computers when someone spotted a mistake. No one was tired. No one needed to go home. Good thing it was Friday, because they finished well after midnight.

I've observed similar scenarios at different schools -- at an inner city Chicago school, a boarding school in India, an elite international school in England. Each time, when a group of committed students with a shared goal get together, they work. In the moment, they're not worried about grades or college applications or future contests. They're worried about putting together the best possible publication they can. In Thinking, Fast and Slow, Kahneman introduces psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's concept of flow, which is when people "expend considerable effort for long periods of time without having to exert willpower" (40). While experiencing flow, people "lose their sense of time, of themselves, of their problems." I've seen it many times, and it's interesting how the same teenagers who can be described as lazy or apathetic by some teachers all of a sudden gain focus and willpower when working on a real task.

Surely a very small percentage of any group of students would experience flow in Journalism class, but there are many activities across the disciplines that can grab students similarly. This is why I believe students should do real work in their classes. They should do the work of scientists, historians, mathematicians -- whatever that work is, as long as it's real. Not all students will become passionate about all (or even most) of their subjects, but wouldn't it be something if many students could regularly experience flow in the classroom? In order to help students become passionate about something, it is important to find passionate teachers. The most impressive question I've ever been asked at an interview -- the question that made me think that I want to work for this principal -- was this: What excites you about your subject? If teachers are excited, students will be swept up, and the only problem we'll have to worry about is making evening phone calls home to explain that we're almost finished with this month's work.

A few more reasons why homework just doesn't work

Thinking Chapter 1: The Characters of the Story

Teaching is about characters -- there are so many in every classroom: the clown, the goody-goody, the bad boy and his girl. But for some future posts, this blog will be about different characters, the ones that starred in a 2012 book by a Nobel Prize winner.

As I was reading Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow, I realized that it's not just a book about how the brain works and makes decisions. It's about teaching. In every chapter, there is at least one revelation about what goes on in the brains of all those classroom characters. And so, I'll try to make some connections, to ponder recent psychological and neuroscientific findings in order to become a better teacher. Sometimes I'll be wrong. Sometimes I'll miss something important. But hopefully I'll hit on something important or interesting from time to time.

*  *  *

Chapter 1 introduces the two characters that Kahneman calls System 1 and System 2. System 1 is made up of automatic thoughts; System 2 consists of the conscious, rational self. Kahneman spends much of the first chapter -- and the whole book, really -- proving that these two systems make us a lot less in control over our thoughts and actions than we might think. Adding single digits (2 + 2) is automatic, while multiplying double digits (17 X 24) takes concentration. You cannot do both of them simultaneously.

The first insight is what most teachers know but most students dispute: you cannot multitask while doing homework. Most students insist that they can listen to music (or watch TV or lurk online) while doing math or writing an essay. For years, I've insisted that it's impossible, but I've been shouted down or ignored. A couple of sentences, I think, help prove my point:

You could not compute the product of 17 X 24 while making a left turn into dense traffic, and you certainly should not try. You can do several things at once, but only if they are easy and undemanding. ... When the driver of a car is overtaking a truck on a narrow road, for example, adult passengers quite sensibly stop talking. They know that distracting the driver is not a good idea (Kahneman 23).

I love this driving analogy, and I bet even my non-driving students could relate to it. Of course driving is not the same as listening to music, but I bet I can prove that students do better work when they are not distracted.

For years, I've been mystified by a pattern in student work. Take-home essays (ones where students had time to plan, draft, conference with me) are usually no better than in-class essays (ones where students had only 30 or 40 minutes to write). In fact, formal take-home essays are sometimes worse than those done under a strict time constraint. You would think that even the laziest student, the one waiting until the last minute to write that formal paper, would have benefited from all that extra time to think about the topic. But it simply is not true: many, many formal essays come back completely incomprehensible, while in-class essays by the same students are at least on-topic.

I've always considered limited explanations for this difference:

1. Procrastination makes the task ultimately impossible; many students simply run out of time and throw together random ideas.
2. The extra time creates extra pressure. When forced to write in class, students grab an idea and go with it.
3. Or perhaps I grade harder on the take-home work, expecting better results because of all that extra time.

Now, I wonder if the difference comes down to distractions: At home, students usually have something else going on, while in the classroom, there is silence. Simple.

An adult passenger would not distract a driver making a difficult maneuver, but many teens distract themselves and each other while performing an equally challenging task -- thinking. And System 2 simply cannot focus properly while System 1 is dealing with song lyrics or text messages or any one of a hundred different attention-seekers. 

My goal is to convince my students to maintain silence while doing homework. But maybe it would be easier to convince me not to assign homework in the first place. But that's something Kahneman hasn't addressed yet.

Celebrating the same old, same old

Students -- like humans -- prefer routine over randomness. This is obvious in elementary school but equally true in the upper grades. For years, I've started each high school lesson with a consistent assignment: students write down a sentence and correct the errors they find. This takes a couple of minutes out of each lesson, but the payoff is clear. Students slowly build the ability to identify errors in their own writing. They feel more confident on standardized exams. They settle down when they enter my classroom and are immediately on task. And I never have to worry about tardy students. As the bell rings, I quickly move around the room and stamp the paper of each student working; the stamp is worth a point on a future quiz. Anyone not working or late to class does not get a stamp, no exceptions. And so it takes about a week for everyone to get the message: when the class starts, we work.

As I read over my previous paragraph, I can see just how boring my lessons must seem. How regimented. But here's what I know: Students love this little routine. Over time, they see how useful it is. They also recognize how I've manipulated them into being "better" students, actually coming to class on time and working right away, but they appreciate it. They laugh about the one or two times they missed a stamp and admit that they appreciate how fair my system ultimately is.

What they don't like is when I break the routine. If they show up to class and there is no sentence to correct, they don't know what to do. The same can be said for every other aspect of class. If an essay is assigned, they know it will be collected on the due date. They know what the penalty will be if it's late. They expect to get feedback in a certain amount of time. Any break in any routine -- even if it benefits them in some way -- is seen as unfair. And for adolescents, the world is judged by how fair it is.

I used to try mixing things up. I thought I'd keep my students on their toes if they didn't know what to expect. If I assigned reading, sometimes there would be a quiz of some sort, sometimes there wouldn't be. When they showed up to class, sometimes there was a sentence to correct, sometimes there wasn't. But with experience, I realized students actually did more work -- and better work -- if they knew exactly what to expect. How will the paper be marked? They want to know, because they want to do a good job. What will be on the test? Tell them, and they'll actually study. It's when they are uncertain that they struggle.

It has taken me years to figure out the point of this post

For years, I have been telling students about something a girl wrote in my yearbook at the end of junior year. I've used the story primarily to entertain, but also to make a point about the kinds of things they can expect to remember 25 years after graduating from high school. Now that I'm teaching in Asia (again), I've just realized that my anecdote might help explain to my students one rhetorical difference between the East and the West.

In the West, we prefer the five-paragraph model of argumentation: introduce your thesis in the introduction and then spend the body of the essay proving why your thesis is correct. In East Asia, the writer prefers to spend the bulk of the essay circling around the topic, perhaps like a vulture assessing the situation below, before landing somewhere in the vicinity of the message. The East Asian way can be quite beautiful, but it requires something from readers: they must understand the point of the message. The thesis is not necessarily present -- in the introduction or the conclusion -- so the readers or listeners must pay attention to the argument as it swoops around and come to the one and correct conclusion on their own. My yearbook example will illustrate the point.

Once, there was a girl I liked back in high school. I thought she had a boyfriend, and I was quite shy, so I never pursued her. Still, we had a lot of fun throughout junior year, laughing and listening to music during our print shop class. (I went to an amazing high school, where our electives included things like drafting and shop classes. We were in the class that actually printed the school publications.) At the end of the year, she wrote a substantial message in the back of my yearbook. Among other things, she wrote that I'm a nice guy, that she enjoying working with me because I was so funny and always made her laugh, that I'm smarter than I pretend to be, and that I should listen to better music. She made fun of my taste -- classic rock and heavy metal -- and suggested I listen to "Don't You Forget About Me" by the Simple Minds and "If You Leave" by OMD. She also wrote that she hoped we'd keep in touch during senior year, despite the fact that we wouldn't be in the same classes. (I went to a big school; graduating class of almost a thousand.)

I tell my students this story to get a laugh, to tell them how naive I was, to teach them a lesson: If you like someone, tell them. I usually say something like: "I was so dumb back then that I thought she was making fun of me because of the music thing. I didn't realize that she was saying, 'I like you.'"

I just finished reading the first essay from one of my students in English class, and I thought, "Oh my god, this reminds me of that yearbook message!" She writes well, and the point is there, but it's not clearly articulated. In other words, she is not following the thesis-first approach that is favored in the U.S.

I'm going to tell that yearbook story again today, and this will be my message: The girl who wrote that message, she was Asian. And I didn't get her point. In the West, maybe because we're dumb or unsophisticated or something, we often misunderstand this kind of argument. I would have understood if she had started with her thesis: I like you. And then if she had presented the rest of her points as proof: I like you because you make me laugh; I like you because you're actually quite intelligent; I like you because you listen to music, and I want to introduce you to some of the songs I like. Then, I would have got it.

To be perfectly honest, I prefer the East Asian way. (But at the same time, they need to learn the thesis-first approach because their SAT and AP exams will be assessed by an American.) The Asian way is subtle. It gives the receiver of the message some responsibility, making the argument a conversation that will lead to a common destination. And it gives the writer an out: If I had responded poorly to that yearbook message, the girl could have easily responded, "Well, I never said I liked you!"

Pi

Sitting around a Quad Dining Hall table, a group of us were discussing life and the meaning of Life of Pi. A couple of us had read the book; some of us had seen the movie; a few had done neither. So first, a quick summary: Pi tells the story of a boy’s journey to safety on a lifeboat. In the narrative, he is accompanied by a tiger, and the two coexist and ultimately help each other make it back to civilization. The bulk of the action is just the two of them, finding ways to eat and sleep and overcome storms and boredom. When the boat lands on land, the tiger scampers off without a backwards glance and the boy is saved. The end. But then, he reveals that there is another version of the story, and in a few sentences, he shatters the magic: there were no animals on the boat, just humans who killed each other. Perhaps the tiger is symbolic of his own animal instincts needed to survive. But all that is unresolved. As is: which is the true story? Animals or no animals? He doesn’t say, although we all know it must be the second one. On the other hand, the question he asks his interviewer (and us) is, Which story do you prefer? Tiger or no tiger? Easy: We prefer the story about the tiger. And this is where it gets confusing. He says, “And so it goes with God.” 

 So "what" goes with God? 

Does the fact that we prefer the story about the animals prove that God exists, or that God doesn’t exist? There are two stories. In one, everything is explained – through storytelling, mythology, fiction, lessons, a supreme being that created everything. In the second – cold, hard facts. No miracles, no magic, no real explanation for anything that happens. Just humans who kill each other senselessly. We prefer the first one, the one about the animals. I asked the table: What’s the message? Is there a God or not? Most quickly lined up: the religious kids said yes, and the skeptics said no. One girl, just to be different, said, “I don’t know.” Not acceptable, I said, you must choose one or the other. So she chose, although I later realized that, initially, she had been correct. The actual answer to the question of God’s existence is a simple “I don’t know.” We will not know – in the scientific way of knowing – the answer until we die. Until then, it comes down to belief (which is a very different way of “knowing” something). So, the question was incorrect. The correct question is, Do you believe in God? This question must have an answer. The answer might be, “Yes, absolutely.” Or, “I don’t know if there is a God, but I believe there must be.” Or simply, “No, I don’t believe.” 

 I suppose most people probably prefer the story of the boy surviving with the tiger. And this is why most probably prefer the stories in their holy books. Without those stories and lessons, what is life? A man walks into a school and kills children. A dictator engineers a holocaust. A society turns its back on the poor. People drop dead too soon. All of it cold, hard, and true. All meaningless. We are born, we live a while, we die. Just like every other living thing. And we’re replaced by the next generation, which is more sophisticated and technologically advanced and knowledgeable but, ultimately, cursed to repeat the same mistakes, cursed to repeat the same vicious cycle of biology: birth, life, death. Is there meaning behind any of it? Maybe, maybe not. We can’t know if there is or isn’t, but we can prefer to believe there is.

Another in a series about students' netiquette

Some students don't know how to email politely. Others go overboard.

At the start of a new semester, a new student wrote to me and signed off like this:

Waiting for your positive reply.
Thanking you,
Yours obediently
... His Name
 
Anyway, that was in early August 2011. (And when I posted this on facebook, I got 30 likes, mostly from former students who have never written like those words.) Let's see if two months have spoiled this student. In a recent email, he wrote:

Respected sir,
Thank you very much. ETC.
Your faithfully,
His Name

Some students, I suppose, will never, ever change.


Fast forward to the summer. I'm gone, he's gone, but he just wrote to me about his AP English score. He got a 5. He is happy. And grateful. And he signed off with:

Waiting for your reply.
Your obediently, 

Challenge 18: Decisions

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)

#79. Explain why and how you would, if given the opportunity, change a decision you made in the past. (Salisbury State)

3 a.m. thoughts

If I could change a decision I've made in the past, I wouldn't have eaten at the Tavern last night. I woke up about an hour ago, stomach in turmoil. I've now been to the bathroom twice in the last hour. Why do I insist on going there for a Friday dinner and drink? The food usually makes me sick, but I keep on going back. Live and don't learn. Evidence that, like most people, I make a mistake, swear I'll never do it again, and then promptly forget my promise and do it again.

At present, this is the only mistake I've made in my life that I would change. And I've made plenty of mistakes.

***

When I was 17, I had a part-time job at a jewelry store. It was about two miles from home, and I would usually take a bus or walk to and from work. One night a snowstorm hit just as we were closing the store. One of my co-workers, an older woman, offered to give me a lift. At first I refused -- she lived in the opposite direction -- but the thought of walking in that blowing snow and ice persuaded me to accept. About a block into our journey, a car came speeding out of a side street, and we crashed. My co-worker's car's front end was completely smashed. Worse, the offending vehicle sped off, so we were left with no one to blame, no one to pay for the damage.

I felt pretty guilty about it. If I had not accepted the ride, she would have driven off in the opposite direction and would not have gotten into the accident. The next day at work, my boss took me aside. "Don't feel bad about it," he said. "You're both OK, and the car will be repaired. That's what insurance is for. And anyway, you never know what would have happened if you had not been in that accident. Maybe she would have been driving home in the opposite direction and gotten into a much worse accident. You never know. She might have been killed. So this accident might have saved her life. The point is, you can't go back and change it, so don't worry about it."

***

The trouble with changing one single decision is that, really, you are probably changing your entire history. I'm trying to think of something stupid I've done, something small and meaningless that weighs heavy on my mind. I remember a test that I failed during freshman year of college. Psychology class. I slept through a part of that test. I remember the guy sitting next to me nudged me a couple of times to wake me up. How stupid. I ended up with a D in that class, almost ruining my college life before it really began. And here's why I slept through that morning test: I worked for the campus radio station, DJing from 2-6 a.m. twice a week. So naturally I was tired. If I could change a decision in my life, maybe I wouldn't go to the radio station that night. I would find a substitute and stay home and study. Pass the test. Do well. Make something of myself.

However, if I had done that, I probably wouldn't have moved up to better time slots at the radio station. The DJs who always showed up, who showed commitment, were the ones who got promoted. If I didn't get noticed as one of the guys who really cared about the station, I probably wouldn't ever have become the program director. Connected to that, I probably wouldn't be inspired to work equally hard at my other part-time job on campus, at the student newspaper. I probably wouldn't have spent equally long hours there. I probably would always put my classes before my hobbies and interests. I probably would never become an editor. Then, after graduation, I probably would never have gotten a job as a journalist. I then wouldn't move to the East Coast, would never work at a Vermont newspaper. And ultimately, I would never have arrived here at this place in my life. Who knows. Maybe a parallel universe exists, where the guy who did well on that psychology test lives. Maybe that guy is better off. Maybe he has a better job, a better life, things I don't have. But that guy isn't me.

***

Another time while still in college, while I had a steady girlfriend, an opportunity with another girl presented itself. I was torn. The new girl was absolutely gorgeous, and she wasn't interested in a relationship, just in some fun. No strings. A friend -- who was a couple of years older -- offered this advice: "Go for it! You'll eventually break up with your current girlfriend, and then you'll kick yourself about your missed opportunities. In life, you never regret the things you do, you regret the things you don't do." I didn't listen to him. I remained faithful. But eventually my girlfriend and I did break up. And in a way, my friend had been right. When I look back on life, I realize that the things that I haven't done are the ones I regret.

Here's one: One summer, I visited Ecuador. It's an amazing country -- small, but major changes in topography and climate. You can ski high up in the mountains in the morning and lounge around on a tropical beach that night. (Well, with proper transportation.) I decided to see as much as I could, staying in the capital city for a few nights, in a cloud forest for a few, and on a beach for a few more. One thing that many visitors to Ecuador end up doing is going to the Galapagos Islands. It's quite expensive and takes some planning, but the point is, it's Galapagos! I thought about it for a few days and finally decided, no, I'll come back another time. So I didn't go. I was in Ecuador and I didn't visit the Galapagos Islands. Now, it's a few years later, and all I can say is, I regret that decision. Sure, I can still go, there's plenty of time. But just getting to Ecuador is hard. And there are so many other places I want to visit. Maybe that's a decision I would change. Then again, maybe not, because I have no idea where I would have ended up had I gone there. So, I'll just live with the regret.

***

I guess it comes down to this: It's the middle of the night. I'd rather be sleeping. But maybe it was a good decision to go to the Tavern last night. Otherwise, I probably wouldn't have thought about any of this. So if I could re-do last night and change a decision, I wouldn't.

Challenge 17: iTunes

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)

#141. In the spirit of adventurous inquiry, pose a question of your own. If your prompt is original and thoughtful, then you should have little trouble writing a great essay. Draw on your best qualities as a writer, thinker, visionary, social critic, sage, citizen of the world, or future citizen of the University of Chicago; take a little risk, and have fun. (U of Chicago)


My question: What do the ten most-played songs in your iTunes library reveal about you?

1. "Does This Mean You're Moving On" by Airborne Toxic Event

This is a clever and upbeat rock song about a break-up. Some of the lyrics:

From the balcony, you call my name
I see you standing in the rain
Your words so dry, your face so wet
Said I broke your heart,
But it hasn't happened yet
I'll bet, your friends all hate me now
I get the strangest looks,
From that bitchy crowd
And though, they must think
They have every reason to
I guess I'm still not quite yet over you

When the words are wrong
And you're hanging on
Another guy's arm
Does this mean you're moving on?

What does this say about me? More than anything, this band and song hit my iTunes library at just the right time. There's no way of tracking my playlist from my vinyl, cassette, or CD days. But when I bought this MacBook and filled it with music, this is one of those bands that I listened to non-stop for a while. I guess I still do. I like to think that I listen to fairly obscure bands, that I'm one of these hipsters that listens to the cool stuff before it's popular. In fact, I'm pretty sure I was the first of my friends to listen to TATE, as they're known. But my coolness is fading -- I'm losing my edge. My brother just recently emailed me about seeing these guys back in Chicago, said it was one of the best concerts he's seen in the last five years. Living in the hills of India, I haven't seen a proper show in years.

2. "Nickels and Dimes" by Social Distortion

I love the wordplay in this song:

I'm a loaded gun pointed at the mirror
A drugstore cowboy whose end is near, yeah baby
I'm a big time skater with broken down dreams
I'm a derelict rebel without a cause
I ain't the cat with the sharpest claws, no baby
'cause sometimes life just ain't what it seems

I'm chasing nickels and dimes
The rest of the world passes me by
I'm just wasting my time

This is the band that temporarily turned me into a writer. Back in college, I worked in the pre-press department of the daily student newspaper during my freshman year. We literally cut-and-paste all the content of the newspaper onto pages which were then photographed and plated and sent to the printer. I desperately wanted to write for the paper. I got to know the editor responsible for the weekly arts-and-entertainment supplement, and I suggested a new column about music. I was also a DJ at the campus radio station, so I thought I knew about the newest, coolest bands. The editor agreed, and soon I was responsible for the "Alternative Beat" column. The very first piece I wrote was about Social Distortion. A couple of years later, I was a daily columnist and editor at the paper; one day, someone came up to me and said, "Hey, you wrote about Social Distortion once, didn't you? Thanks so much for that!"

3. "Into Action" by Tim Armstrong

This is number 3 on iTunes but probably number 1 on my iPod. Tim Armstrong fronted the punk bands Operation Ivy and Rancid, but this is from a solo project that's mellower and ska-influenced. For at least a month, I listened to this song every single day on my walk to work -- it woke me up and put me in a good mood.

We're gonna dig dig dig in deep hold our sacred ground
When the music come playing then you jump up, jump down
If you hook up the speakers, man, we'll bring the sound
And the music will be heard from miles and miles around
We got songs of redemption, songs of war
We got songs like this that can pack the dance floor

Let's get moving into action
Let's get moving into action
If your life's too slow, no satisfaction
Find something out there, there's an attraction
If you hesitate now, that's a subtraction
So, let's get moving girl into action

4. "Let's Make Love and Listen to Death From Above" by CSS

The lyrics of this one aren't important. In fact, I don't even like CSS so much recorded. They are simply the best live band I have ever seen. I saw them at the Pitchfork music festival in Chicago several years back. Purely by accident, while waiting for the next band on the main stage to come on, I walked into the small side-stage tent where CSS were playing. A girl band from Brazil, Cansei de Ser Sexy ("I've grown tired of being sexy" in Portuguese) had everyone in that tent bouncing and sweating for their entire set. I'll never forget it. This, by the way, appears to be the only female act on my list -- wonder what that says about me.

5. "I Don't Wanna Grow Up" by Eddie Spaghetti

This is a Tom Waits song, also covered by The Ramones, but I can't stop listening to Eddie Spaghetti's countrified version. The lyrics say it all:

I don't wanna have to shout it out
I don't want my hair to fall out
I don't wanna be filled with doubt
I don't wanna be a good boy scout
I don't wanna have to learn to count
I don't wanna have the biggest amount
No, I don't wanna grow up

6. "Bad Time" by The Jayhawks

Sometime around my fourth year of college, a friend who worked at a record store brought over the Jayhawks new CD. We popped it in the stereo, popped a couple of beers open, and sat there listening to the CD on repeat. I often wonder how many hours I've spent just hanging out, listening to music, talking about whatever. This is the one songs that really stands out.

I'm in love with the girl
That I'm talking about
I'm in love with the girl
That I can't live without
I'm in love
But I sure picked a bad time
To be in love, to be in love

7. "Stray Dog and the Chocolate Shake" by Granddaddy

Another fairly obscure California band, Granddaddy was just cool. This song has a cheesy synthesizer opening which brings back memories of driving on Lake Shore Drive with one of my buddies back home. I was in a particularly good mood and started imitating playing the synthesizer on my dashboard. We laughed so hard I almost crashed.

8. "Spending the Day in the Shirt You Wore" by Poi Dog Pondering

I saw these guys play a tiny room on my university campus, back when they still lived in Hawaii. They were touring around the mainland, playing small venues, trying to build up a following. They ended up playing for almost three hours, half of which was the 10 members of the band experimenting with songs and sounds. They said they were having a great time, and so were those of us in the audience that night. The best way to describe their music is: it's pretty. Here's one entire song:

Oh the days of wine and roses and the rubbing of noses
Bare feet, new sprouts, and garden hoses.
Skipping stones, while skipping home...
"Look at that tree, it's got a brand new leaf!"
Candlelight, candlelight -- for no reason
Eating fresh fruit when it's in season.
Take an aimless drive behind a motor wheel
Sticking fingers on paintings to see the way they feel!
Spending the day in the shirt that you wore
I can sense your presence from the day before ...

9. "Big Romantic Stuff" by Bob Geldof

When I was in high school, my hero was Bob Geldof. That's because I loved Pink Floyd, and Geldof played the role of Pink in their movie The Wall. I later learned he was the singer of the Boomtown Rats, so I liked them (and that's probably what got me out of my classic rock stage). I ended up really liking his solo work, which had an acoustic Irish sound. The lyrics are full of melancholy and longing.

That French song playing on the radio at noon
The singer's name was Jean Michel and he's singing 'bout la lune
And she shivers as she comes awake
And remembers how to think
And she shakes the hair out of her eyes
But the daylight makes her blink
And the song it whispers in her mind like a half forgotten sigh
Of times of love the longest days and youth and endless skies
And ooh la la la
ooh la la la

Did they never tell you 'bout it baby
Did they never say it's tough
Are you never going to give up on that
Big romantic stuff

10. "I'll Follow the Sun" by The Beatles

I'm quite surprised that The Beatles made it into my top 10. For the longest time I refused to listen to them, thought they were too old or poppy or British or whatever. But everyone, I guess, eventually grows up. Maybe some day my entire top 10 will be filled with these guys. For now, it's a great way to end this list.

One day you'll look to see I've gone,
For tomorrow may rain so I'll follow the sun.
Some day you'll know I was the one,
But tomorrow may rain so I'll follow the sun.
And now the time has come so my love I must go,
And though I lose a friend in the end you will know, oh ...

Challenge 16: Box

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)

#69. One of Ramapo’s goals is to increase your capacity for learning and to teach you to think “outside the box.” Describe an experience that has had a significant impact on your intellectual development. (Ramapo College)

During my first year at my new school, I was asked to teach drama. The idea scared me, considering I knew nothing about the subject and had never acted in a play; in fact, I suffer from stage fright. Compounding my worries was the idea of directing the drama productions each semester. But I wanted the job, so I agreed.

I bought some books and scoured the internet for ideas on how to teach the subject. I could take an academic approach and have the students read and analyze plays. Or I could try to teach them the way many people learn to swim: by jumping in. I was saved on my first day of class when one of the students asked if he could direct the fall production. "Let me think about it," I said but secretly cheered -- yes, I could learn to direct by watching a student do it!

The play was a success. The student director secured a cast of 30, ranging from squirrely elementary students to surly seniors. He figured out how to make the main characters fly. He had elaborate sets designed, including a pirate ship. He created the lighting and sound effects. And every step of the way, he came to me for advice, thinking that I knew what I was talking about. My advice was, if anything, common sense suggestions and ideas for working patiently with people.

Along the way, when he was especially freaking out about some glitch, my common refrain became: "Don't worry about it. You're doing fine. And anyway, I'm around, so I'll make sure nothing goes completely wrong. Plus, think about it this way: If the play succeeds, all of the credit will go to you. If it fails, well, it'll be my fault because I should've known better."

As I said, things went well. And he got all the credit. And I was happy about it.

The experience taught me more about teaching than any education class could. I realized that, more than any other way, students learn by doing. Give them responsibility and they'll manage. Support them behind the scenes and they'll succeed as leaders.

The second semester, I directed a series of one-act plays. The event was also a success, and the students in the production certainly learned a lot. But what did I prove? That I -- an adult -- could direct. I thought about the first semester and realized that it's so much more fulfilling when a student or group of students prove that they can do something. Schools belong to students, after all, and they should be pushed to take the lead.

I think that a lot of educators talk about creating student leaders, but I wonder if these are just empty words. Having students actually take full responsibility is scary and difficult. There is always the concern that they might screw up. There is always the thought, they're just kids, and adults know best.

Since then, I've pushed for more student-led events. Some have succeeded, some haven't. Each time there has been resistance from other teachers and administrators. But also each time, the students have learned more than they ever would have if they had just followed someone's instructions.



(Here is an interesting side note: Just now, as I was finishing this post, a couple of students walked in to ask me for advice on creating a charity concert. I got excited about the idea, and then they got even more excited, and left saying, "Wow, what if we end up starting a new tradition? That would be so cool." I hope they do.)

Challenge 15: Conversation

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)


#22. Tell us about one of the [most memorable] conversations you have had. (Stanford)

"Most Memorable Conversation" recipe

Prep Time: 10 minutes, Cook Time: 2-3 hours, Remembered: forever

Serves: 1

Ingredients

2 best friends

1 dark evening

1 empty park

6 inches of fresh snow

1 leather football

2-3 lazy hours

1 discussion topic: our futures

0 interruptions

Directions

Meet best friends after dinner in the neighborhood park. It's not so late but dark and quiet -- the freshly fallen snow has hushed all city sounds. Imagine yourself in the countryside somewhere, even though you've grown up in the city and can only imagine what the countryside is like. Stand in the center of the park and survey the unbroken snow. Realize that it should be colder than it is, but an inner happiness keeps you warm. Make small talk, maybe about eighth grade graduation, which is about six months away, maybe about that cute new Mexican girl Kim; everyone's in a good mood, so no one argues about who will ask her out. Remember the football one of you brought and take turns practicing passing, receiving, and tackling. Throw long, spiraling bombs. Dive for the ball. Trip and knock down the guy with the ball. In this powdery snow, no one gets hurt. After some time, stand around in the center of the park again. Ask the question on everyone's mind recently: What do you want to do with your life? Make bold predictions. I will be married by age 21 and have children by 23, named after grandparents I've never met. Thoughts linger on Kim momentarily, but, no, only a Polish girl will do. And career? I will be a firefighter, or maybe a lawyer. Remember the nearby apartment building that burned down recently, the terrifying flames and smoke, the noise and confusion, and decide to be one of the men that make everything right. Dad is pushing for law, but he doesn't realize the years of school that would take. More than anything, you want school to be over with. You were impressed when an older kid spit on the school building and kicked it on the day after his graduation. I'm gonna do the same thing, you declare. Once I'm done with school I will never set foot in one again. Your friends laugh, agree. Everyone also agrees that nothing can separate us, that we will never leave this city we know so well. More snow falls, a steady flurry that'll cover up our tracks before the night is over. If this keeps up, maybe school will be cancelled tomorrow. As you and your friends separate and you walk up the block towards home, you pray for the first time you can remember. You start with some bargain with God -- if we have a snow day tomorrow, I promise I will be good.

Nutritional Information

This is a harmless little memory, lacking in detail and clarity because it's such an old one. A classic! What's noteworthy, however, is the absolute simplicity it reveals. At age 13, I was wrong about everything. I thought I knew it all, of course. I was especially confident in my future. But every prediction was off-target. I moved away from Chicago soon after college graduation. I became a teacher. I took almost twice as long to marry as I thought I would, and I ended up with a brown girl after all. Even these two best-friends-forever have been replaced and forgotten. What I thought would make me happy -- or who I thought I would be when I was older -- was wrong because, really, I couldn't predict the future and I didn't realize that the future me would be a different person, with different thoughts and opinions based on subsequent experiences. What will remain forever -- maybe -- is the memory of that long-ago day when everything fit so perfectly in place.

Challenge 14: Water

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)


#66. Pick a story of local, national, or international importance from the front page of any newspaper. Identify your source and give the date the article appeared. Then use your sense of humor, sense of outrage, sense of justice—or just plain good sense—to explain why the story engages your attention. (University of Chicago)

A few weeks ago, I chaperoned a school trip to the Indian city of Dharamshala, home of the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government-in-exile. While there, the students and I met Hollywood heart-throb Richard Gere and participated in an art event where people had a chance to walk on soil that had been smuggled out of Tibet. A couple of days later, I saw stories about both Richard Gere and the art event in The Times of India newspaper. The art event seemed particularly important; one activist was quoted as saying something about how China would have to take notice now that there were exiled monks and nuns and old people walking on their home soil. Somehow, this event would change public opinion, create an outcry, lead to a free Tibet.

On Oct. 25, I logged on to the New York Times website to see if there was anything about this event. Was this really an international news story? Were the Chinese reconsidering their takeover? There was nothing on the site about Dharamshala; instead, there was a business story that made me realize just how little the Chinese government cared: China Takes a Loss to Get Ahead in the Business of Fresh Water. The Chinese, it seems, are investing heavily in desalination technology. It's a money-losing proposition, but it is seen as "economic strategy." According to the article, "the government has set its mind on becoming a force in yet another budding environment-related industry: supplying the world with fresh water."

The article explores "plenty of reasons for China to want a homegrown desalination industry, not the least of which is homegrown fresh water." Demand for water is growing, and the government is looking for ways to supply the country's future needs. More important, however, are the export possibilities: "The global market for desalination technology will more than quadruple by 2020 to about $50 billion a year, the research firm SBI Energy predicted last month, and growing water shortages worldwide appear to ensure further growth." Ultimately, it seems that China is pushing for new technology that will make it a world leader in the near future.

Reading this article, I was reminded of something I learned many years back in an Asian history class. American policy decisions, my professor had said, are based on predictions for the next three to five years. The Chinese, on the other hand, look to the next several decades or even centuries.

And so, do the Chinese even care that a couple hundred Tibetans walked on some soil? Most probably not; they're too busy planning their world dominance.

Challenge 13: Quit

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)


#11. If you were to describe yourself by a quotation, what would the quote be? Explain your answer. (Dartmouth)

"If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. Then quit. There's no point in being a damn fool about it." --W. C. Fields

Some answers need no explanation. This is one. This is one quotation that tells you everything you need to know about me. But the prompt tells me to explain my answer, and so I will try.

This quote begins by letting you know that I do not always succeed. In fact, I am often a failure. I admit that I've failed in life. But that should also inform you that I try difficult things, things that are not easy. And so I sometimes do not succeed. But when I meet failure, I try, try again. I pick myself up, brush myself off, and try again. Not everyone does this. First of all, many people do not even try anything new; they just go with what they know, they do what they can do. Not I. I try. And when I fail, I don't give up. But eventually I quit. I'm reasonable. I know when enough's enough. There's no point in doing the same thing again and again. One definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different results.

Actually, this essay is going nowhere fast. Let me start over.

W.C. Fields was an American original, one of the first leading men of Hollywood. A comedian and actor, he invented the persona of the hard-drinking funny man. Without him, John Belushi and Jack Black would not be possible. In fact, when studying early films, one sees that Fields belongs in the league of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Groucho Marx. His quote about trying again but not being a damn fool about it is a classic example of his humor: start with a cliche and turn it into something new and funny. Some other famous quotes of his include: "If a thing is worth having, it's worth cheating for." "Whilst traveling through the Andes Mountains, we lost our corkscrew. Had to live on food and water for several days." This second one alludes to his alcoholism, which became his undoing. Some quotes attributed to him reveal a keen common sense: "A rich man is nothing but a poor man with money." "Never try to impress a woman, because if you do she'll expect you to keep up the standard for the rest of your life." And then some things he said were just hilarious, revealing a biting sarcasm: "I am free of all prejudices. I hate everyone equally."

This essay is still going nowhere. What does a brief biography (mostly copied from Wikipedia) about a dead comedian reveal about me? Nothing.

I once read that great business leaders first failed at a business concept or two before finding the idea that really clicked. They learned from each failure. But each one knew when to quit, when to move on to the next idea. Although W.C. Fields seemed to be kidding, his advice makes sense in the world of business. I, however, am not really interested in business, so I guess this has little to do with me.

Let's see, this quote describes me because ... because ... oh, never mind.

Challenge 12: Practice

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)

#48. Name one book you have read in the past year, describe your reason for considering this book significant and what you gained from reading it. (Lewis and Clark College)

In the last couple of weeks, a debate has raged among teachers at school: Is six hours of practice worth it? The fall drama production is being staged this weekend, and the cast has been rehearsing until at least 9 p.m. every day; crew members have stayed until 2 a.m. a couple of times, preparing the lights and sound. The director asked teachers to go a little easy on the kids in the play this week, and the head of school even asked if the cast and crew could have a day off from school on the Monday after the play. Some teachers scoffed at these requests, wondering if the production deserves so much time and recognition. At the end of the day, it's only a school play, they said, so is six hours of practice really worth it?

The answer, according to Malcolm Gladwell's recent book Outliers, is yes. Six hours of practice is worth it if we want our students to become truly excellent. "Achievement is talent plus preparation," Gladwell writes in a chapter called "The 10,000-Hour Rule." He cites a study of violinists at a top music school. The students were divided into three ability levels and asked to count how many hours they had practiced over their entire careers. The researchers found that all students practiced the same amount at a very young age, but eventually a split occurred.

The students who would end up the best in their class began to practice more than everyone else: six hours a week by age nine, eight hours a week by age twelve, six­teen hours a week by age fourteen, and up and up, until by the age of twenty they were practicing—that is, purpose­fully and single-mindedly playing their instruments with the intent to get better—well over thirty hours a week. In fact, by the age of twenty, the elite performers had each totaled ten thousand hours of practice. By contrast, the merely good students had totaled eight thousand hours, and the future music teachers had totaled just over four thousand hours.

Gladwell reviews the young life of various masters—from Bill Gates to the Beatles—and concludes that all of them "practiced" for about 10,000 hours before they were recognized as excellent. Gladwell cites another source who claims, "In study after study, of composers, basketball players, fiction writers, ice skaters, concert pianists, chess players, mas­ter criminals, and what have you, this number comes up again and again. ... It seems that it takes the brain this long to assimilate all that it needs to know to achieve true mastery."

So, yes, six hours of practice for the play is worth it. It's worth it if these students—or at least some of them—discover that they truly love this kind of work and continue amassing thousands of hours of practice in the coming years. Alternately, some of the kids in the play may have discovered that this just isn't for them, that going to school full time and then really working for six more hours is torture, not fun. In either case, the kids have gained something.

If I think about my own talents, I realize that Gladwell is correct. I remember the thousands of hours I spent in my college newsroom, and I can understand why I'm pretty good at writing. When I look back on all the books I've read in my life—and the many hours that I spent reading—I can understand why I'm a strong reader.

Gladwell's book gives me new ammunition when trying to convince students to read and write more. If you truly want to score higher on the SAT or AP exam, if you truly want to succeed at university, you need to read and write right now. A lot.

But, really, Outliers is about more than succeeding on a standardized exam. It lays out a recipe for becoming successful at anything. Start with this question: What do you find yourself doing when you don't have to? Whether it's music or a sport or hobbies like dance or photography, what is the one thing you can spend hours doing without getting tired? Maybe it's worth pursuing. Maybe you can make millions doing this thing when you're in your 20's, but only if you put in the time and effort now.

The trouble, I think, is that not enough students are committed to any one thing. There are too many distractions, but also, there are so many minor commitments that take up time. Some students spread themselves too thin. Others get stuck in front of a computer all weekend. The very best, though, have one or two activities on their minds at all times, and they simply ignore everything else.

It comes down to proper guidance from adults. We're the ones who wasted our youth and have the benefit of hindsight. Even without reading about the 10,000-hour rule, we know the amount of dedication required to succeed. The director of this play is the one who insisted that the kids needed this much practice; more importantly, she dedicated her own time to the task and rounded up a group of willing teachers and staff to help out. The rest of the teachers at the school, instead of questioning the worth of six-hour rehearsals, should think about how they can help students pursue their passions.

Challenge 11: Reverse

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)


#142. Don’t write about reverse psychology. (U of Chicago)

This writing prompt makes me think of one of my all-time best friends, Colin -- a fellow ESL teacher in Japan, an alcoholic from Liverpool, a guy who could curse in a dozen languages. I only knew him for about a year, but I still count him as a true friend, someone I miss.

I remember a random Sunday morning. The two of us were wandering around Numazu, the city we had just moved to. We were both new to the job and had been paired up as roommates at the Ooka City Plaza by our employer, a large language school. We were going nowhere in particular, maybe just walking off hangovers, maybe just checking out the city, maybe just looking for something to eat. Everything that morning was funny. One of us would point at a tiny car driving by or a grandmother on a bicycle, and both of us would burst into laughter. At one point, Colin pointed at a vending machine full of tiny canned tea -- I wish I had a picture of it -- and we realized it was the funniest thing we had ever seen. How can a vending machine be funny? I don't know, I'm sure it can't, but we laughed. We stood there laughing for a good five minutes, doubled over in pain we were laughing so hard. I looked up and saw our Japanese manager driving by, giving us a strange look. We thought we'd be fired the next day. The thought of being fired made us laugh some more.

I have no idea where Colin is today. We lost track of each other when I still lived in Japan, and that was more than 10 years ago. He truly was an alcoholic, perhaps the one true alcoholic I've ever really known. We got paid at the beginning of each month, and he was broke within two weeks, having spent all of his money on beer and o-sake. I would lend him cash to get him through his two-week dry spells. Some mornings, I'd go to the bathroom and see four or five beer-bottle labels stuck to the wall above the bathtub -- Colin used to take long baths and drink the night away. The drinking didn't drive us apart; even the unreturned loans didn't. I was transferred to a school an hour away and we each found new drinking buddies.

Colin had a way with words. You could tell him a phrase in a foreign language -- like I did with Polish -- and he'd remember it. Forever. His brain soaked up words the way his liver soaked up alcohol. He'd try to pick up girls, usually unsuccessfully, in English, Polish, Japanese, but also French and Mandarin and Hindi. He'd also go on these ridiculous rants. "If the opposite of insane is sane, what is the opposite of invert? Vert? And what's the opposite of incognito?" he'd ask some unsuspecting soul. "If the opposite of undercook is overcook, what's the opposite of understand? Overstand? If it's misunderstand, is the opposite of undercook really misundercook?" And because he was good with words, he'd ask about a slew of negative words with no positives: disdain, disgruntled, dismayed, disrupt, as well as nonchalant, nondescript, and nonplussed. This kind of wordplay always cracked me up, but I could never keep up, could never think of an opposite that he hadn't already mentioned.

I played one of my all-time greatest pranks on Colin one night. We were out at an izakaya, a type of bar that serves big drinks and small plates of food. With us was a couple we had just met -- an American guy and Japanese girl. At one point, maybe because he was out of money, Colin left. The couple and I stayed for another round, then decided to go back to the Ooka City Plaza to hang out and listen to some music. When we walked into the apartment, Colin was lying passed out on the floor in front of his bedroom. It looked like he had sat down to untie his shoes and then just fallen over. I thought of a brilliant plan: I asked the girl to lie down next to Colin -- she did -- and I took took a picture with my Polaroid camera (you know, the kind that instantly develops a tiny, square photo). I taped the photo to Colin's door -- a photo of him "cuddled up" on the floor with some random girl. The next day, he almost had a heart attack. "I swear I remember the walk home, and I was alone," he said. "Well, I don't really remember walking up the stairs, but there's no way I met some girl between the entrance and our door." When I finally told him the truth, all he could do was shake his head and say, "Well done." We laughed about that photo for many weeks.

I have no idea where that photo is today. I think I kept it, but I don't know. The thought of it still makes me smile. The thought of my long-forgotten friend makes me smile, too. If I ever do run into Colin again, I'll finally have something to add to his string of ridiculous questions: "How can a person not write about reverse psychology?"

Challenge 10: Hero

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)


#31. Tell one story about yourself that would best provide us, either directly or indirectly, with an insight into the kind of person you are. For example, the story can simply relate a personal experience, or a humorous anecdote; it can tell about an especially significant academic encounter or about an unusual test of character. The possibilities are unlimited (well, almost so). You choose. Just relax and write it. (Princeton)

For one academic year when I was a college student, I wrote a daily opinion column for my school newspaper. My opinions weren't always well-informed or rational, my writing often bordered on incompetent, my humor was only sometimes on the mark. Still, I count this as a major achievement. I was a full-time student, was the program director at the campus radio station, was the editor of the newspaper's weekly entertainment supplement, and I still managed to find the time to write 700-800 words a day on topics of my choice -- politics, pop culture, local news. (And in case you're wondering, yes, I did have a girlfriend, so no "loser" jokes please.)

A few experiences relating to my column stand out from that year. One of my happiest was receiving a letter in the mail (an actual letter, not an email!) from one of the top feature writers in Chicago, who wrote, in part, "You're pretty weird, but I always read your column." (Those were his exact words; I'll never forget.) One of my most humbling was when a group of advertisers demanded that I be fired because I had written something sarcastic about their town. (This was a paid job, and our newspaper earned most of its revenue -- my salary -- from ad sales, so this was a real threat, but luckily the editor in chief and staff adviser were calm about the whole thing and reminded the advertisers that my piece was just an opinion and this was, after all, America.)

The incident that stands out the most, however, had little to do with my actual role as daily columnist and budding humorist. It was a time when I happened to be in the right place at the right time.

Almost all the editors were out of town for three or four days to attend a writing conference. For some reason I wasn't able to go, so I stayed behind to supervise the entire news staff in creating the Thursday and Friday editions. Wednesday evening went fine, and the Thursday paper looked good. (I should mention that the other editors had done most of the work before leaving on Wednesday, so I just had to stick around to make sure everything went OK before the paper was sent to the printer at midnight.) On Thursday morning, however, I received a phone call that made me think, momentarily, that I was in a movie (although I wasn't sure if it was a comedy and someone was making fun of me or if it was a tense, political drama).

I was in the office at 9 a.m., blowing off yet another class because of this darned job. The phone in the editor's office rang, and I thought, "Hmm, I'm in charge today, I guess I should get that."

On the other line was a man, whispering something about plans to fire the university president. I had no idea what any of the information meant, so I asked him to slow down, to explain.

"The Board of Regents is planning to meet this weekend in secret," he said, "and they're planning to fire him."

"Is this allowed?"

"No, what are you stupid? Of course this isn't allowed."

"Then how can they get away with it?"

"Because no one knows about it!"

"So ...?"

"So you need to write about it! This is the newspaper, isn't it?"

I asked him for his name; he refused to give it. I asked him for some more details; he gave me names of people I might call. Then -- like in any movie where someone's on the phone and someone else walks in the room -- he hung up.

Was this a joke? Was someone just messing with me? I wasn't sure. The irony in this situation was that it was I who had received the information. I was known on campus as a great hater of the school president. Without ever really having a reason (other than not having anything else to write about), I often made fun of the man and even once suggested that he be fired. But ... if the anonymous source had been correct, the president was now going to be fired in an illegal power move by the Board.

Ultimately, I didn't know what to do, or if this was a hoax or not, so I called up the editors, interrupting their conference. We worked for the rest of the day on the story, and I designed an amazing page one for the next day. The article caused an uproar, the president's job was saved, and I was a hero. No, actually, the first two things happened, but I never received any credit for any of it. In fact, the president never even called to say thanks, and I soon went back to writing sarcastic opinion pieces about him.

But something did change that weekend: I went from a snot-nosed young writer to a proper journalist. Despite my personal opinions and biases, I was able to work on a story that pursued the truth of an unfair situation. This, I realized, is what journalists do day in and day out. This, I thought, was the job for me.

Challenge 9: Ch-ch-changes

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)


#118. Reveal your personality by naming all the positive and negative features you possess. Which of them you'd like to get rid of and which you'd like to promote and enhance.

I am extremely annoying, often annoyed, blameworthy yet blameless, a cantankerous contrarian, doubtful, deliberate, enthusiastic and engaging, funny and flirtatious, greedy, grumpy, helpful and hurtful, interested but ill-equipped to answer this question, at times a jerk but also a jester, a kindly kidder, a lazy liar, mostly motivated, nearly notorious, openly opaque, pleasant but perturbing, questioning and quiet, reasonable and relaxed, scandalously sexy, terribly truthful, ugly, very withdrawn, xenophobic yet zealous.

I also know my ABC’s. And I guess you can say that I am something of an immature smartass.

I do think that most of my list is accurate. I am those things – and more. But I’m having trouble deciding which of my particular features I'd like to get rid of and which ones I’d like to promote or enhance.

However, more and more, the one personal feature that I would like to eliminate is my age. I’m getting old, damn it. This never used to bother me – in fact, this is something I used to look forward to – but as I walk around this morning and my knee aches for some unknown reason, I think about my aging body and wonder if I could trade it in for a younger model.

But what to do. One cannot turn back the clock or stop this thing called time. It’s useless even thinking about it. Perhaps it is equally useless thinking about all of one’s qualities and considering which to drop.

I am all of those things, but every personal quality, even age, is relative. Sure, I feel old and my knee hurts, but am I as old as the 20-year-old bulimic who has damaged her organs beyond repair? I've been around the block a time or two, but do I know as much about life and death as a child soldier in Rwanda or Sierra Leone? I've got problems, sure, but are they as troubling as the teenagers sitting in prison for drug offenses?

Maybe the best thing to do when contemplating one's positive and negative features is to put life into perspective, to embrace one's flaws and imperfections as well as hold onto one's core values.

At my core? The refusal to take certain things seriously. I'll end by quoting "Synthesis," a song by Frank Turner, a former punk rocker/current folk singer:

All your friends and peers and family solemnly tell you you will
Have to grow up be an adult yeah be bored and unfulfilled
Oh when no one's yet explained to me exactly what's so great
About slaving 50 years away on something that you hate,
About meekly shuffling down the path of mediocrity
Well if that's your road then take it but it's not the road for me.

And I won't sit down
And I won't shut up
But most of all I will not grow up!

Challenge 8: Freshman

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)


6. If you were to look back on your high school years, what advice would you give to someone beginning their high school career? (Simmons)


Do something. Don't just sit around, wasting evenings and weekends, doing the same old thing or nothing at all.

Yes, you've heard it before and you'll hear it again, but the point is simple: you're only young once; when you leave here, it'll be too late; no matter how much you hate it now, you'll miss it when you're gone; like just about every graduating senior, you too will cry on the high school ramp on the day you leave this place.

And why will you cry? Simple: Because saying goodbye to your home and friends is hard. But also, that's when it'll hit you: You'll never walk these hills again, you'll never roam these halls again, you'll never be here -- in this place at this moment -- again. It will be the death of this phase of your life.

I was checking college football scores the other day, logging onto student newspaper websites to get the flavor of the games from their perspective, when I came across an interesting article about an MTV show I've never seen. The guys from "The Buried Life" had visited campus, and they talked to students about fulfilling their dreams, about creating a bucket list and making it happen. The student reporter said that the presentation, "though buried itself in excessive T-shirt giveaways and excessively bad dance music, was surprisingly heartwarming."

Surprisingly heartwarming. Fulfilling dreams can be heartwarming. A bucket list, I thought, was for old people, a to-do list of things to accomplish before dying. But here were college students, gathered in an auditorium on a weekend evening, talking about their own bucket lists. Some students said they "wanted to have fun and live for the moment." The "overwhelming majority" of the students' stories and bucket lists, however, "were extremely noble and selfless." The reporter quoted one student whose main goal in life right now is to open a school in Guatemala, a project that began five years ago and then stalled.

My advice, then, is for you to create a bucket list for each phase of your life. You're in high school now. Sure, there are rules and regulations, possibilities and impossibilities, requirements and mandatory activities. But there's still time in the day. You still have energy and curiosity and passion. You'll be here only a few short years, and then these opportunities will be gone, forever.

I don't know how much longer I'll be here at this school, either. So here's my personal bucket list:

Watch more Hindi movies and Korean music videos. Play soccer on the basketball court, but also try rock climbing and volleyball after school and squash and running before. Run to Happy Valley and walk to Everest House. Pick ferns. Go white-water rafting on a holy river. Help put out a forest fire. Finish the library project in a nearby village. Watch the sunrise from different vantage points. Help write and illustrate a children's book based on locals' stories. Camp out on Flag Hill. Take 50 more photos of the sky. Dance in the street during some random local celebration. Crash a wedding. Walk down to Midlands Stream. Make momos at home.

Some of the items on this list are specific to this place and cannot be done elsewhere. Most cannot (or should not) be done alone. Hint-hint.

Challenge 7: Study

I have challenged my students to write a college application essay of at least 300 words every day for 30 days, working off a long list of essay topics. Below is one of my attempts. (Note from the future: Out of about 50 students, 22 actually completed it. I tried but gave up after 18 days.)


#122. What would you like to study? Describe your academic interests.

I recently watched a Discovery Science program about the most fascinating experiment: Researchers had test subjects rank how funny cartoons were; they wanted to see if the subjects' brains could be tricked into thinking something was funny or not. And they proved that, yes, the brain can be tricked. Here's how they did it: All of the subjects had to read cartoons and then check responses while holding pens in their mouths; half of them held the pens between their teeth, and the other half with their lips. In effect, the people holding pens between their teeth unknowingly forced their face into a smile; they found the cartoons funnier and ranked them higher than the other group, who had forced their mouths into a frown. In other words, this experiment shows that how people respond to outside stimuli depends, in part, on whether or not they are already smiling.

I am interested in studying why this is true, and what the implications of this may be.

For years, I have "known" that the brain can be tricked, or that the brain can trick the rest of the body. For example, I have observed in myself the following: When I feel cold or flu symptoms coming on, how I respond determines whether or not I actually get sick. If I stay positive and think, "I cannot and will not get sick" (maybe because the weekend is approaching and I have awesome plans), I end up not getting sick. If, on the other hand, I think, "Darn it, I'm going to be sick, I just know it," I end up bedridden the next day. This is not a fluke, I don't think. General health -- I'm talking about day-to-day stuff, not necessarily major diseases -- can be influenced by a person's attitude and outlook. (And maybe I'm writing this now to remind myself, as I've been hit by flu symptoms in recent days, and I need to fight biology with psychology.)

We've all heard "mind over matter" and that "laughter is the best medicine." I think it's true, and I want to study the power of laughter, not just in medicine but in other fields as well. I read once that students who laugh during a lesson learn more than those that do not. So, when I taught ESL in Japan, I tried to make my students laugh. I tried to be funny. (It was quite easy; just act like a fool and they'll laugh; it's much more difficult in a high school classroom.) I'm pretty sure they had a good time, but I don't actually know if they learned more than if I had been serious. This is what I want to study.

The fields of neuroscience and social psychology are expanding, and superstar scientists like David Eagleman and Dan Gilbert are reaching out to the masses with best-selling books on what goes on in the brain. I am unsure which exact branch of science I wish to study, but I would one day like to join the ranks of Eagleman and Gilbert with some new information on how and why laughter affects the brain the way it does.