discussions on tuesday sept. 6

please post your feedback about the discussions as comments to this post.

Rest in Peace Crocodile Hunter

What is the world without Steve Irwin?

Reponse paper question

The question is:
"Using the assigned readings, describe the worldviews of Diamond and Levitt and Dubner. How are these worldviews dichotomous, and which view do you find more persuasive and why?"
I thought it might be helpful if i made a separate post for to discuss this question. Any ideas, changes, should we leave as is?

Haiz's discussion plan for Tuesday September 5

Here is my extremely rough plan for Tuesdays discussion using our meeting Friday and Joe's email as jumping off points:

I am going to begin by asking the students to consider why are we here, what is the purpose of discussion groups, how can we operate to maximize the potential of our group, what is the purpose of education? My hope here is that students will begin to become more conscious of their own learning and start to take charge of their own education and feel empowered to do so. Also, ideally I hope that we will establish some group expectations around the idea of maximizing the learning potential of our group such as staying on top of the reading and being respectful of each other by making sure everyone has space to speak.

Next I am going to move into discussing Freakonomics and possibly utilize a version of the "social science exercise." We will begin by taking a look at the reading and discussing how they construct their argument. I am not yet sure how i will use the social science exercise. One goal i have is for my group to reach an understanding of how the authors’ methods of analysis lead to a world view which grows as much from their particular assumptions and methodology as from the evidence. I may accomplish this by constructing with the whole group an incentive based explanation for a question and then investigating with them the assumptions which underlie our very question and methodology, but as of know i am unsure of what I am going to do. Ideally i would like to bring guns, germs, and steel into the picture and ask the students to think about how diamond's methodology and assumptions shape his conclusions. Hopefully, the students will start to notice the underlying dichotomous nature of Diamond's and Freakonomics' arguments and will see how a more accurate explanation of the world may arise when we try to bridge dichotomy. I am not finished, and I will try to elaborate further n the next couple of days. Please post any questions or comments which may help me by clicking on comments below. Also, if anyone else wants to make a new post for their discussion outline please do so.

Joe's email for tuesdays class

I have pasted in the email we recieved from Joe about class on Tuesday. I will be posting my response and discussion outline based on his initial plan. Due to its length i am just going to make a whole new post. ****Please do not overlook my first post below, thanks - Haiz.

Dear Wataugans,
Thank you for a very good discussion today. I believe that the plan I
created is better for our discussion -- which, to me, is the fun of
collaboration.

Here is a synopsis of what we will do on Tuesday 9/5:

We will begin by meeting in the GH. I will introduce Levitt and
Dubner, focusing on the "assumptions" the authors's make about humans
as rational actors, responding to incentives. I will problematize this
notion, introducing one or more counterexamples (e.g., the "Vikings" of
Greenland from Diamond's COLLAPSE). I will also say a few words about
the Levitt/Dubner methodology. This should take 15 minutes.

We will then dismiss into groups. In the groups, TAs will begin by
establishing discussion ground rules if need be, or by discussing the
rationale/objective for having such groups. Following this, TAs will
engage the students in a discussion of the FREAKONOMICS methodology --
specifically, how Dubner/Levitt apply their assumptions and research
techniques to chapter one. After this, TAs will engage the students in
an extended "social science exercise" in which the students will form
an interesting question regarding human behavior in the LLC and gather
some evidence. I offered several possibilities for this exercise in
the meeting, suggesting that TAs may wish to develop a question and
then have the students fill out questionnaires that they or the
students design -- brief, very impromptu questionnaires. Students will
then be invited to interpret the data they receive in smaller groups,
presenting a hypothesis regarding "incentives." This is of course one
suggestion; I invite TAs to offer their ideas on this email listserv,
an invitation that I believe Haiz will accept shortly.

At the end of the activity, TAs will bring closure by making reference
to the worldview of Levitt/Dubner -- rational actors responding to
incentives by maximizing their benefits -- contrasting this worldview
with that of Diamond who favors environmental causation, broadly
speaking. In a word, Humans vs. Nature. TAs will then assign the
response paper question (two pages typed, two copies, PLEASE have the
students put the names of their "link" professors at the top), which
will be: "Using the assigned readings, describe the worldviews of
Diamond and Levitt and Dubner. How are these worldviews dichotomous,
and which view do you find more persuasive and why?" If anyone else
has any ideas, or suggestions, please email the group.

At our next meeting, on Friday next, we will discuss how we will spend
the week of T, 9/12 and Thur, 9/14. It may be that we will continue
with the "smoking project," or we may do something else.

One more thing: Please use this email list for questions, concerns,
issues, and problems. We should all be involved in a constant
conversation about teaching this term -- email is a great way to do
this -- and this will help us address issues before our Friday
meetings.

Have good weekends,

Joe

The Inaugural Post

Here it is, the first post of the Watauga TA blog. Yay! Theorized by Adam Wells, actualized by Haiz Oppenheimer, hopefully to be utilized by the Watauga College TA's, and yes even the mere faculty. Personally I hope this place will become a true resource for our class, and perhaps beyond.

Lets figure this space out together. What should we do with this blog? I think I might start posting my theoretical discussion outlines, as well as problems, successes, and failures, and general feedback from my perspective as a TA on the class and the students. What do you want to do?
Please feel free to post any suggestions for altering the layout or anything you think needs to be done to the blog. When you want to post, you can simply click to make a new comment at the bottom of each post, or you can create a whole new blog entry by clicking new post at the top of the screen.