Why do you and why do I want to train my left hand to become nearly as efficient as the right?
If you were able to use both your hands equally, or as close as you can for everything, you would be far more efficient in general. Imagine it as this, Your left hand(or right if you are left handed) is half as good as your right. Not exactly, but that seems fair enough to base it on. So your right hand will be 100% and your left hand will be 50%. So overall 75% effective. If you managed to train your left hand, obviously not as good as your right, it may end up 80% instead of 50%. That would make a 90% overall instead of 75%. Obviously not exactly as that is just an estimate, but still shows the point.
Plus, to add to that, your right hand will be better assisted by the left, increasing productivity even more. So your right hand will do better just by having your left hand doing better so your right hand will be less taxed by everyday activities meaning it will have less to do. That would mean your right hand will exceed the 100% you had before, possibly even to 110% of what you had. Isn't it a great feeling, exceeding 100%.
Pretty much you would just have more control.
So, why exactly did I want to start using my left hand?
There are times during school where you would randomly start to write with your opposite hand. No reason really, you just wanted to see how well you could do. That happened today. At first it was barely readable but then it got a little better as I slowed down and better gripped the pen. Just within the last hour, I google searched the possibility to learn with the left hand and I discovered that others had done this to varying levels of success.
Now, it is possible to train the left hand, but the right hand is because most peoples left side of the brain is dominant. For some reason, the right hand is linked with the left side of the brain and the left with right. This means the left side of my body will never be as strong as the right. Limited not only to hands but legs are another good example.
So from now, I will start doing a lot of things with my left hand that I would generally have done with the right. Varied examples include washing myself with the sponge being equipped in the left hand, opening doors, turning on taps, holding things in general and so on. Of course, writing, one of the hardest things with the off hand but definitely worth doing to train fine motor skills. Wherever appropriate I will try to use my left hand instead of the right hand.
We will see how this goes, if it is possible for my left hand to become stronger. Others have done it, let's see if I can.
Friday, October 10, 2008
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Even more about busywork
Believe it or not, I managed to think of more I can write about busywork.
When you were at school, did you have to copy information off a board or projector and into a book? Probably, some teachers see it as the number 1 way to teach. It is generally a boring activity which involves writing out someone Else's work, a bit of time, and can often take longer as you have to wait for others to catch up or for the teacher to finish writing on the board.
Why is this done? It is so easy to photocopy or just print out multiple sheets of information, printed neatly rather than written or scribbled down on a lined piece of paper in an exercise book. This would make it simple for students to read and understand.
Students do not absorb information while they write out. Unless somewhat entertaining or interesting, students will not pay much attention to what they are writing, just copy. Also, because writing out is slower than just reading, it will longer to work out the meaning and to make anything of it. Rereading the writing after that, often going around the room with students reading out loud(which is also pointless, unless students are being graded on their reading ability), must happen to understand.
Once, not too long ago, in science we were forced to copy down something like 7 projector slides of information about aquaculture. That took up many pages in my book, and no one in the class made much of it. It was just do this or come back at lunch and do it. It also looked like it was just copied off the Internet, probably Wikipedia, but the teacher claimed she wrote it. We were then forced to read it out loud going around the room with different students reading each paragraph. There was enough that we read at least 3 times each. As the writing was uninteresting and my science class is mostly people who aren't so into school, we still did not absorb any information from it.
I did not understand, what was the point of all that? We learnt nothing and wasted 2 weeks. It is not always that extreme, but copying down notes happens quite often. Just imagine it as you go on the Internet to read about something, but as a future reference you decide you want a copy of the text. Instead of printing you write it out with a pen on a piece of paper.
It's not laziness. It's saving time while getting the same value for less work.
When you were at school, did you have to copy information off a board or projector and into a book? Probably, some teachers see it as the number 1 way to teach. It is generally a boring activity which involves writing out someone Else's work, a bit of time, and can often take longer as you have to wait for others to catch up or for the teacher to finish writing on the board.
Why is this done? It is so easy to photocopy or just print out multiple sheets of information, printed neatly rather than written or scribbled down on a lined piece of paper in an exercise book. This would make it simple for students to read and understand.
Students do not absorb information while they write out. Unless somewhat entertaining or interesting, students will not pay much attention to what they are writing, just copy. Also, because writing out is slower than just reading, it will longer to work out the meaning and to make anything of it. Rereading the writing after that, often going around the room with students reading out loud(which is also pointless, unless students are being graded on their reading ability), must happen to understand.
Once, not too long ago, in science we were forced to copy down something like 7 projector slides of information about aquaculture. That took up many pages in my book, and no one in the class made much of it. It was just do this or come back at lunch and do it. It also looked like it was just copied off the Internet, probably Wikipedia, but the teacher claimed she wrote it. We were then forced to read it out loud going around the room with different students reading each paragraph. There was enough that we read at least 3 times each. As the writing was uninteresting and my science class is mostly people who aren't so into school, we still did not absorb any information from it.
I did not understand, what was the point of all that? We learnt nothing and wasted 2 weeks. It is not always that extreme, but copying down notes happens quite often. Just imagine it as you go on the Internet to read about something, but as a future reference you decide you want a copy of the text. Instead of printing you write it out with a pen on a piece of paper.
It's not laziness. It's saving time while getting the same value for less work.
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
I-doser - anaesthesia SUCCESS
When I say success, I mean to the extent of how far it can go with me sitting in a moderately comfortable position with my headphones(not the greatest) instead of lying in a relaxed position with good headphones that wouldnt fall off. I also can never clear my mind and always have that voice telling me what to do.
So, at about 11PM last night, I decided I would use the anaesthesia dose to put me to bed. Interesting results. At first nothing really happened, I was getting bored and I was only 6 minutes in but I had a compulsion to continue.
At about 70%, my left leg started getting numb. No, it wasn't because I was sitting in a bad position but I started thinking it was actually working. Further on, numbing increased and started in the right side of my torso. These both continued for a short period, maybe a few minutes, after the dose.
That's one of the effects it's supposed to give, the other is drowsiness. I felt drowsy, it didn't put me to sleep but I felt tired. Not just because it was late. I was awake before it and I don't usually feel tired until the voice inside my head shuts up and lets me go to sleep. The funny thing is, the dose wears off shortly after it has finished. I couldn't get to sleep though I felt tired, but it had worn off, and I didn't feel like sleeping anymore. I managed to get to sleep well past 12.
So, as the dose concluded, I got up and walked to my bedroom. I felt heavier than usual and collapsed onto my bed. Whenever I listen to I-doser then go to bed, I turn off the light and the window glows and looks different. This may actually be because of having eyes shut for a while. But that night as I lay their attempting to go to sleep, I kept seeing a strange red colour in the bottom right corner of my peripheral vision. Just occasional, it wasn't a fixed object but wherever I looked sometimes it would be there. Random observation.
Other things to note are that I almost fell over in my bedroom, I started getting scared of nothing as I-doser causes me to get paranoid, and I felt easily relaxed while in bed. And like I said before, I wasn't in the optimal position for I-doser, so the effects were not complete, which is unfortunately why it didn't actually put me to sleep.
I-doser does work. It is just harder to do it than they tell you.
So, at about 11PM last night, I decided I would use the anaesthesia dose to put me to bed. Interesting results. At first nothing really happened, I was getting bored and I was only 6 minutes in but I had a compulsion to continue.
At about 70%, my left leg started getting numb. No, it wasn't because I was sitting in a bad position but I started thinking it was actually working. Further on, numbing increased and started in the right side of my torso. These both continued for a short period, maybe a few minutes, after the dose.
That's one of the effects it's supposed to give, the other is drowsiness. I felt drowsy, it didn't put me to sleep but I felt tired. Not just because it was late. I was awake before it and I don't usually feel tired until the voice inside my head shuts up and lets me go to sleep. The funny thing is, the dose wears off shortly after it has finished. I couldn't get to sleep though I felt tired, but it had worn off, and I didn't feel like sleeping anymore. I managed to get to sleep well past 12.
So, as the dose concluded, I got up and walked to my bedroom. I felt heavier than usual and collapsed onto my bed. Whenever I listen to I-doser then go to bed, I turn off the light and the window glows and looks different. This may actually be because of having eyes shut for a while. But that night as I lay their attempting to go to sleep, I kept seeing a strange red colour in the bottom right corner of my peripheral vision. Just occasional, it wasn't a fixed object but wherever I looked sometimes it would be there. Random observation.
Other things to note are that I almost fell over in my bedroom, I started getting scared of nothing as I-doser causes me to get paranoid, and I felt easily relaxed while in bed. And like I said before, I wasn't in the optimal position for I-doser, so the effects were not complete, which is unfortunately why it didn't actually put me to sleep.
I-doser does work. It is just harder to do it than they tell you.
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Improve Primary School Homework
The solution to primary school homework is simple -- don't just pile up tasks for them to complete. Instead they should be taught how they can effectively study for themselves and not have to slave over unrelated homework. Then, by the time they reach high school, they would have figured out that what the teacher gives them isn't important - it's what they actually learn that is related to the course.
Kids come home from school, often packed with homework to complete by the deadline. Not all, but definitely a considerable amount of children anyway. They do not need to be given a large amount of work to complete at home, especially those in the low grades. It would be a better idea to influence them to study the material themselves rather than given a preset homework sheet designed for everyone.
School's seem to overlook a lot. Students would spend a lot less time doing homework if they weren't given much, but knew that they had to study it for themselves. They would also learn the same amount in the process making homework much more efficient and effective. It would carry on through high school. Students, particularly smarter ones, won't have to be told what to do for homework. They will just know "learn this" but not to be bothered by busywork.
Kids come home from school, often packed with homework to complete by the deadline. Not all, but definitely a considerable amount of children anyway. They do not need to be given a large amount of work to complete at home, especially those in the low grades. It would be a better idea to influence them to study the material themselves rather than given a preset homework sheet designed for everyone.
School's seem to overlook a lot. Students would spend a lot less time doing homework if they weren't given much, but knew that they had to study it for themselves. They would also learn the same amount in the process making homework much more efficient and effective. It would carry on through high school. Students, particularly smarter ones, won't have to be told what to do for homework. They will just know "learn this" but not to be bothered by busywork.
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