The Learning Teacher

I have decided to move my blog to a new website. It is more user freindly.

There will be a new link in my website soon. You will be able to access my blog through my website or by going directly to:  http://edwinvethamani.posterous.com/

So this will be the final posting in this blog address. I have a posting on the UPSR and PMR Roundtable Discussion on my new wesbite. Look forward to getting your comments on the issue too.

 All good wishes

Edwin

Well, July 1 has come and gone and still I had not managed to get bad to writing - at least the kind of writing I want to do. Much of my day is spent in front of a computer screen, if not the car windscreen is infront of me (I spend at least 3 hours a day on the road, I believe). Then, of course, there is my Blackberry which allows me to read my Facebook, emails and Yahoo Messenger. With so much access to social media and one’s (at least, mine) constant interaction in all of them, I guess it is no surprise that I have little time to do other meaningful writing.

But I did discover that I could survive without social media while briefly in hospital. So when I returned to my daily routine, I have managed to give more time to doing other meaningful things - and am quite happy with what I have accomplished.

The greatest frustration was working on an article for 2 hours and then only to discover that I had downloaded it as a temporary file and could not retrieve it. I thought I had saved it on my desktop - annoying and I’ve not gone back to reworking that article - sorry Tim!!!

But I managed to review two articles - one really badly written piece. When I rang one of the authors, he told me that his co-writer had written it and then submitted it. This got me thinking of the risks we sometimes take when we co-write with our graduate students. Two of my ex-colleagues found themselves in hot water when their work was accused of plagiarism. You cannot say, I didn’t write it when your name appears on the article, worse still if yours is the first name.

So in the rush and push for publications, we need to worry about our writing bedfellows. It seems safe to do it alone - like so many things in life.

Now that I have started writing, I’m kind of enjoying it.  I have been reworking on some of my earlier poems and hope to upload them in my website soon.

I hope to be back more regularly to the keyboard on my computer and do some new writing too.

Have a good weekend!

It’s been a long sabaticcal from my blog. Both work and Facebook seem to have kept me away from it.

From July I shall resume blogging. I also want to return to creative writing, and will begin to rework some of my work in progress and start on some new work I have been thinking about. I will upload my work in my website in a sub-section called “At the Drawing Board” under the Literary publications section. I look forward to my reader’s comments on my writing.

Hope to be back from 1 July 2010.

Edwin

Another festives season! Isn’t it just wonderful! Probably means different things to each of us! That’s the beauty of it!!!

To all my Chinese friends and colleagues, here’s wishing you a fulfilling and happy year ahead!!

May you have peace, joy and good health!

Warmest regards!!!

I was at a local supermarket buy some wine for the festive season and could not help noticing a young boy holding a cheap bottle of brandy behind me.

I turned to him and told him that he was under-aged and he should not be buying alcohol. He was quick to respond: Buying for my elder brother. To which I replied, “You should ask him to buy it himself”.

As I was leaving the counter, the boy took his place at the payment counter. The cashier refused to accept the boy’s money and turned him away. I was pleased that this cashier had said no. I sincerely hoped that he did it because it is illegal to sell alcohol and cigarettes to those below 18 years of age and not because he had heard what I had said and feared that I might complain to the management.

The incident also got me thinking about how children and teenagers get access to cigarettes if it is not to be sold to anyone below the age of 18!!! How do all the vendors get away with it? Smoking kills and this is flashed on all the cigarette boxes!!! Still, our shopkeepers and all kinds of vendors sell them freely to whoever chooses to buy. Money talks!

Should the government now start arresting the young smokers and those who sell the cigarettes? We seem to be more caught up with illegal DVDs. Shouldn’t the law apply to all these offenders - cigarette, alcohol and illegal DVDs sellers?

Our education system seems to have had limited success in discouraging the young from smoking. The fear is that the early smoking habits could lead to other more harmful habits like taking recreational and hard drugs.

There are more newspaper articles about arresting people in possession of a rather benign illegal DVD than about arresting those who sell harmful cigarettes to under-aged smokers or the under-aged smokers themselves.

Is society a little too complacent about young people smoking cigarettes because it has become common place and society does not worry about the breaking of the law by the cigarette vendors?

I have been reading plays written by my son, Vincent, over the years and am very pleased for him as his plays have been shortlisted in 2008 and 2009 for the Malaysian Short and Sweet competition and were performed at KL PAC.  Below is a link to a live recording of a performance. Vince is also one of the actors. This play is called ‘Reverse Psychology’.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eQNT-I1wH8

This is a version of the workshop I presented at the MELTA Literacies Day programme held at WOU in Kuala Lumpur.

So what is social media? Social Media refers to Internet-based and mobile-based tools for sharing and discussing information among human beings. There are numerous Internet tools for almost countless social purposes.

So are you in the Digital Age or a dinosaur in the 21^st century? Below is a series of “Self-Check” questions. See how you fare!

l      Do you use the Internet? List the uses.

l      Do you use email for correspondence? If yes, how frequent and how many hours per day is spent on email correspondence?

l      Do you chat online? If yes, how often.

l      Do you blog? If yes, how often?

l      Do you participate in an online forum? If yes, how often.

l      Are you on Facebook? Why are you there? How often do you connect with others?

l      Do you twitter? How often? What do you twitter?

l      Do you have an e-portfolio or website or homepage?

l      Have you posted anything on YouTube?

l      List any other ways you use the Internet.
 

You answers will indicate your position in a social media literacy continuum– from illiterate to functionally literate to fully literate. So where do you stand?

Have you heard of any of the following applications? Which do you use? If you have not used it, try to guess what kind of social media the application could be.

Below is the list:

 

1. Askville               2. Bebo            3. Customer Lobby     4. Delicious

5. Digg                   6. Epinions       7. Facebook              8. Flickr

9. Google Reader    10. Hi5             11. I (name one!!)      12. Justin tv

13. Kongregate       14. LinkedIn      15. MySpace            16. NutshellMail

17. Orkut                18. Plurk          19. Ozone                 20. reddit

21. Second Life       22. Upcoming    23. Vimeo                24. Wetpaint

25. Xanga               26. Yelp            27. YouTube           

28. Yahoo Messenger.                    29. Zoomr

 

Below is an A-Z of social media I put together - thanks to wikipedia!

A-Z of Social Media

 (Source: http://www.wikipedia.org)

    Askville

    Askville is a user-driven research site.  Askville is designed to run much like a
    computer game. Users gain or lose “experience points” in particular topics as
    they answer questions in those topics, depending on how good their answer is.
    Users also receive “quest gold” by asking and answering questions, and by voting
    on the worth of other people’s answers. In the past, these coins could be
    redeemed for items in an Askville store. The store is out of stock at present and
    there is no indication when, or if, it will open again.

   Also unlike other question-answer sites, Askville has evolved into a social community as well as an information site. This is primarily due to their discussion boards, where Askvillians can enter into long discussions sparked by individual questions. Though indeed sparked by the questions, discussions often take on a personality of their own. No “experience points” or “quest gold” are awarded for discussions, but many Askvillians have come to value the give-and-take, the bickering, and especially the supportive friendships made there.
 

Bebo, an acronym for “Blog early, blog often”, is a social networking website, founded in January 2005. It can be used in many countries including Ireland, Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Australia.
 

Customer Lobby

Customer Lobby is a web-based reviews company for service-based businesses. The company was founded in the effort to create a comprehensive reviews solution for services businesses in the burgeoning Web 2.0 environment. Customer Lobby provides a service and corresponding web software to clients to get, manage and publish customer reviews. Its system allows clients to proactively invite end-customers for reviews, verify their authenticity before publishing, and correspond with consumers to manage negative reviews.
 

Delicious

Delicious (formerly del.icio.us, pronounced “delicious”) is a social bookmarking web service for storing, sharing, and discovering web bookmarks. It has more than five million users and 150 million bookmarked URLs.

Social bookmarking is a method for Internet users to share, organise, search, and manage bookmarks of web resources. Unlike file sharing, the resources themselves aren’t shared, merely bookmarks that reference them.
 

Digg

Digg is a social news website made for people to discover and share content from anywhere on the Internet, by submitting links and stories, and voting and commenting on submitted links and stories. Voting stories up and down is the site’s cornerstone function, respectively called digging and burying. Many stories get submitted every day, but only the most Dugg stories appear on the front page. Digg’s popularity has prompted the creation of other social networking sites with story submission and voting systems.
 

Epinions

Epinions.com is a general consumer review site that was established in 1999. Epinions was acquired by Shopping.com (known as DealTime.com at the time of the acquisition) in 2003, which in turn was acquired by Ebay in 2005. At Epinions, visitors can read reviews about a variety of items to help them decide on a purchase or they can join for free and begin writing reviews that may earn them money and recognition, according to the site’s FAQs.
 

Facebook

Facebook is a free-access social networking website that is operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc
 

Flickr

Flickr is an image and video hosting website, web services suite, and online community platform. In addition to being a popular website for users to share personal photographs, the service is widely used by bloggers as a photo repository. As of June 2009, it claims to host more than 3.6 billion images, up from 3 billion in November 2008.
 

Google Reader

Google Reader is a Web-based aggregator, capable of reading Atom and RSS feeds online or offline. In general internet terms, a news aggregation website is a website where headlines are collected, usually manually, by the website owner.
 

Hi5

Hi5 is a social networking website. Hi5 claims to have over 60 million active members. In Hi5, users create an online profile in order to show information such as interests, age and hometown and upload user pictures where users can post comments. Hi5 also allows the user to create personal photo albums and set up a music player in the profile. Users can also send friend requests via e-mail to other users. When a person receives a friend request, he may accept or decline it, or block the user altogether. If the user accepts another user as a friend, the two will be connected directly or in the 1st degree. The user will then appear on the person’s friend list and vice-versa.

I

I can’t seem to find a website!
 

Justin.tv

Justin.tv is a website that allows users to produce and watch live streaming video. Like YouTube, Justin.tv user accounts are called “channels”, and users are encouraged to broadcast a wide variety of user-generated live video content, called “broadcasts”.

Justin.tv is notable for its origin: The original Justin.tv was a single channel featuring founder Justin Kan, who broadcast his life 24/7 and popularised the term lifecasting. In 2007, Justin Kan stopped broadcasting and Justin.tv relaunched into its current form as a network of thousands of various channels.

Users are permitted to broadcast to an unlimited number of people for free, and watching broadcasts do not require user registration. Broadcasts that are considered to contain potentially offensive content are available only to registered users over the age of 18. Broadcasts containing defamation, pornography, copyright violations, and material encouraging criminal conduct are prohibited by Justin.tv’s terms of service.
 

Kongregate

Kongregate is a social web games website, described by its founders as “the YouTube of videogames”. The site allows visitors to play games created and submitted by members, in much the same way that YouTube showcases video content created and submitted by its members.

LinkedIn

The purpose of the site is to allow registered users to maintain a list of contact details of people they know and trust in business. The people in the list are called Connections. Users can invite anyone (whether a site user or not) to become a connection.

The “gated-access approach” (where contact with any professional requires either a preexisting relationship, or the intervention of a contact of theirs) is intended to build trust among the service’s users.
 

MySpace

MySpace is a social networking website with an interactive, user-submitted network of friends, personal profiles, blogs, groups, photos, music…
 

NutshellMail

NutshellMail is a web-based service that enables you to access, manage, and monitor messages from all your email and social networking accounts through your most commonly used inbox. NutshellMail transforms your primary email account into a universal inbox so you can retrieve messages and manage all your accounts in one place while still keeping them separate and organised. NutshellMail also provides a secure and compliant way to access messages in the workplace for employees who are restricted from external webmail sites.

Orkut

Orkut is a free-access social networking service owned and operated by Google. The service is designed to help users meet new friends and maintain existing relationships. Although Orkut is less popular in the United States than competitors Facebook and MySpace, it is one of the most visited websites in India and Brazil.

Plurk

Plurk is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows users to send updates (otherwise known as plurks) through short messages or links, which can be up to 140 text characters in length.

Updates are then shown on the user’s home page using a timeline which lists all the updates received in chronological order, and delivered to other users who have signed up to receive them. Users can respond to other users’ updates from their timeline through the Plurk.com website, by instant messaging, or by text messaging.

Qzone

Qzone is a social web site, which was created by Tencent in 2005. It permits the user to write a Blog, keep a diary, send photos, and listen to music. Users can set the background of Qzone and accessories based on their preferences so that every Qzone is customised to the user’s taste. However, most services of Qzone are not free; only after buying the “Canary Diamond” can users access every service without paying extra.

According to a report published by Tencent, Qzone had more than 200 million uses as of January 31, 2009, surpassing other social networking websites like Facebook and MySpace.

 

    Reddit

 

    Reddit is a social news website on which users can post links to content on the Internet. Other users may then vote the posted links up or down,   causing them  to become more or less prominent on the reddit home page. The site has discussion areas in which users may discuss the posted links and vote for or against others’ comments. When there are enough votes against a given comment, it will not be displayed by default, although a reader can display it through a link or preference. Users who submit articles which other users like and subsequently “vote up” receive “karma” points as a reward for submitting articles those other users consider interesting.
 
     Second Life

Second Life (SL) is a virtual world developed by Linden Lab that launched on June 23, 2003 and is accessible via the Internet. A free client program called the Second Life Viewer[1] enables its users, called Residents, to interact with each other through avatars. Residents can explore, meet other residents, socialise, participate in individual and group activities, and create and trade virtual property and services with one another, or travel throughout the world, which residents refer to as the grid. Second Life is for people aged 18 and over, while Teen Second Life is for people aged 13 to 17.

Twitter

Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that enables its users to send and read other users’ updates known as tweets.

Upcoming

Upcoming (formerly Upcoming.org) is a social event calendar website. Upcoming combines features of an event calendar and a social networking site. Primarily, the site is a searchable, browsable repository of upcoming events, such as music concerts, art exhibits, business conferences, and so on. Event information can be contributed by the user community, although an increasing percentage of event data now comes from commercial sources.

Vimeo

Vimeo is a video-centric social network site. The site supports embedding, sharing, video storage, and allows user-commenting on each video page. Users must register to upload content. Registered users may also create a profile and upload small user pictures as their avatars, comment and “like” videos.

Wetpaint

Wetpaint is a company that provides social network service and wiki hosting service (or wiki farm). Wetpaint targets non-technical internet users who want to collaborate online, and therefore attempts to include easy to use features, such as a three step wiki creation wizard.
 

Xanga

Xanga is a website that hosts weblogs, photoblogs, and social networking profiles.
 

Yelp

Yelp, Inc. is a Web 2.0 company that operates a social networking, user review, and local search web site of the same name. Over 25 million people access Yelp’s website each month, putting it in the top 100 of U.S. Internet web sites.
 

YouTube

YouTube is a video sharing website on which users can upload and share videos.
 

Yahoo! Messengerer

Yahoo! Messenger is a communication tool, and anyone, anywhere in the world, with a computer and Internet connection can use it.
 

Zoomr

Zooomr is a website for sharing digital photos. Zooomr has no limits on uploading, storing, and archiving photos.
 

Found any website site you want to visit and participate in? Someone have gone overboard and spend hours at the computer. This might be a little hazardous! Health warning for all of us in the digital age! 

It is good to have e-literacy and be connected to our friends and colleagues in cyberspace but too much of anything could be harmful.

Irish poet John O’Donohue, devoted a section of his book Beauty: The Invisible Embracece

O’Donohue explains, ” . . . the digital virus has truncated time and spacece.”

The self has become anxious for what the next moment might bring. This greed for destination obliterates the journey. The digital desire for the single instant schools the mind in false priority. (Page 27)

 

He laments the impact of things digital on the quality of life:

When you accumulate experiences at such a tempo, everything becomes thin. Consequently, you become ever more absent from your life and this fosters emptiness that haunts the heart.  

Such dire warnings stand in stark contrast to the claims of various purveyors of the Digital Age. According to them, life is grander, more fun and vastly more entertaining when it flashes by with the velocity of a TV ad.

It is a matter of choice and judgment. Each individual must learn how and when to go unplugged. Digital offers richness and value when chosen thoughtfully.
 

Source: What Digital Age? By Jamie McKenzie

http://fromnowon.org/may08/digital.html

 

So if you have not got on the social media bandwagon choose wisely and get connected only with those you want and need to.

Good luck in cyberspace … don’t scream …..

Here’s the link to an interview in The Sunday Star on the work I am doing at Wawasan Open University:

http://thestar.com.my/education/story.asp?file=/2009/10/25/education/4890989&sec=education#

Here’s wishing all my Hindu friends and their families a wonderful Deepavali and a day of great joy!

A few of my colleagues in Asia TEFL have been sending out greetings for Rosh Hashana, Eid and the Puja festivals. Amidst all these message a Singaporean colleague shared a common ground among all our varied religions - the golden rule.

As I had just written about International Peace Day, I thought how appropriate it is to look at the various religions which attempt to bring out the best in us. So I googled “golden rule” and found the following quotes from the many religions of the world.

The religions are listed in alphabetical order.

Do take time to have a read.

Again - such wonderful material for classroom discussions.  

Bahá’í Faith:   “Ascribe not to any soul that which thou wouldst not have ascribed to thee, and say not that which thou doest not.” “Blessed is he who preferreth his brother before himself.” Baha’u'llah

 ”And if thine eyes be turned towards justice, choose thou for thy neighbour that which thou choosest for thyself.” Epistle to the Son of the Wolf

 Brahmanism: “This is the sum of Dharma [duty]: Do naught unto others which would cause you pain if done to you”. Mahabharata, 5:1517 ”

 Buddhism:   “…a state that is not pleasing or delightful to me, how could I inflict that upon another?” Samyutta NIkaya v. 353 

 Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful.” Udana-Varga 5:18

 Christianity:   “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.” Matthew 7:12, King James Version.

 ”And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.” Luke 6:31, King James Version.

 ”…and don’t do what you hate…”, Gospel of Thomas 6. The Gospel of Thomas is one of about 40 gospels that were widely accepted among early Christians, but which never made it into the Christian Scriptures (New Testament). 

 Confucianism:  “Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you” Analects 15:23

 ”Tse-kung asked, ‘Is there one word that can serve as a principle of conduct for life?’ Confucius replied, ‘It is the word ’shu’ — reciprocity. Do not impose on others what you yourself do not desire.’” Doctrine of the Mean 13.3

 ”Try your best to treat others as you would wish to be treated yourself, and you will find that this is the shortest way to benevolence.” Mencius VII.A.4

 Ancient Egyptian: “Do for one who may do for you, that you may cause him thus to do.” The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant, 109 - 110 Translated by R.B. Parkinson. The original dates to 1970 to 1640 BCE and may be the earliest version ever written. 3

 Hinduism:   This is the sum of duty: do not do to others what would cause pain if done to you. Mahabharata 5:1517

 Humanism: “(5) Humanists acknowledge human interdependence, the need for mutual respect and the kinship of all humanity.”

 ”(11) Humanists affirm that individual and social problems can only be resolved by means of human reason, intelligent effort, critical thinking joined with compassion and a spirit of empathy for all living beings. ” 4

 ”Don’t do things you wouldn’t want to have done to you, British Humanist Society. 3

Islam: “None of you [truly] believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself.” Number 13 of Imam “Al-Nawawi’s Forty Hadiths.” 5

 Jainism:   “Therefore, neither does he [a sage] cause violence to others nor does he make others do so.” Acarangasutra 5.101-2. 

 ”In happiness and suffering, in joy and grief, we should regard all creatures as we regard our own self.” Lord Mahavira, 24th Tirthankara

 ”A man should wander about treating all creatures as he himself would be treated. “Sutrakritanga 1.11.33

 Judaism:   “…thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”, Leviticus 19:18 

 ”What is hateful to you, do not to your fellow man. This is the law: all the rest is commentary.” Talmud, Shabbat 31a.

 ”And what you hate, do not do to any one.” Tobit 4:15 6

 Native American Spirituality:  “Respect for all life is the foundation.” The Great Law of Peace.

 ”All things are our relatives; what we do to everything, we do to ourselves. All is really One.” Black Elk

 ”Do not wrong or hate your neighbor. For it is not he who you wrong, but yourself.” Pima proverb.

 Roman Pagan Religion: “The law imprinted on the hearts of all men is to love the members of society as themselves.”

 Shinto:   “The heart of the person before you is a mirror. See there your own form”

 ”Be charitable to all beings, love is the representative of God.” Ko-ji-ki Hachiman Kasuga

 Sikhism:   Compassion-mercy and religion are the support of the entire world”. Japji Sahib 

 ”Don’t create enmity with anyone as God is within everyone.” Guru Arjan Devji 259

 ”No one is my enemy, none a stranger and everyone is my friend.” Guru Arjan Dev : AG 1299

 Sufism: “The basis of Sufism is consideration of the hearts and feelings of others. If you haven’t the will to gladden someone’s heart, then at least beware lest you hurt someone’s heart, for on our path, no sin exists but this.” Dr. Javad Nurbakhsh, Master of the Nimatullahi Sufi Order.

Taoism:  “Regard your neighbor’s gain as your own gain, and your neighbor’s loss as your own loss.” T’ai Shang Kan Ying P’ien. 

 ”The sage has no interest of his own, but takes the interests of the people as his own. He is kind to the kind; he is also kind to the unkind: for Virtue is kind. He is faithful to the faithful; he is also faithful to the unfaithful: for Virtue is faithful.” Tao Teh Ching, Chapter 49 

 Unitarian: 

“The inherent worth and dignity of every person;”

“Justice, equity and compassion in human relations…. ”

“The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all;”

“We affirm and promote respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.” Unitarian principles. 7,8

 Wicca: “An it harm no one, do what thou wilt” (i.e. do what ever you will, as long as it harms nobody, including yourself). One’s will is to be carefully thought out in advance of action. This is called the Wiccan Rede

Yoruba: (Nigeria): “One going to take a pointed stick to pinch a baby bird should first try it on himself to feel how it hurts.”

 Zoroastrianism:   “That nature alone is good which refrains from doing unto another whatsoever is not good for itself”. Dadistan-i-dinik 94:5

 ”Whatever is disagreeable to yourself do not do unto others.”  Shayast-na-Shayast 13:29

Some philosophers’ statements are:

 Epictetus: “What you would avoid suffering yourself, seek not to impose on others.” (circa 100 CE)

 Kant: “Act as if the maxim of thy action were to become by thy will a universal law of nature.”

 Plato: “May I do to others as I would that they should do unto me.” (Greece; 4th century BCE)

 Socrates: “Do not do to others that which would anger you if others did it to you.” (Greece; 5th century BCE)

 Seneca: “Treat your inferiors as you would be treated by your superiors,” Epistle 47:11 (Rome; 1st century CE)

Source: http://www.religioustolerance.org/reciproc.htm