There is a nice JISC report out on ‘Developing students’ digital literacy’. They define digital literacies as ‘the capabilities, which fit someone for living, learning and working in a digital society’. They list the follow seven elements: Media literacy - critically read and creatively produce academic and professional communications in a range of media. Information literacy - find, interpret, evaluate, manage and share information. Digital scholarship - participate in emerging academic, professional and research practices that depend on digital systems. Learning skills - study and learn effectively in technology-rich environments, formal and informal. Communications and collaborations - participate in digital networks for learning and research. Career and identity management - manage digital reputation and online identity. ICT literacy - adopt, adapt and use digital devices, applications and services.   They put forward a series of guidelines for improving students’ digital literacies: Reviewing what support is available for digital literacies Link digital literacies in with other priorities Create a buzz Get people talking Provide support in the curriculum Encourage students as change agents

We constantly see polls concerning the popularity of presidents…Who was the greatest president? Who is the smartest president?  Who was the most popular?…so on and so forth… The question that came up today as I was driving into work (and it was on a radio show that I was listening to) was "If you put all of the presidents in a ring for a fist fight, who would win?" Let’s assume (for parameters sake) that we’re talking about presidents at the age they were during their presidency…so take each one at their peak physical condition during the four or eight years that they were president.  There will be no breaks during the fight, they’re fully fed & hydrated and they are not distracted by thoughts of family or war or economic issues…AND they’re perfect ok with the time warp they just went through. Who would your top 5 be? As a bonus, let’s throw in a bear in round 2… Could all the presidents team up to kill the bear & then they would have to turn on each other… Who would win in a brawl once the bear was dead or incapacitated?Filed under: In The Classroom Tagged: #sschat, classroom, educator, flipped class, flipped learning, genius hour, hsgovchat, instructor, lesson crashers, lessoncrashers, POTUS, president, presidents, presidents of the united states, presidents of the united states of america, sstlap, teacher, thrasymachus, thrasymakos, war powers, what if

Those who share power, weaken themselves, but those who share wisdom strengthen each other - Niccolo Machiavelli I came across a great article this morning and, later, a tweet from Mr. Voyles, a teacher on my wife’s elementary campus, that push my mind in the same direction: education inspired distractions. I wrote an article for TechEdge Magazine in which I derided (esoterically almost) the use of technology as a way to distract students as opposed to engaging them at high cognitive levels. This type of approved "distraction" is and has been (in my opinion) the biggest weakness in education for decades.  We look for new systems or tech to "engage" our kids, while we ignore good pedagogy and content.  When we use terms like "engage", many of us really mean "distract". These new systems and tech are throw at us (while the presenter uses statements like… "this training really should take 3 weeks, but we need to get through it in 15 minutes") without giving the consuming learner time to assimilate.  The claim that there is an "educational pendulum" exists because new things are only half way implemented, deemed to be a failure, cast out, then replaced by the "new" new thing. There is NOTHING that will replace good pedagogy.  Our students are not mathematical variables that fit into an equation and, yes, they will get distracted by the newest tech…but, as an old professor of mine once said, "Education demands from the subject some effort, especially some effort of attention, while propaganda does not" (see where he stole that from in the image below :)). Good pedagogy consists of what it has always been since Ancienc Athens… relationships (dare I say true friendships), guidance as opposed to indoctrination, high expectations as opposed to soft bigotry, and adopting a mindset that allows the teacher to prepare students for a future that will likely never experience by that teacher. This approach allows our students to claim and expand upon their self identity.  It allows them to stake a claim in the future that they are currently building.  In short, allowing kids to take the helm as soon as possible in your class helps them reconnect their work and their dreams. I’d like to call your attention to a piece of paper that was handed to me over 22 years ago by a college professor at Northlake Community College in Irving, Texas.  The two underlined sentences have stuck with me this entire time. "Learning how to learn is more important that any specific thing he can communicate." That was in print 22 years ago.  We’re aren’t inventing a better way to educate…we’re uncovering it. How do we reconnect student’s work with their dreams?  Teach them how to learn how to learn. We have to let go.Filed under: About Me, In The Classroom Tagged: #caedchat, #edchat, #txed, #txeduchat, Aristotle, augmented reality, aurasma, classroom technology, ed tech, edtech, educaiton philosophy, education, education technology, gafe, google, google apps, Gueri11aEd, pedagogy, plato, student centered, teacher centered

Picture from the Innovating Pedagogy report.   I read a blog post this morning, which argues that learning to learn will be the most significant classroom innovation in the next ten years, for both teachers and students. It’s always dangerous to make predictions about the future; none of us could have possibly imagined the impact the web would have had on all aspects of our lives. Mobile devices and tablets, and almost ubiquitous wifi, means that we have information at our finger tips 24/7. The blog post lists the following facets of learning to learn: Learning how to learn will mean being able to find, filter, evaluate, categorize, store, remix and create information… no matter how much information is available or in what format, media, or language it is available. Learning how to learn will mean being able to work and learn with (not just about) people at a global scale… no matter what geographic distance, time zone, culture or language. Learning how to learn will mean being able to understand the different purposes of a variety of tools and platforms and being able to harness the power of these tools and networks so you can fluently switch between them or combine them … no matter how new or old the platforms or tools. Learning how to learn will mean to adapt to new forms of media… no matter if this means letting go of nostalgic attachments or customary workflows or routine habits in reading, writing and communicating. This resonates with the OU’s 2014 Innovating Pedagogy report which lists learning to learn as one of the ten key developments that are likely to have a significant impact on learning and teaching in the next few years. The report states:   We are always learning. Throughout our lifetime we take on board new ideas and develop new skills. What we find difficult are learning what others want to teach us, and managing our learning in order to achieve particular goals and outcomes. Self-determined learning involves learning how to be an effective learner, and having the confidence to manage our own learning processes. ‘Double-loop learning’ is central to this process, for double-loop learners not only work out how to solve a problem or reach a goal, but also reflect on that process as a whole, questioning assumptions and considering how to become more effective. This helps them to become self-determined learners with the ability to seek out sources of knowledge and make use of online networks for advice and support.   Amongst the resources lists is an excellent article  by Lisa Marie Blaschke - are your ears burning Lisa?

#TLAP meets Growth Mindset! A natural combination! Source: storify.com Love participating in twitter chats. Great collaboration!!! See on Scoop.it - InformationCommunication (ICT)

Filed under: Curious David, Screencasts, SPSS, teaching statistics Tagged: Carroll Alumni, Curious David, PSY205, Screencasts, SPSS, Teaching statistics and Experimental Design

Videonot.es is an underutilized online resource that saves projects automatically to your Google Drive.  Using this resources is easy as pie. First, connect your Google Drive account and import a useful YouTube video.  Then, start taking notes on the right side of the page.  Each time you write a note it is time stamped to your video. So, for example, if you have a multistep set of instructions your viewer can click on which ever step they want to watch and videonot.es will take them directly to that part of the video. This means that viewers need only watch the parts of videos they need to watch. This saves your viewers time and frustration. This tool can be used by everyone from session presenters (as follow up to your presentation or to flip your session and give background information prior to your session) to flipped classroom educators (introducing content at home so classroom time can be used to work on the work). To learn more, watch this video tutorial by clicking here. Enjoy! Put this resource in the hands of your students to make their video tutorials MORE helpful! Filed under: In The Classroom, Technology Tagged: adorable cats, classroom tech, Digital Learning, drive, ed tech, education tech, education technology, flipped, flipped classroom, flipped learning, flipped pd, good teachers, google, Gueri11aEd, GuerillaEd, instructional technology, it, region 11, tutorials, videonot.es, videonotes

Now into my second month at Bath Spa University and I already feel as if I have been here forever Very impressed with the working environment. Stunning campus, nice office now complete with pictures. But there are a number of other things I am impressed with. Printing on the go (I know it’s nothing special but very convenient), just send your file go to the nearest printer, swipe your card and voila! Lots of recycling schemes, recycling bins everywhere. IT services are not only pleasant and friendly but efficient. Mac Book Pro up and running in no time, and now iPad Air (which I just love!) and mobile. Everyone uses Google Gmail and good drive for sharing. There is a good culture of sharing calendars as well. None of this is rocket science, but it all makes for a good working environment!

Google continues to amaze me.  Their stuff isn’t usually flashy, but it IS always useful. Dallas Google Leadership Symposium I was shown a cool new (for me) combination of Chrome Add-Ons that are super simple on the surface, but, because of their simplicity, can be used in a variety of ways by students, teachers, and administrators. Filed under: In The Classroom, Technology Tagged: annotate, annotating, annotation, chrome, classroom tech, classroom technology, clearly, docs, google, group activity

This is a story our local news station did on our #digcit unit: #Twitter Story: PHMS’ by @ICTPHMS #Vimeo http://vimeo.com/63169764  #Vimeo #SM Keloland Twitter Story: PHMS from Mr. Kirsch on Vimeo.

  DO I HAVE A DEAL  DECAL FOR YOU! I just discovered several hundred decals that I must have obtained from our Alumni Office (when it was called that) when my students and I used to do surveys of Carroll COLLEGE alumni.  I consider these priceless memorabilia but I am willing to give them to any former Carroll student who wants one and is willing to share with me one "Carroll Moment"—a brief reflection (positive or negative) on this blog and who also will send to me a snail mail address (send it to my Carroll email address) so that I can in turn send you a decal! I’d love hearing from you. Send me a photo from your Carroll days, and I’ll send you two decals. Offer good until I run out. Here are some "facts" about Carroll today. Hope that you can share with me a Carroll Moment. Keep those Facebook, Twitter, and Linkin messages coming. It is fun to stay in touch! David, Ralph, and Virginia             Filed under: alumni, Carroll College Waukesha, Carroll University, Curious David Tagged: Carroll Alumni, Carroll University, Commencement, Curious David

  Image from http://tinyurl.com/kzq3psu   I have just taken over leading the DiTE (Diversity in Teacher Education) project at Bath Spa University. In this post I will summarise the main focus of the project.   There is a major policy debate nationally - and indeed internationally - about the efficacy of different approaches to teacher education in the light of the challenges of preparing teachers for twenty-first Century schools., and in particular the  binary opposition of university-led versus school-led approaches to the training of teachers.   The project consists of four phases: The first phase is producing a picture of the landscape of teacher training and in particular the different routes. It will cover dimensions such as the: duration, level, cost, location and leadership of the provision and the demographic characteristics of the tutors and students involved in the different routes to Qualified Teacher Status (QTS). The second phase will involve in-depth exploration of the characteristics of a sample of different types of provision in terms of their aims, structure, qualifications and, most crucially, the student experience. The sample will include HEI-led partnerships offering BA(QTS) and PGCE courses. School-Centred ITT schemes, Teach First provision, School Direct and School Direct Salaried routes and the Troops to Teachers programme, and also perhaps those following the Assessment Only route to QTS including unqualified teachers recruited directly to Academies or Free Schools. The third phase will entail specifying and measuring any differential outcomes and effects of the different training routes studied in Phase 2. An attempt will also be made to determine different rates of employment and whether teachers trained on different routes have differential effects on pupils’ learning outcomes. The fourth phase will focus on dissemination and recommendations to policy makers. It will contribute to a broader understanding of processes of professional formation in teaching (and potentially allow comparisons with other professions).  

I was blessed with a demeanor that helped me quickly create fairly strong bonds with my high school seniors.  Despite my dry sense of humor, students could always tell that I cared about them whether I intended on communicating that fact or not. One sure fired way to build relationships was to use humor as a teaching strategy.  Later in my teaching career, I would try to use humor in the classroom to some degree (as this post on humor attests to).  Our year would usually start off with self demeaning humor to let them know that I wasn’t too full of myself. At first, though, I relied too much on what I knew and not enough on learning about my students early in my career.  I knew how to use Socratice questioning effectively and how to challenge my students thinking in a few other ways, but I over emphasized the surgical use of questioning strategies before I developed strong social bonds.  Few realize that questions, while they do make people think deeply, also look like attacks to those not used to them.  As we moved through the semester, I often to teach my students the lesson that thinking deeply means to think about thinking.  Students though, year after year, saw open ended questions as arenas to showcase their failure to grapple with them (or rather their lack of being exposed, in some cases, to questions like the ones I was throwing out).  The lesson I learned? You gotta take care of Maslow’s before you take care of Bloom’s. I have become a relationships first person.  Since those days, I’ve come to see that if you don’t package what you’re selling correctly…ain’t nobody gonna buy your product. I was goofing around with my children at a local Barnes & Noble a couple months ago.  They found the "Thomas the Train" table in the children’s section, so I stole a few moments to peruse the newest offerings. I came across Emotional Intelligence, a decade old book that I had heard about but never read.  I decided to purchase it in CD format and have since finished listening to it as I commuted to my new job.  As far as emphasizing relationships is concerned, I’m not sure I learned too much that I hadn’t figured out or experienced in my 10 years of teaching high school government.  However, "the why" of what I do that the book illuminated was astounding! One of my favorite lines in his book, Emotional Intelligence, Daniel Goleman recounts an explanation a neuroscientist at the Center for Neural Science at NYU, Joseph LeDoux, gave Mr. Goleman concerning the relationship between the emotional (amygdala) parts of the brain and the rational (hippocampus) parts of the brain: The hippocampus is crucial in recognizing a face as that of your cousin.  But it is the amygdala that adds you don’t really like her. While I’m certainly no neuroscientist, I can compare my personal experience to what I’ve read in chapter 2 (Anotomy of an Emotional Hijacking) of Emotional Intelligence and see some very distinct lines of symmetry between the two.  The lower levels of our brain, the book continues, developed first, as far as evolution is concerned.  Emotion came about as unthinking short cuts to action.  The hippocampus and neocortext are the thinking parts of the brain that developed later and allow us to be the complex creatures that we are. Everything we learn, Mr. Goleman states in his book, gets stamped to varying degrees with the "flavor" of the emotional environment via the amygdala. We recognize failure as debilitating if other’s reaction to our shortcomings (especially early in our lives) overshadow our attempt to learn from that failure.  If a student or friend fails and we support them in that failure, however, the supportive emotional flavor of the moment stamps our shortcoming as a step on our way to self actualization.  If educators (and many do) redefine "failure" as an open invitation to continue the learning the first few weeks of school, then students will be more willing to "fail". Once I learned to work on relationships, I found that I could ask deep and probing questions of my students.  Because of the safer environment AND because I announced that the most important questions in life are often "unanswerable" student’s felt secure that the only task I was asking them to perform was to support their answers.  The answers weren’t the point…the process was. This kid spent an inordinate amount of time preparing for a couple dozen failures.  When his contraption worked on the fourth attempt he was thrilled!  However, his success lasted mere moments…but his struggle to learn began the moment he was introduced to rube goldberg machines and likely continued far after his "success".  The true success here was the fact that his parents and teachers taught him that "failure" isn’t really a stopping point. Just as we need steps on stairs to ascent a building, failures can be thought of as mini stopping points on our climb to success. Plato once wrote "Be kind, for everyone is fighting a mighty struggle."  What he meant was that we are all fighting demons and the strongest demon is ourselves.  We really don’t need help from others to give that phantasm a voice.  We are our own worst enemy in our struggle to become self actualized.  To be told that we "failed" in  such a way that we no longer want to try…now we’re fighting two fronts in our battle to become who we were meant to be. Our perception of reality flows first through our senses, then the amygdala, and then the rest of the brain.  Everything gets stamped by emotion first and reason second.  It does not mean that emotion is superior to reason in every case, but it does mean that we must consider emotional environments before we consider reason. Humor, creativity, and innovation have a common ground…they challenge the status quo.  Being challenged to be innovative and creative can also be fun… again, as I outline in this post.Filed under: In The Classroom, Political Philosophy Tagged: amygdala, emotional intellignece, hippocampus, neocortex, plat, rube goldberg machine

Don’t know how to partake in a twitter chat? Follow the embed screencast and learn how.

My 3rd grade son, Charlie, found a way to screen-cast on iOS devices.  This is what he showed me.  Follow instructions at your own risk.  Not advocating these actions.  Just impressed that he figured this out on his own.  He may ground at a later date if this crashes his iPad. It’s worked well so far! Filed under: In The Classroom, Technology Tagged: classroom technology, ed tech, edtech, education technology, iRec, screencast, screencast ipad, screencast iphone, screencasting, screencasting ipad, screencasting iphone

Students quoted reflections on their Social Media Profiles verse their "hard copy" resumes. [View the story "Social Media may be more important than your Resume." on Storify]

Image Bild: CC BY-NC-SA Some rights reserved by Opedagogen   Nice blog post today by Alastair Creelman on collaboration. He begins by arguing that ‘Learning involves collaboration and interaction…’ He points to a guide that has been published, which describes the following facets of collaboration: Collaborative writing Shared workspace Curate Plan News gathering Screencasting Network E-meetings Research The guide describes tools that can be used to enable each of these; for example Google Drive for collaborative writing or Twitter for networking. A very useful and practical guide!

This post is password protected. You must visit the website and enter the password to continue reading.Filed under: Camtasia Studio, Curious David, Screencasting Tagged: Screenflow

Guest Post By Charles Cooper Our world is surrounded by mystery. We seek out limits to our knowledge when watching movies, reading dystopian books, and even as we converse with friends. The mysterious, framed the right way, compels us to seek and enrich our lives and who we are. Often times, absence of mystery in relationships, tired stories, and mundane routes to work put real pressures on us that effect our daily mindset. It’s torturous! The lack of a reliable source in Truth has compelled man for eons to explore, invent, create, and, at times, reorder perceived reality. Mystery and lack of answers compell. Having things or ideas handed to us without having work for those things, often, result in ingratitude and stagnation. How is your content delivered to students? Are you the source of all knowledge? Do your student struggle for your acceptance of their answer or do you struggle with your students as you seek, as partners in education, a new continent of knowledge and experience? None of us wants to be in a tired, drab relationship at home. Why would your students want anything differently at school? As educators, invite mystery, real mystery, into your classroom. Present something that you are ignorant in to your students and ask for their help! Ask your students "What breaks your heart in this world and what can we do about it?" If we are truly getting our kids ready for a future none of us can predict, then why are so many classrooms so predictable in so many ways? Spend a class period having your kids Google problems in the world, BIG problems, REAL problems, and brainstorm ways you all can get on the road to finding solutions, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant those problems may seem. Be a seeker of knowledge with your kids instead of a fictitious (and impossible) knower of all things. Lift THEM up. Knowing more than your kids is safe. Its a given on some levels. Take a risk and get your kids to know more than you… Then celebrate that and advertise it to your fellow teachers, your parents… The world. Leverage the unknown, the mysterious…to benefit your kids!Filed under: Government/Civics, In The Classroom Tagged: #edchat, education, mystery

What is Storify? Storify is a visual way to tell social media stories using your Tweets, Facebook updates, pics, and other social media information.  Storify is overwhelmingly a neat way to show how a story develops over social media — without you having to take screenshots and insert your own links. How to Use Storify: Luckily, it’s easy. First, create an account at Storify (you can log in with Twitter or Facebook). Click the blue "Create a Story" button in the top right hand corner. Look at the right side of the new screen where the icons of your favorite social media websites reside.   Click on any social media icon (like Twitter), then put in a username for that network you want to search. You’ll see all the recent Tweets from that person/hashtag/search query. Now, start dragging content from the right hand panel from the social media networks you are searching into the left hand panel where you are telling your story. Add words or titles. You are finished!! A story told in text and pictures via social media updates. Want an Example? Here’s one of my classes using storify. It’s a recap of our Digital Citizenship Chats we did on our #blogs.  

As part of the DiTE (Diversity in Teacher Education) project we are running a series of seminars. Today’s was given by Kate Reynolds (dean of education) and Pat Black. The focus of the seminar centred around two key questions: What is a qualified teacher and what is PGCE? And what are the associated policy issues? A key question is what is the future of teacher education? What is the impact of the diversity of routes into teacher education now available and what does it mean to be a teacher and what is the role of universities in teacher education?   Pat summarised some of the teacher initiatives of the past few years and associated policy perspectives. She mentioned in particular the November 2010 white paper on the importance of teacher education, highlighting the following recommendations: Teach first to expand Outstanding schools to be given role Bursaries for training More time in the classroom National framework for training State funded schools   She also referred to the 2011 report on training next generation of outstanding teachers.  Of particular note of course is the Carter review, which looked at teacher education. Carter undertook a review of initial teacher training (ITT). The core aim was to identify which core elements of high quality ITT across phases and subject disciplines are key to equipping trainees with the required skills and knowledge to become outstanding teachers. In addition, he looked at how to improve the transparency of training offers and access to course   Pat also referenced the report on the establishment of a new college of teaching referenced in the a world class teaching profession report, which I blogged about recently. She also mentioned the ‘A manifesto for teacher education’ report, which states that: Our schools and colleges need to be able to recruit qualified teachers who are experts in teaching and learning as well as subject specialisms.              

This post is password protected. You must visit the website and enter the password to continue reading.Filed under: Curious David, PSY205, Screencasts, SPSS

By all means, marry.  If you get a good wife, you’ll become happy; otherwise, you’ll become a philosopher. ~Socrates Socrates was married.  We know that from several sources.  Socrates had more than one child.  That is also mentioned in several sources (re: The Apology of Socrates).  Yet, when Socrates is moved to talk about love, he quotes, not his wife or another male philosopher, but Diotima of Matinea.  Unfortunately for the reader, the definition for love is never truly nailed down by the interlocutors, left confidently by Socrates as a painted canvas of wispy, enduring, natural/divine yearnings. Socrates understood explicitly… To our detriment, he fails to transfer that knowledge to us. Years, maybe decades, after their initial encounters, it was obvious Socrates’ interaction with Diotima had been a deep and permanent one.  Female philosophers were exceedingly rare, back in the day, and to have a man like Socrates quote a female during a male drinking party would have been "interesting" to the listeners. But, I’m getting ahead of myself… The Story I was talking with a friend the other day.  I can’t remember which friend or which day because my interest in the topic of philosophy, like a mild poison, sometimes blinds me to such details (re: Phaedo).  We allowed the discussion to lead us in which ever direction it wanted while noting, in passing, points of interest and new conversational landmarks, if any were spotted.  As many of my serious exchanges go, eventually we were lead to Plato and Socrates. Plato, of  course, is the author of so many dialogs that are, individually and collectively, intricate and mind blowing works.  His teacher, Socrates, chose not to write anything down in books or treatises (re: Phaedrus), but did teach Plato much of what he knew, as is assumed by many. As the source of such wonder and knowledge, one might ask, who taught Socrates what he knew? One of Socrates’ Teachers If we believe Plato’s (and other’s) account…Socrates was originally a natural philosopher or, as we would say today, a scientist (re: Aristophanes’ The Clouds). He was known to investigate things "above the clouds and below the earth" in his efforts to find Truth.  At the bottom of his search for Truth was his need to know how to live rightly.  Socrates was guided by the question, "How are we to live?" At some point in Socrates’ life, he comes into contact with Diotima, one of the few female philosophers in the Platonic corpus (re: Symposium). The above facts are recounted in one of Plato’s dialog on Love called…well… The Symposium (which is the bookend writing for The Republic…which mentions husbands and wives, but not love, interestingly enough…There is another dialog written on love, The Lysis, but it’s focus is friendship and love).  In the Symposium several men at a drinking party have a contest to define love…but each attempt fails because it is from their own very specific perspective.  For example, the doctor defines it in terms of the body, the comedic poet in terms of ultimate success in man challenging the gods, and the tragic poet in terms of futility against the gods. When it is Socrates’ turn to speak, he claims that Diotima had show him the true meaning of love.  According to her, love was a way to contemplate the divine.  For example, one may become linked in with a beautiful person, or soul, or both and fall completely in love.  Because man is a rational creature, the mind, despite the intense emotion, gravitates toward the nature of this emotion toward that old "friend".   Especially if the love is forbidden, contemplation quickly turns to the nature of this madness, love, and the nature of the person being loved.  The person and the emotion are separated.  When love is divorced from the person and thought of independent of a vehicle or carrier of love, that, says Diotima, is when the mind can turn to the Divine. Even erotic (ie. Eros… longing, not just sexual, you dirty birdies) attraction can lead the mind from the low to the high.  With the guide of reason even the lowly sexual desires can lead to high minded thinking and reasoning.  Without the guide of reason… well compare what happens, for example, at the end of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet on one hand and The Tempest on the other.  The missing element in one play was a careful guiding hand. As in all of his dialogs, Plato writes to several audiences simultaneously.  You have to pay attention to the setting, what is said, what is not said… to every sentence and the layers of meaning they create to really get what Plato is trying to hint at. Such is the case with his definition of love. In the Symposium there are seven major participants and, therefore, seven definitions of love.  The first few definitions are really bad definitions as they are limited by the speaker.  The doctor, Eryximachus, for example, can only talk about love as a function of the body and nothing more.  But the praises and definitinos of love get more and more complex until we end up with the final speaker on the nature of love…Socrates. Socrates, however, doesn’t define love.  He tells a story of our female philosopher.  He lets her define it for him.  She teaches him about love and he remembers years and, even, decades later. Why does Plato do this? Diotima We must turn our attention to Diotima, her characteristics, and her function as a knower in the dialog. Piecing together a few brief experiences and descriptions of this character, we find a tantalizing puzzle.  The following is my own interpretation based on the limited exposure we have to Diotima provided by Socrates and nothing more: She seems to have a very strong personality and is sure of herself.  This is likely the reason the head strong (younger) Socrates stays to listen to her and seeks to understand her completely.  She sees or has seen something that he has difficulty wrapping his mind around.  He is eager to see what she sees.  As a rational, science minded man concerned with inanimate things, Socrates is new to the concept of true and deep love that lifts one’s eyes beyond the physical.  Even the concept of the Divine might have been foreign to him at this point in life.  She is also described as incredibly beautiful, but, as we see in the latter parts of the Symposium, Socrates isn’t simply attracted to physical beauty (Alcibiades attests to this when he breaks into the party, already drunk himself, and wondering why Socrates never "loved" him…Alcibiades was always described as a very attractive person).  Socrates appreciates beauty, but sharp wit, sharp humor, and intellectual capacity is more akin to the beauty Socrates seeks out.  Further, as a "seer", Diotima’s eyes were particularly of interest for our philosopher.  She could see things that were beyond the scientists’ universe and that puzzled Socrates.  As a matter of fact, Diotima is credited with the change in focus that Socrates had from "out there" to "in here".  After his encounter with Diotima, Socrates begins to understand that the Truth cannot be systematized or be put into a formula.  He turns, then, to the Truth’s shadows…human opinions.  Socrates intimates that we all see/experience a different sliver or facet of the Truth, so if enough facets were put together we could get a clearer picture of his main concern, the right way to live.  Finally, there is an easiness to her approach to philosophy that catches Socrates off guard.  There is a joy to her practice of philosophy that, if you’ve ever talked to any philosophy major, doesn’t come naturally to most people who dabble in philosophy. To an extent, and this is my guess, Diotima seems to "be" what Socrates (at that time) was "trying to be".   She was a natural while he had to work, wonder, and contemplate.  Love, then, might be similar.  Diotima’s love covered all of the ground from the lowly physical to the Divine… it was a catalyst to compel people to reach for new heights.  It was a vehicle used to carry (inspire) anything to higher ground.  Socrates’ love was likely grounded in the physical because he was a natural philosopher (again, a scientist).   His chance meeting with her certainly changed that assumption since he was still thinking and talking about her and her views years later. The lesson Socrates might have learned is that the danger in trying to question/investigate love (philosophical or otherwise) too much is that you unravel a solid unified tapestry into its individual pieces…then wonder where it disappeared to.Filed under: Political Philosophy Tagged: diotima, diotima of manitea, philosophy, plato's symposium, platonic, socrates, symposium, the republic, xanthippe

Students in Mr. Kirsch’s ICT class reflections on the infographic describing information on how their Social Media profiles may be looked at more by employers verse their "hard copy" resume. Source: storify.com See on Scoop.it - FootprintDigital