Title: E. Alana James, Ed.D. working as an independent academic consulting for: Jones International, Cololorado Technical and Walden Universities For more information and/or data please contact: E. Alana James8 CastleparkKinsale, Co. Cork, Ireland00353-(0) This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it      

Last Thursday night our intercultural group met to talk about the recession. I brought two things: food that was leftover from another event that day which included bread pudding made from those leftovers, and a lot of enthusiasm for O’Bama’s speech on the previous Tuesday. It seems to me that both sum up my ideas about the appropriate responses to economic downturns: 1) make the most of what you have and share with others, and b) encourage the world leaders to put money into building up areas of their countries infrastructures at the same time putting people to work. This morning I woke up a little disturbed... (Interested? To find out more click the read more link)

    GEEEEEZ- been here three years and still I am unpacking the differences between UK and US English (let along Irish English which is a mixture with its own peculiarities.  The new information/understanding that came to light on Friday night was that cardigans are not jumpers.  Here I had thought that jumper was synonymous with sweater - after all in most cases you hear it when you are referring to sweater.  What I did not realize was that cardigan (which I would maybe call cardigan but most likely title sweater as well) is clearly NOT included here in the jumper category.  Oh no  - cardigans are not jumpers even though both are sweaters. Got that straight? How about your puddings?  Are they sweet or savory?  Savory is not a word that I used in the states but here it is a clear delineation with foods being either it or sweet.  Puddings on the other hand are NOT the semi gelatinous but cloudy variety that cluster in the chocolate, vanilla or tapioca range.  Rather puddings are (or so I have sorted it out as of now) to be any desert.  But just as with sweater in the US there are many varieties.  Whether or not cakes or pies are included in puddings, I am still not clear, but I am sure that cookies are not because they don't have cookies here, they have biscuits.  Cookie, when it was used in the home of one of our friends ONLY referred to the classic Toll House or chocolate chip (as that is the one that is truly linked to America).  It is also the one that does not necessarily appeal to the tastes of our neighbours. But then you know what they say about taste and the fact that there is no…

At the time of this writing, in the fall of 2009, I am 56 years of age.  I start with that because this is an age where people wrestle with thoughts about whether or not they are getting old.  One half of the equation is that age is a state of mind, yet as an educator, I think the other half has to do with whether or not we keep learning.  Fortunately for those of us who want to stay young, or reinvent part of our lives, neuroscience, transformation and creativity have ideas we can work with. I will take them one at a time: Neuroscience The message from neuroscience is our brains are designed for flexibility. interested? Follow the Read More Link

References Attwell, G. (2009). Social software, personal learning environments and the future of teaching and learning (pp. 1-13): Scribd. Begley, S. (2007). Train your mind, change your brain : how a new science reveals our extraordinary potential to transform ourselves. New York: Ballantine Books.   Elliott, J. (2003). Interview with John Elliott. Educational Action Research, 11(2), 169-180.   Granovetter, M. (1973). The strength of weak ties: A network theory The American Journal of Sociology, 78(6), 1360-1380.   Hickman, L. (Ed.). (1998). The essential Dewey, Volume 1: Pragmatism, education, democracy Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press.   Illich, I. (1971). Deschooling society ([1st ed.). New York,: Harper & Row.   James, E. A. (2006a). An evaluation of Web-Based Professional Development using participatory action research to study educational disadvantage in the United States. Paper presented at the European Conference on Educational Research 2006, Geneva, Switzerland.   James, E. A. (2006b). A study of PAR for educators developing new practise in areas of educational disadvantage. Educational Action Research, 14(4).   James, E. A. (2009). Participatory action research as professional development: Creating new education practices for homeless or highly mobile students in the United States. Saarbrucken, Germany: VDM Verlag.   James, E. A., & McKay Epp, B. (2007). The third year outcomes of participatory action research facilitated online Paper presented at the British Educational Research Association Annual Conference, Institute of Education, University of London, 5-8 September 2007   James, E. A., Milenkiewicz, M., & Bucknam, A. (2008). Participatory action research: Data driven decision making for educational leadership. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.   Laszio Barabasi, A. (2005). Network theory-the emergence of the creative enterprise, Science (Vol. 308, pp. 639-642): AAAS.   Mitra, S. (2007). Sugata Mitra shows how kids teach themselves. Paper presented at the TED, Geneva Switzerland.   Mitra, S., Dangwal, R., Chatterjee, S., Jha,…