publishedmedium:psychology today

All Work and No Play Make the Baining the “Dullest Culture on Earth” | Psychology Today
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201207/all-work-and-no-play-make-the-baining-the-dullest-culture-earth

Fajans studied the Baining in the late 1970s and again in the early 1990s.  Like her predecessors, she found that they lacked the cultural structures that are the stock-in-trade of anthropology, such as myths, festivals, religious traditions, and puberty rites, and that the method of trying to learn about them through interviews produced little response. They did not tell stories, rarely gossiped, and exhibited little curiosity or enthusiasm. In Fajans’s words, “Their conversation is obsessively mundane, concerned primarily with food-getting and food-processing.”  She found, however, that she could study them by following them around and observing their daily activities and interactions.  From this she could discern their general cultural beliefs and values.  What she found is fascinating, at least to me.  By negative example, it tells us something about the value of play to human existence.

#enfants #éducation

What Leads Families to “Unschool” Their Children? Report II | Psychology Today
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201203/what-leads-families-unschool-their-children-report-ii

In response to Question 6a, 101 of the 232 families indicated that at least one of their children attended school prior to starting #unschooling, and that the child’s experience in school led them to remove the child from school.  In their explanations, 38 of these families referred specifically to the rigidity of the school’s rules or the authoritarian nature of the classroom as reason for removing the child; 32 referred to the wasted time, the paltry amount of learning that occurred, and/or to the child’s boredom, loss of curiosity, or declining interest in learning; and 32 referred to their child’s unhappiness, anxiety, or condition of being bullied.

#éducation

Video Game Addiction : Does It Occur ? If So, Why ? | Psychology Today
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201202/video-game-addiction-does-it-occur-if-so-why

Mike Langlois, who teaches a course in psychotherapy at my university, describes himself as a game-friendly psychotherapist. He works with clients who play video games, and he believes that many are suffering not from the gaming itself but from the stigma associated with it. People play games because they are challenging, fun, and conducive to social interaction with other gamers; but they are bombarded by messages from the larger culture suggesting that gaming is a sign of laziness, is “addictive,” and leads to all sorts of ill effects, and so they become concerned about their gaming. People who spend similar amounts of time at chess, or reading English literature, or skiing, don’t get these messages. The messages themselves, according to Langlois, can produce distress in gamers. As Langlois puts it, “The stereotype presents the gamer as apathetic and avoidant of any work or investment. One thing we know about stereotypes is that they can be internalized and lead to self-fulfilling negativism, and I’ve come to hear gamers refer to themselves as lazy slackers.”

#jeux_vidéo

The Many Benefits, for Kids, of Playing Video Games | Psychology Today
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201201/the-many-benefits-kids-playing-video-games

It is always a mistake, I think, to tell kids what they must or must not do, except in those cases where you are telling them that they must do their share of the chores around the house or must not do things that hurt you or other people. Whenever we prevent our kids from playing or exploring in the ways they prefer, we place another brick in a barrier between them and us. We are saying, in essence, “I don’t trust you to control your own life.” Children are suffering today not from too much computer play or too much screen time. They are suffering from too much adult control over their lives and not enough freedom

#éducation #enfants #jeux_vidéos

Is Real Educational Reform Possible? If So, How? | Psychology Today
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201108/is-real-educational-reform-possible-if-so-how

The pendulum never moves very far before it is pushed back in the other direction, because neither type of reform works. Progressive policies, inserted into a system in which children are still expected to learn a certain pre-specified set of skills and body of knowledge, don’t work because children on their own don’t choose to learn the specific curriculum that is expected of them. The no-nonsense policies of the traditionalists have the advantage of making it clear to children what they are supposed to do and learn, but those policies don’t work because they preclude creative thought and most strongly interfere with children’s natural ways of learning. Children may learn the rote material needed to pass tests, but they don’t remember it or use it in daily life because it has no meaning to them.

#éducation #ief

The Human Nature of Teaching II: What Can We Learn from Hunter-Gatherers? | Psychology Today
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201105/the-human-nature-teaching-ii-what-can-we-learn-hunter-gatherers

Hunter-gatherer children were the freest human children ever to have walked the earth. Hunter-gathers believed that children learn through their own, self-directed, self-initiated play and exploration, so they allowed their children unlimited time for such activities. In a survey of hunter-gatherer researchers that I helped to conduct some years ago, all said that the children in the group that they had studied were free to explore on their own, without adult guidance, essentially from dawn to dusk every day. They were allowed such freedom beginning at about age 4 (the age at which, according to hunter-gathers, children “have sense” and do not need to be watched regularly by adults) on into their mid to late teenage years, when they began to take on adult responsibilities. By providing children with food and other subsistence needs, and by not burdening them with many chores, hunter-gatherer adults allowed their children ample time to educate themselves.

#éducation #apprentissages

Wikileaks Emotional Diary of September 11th | Psychology Today
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evolved-primate/201008/wikileaks-emotional-diary-september-11th

#journalism #media #research #wikileaks #pdlt