I love calculus - all my designs in college were based on differential equations - all my reviewers got what I was doing because they kept referring to derivatives when critiquing my work.
Not only did I survive, I get to teach sophmore English tomorrow!
With calculus, I only had five students, so I had them teach me. I always learned best when teaching others, so I thought it'd be good for them. I had a blast, and the kids even commented on how I wasn't a yeller; I'd simply call them out by name when they needed to simmer down.
One of the students in the class taught our h.s. calculus class. The teacher couldn't do it.
Here is a link I used to help me brush up on mathematical concepts. It is like a search engine but the data is all objective and you can calculate anything that can be calculated. This is the calculus page. Wolphram Alpha Computational Knowledge Engine
well done sarah. it must be hard to teach material you aren't comfortable with. Out of curiosity, are schools not required to find specialists to take the role of specialists who are sick or whatever...?Or does your job literally mean you can be asked to teach any subject at all? that sounds like a real challenge!
very cool TK... that's a pretty big deal... congrats...
good job sarah...
i've been a substitute teacher of sorts this week too... the prof that teaches one of the history classes (modern movements) at temple is out of town for the week and i'm filling in for her... monday i gave a lecture on dutch modernism from berlage to WWII, which included the amsterdam school, de stijl, and nieuwe zakelijkheid... tomorrow i'm giving a lecture on postwar dutch modernism with a concentration on team 10 (my dissertation topic)... now if i could just get motivated enough to quit procrastinating and write the damn lecture...
also, if anyone is in the job market... charles renfro (of diller scofidio + renfro) lectured at temple last night and said that they are hiring!!!
jump i am not sure about Texas but i used to substitute while in grad school to help pay the bills and therefore know that at least in FL and i think many other states to be a sub requires very little (some states or counties require a high school diploma or maybe a BA) and nothing in the way of specific subject area knowledge. But that is just for subbing not regular teaching.
On a side note I am at home sick. Of course right? Get home from a vacation work a day and then out for more time off. I think it was all the walking in the rain around Atlanta Sunday that did me in.
Haven't really been able to celebrate yet (but had a beer once I got home last night after teaching). Got a deadline to finish the new intro to sustainability and design course proposal for spring semester. All those liberal education theme requirements and student learning objectives are keeping me up at night.
TK, unless it happened between last night's lecture and this morning he's still at DS+R... maybe your thinking of one of the OMA partners (i forget which one) that just launched their own gig...
Sarah you are so smart, getting the students to teach for you - seriously, it helps them learn. I'm glad the subbing is going well so far.
Finally taking a break tonight to go to a talk at our local museum on "emerging voices" in the local design scene. I need it, even if it's just an hour.
Jump, in Texas you need to have a bacholers, but it doesn't matter what subject. I've done special Ed, track, math, and today did English II. If you don't want to teach it, you just don't accept the job.
Sarah, I think that is a great way to teach something. I will need to remember that for if/when i end up teaching again. It seems a great teaching tool.
Donna, what barry said.
I am beat and still feeling sick so off to bed early.
Night all.
Hi all. I'm in Wisconsin fighting the good fight. There's lots of energy to be saved all over the place!
Also today we created a new unit of measurement out of my last name. The scale is 1 to 26 with 26 being the most awesome/intense. It can also be used as a verb, FYI.
treekiller congrats. treekiller - research fellow has a nice ring to it. I have my own bit of good news... which I'll reveal here before I do on the school blog.
It's official I'm one of the keynote speakers at the conference on sustainability in Puerto Rico. All I have to do is to turn my abstract into a full paper in 20 days, less the week the missus is here, so 2 weeks to turn it into a full blown paper that can possibly re-direct architecture in the Caribbean to more sustainable. I can do it right? right? sob!
I hate to be THAT guy about treekillers news, but $255,545 stretched over three years is kind of sad. At least compared to his spending plans...
If you hire an assistant for the awesome salary of $35K/year, the real salary expenses (if you include payroll taxes and health insurance + benefits) add up to just over $50K/year. At that rate a single assistant will cost you around $150K over the course of 3 years. Add your modest salary increase, and you are back to square one. Something is better than nothing, but you still have a long climb ahead of you.
Speaking of being negative tonight, I think it's sad that someone is being allowed to do a teacher sub-in for a topic she knows very little about. Especially given the fact that so much over-qualified labor is to be had out there. I've always been a fan of unions, but there are massive drawbacks: this scenario being one of them.
I know this thread is a great support group. I like it as such, and I plan posting my next accomplishment here (if and when). But tonight I'm feeling kind of scrappy! Yeah?! Wanna take that outside buddy? Wooo!
Steel, whats union got to do with it? I'm not part of any union. And all those unemployed people can sub. You just have to sign up, got to orientation, and then sign up for the gig. Pretty simple. Teaching English yesterday was much easier. I tired to engage the students, but the AP students didn't want to read the short story; they were just being lazy. The regular class I had read aloud, and we answered the questions as we went along. I tired to bring in connections with things they were familiar with - though mostly I was getting the cold shoulder. Buncha lazy kids, I tell ya.
Oh, and I always start off by introducing myself, and how I used to be an architect. They always ask why I would switch, and if I was rich. Ha! I'm busting that bubble before the poor saps get to college.
Speaking of being negative tonight, I think it's sad that someone is being allowed to do a teacher sub-in for a topic she knows very little about. Especially given the fact that so much over-qualified labor is to be had out there.
I'm sick and tired of the disrespect people have for educators - just because you know a bunch of shit in some subject doesn't mean you know how to teach. that's not what teaching is.
and subbing for one day is primarily classroom management. and if you ever have to sub for a bunch of troubled 7th and 8th graders - you could be f-ing stephen hawking genius and they'd completely destroy you if you don't know how to control a room and keep them engaged.
Yep, subbing in the high school-ish ages is basically keeping the kids from toking up during class. But if you can tell them some fun stories and not make them work too hard you'll all have fun, then it's back to the grind and discipline of their regular teacher the next day.
I had a sub in hs (and I still remember this, 30 years alter!) tell us the story of getting a flat tire and being offered a ride home by a woman who had to stop at her own house before taking him home - said house turned out to be a mansion staffed by terrifying guard dogs with a table covered with mail addressed to a company that sold sex toys and porn. The sub claimed to be scared to death that he would never be allowed to leave the house - so it was a (fully made up, no doubt) cautionary tale to us high schoolers about not accepting rides from strangers, basically. But it kept us enthralled for 45 minutes AND we felt special that this young sub was treating us like confidantes. Very smart guy.
And good on you, Sarah, for telling the kids architecture won't make you rich. We've either got to start meeting that myth or destroying it, and the latter seems more plausible.
YOU CAN DO IT, TECHNO!!!!! Just tell the lady you can't help with any wedding planning in the next three weeks.
I think I learned how to be a squash buckling pirate with my T-Square under the guidance of a substitute teacher.....Those were the days my friend. Talk about classroom control...yahoo!
steelstuds, you more or less nailed how thin that budget is in terms of salaries. But we're hiring grad students (yes, they get benefits) as our Research Assistants (not full time), so the money goes farther. Also, the faculty salaries are front loaded to the first year for developing the course and all the other programs. The first pass at the budget was up at $500k for the three years, and we had to aim for $250k to get approved...
hey, has anyone here used Idea Paint for any projects? We're looking at it at work, but one guy here keeps saying how short-lived white board paint is, so I was wondering about whether you guys might have experience with it?
I hate reading things like this cause it tells you how screwed up "Scientific Research" actually is. Think of the Billions and Billions of dollars which go to Medical Research...then think about Architectural Research. If we can solve it with a pill we will. Architecture on the other hand is like an Sex Infected Central American Human... Then go pay your health insurance which is a fricking 80/20 program with the ultimate decductable of $20,000.00 a year....
Ok, so I knew you could walk around streets on google earth in America, but I didn't realize they had also done the rest of the world. Between weather.com's compair monthly averages feature and google earth, you can pretty much determine if you'd even like living in a place before moving. I can also tell if husband would be able to continue working on Mercedes and BMW. Seems most cars on the roads are puegots and fiats.
Oh, I have my tech Ed testthat determines if I'm smart enough to teach architecture. This is my future. Wish me luck!
we use google street view to check out properties all the time. it saves taking a trip to see a rubbish bit of land. For the sites we do take a look at makes it easier to find the place to begin with (there are almost no street names in japan so getting somewhere is much easier with visual cues). amazing to think how much the internet and google has changed things and we hardly even notice.
good luck archi! i find i need about a week to push out an 8 page paper, myself. on average i can manage a page or two a day if i really get into it. which is why it takes a year to write a phd even with all the legwork done ;-) real writers are so amazing to be putting out that much and more and make it seem all so effortless.
funny donna, i thought he was bragging not trying to caution you all!
good luck sarah. am sure you will do well. am curious what you would teach in high school anyway about architecture? at my high-school we had drafting class but it was really just nonsense and not a proper course at all. in texas, can you study architecture as part of HS curriculum?
all LAs and planning folks: I'm currently doing some research on buried streams and rivers in urban areas - anyone have any recommendations for books/articles?
totally an anti-green/sustainable question... but a student asked if there was a book that believed environmental concern was bs and I was stumped (perhaps most of my reading is one sided?) DJ, treekiller, *melt and any other greenies is there such a book? Have you burnt them all?
Jump you are a far greater writer than I... I can write about 1.5 pages but by the time it's edited it's usually about 2 paragraphs. But I will get better (positive mantra). Today I summarised my 3 page curriculum vitae to 125 words, and my one page lecture abstract to 3 sentences.
I think I got a solid 90 on the test. I had to guess on some of the manufacturing type questions, and some of the computer related things, but I feel so great about it. I can't wait to tell the principal, if he interviews me, to explain how I can tie the English class lesson over Lord of the Flies to logier (sp?) and the primative hut, and bring it all to present with designing relief housing.
If your student is interested in counterclaims-- I'd suggest they look into a lot of the journals put out by the Cato Institute.
As much as I do hate them, a majority of their reasoning when it comes to urban planning and architecture is somewhat sound even if they are dodging the question.
One specific topic I remember was Cato's stance on why high-speed rail is patently absurd. They do admit that in many cases there isn't the right environment for it.
And they were taking a very anti-public transportation stance while only using high-speed rail as a counter example (but not necessarily rapid transit, light rail or subway).
Anyways, they reasoned that high-speed rail would not only be an ultimate failure but the cost of instituting high-speed rail as a transportation option was so expensive that they could just buy every projected public transport rider a brand new Cadillac with gas for the next decade.
Another recent but interesting stance from Cato is that global climate change is anthropologically-linked "in some regards" but no known solution would have any significant impact on slowing, changing or reversing climate change.
In their argument, it is a essentially worthless and expensive pursuit to try to change that course.
However, I've also seen another argument from Cato that-- while impossible to steer climate change-- energy conservation is a worthwhile pursuit as saving energy would allow us to expend it at further, possibly more important points in the near future.
@Unicorn: Cato Institute is primarily funded by Coch brothers. Same people who are funding the Tea Party and have sunk 100's of millions into fighting the global warming (aka. climate change) facts. That libertarian think-thank should just not be mentioned in these circles.
Also Unicorn: your lashing out on that dude trying to (poorly) design a house for his parents and a disabled brother was way out of line. Grow a pair and stop picking on people that need the most encouragement. It's just weak.
wrote a lot of stuff refuting compactness as a solution to climate change.
there is a lot of that sort of thing in urban planning world. books refuting climate change are also common. writers who say architecture need not do this or that i haven't come across. i guess those who feel that way are satisified with refuting the issue in abstract level and simply don't get to the architecture itself....
I'm sick and tired of the disrespect people have for educators - just because you know a bunch of shit in some subject doesn't mean you know how to teach. that's not what teaching is blah blah blah blah
I completed most of my formal education in Canada. It was challenging and educational. I've since migrated to US about a decade ago. Most of my US peers here have horror stories of their public school experience. From gross incompetence to molestation (private schools are not that much better). Most of public school teachers I've known in NYC (and I've known a bunch) were raging alcoholics. Most of teachers outside of NYC I've known have been barely literate. And between the alcoholics and illiterates they too had stories of other teachers being incompetent molesters.
Something is seriously screwy with the US PE system. Bush's No child left behind was an act of sabotage/treason. Teacher's unions have responded in a fashion reminiscent of tea party's tactics. The whole thing looks fucked.
I appreciate Sarah's enthusiasm, but as any other reasonable human being, I picture her walking away from this job with tears in her eyes,
toaster, check out this art project Charting Pogue's Run in which a local artist mapped the underground/urbanly destroyed stream onto the surface of the streets.
I for one would be relieved to see rockandhill/hillandrock/orochi/unicorn gone from Archinect forever. And that's the last time I'll waste any electronic bits on that topic.
I would certainly refine the lesson before I taught it, but just forming the idea is enough to impress a principal, I think. I can't wait for those test scores.
ugh... we shall not speak of such things nam... especially since my wife's family is all from alabama...
my studio is presenting their first stab at actual architecture (rather than site research/mapping) tomorrow... i'm excited to see what they'll have... they've been working in groups of 2 or 3 throughout the first phase of the studio and i was shocked last week when i gave them the option of continuing to work in groups or as individuals during the design phase and they all decided to keep working in groups... then on wednesday i'm gonna be on one of the other "research studio" reviews, so i'll have a chance to scope out the competition too!
Phillip you are right Gottfried Semper did talk about the primitive hut, and specifically the Caribbean hut of the Amerindians (Tainos & Caribs) that occupied the islands of the Anglo-phonic West Indies. Hi witness of this artefact was at the London Exposition of 1851 and he made comparative observations of the skin/structure relationship of the hut and the design of the Crystal palace itself - an argument that would later be used to understand the work of Foster, Grimshaw, HdM etc.
I give out the first real assignment to the graduate students on Tuesday. The course is centred around the integration of technology in the design of architecture. This primary assignment is the creation of a reference book and includes renewable topics - should be fun.
Thread Central
I love calculus - all my designs in college were based on differential equations - all my reviewers got what I was doing because they kept referring to derivatives when critiquing my work.
Not only did I survive, I get to teach sophmore English tomorrow!
With calculus, I only had five students, so I had them teach me. I always learned best when teaching others, so I thought it'd be good for them. I had a blast, and the kids even commented on how I wasn't a yeller; I'd simply call them out by name when they needed to simmer down.
One of the students in the class taught our h.s. calculus class. The teacher couldn't do it.
Here is a link I used to help me brush up on mathematical concepts. It is like a search engine but the data is all objective and you can calculate anything that can be calculated. This is the calculus page. Wolphram Alpha Computational Knowledge Engine
well done sarah. it must be hard to teach material you aren't comfortable with. Out of curiosity, are schools not required to find specialists to take the role of specialists who are sick or whatever...?Or does your job literally mean you can be asked to teach any subject at all? that sounds like a real challenge!
that is awesome TK! you are def on the way!
very cool TK... that's a pretty big deal... congrats...
good job sarah...
i've been a substitute teacher of sorts this week too... the prof that teaches one of the history classes (modern movements) at temple is out of town for the week and i'm filling in for her... monday i gave a lecture on dutch modernism from berlage to WWII, which included the amsterdam school, de stijl, and nieuwe zakelijkheid... tomorrow i'm giving a lecture on postwar dutch modernism with a concentration on team 10 (my dissertation topic)... now if i could just get motivated enough to quit procrastinating and write the damn lecture...
also, if anyone is in the job market... charles renfro (of diller scofidio + renfro) lectured at temple last night and said that they are hiring!!!
jump i am not sure about Texas but i used to substitute while in grad school to help pay the bills and therefore know that at least in FL and i think many other states to be a sub requires very little (some states or counties require a high school diploma or maybe a BA) and nothing in the way of specific subject area knowledge. But that is just for subbing not regular teaching.
On a side note I am at home sick. Of course right? Get home from a vacation work a day and then out for more time off. I think it was all the walking in the rain around Atlanta Sunday that did me in.
thanks!
Haven't really been able to celebrate yet (but had a beer once I got home last night after teaching). Got a deadline to finish the new intro to sustainability and design course proposal for spring semester. All those liberal education theme requirements and student learning objectives are keeping me up at night.
Phil, didn't Renfro just launch his own firm?
TK, unless it happened between last night's lecture and this morning he's still at DS+R... maybe your thinking of one of the OMA partners (i forget which one) that just launched their own gig...
Sarah you are so smart, getting the students to teach for you - seriously, it helps them learn. I'm glad the subbing is going well so far.
Finally taking a break tonight to go to a talk at our local museum on "emerging voices" in the local design scene. I need it, even if it's just an hour.
i believe it was Ole Scheeren
Jump, in Texas you need to have a bacholers, but it doesn't matter what subject. I've done special Ed, track, math, and today did English II. If you don't want to teach it, you just don't accept the job.
Donna, I'm surprised that you're not presenting your 'emerging voice'...
Sarah, I think that is a great way to teach something. I will need to remember that for if/when i end up teaching again. It seems a great teaching tool.
Donna, what barry said.
I am beat and still feeling sick so off to bed early.
Night all.
Thanks you guys, but I'm not emerging. I more float lazily along on the surface.
The event was really fun - one super-energizing designer especially, and I got a glass of wine!
Hi all. I'm in Wisconsin fighting the good fight. There's lots of energy to be saved all over the place!
Also today we created a new unit of measurement out of my last name. The scale is 1 to 26 with 26 being the most awesome/intense. It can also be used as a verb, FYI.
Whoops, almost forgot: congrats, tk! That's awesome! We should talk about energy modeling sometime...
treekiller congrats. treekiller - research fellow has a nice ring to it. I have my own bit of good news... which I'll reveal here before I do on the school blog.
It's official I'm one of the keynote speakers at the conference on sustainability in Puerto Rico. All I have to do is to turn my abstract into a full paper in 20 days, less the week the missus is here, so 2 weeks to turn it into a full blown paper that can possibly re-direct architecture in the Caribbean to more sustainable. I can do it right? right? sob!
I hate to be THAT guy about treekillers news, but $255,545 stretched over three years is kind of sad. At least compared to his spending plans...
If you hire an assistant for the awesome salary of $35K/year, the real salary expenses (if you include payroll taxes and health insurance + benefits) add up to just over $50K/year. At that rate a single assistant will cost you around $150K over the course of 3 years. Add your modest salary increase, and you are back to square one. Something is better than nothing, but you still have a long climb ahead of you.
Speaking of being negative tonight, I think it's sad that someone is being allowed to do a teacher sub-in for a topic she knows very little about. Especially given the fact that so much over-qualified labor is to be had out there. I've always been a fan of unions, but there are massive drawbacks: this scenario being one of them.
I know this thread is a great support group. I like it as such, and I plan posting my next accomplishment here (if and when). But tonight I'm feeling kind of scrappy! Yeah?! Wanna take that outside buddy? Wooo!
Well I think it's wonderful news. Congrats TK on getting the funding!!!
Great job Sarah with the subbing!!! I too feel that getting the kids to "teach" you is one of the best ways to learn the subject.
Congrats Atechno!!! That's incredbily exciting nes.
Donna - you might think you are just a floater but seeing you in action I know that just in't the case.
I love the fact I know such awesome movers and shakers. Keep up the good work folks.
Steel, whats union got to do with it? I'm not part of any union. And all those unemployed people can sub. You just have to sign up, got to orientation, and then sign up for the gig. Pretty simple. Teaching English yesterday was much easier. I tired to engage the students, but the AP students didn't want to read the short story; they were just being lazy. The regular class I had read aloud, and we answered the questions as we went along. I tired to bring in connections with things they were familiar with - though mostly I was getting the cold shoulder. Buncha lazy kids, I tell ya.
Oh, and I always start off by introducing myself, and how I used to be an architect. They always ask why I would switch, and if I was rich. Ha! I'm busting that bubble before the poor saps get to college.
I'm sick and tired of the disrespect people have for educators - just because you know a bunch of shit in some subject doesn't mean you know how to teach. that's not what teaching is.
and subbing for one day is primarily classroom management. and if you ever have to sub for a bunch of troubled 7th and 8th graders - you could be f-ing stephen hawking genius and they'd completely destroy you if you don't know how to control a room and keep them engaged.
Yep, subbing in the high school-ish ages is basically keeping the kids from toking up during class. But if you can tell them some fun stories and not make them work too hard you'll all have fun, then it's back to the grind and discipline of their regular teacher the next day.
I had a sub in hs (and I still remember this, 30 years alter!) tell us the story of getting a flat tire and being offered a ride home by a woman who had to stop at her own house before taking him home - said house turned out to be a mansion staffed by terrifying guard dogs with a table covered with mail addressed to a company that sold sex toys and porn. The sub claimed to be scared to death that he would never be allowed to leave the house - so it was a (fully made up, no doubt) cautionary tale to us high schoolers about not accepting rides from strangers, basically. But it kept us enthralled for 45 minutes AND we felt special that this young sub was treating us like confidantes. Very smart guy.
And good on you, Sarah, for telling the kids architecture won't make you rich. We've either got to start meeting that myth or destroying it, and the latter seems more plausible.
YOU CAN DO IT, TECHNO!!!!! Just tell the lady you can't help with any wedding planning in the next three weeks.
I think I learned how to be a squash buckling pirate with my T-Square under the guidance of a substitute teacher.....Those were the days my friend. Talk about classroom control...yahoo!
WTF moment of the day:
US govt infected Guatemalans with syphilis in 1940s
not only syphilis, but also gonorrhea.
simpler times indeed.
Without reading the article, did the Guatemalans at least enjoy being infected?
steelstuds, you more or less nailed how thin that budget is in terms of salaries. But we're hiring grad students (yes, they get benefits) as our Research Assistants (not full time), so the money goes farther. Also, the faculty salaries are front loaded to the first year for developing the course and all the other programs. The first pass at the budget was up at $500k for the three years, and we had to aim for $250k to get approved...
hey, has anyone here used Idea Paint for any projects? We're looking at it at work, but one guy here keeps saying how short-lived white board paint is, so I was wondering about whether you guys might have experience with it?
You guys could always just buy a quart, paint a surface, and then do your best to destroy it. You know, just as a test.
I hate reading things like this cause it tells you how screwed up "Scientific Research" actually is. Think of the Billions and Billions of dollars which go to Medical Research...then think about Architectural Research. If we can solve it with a pill we will. Architecture on the other hand is like an Sex Infected Central American Human... Then go pay your health insurance which is a fricking 80/20 program with the ultimate decductable of $20,000.00 a year....
thanks Donna
13 days to finish my paper... I've at least laid out some stuff. I'm thinking of squeezing the arm of a student to aim in some fancy graphics
Ok, so I knew you could walk around streets on google earth in America, but I didn't realize they had also done the rest of the world. Between weather.com's compair monthly averages feature and google earth, you can pretty much determine if you'd even like living in a place before moving. I can also tell if husband would be able to continue working on Mercedes and BMW. Seems most cars on the roads are puegots and fiats.
Oh, I have my tech Ed testthat determines if I'm smart enough to teach architecture. This is my future. Wish me luck!
we use google street view to check out properties all the time. it saves taking a trip to see a rubbish bit of land. For the sites we do take a look at makes it easier to find the place to begin with (there are almost no street names in japan so getting somewhere is much easier with visual cues). amazing to think how much the internet and google has changed things and we hardly even notice.
good luck archi! i find i need about a week to push out an 8 page paper, myself. on average i can manage a page or two a day if i really get into it. which is why it takes a year to write a phd even with all the legwork done ;-) real writers are so amazing to be putting out that much and more and make it seem all so effortless.
funny donna, i thought he was bragging not trying to caution you all!
good luck sarah. am sure you will do well. am curious what you would teach in high school anyway about architecture? at my high-school we had drafting class but it was really just nonsense and not a proper course at all. in texas, can you study architecture as part of HS curriculum?
congrats to all award winners, grant recipients, newlyweds and emerging emergers...
hi vado!
all LAs and planning folks: I'm currently doing some research on buried streams and rivers in urban areas - anyone have any recommendations for books/articles?
Toaster-
try searching for these projects:
Anne Winston Spirn's West Philly project was one of the first.
i did some work on the urban design around the daylighting of Saw Mill River in Yonkers NY
then there is the grand pombah of all daylighting schemes: the Cheonggyecheon in Seoul.
much congrats to tk! what a great crowd I am blessed to be able to mingle upon.
Sarah, I am also interested in your teaching experiences. keep 'em coming.
totally an anti-green/sustainable question... but a student asked if there was a book that believed environmental concern was bs and I was stumped (perhaps most of my reading is one sided?) DJ, treekiller, *melt and any other greenies is there such a book? Have you burnt them all?
Jump you are a far greater writer than I... I can write about 1.5 pages but by the time it's edited it's usually about 2 paragraphs. But I will get better (positive mantra). Today I summarised my 3 page curriculum vitae to 125 words, and my one page lecture abstract to 3 sentences.
I think I got a solid 90 on the test. I had to guess on some of the manufacturing type questions, and some of the computer related things, but I feel so great about it. I can't wait to tell the principal, if he interviews me, to explain how I can tie the English class lesson over Lord of the Flies to logier (sp?) and the primative hut, and bring it all to present with designing relief housing.
BTW, it was Logier, right?
ATP--
If your student is interested in counterclaims-- I'd suggest they look into a lot of the journals put out by the Cato Institute.
As much as I do hate them, a majority of their reasoning when it comes to urban planning and architecture is somewhat sound even if they are dodging the question.
One specific topic I remember was Cato's stance on why high-speed rail is patently absurd. They do admit that in many cases there isn't the right environment for it.
And they were taking a very anti-public transportation stance while only using high-speed rail as a counter example (but not necessarily rapid transit, light rail or subway).
Anyways, they reasoned that high-speed rail would not only be an ultimate failure but the cost of instituting high-speed rail as a transportation option was so expensive that they could just buy every projected public transport rider a brand new Cadillac with gas for the next decade.
Another recent but interesting stance from Cato is that global climate change is anthropologically-linked "in some regards" but no known solution would have any significant impact on slowing, changing or reversing climate change.
In their argument, it is a essentially worthless and expensive pursuit to try to change that course.
However, I've also seen another argument from Cato that-- while impossible to steer climate change-- energy conservation is a worthwhile pursuit as saving energy would allow us to expend it at further, possibly more important points in the near future.
@Unicorn: Cato Institute is primarily funded by Coch brothers. Same people who are funding the Tea Party and have sunk 100's of millions into fighting the global warming (aka. climate change) facts. That libertarian think-thank should just not be mentioned in these circles.
Also Unicorn: your lashing out on that dude trying to (poorly) design a house for his parents and a disabled brother was way out of line. Grow a pair and stop picking on people that need the most encouragement. It's just weak.
wrote a lot of stuff refuting compactness as a solution to climate change.
there is a lot of that sort of thing in urban planning world. books refuting climate change are also common. writers who say architecture need not do this or that i haven't come across. i guess those who feel that way are satisified with refuting the issue in abstract level and simply don't get to the architecture itself....
@ sarah. i think its spelled laugier.
Toaster said:
I'm sick and tired of the disrespect people have for educators - just because you know a bunch of shit in some subject doesn't mean you know how to teach. that's not what teaching is blah blah blah blah
I completed most of my formal education in Canada. It was challenging and educational. I've since migrated to US about a decade ago. Most of my US peers here have horror stories of their public school experience. From gross incompetence to molestation (private schools are not that much better). Most of public school teachers I've known in NYC (and I've known a bunch) were raging alcoholics. Most of teachers outside of NYC I've known have been barely literate. And between the alcoholics and illiterates they too had stories of other teachers being incompetent molesters.
Something is seriously screwy with the US PE system. Bush's No child left behind was an act of sabotage/treason. Teacher's unions have responded in a fashion reminiscent of tea party's tactics. The whole thing looks fucked.
I appreciate Sarah's enthusiasm, but as any other reasonable human being, I picture her walking away from this job with tears in her eyes,
toaster, check out this art project Charting Pogue's Run in which a local artist mapped the underground/urbanly destroyed stream onto the surface of the streets.
I for one would be relieved to see rockandhill/hillandrock/orochi/unicorn gone from Archinect forever. And that's the last time I'll waste any electronic bits on that topic.
vado you live! Yay!
studs, i agree on both counts (CATO and UG, who appears to have gone off his meds again)...
definitely spelled laugier... didn't semper talk about the primitive hut too? laugier = trabeation and semper = weaving, if i remember correctly...
HI VADO!
I would certainly refine the lesson before I taught it, but just forming the idea is enough to impress a principal, I think. I can't wait for those test scores.
Hiya Vado,
Morning all. It is a beautiful fall morning here in Florida finally. No big plans for today...
Phil, how about them gators (fail)
ugh... we shall not speak of such things nam... especially since my wife's family is all from alabama...
my studio is presenting their first stab at actual architecture (rather than site research/mapping) tomorrow... i'm excited to see what they'll have... they've been working in groups of 2 or 3 throughout the first phase of the studio and i was shocked last week when i gave them the option of continuing to work in groups or as individuals during the design phase and they all decided to keep working in groups... then on wednesday i'm gonna be on one of the other "research studio" reviews, so i'll have a chance to scope out the competition too!
Phillip you are right Gottfried Semper did talk about the primitive hut, and specifically the Caribbean hut of the Amerindians (Tainos & Caribs) that occupied the islands of the Anglo-phonic West Indies. Hi witness of this artefact was at the London Exposition of 1851 and he made comparative observations of the skin/structure relationship of the hut and the design of the Crystal palace itself - an argument that would later be used to understand the work of Foster, Grimshaw, HdM etc.
I give out the first real assignment to the graduate students on Tuesday. The course is centred around the integration of technology in the design of architecture. This primary assignment is the creation of a reference book and includes renewable topics - should be fun.
Richard Meier's daughter, Ana, was married last week. The NYT's gave her the wedding spread for their Sunday publication.
Of course Meier's daughter had a white wedding.
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