Dyslexia, ADHD and Education

Education is an interesting subject. So many people have their ideas about standards and how to do it and when to introduce a certain subject to a child and on and on and blah blah blah.

Kids know intuitively when they're ready to move on or not. They know what they like and what they don't like. They know they have certain skill sets and that those subjects or sports or musical instruments or art or cooking or whatever it is...they know what makes them tick and what turns their brains on. Or off.

I was labeled a lot as a kid. I was a genius with a school problem. My IQ was off the chart, yet I cannot take a standard test to save my fucking life.

I was actually put in a remedial class (even though my IQ was genius level) because the standardized test (created by idiots) told these noodleheads that I didn't know how to do math or read.

Well. Hmm. If your IQ is well over 150, chances are you probably ain't dumb. If you are learning algebra and can write in cursive before you even go to kindergarten, there's probably something else going on.

Could it be the "system" and "institutionalized schooling" that is the issue? I was fortunate enough that my parents recognized that the system was failing me. That I was BORED out of my GOURD in those remedial classes.

So, they fought for me and got me into the advanced placement classes. There, of course, I flourished.

See, I have a form of a learning disability. I wasn't told that EVER, but I have had it since birth. If I wanted my Mom to pick me up? I said "Down, Mommy!" If I wanted her to put me down, I'd say "Up, Mommy!"

I still cannot, without really having to think of it, tell you "right" from "left." My brain simply does NOT work in those terms.

I am ambidextrous, I am a scientist and an artist, I have days of pure scientific thought and reading scientific papers on Theoretical Physics and then I have days where I make 5 flower arrangements and I feng shui the house or I cook a four course meal replete with wine pairings.

My brain is different. I've always known it. And then I was also born with good genetics, so I'm considered to be "pretty." I've got the nice small aqualine nose, big blue eyes and sandy blonde hair. For that reason, I was afforded a lot of extras along the way. I didn't have to fight too hard to get noticed, so it's kind of a shitty thing, but it's a true thing that pretty people generally get along more easily in life. I'm not questioned when I'm on a private beach. Or in a private club. Or in an exclusive party. I walk in like I own the place and people just assume I do. It's ridiculous, but it has gotten me some good contacts and I've tried my entire life to do good with the tools I've been afforded, even the looks part of it.

This is sounding very much like I'm full of myself and, I assure you, I am not. I have learned to be confident, and that's different. I certainly don't go around thinking I'm all that! In general, I feel dumpy and old, but I've been told otherwise, so I start believing that my crappy body image has been wrong all along. I was anorexic, and had terrible body dysmorphic disorder for a good 30 years of my life, so it's been a long road to get back to not hating my body.

So, the "institutional learning" didn't work for me. Experiential learning is what made me flourish. Learn by doing or learn by teaching. When I read, I get to the meat of an article. I don't need to really read something fully to understand it.

The details are not important, so those standardized tests that ask me:

"If a train is going 80 miles per hour and passes a junction at 5pm when will it get to its destination in Akron, Ohio when the sun is shining and there are 50 people on the train and one of them has tuberculosis and coughs near 5 other people?"

I don't know and I don't give a flying fuck. Who CARES? 

So, I'd just fill in a circle and move on to a question that I hoped made more sense to me!

"If all Bees are Boos and no Boos are Flips will Bees and Flips ever be together?"

Again, WHO CARES?

So, again, I'd fill in a circle, make a best guess, and then I'd move on to the next question.

Standardized tests are standards created by who knows? 

Who are these people who tell me how I should think?

Are these people "average" in their intelligence? Well, if that's the case, I don't EVER want to pass a standardized test! What an insult to my weird little brain!!

So, that's my problem. My achilles heel has been that my brain doesn't seem to work like other people's brains. I'm bossy, I'm opinionated, I think I know things that sometimes I am wrong, but at least I have the cojones to admit when I am mistaken!

However, I also know a lot of shit. A lot of shit about a lot of things. My curiosity knows no bounds. There isn't much that a person can throw at me that I cannot at least make a sufficient response so that they feel comfortable talking to me.

I read an important article by a pediatric occupational therapist today, thanks to my friend Megan who shared it on Facebook. It was featured in the Washington Post and it's entitled "Why so many kids can't sit still in school today." You can read the article HERE. The gist of it is that kids are being made to "sit still" and "pay attention."

They're basically oxygen deprived and have no core strength from lack of movement. 

Well, that sucks!

I know even for me, just in the time I've started writing this, well, I've been fidgeting, shifting in my seat, drinking a diet coke, change the way my posture is so that I'm not touching the back of my chair, I've bended, rubbed my back, turned around to look at my snoring dogs...

You get the picture. How often can you sit perfectly still? 

Now, I do not claim to be an expert at this stuff. Child psychology is NOT my forte. I was a mentor/teacher at college level for about 18 years. I had my whale research center called The Center for Oceanic Research and Education (CORE) for 10 years. We were an accredited non-profit and I had students from all over the world who would come and take part in my experiential learning program. Most of the kids got college credits for what we would do for them. 

It was the most rewarding and fun thing to do! And the classroom work? Totally minimal. We did about 20 hours of actual classroom, and the rest of the time (mostly these were 3 month programs, 5-6 days a week, 11-13 hour days) we were on the boat either doing the research, the education or both at the same time. We also had other types of field trips doing beach clean-ups, information booths at the library, creating educational art or other materials, hands-on programs in schools, we even built a life-sized inflatable whale and the little elementary-aged kids would just EAT THIS UP!

The kindergarten through 3rd grade kids were my favorite. We had a very brief slide show about whales, dolphins and porpoises, but mostly I let the kids lead the way and inform me about their knowledge of cetaceans and the ocean.

Each school visit was different. The program was never quite the same from group to group because each child has their own viewpoint about things. I learned stuff from the little ones that I'd never imagined because their curiosity was BOUNDLESS.

It was from a third grader in a school in Marblehead, MA that I first learned that polar bears are classified as a Marine Mammal! That little kid had done his research! Here I was a well-known, published whale researcher and I had to learn this from a third grader! 

I love that.

So, my point here is that sometimes adults are fucked. We have our rigid ideas about what's what and how this or that "should" be done, when, in fact, things change. People change and evolve. Nothing remains the same. Ever. Time marches forward and technology advances and it's sometimes very hard to keep up with it all...

I was speaking with my wonderful Dad and his lovely wife yesterday, and even my husband and then my Momma a few days ago about internet security issues. It's a BIG problem. Credit card scanners are every where these days and they don't even have to TOUCH your card to get your number. I've had my identity lifted THREE times just in the last six months. 

Luckily I know what to do to prevent incurring false charges against me like making reports to the Internet Crime Complaint Center and also making reports to your state's Attorney General's Office.

I've had to do this now multiple times on about 10 different issues from false advertising (Duplicell Facebook ad that was untrue), to identity theft (Sprint will NOT give me my money back even though I've clearly never had an account with them), Verizon (who says I used my phone when my phone was broken for 6 weeks and I had cancelled my service), to someone actually stealing my debit card numbers and making other charges in Kansas (I've never been there or bought anything from a company in Kansas).

So what you have to do is contact your bank or credit card company, report the false charges and they will try to intervene on your behalf. In the case of my bank, they could not get anywhere with Sprint or Duplicell, so I had to go directly to the companies. Duplicell was great, actually, and returned the money willfully but not without trying to make me feel stupid about not reading the "fine print" when, in fact, their Facebook ad said, "Free trial, just pay shipping." Well, that's not free in the first place, but the $3.95 shipping was fine. Then 14 days later they charged me another $85! Because I didn't return the product.

So, it wasn't a free trial at all. It was a paid trial. But the ad clearly stated "Free trial." So, they had to give the money back! Dummies.

And I'm still battling with Verizon and Sprint and that asshole Adam who now lives in Texas and charged on my Marblehead Garden Center account and then skipped out on the $140. I've filed claims against all of these fartheads. It's a total of about $800. 

Ridiculous.

Something that even my uber-intelligent relatives and husband didn't know is that when you log into your bank or your credit card company and you give them personal information, make sure your browser up there has the beginning of it say:  "https//..." If it says just "http://" without the "s" then you're not in a secured area on the internet.

That is Hypertext code (which I had to learn back in 1995) for "secure." So, the encoders know how to vet a company and they have a secured place on the internet for your private information like your Social Security number and your address and your maiden name and all those other security pieces of information that they ask for...

If your computer keeps booting you out of a site that is asking for this information, it's because it's likely NOT a secure site and you should not use that particular site. Sometimes the computer knows best.

If you receive an email that looks legit, but it's asking you to reset a password or give up any personal information? Well, it's likely a spam or phishing operating. Phishing is when they are "trolling" for personal, private information so that they can use it to steal your identity and commit fraud or whatever.

There are big operations out there making a shitload of money trying to get your information. Sprint, for instance, likely had someone out there trolling for information, and someone had stolen my debit card number and then, POOF, Sprint used my debit card numbers to charge me a little over $200 even though I have NEVER had an account with them. Never once. I used Verizon (and now they're being total assholes) and then I now use AT&T.

This is rampant, and I suggest that unless you pay your stuff with a secured credit card? You should go back to the old fashioned mailing in of checks or use PayPal which is a top-notch secure company.

Hackers have nothing better to do that make your life miserable. I am a bit of a hacker myself, but I use my knowledge to help make the internet and you safer. However, the hackers are MAKING money and I'm losing, so maybe you shouldn't trust me!!!  

I jest.

But, be safe out there. I've rambled on long enough.

Commence being kind again! 

Thanks for reading.