OneOfMany

Welcome aboard! I’m trying to brainstorm a punchy campaign slogans, like:
Make America Bound in Darkness Again
It’s Eternal Doom Again in America
Evil Overlords We Can Believe In

tsk tsk tsk, what’s with with all these bush-league tickets? Go big or go home, VOLDEMORT/SAURON 2024

Wow, hi arwsf and JayMatt19! Let’s keep this golden oldies reunion going!

Also, does anyone know where the subtitles went? I feel so lost without them…

Your priorities are messed up if you’re complaining that a student’s questions “zap you of your enthusiasm.” Teaching is (or at least, should be) about addressing the student’s needs, not the teacher’s. Enthusiasm should be generated through interaction with your students, not from your satisfaction with your lesson.

My suggestion: try legitimately addressing the points she raises. Don’t write them off as mockery, even if it IS clear that she’s only questioning out of belligerence. Don’t try to divert her with unrelated incentives. Don’t be defensive or evasive if you can’t give her an answer–say, “That’s a good question, I need some time to think about it,” and try to prepare something that SHE will find meaningful. If she’s putting a negative spin on everything you say–try to look past the negativity, pinpoint the issue she’s bringing up and open it for discussion. Whatever you do, be straightforward and level-headed, and don’t let your pride or personal outrage get in the way. If you do that, I think you’ll find that she will respect you more and might even be willing to listen to what you have to say.

Also, in general, try to have an bit of leeway for an open forum during the lesson. Don’t try too hard to keep to your script. Mentally prepare yourself for spontaneous discussion, and encourage it. Don’t make this about “fixing” this student–it’s really an opportunity for you to develop better teacher skills and genuinely engage your students.

You really are a Randroid, aren’t you.

Funny you mention that, because the full quote is:

“People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually, from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint, it’s more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly…timey-wimey…stuff.”

whoever will give me free doughnuts

A bad wind…is a sign of no good…? Seems about right.

That last one is really cunning. The rest of them are just painful to read. X_X

Classic Joseph misdirection technique (go back and look at the comment): railroad someone making a point with related but irrelevant (yes, irrelevant) teshuvos to put them on the defensive. Solution: don’t feed the Joseph.

The CR Discworlders Club

Feel free to use it to discuss anything geeky and/or nerdy. ^_^

zenzizenzizenzic is still my favorite word. ^_^

Syag:

You’ve got it backwards. I fault you for jumping to the conclusion that this person must have insufficient faith, when I think–and SHE says STRAIGHT OUT, MULTIPLE times–that this is her questioning what has been brought to support her faith so far, NOT her questioning her faith. That is why I think you are unjustly equating asking questions with losing faith. And I am backing her up on this because I have gone through (and still am going through, to some extent) the same exact experience. For a person who thinks these things through, there is a difference between belief in the religion and faith in the people practicing the religion.

And no, none of my opinions on this matter are based on “preconceived bias or stereotype.” Precoceived? Conceived before what? Actually having knowledge of Bais Yaakov hashkafos? I’ve been to mainstream, right-wing Bais Yaakovs for nearly my entire life. My opinion of them is not based on anything other than my experience in them–an opinion that was actually incredibly positive before the actual experiences. And no, I am not acting out spite or anger or anything like that. I am saying my straight-up opinion based on my experiences, positive AND negative. I am not trying to play games or be nasty here.

One more thing: if you still think my responses are way off mark, please explain to me why they are, exactly, because I cannot tell what you are really trying to criticize me for.

This is in response to ultimateskier, but I am addressing it to everyone here:

You’re saying that you’re freaked out about the idea of a potential mentor being someone who “isn’t firm in their beliefs.” This is what I think you are misunderstanding about bais yakov maidel’s complaint (for lack of a better word), and learning and Judaism in general:

ASKING QUESTIONS DOES NOT INDICATE A LACK OF BELIEF.

You are all saying that bais yakov maidel isn’t strong enough in her belief. What I want to know is: how do you know that?

Wait, don’t answer that question. I already know the answer. As Bais Yaakov students, we were all taught that we didn’t need what men learned to be good, believing Jews. Our job was to develop belief with what they gave us, which they told us was enough. So as far as we know, anyone who couldn’t make do with that couldn’t really believe–because what she had was all she needed.

But I disagree with Bais Yaakov on that point. And I want to make this very clear: I do NOT think that people feel that what Bais Yaakov has provided them with is sufficient are stupid or cowardly. Everyone has different intellectual and emotional needs and THAT IS FINE. What ISN’T fine is a system where these needs can only be accommodated at a specific level, and other needs are dismissed and belittled. Our Torah is incredibly vast and deep, and not something people should be questioned or shamed for wanting to learn. Really, I think that that is antithetical to the spirit of Judaism, and something that should not be promoted to ANY Jew.

Speaking of high school teachers…I had a teacher in high school–a “real” rebbetzin in every sense of the word–who told us often about how she shouted down for apikorus as a student. She would then say, “But when you are seeking to truly understand Torah, there is no question that is apikorsus.” And, no this teacher wasn’t what you are accusing bais yakov maidel of being. This same teacher yelled “TOIRAH IS A BESTE SCHOIRAH” when she first walked in on the first day of class, and had us write an essay explaining what Torah meant to us before she would teach us anything. Her love for and commitment to Torah were nothing like what I’d seen in all of my other high school teachers. And I think this is BECAUSE she wasn’t afraid to really examine why she found Torah meaningful.

Again, I’m NOT saying that the rest of my teachers were no good. You are not a fake believer if you are not all “intellectual” (I do not think this is the right word in this context) about it. BUT. Someone who refuses to ask real questions about what they believe in, and shuts down and belittles the questions of others, isn’t someone who is secure in their belief.

TL;DR: Asking questions and wanting to learn at whatever level you are at more builds security in beliefs, and being afraid to ask questions and shutting them down is a sign of dangerous insecurity.

how “prudish” does it have to be

(1) You really misunderstood the point bais yakov maidel was trying to make.

(2) How exactly is a teacher who is realistic about her belief and sincerely tries to strengthen it a bad thing? (And if you don’t think that was what bais yakov maidel was on about, I urge you to read point (1) again.)

what

She teaches in Machon Raaya too. ^_^

SaysMe: Whew, good memory! Yeah, it was a week or so ago. Thanks. ^_^

snort. You ever heard of a cattle stampede?

The weather IS unusually nice for this time of year…

Is this a serious thread? I ask this seriously.

benignuman: We are working with different understandings of the concept of belief. I think yours generates a good framework of understanding, but I do not think it is sufficient. Also, I think your understanding of the nature of science as a whole (as laid out in the first paragraph of the OP) is not fully formed. This will factor in later.

One thing that important to tack onto this concept is that science is not determined by scientists. Science is a tool used to catalogue information, and scientists are people who use that tool. As with all tools, if the user does not properly understand the use of the tool, or insists on applying the tool to tasks it is inherently unsuited to, work done with the tool with likely be faulty. Science is very often touted as a way to get all the answers about the universe and such (which I expect is where axioms about physical existence and projected rules and laws come from), when in reality, science as close to a goalless process as possible. It is a means, not an end. If it has any end, it is only to be an efficient means. We create our own ends to give meaning to the enterprise, but those meanings are not intrinsic to science itself. And yes, due to the inductive nature of scientific inquiry, such subjectivity can lead to skewed conclusions. But at the end of the day, science is still fully capable of washing its hands of all that. The responsibility does not lie with the method itself.

There is no such thing as “belief” in science, for two reasons: (a) As jewfishfeminist said, you can choose to acknowledge or contest its principles, but belief does not come into the equation one way or another; (b) Belief is antithecal to scientific methodology in that it compromises falsifiability and is at odds with its ethos of discovery.

–Richard Feynman

I have the aforementioned astigmatism problem, so glasses. I am so used to seeing myself in glasses that my reflection plain unnerves me when I go without. (That might also be due to the fact that I can’t really see it.)