I’ve been playing games with two young children and it has been quite entertaining. We play Uno and Hive and Labyrinth, along with a version of Go Fish. They are sharks. They also love to gang up on me even if it means they forget to strategize about each other. The five-year old has made [...]
Category: books
A day late …
Last week I wrote about Daniel Willingham’s book, Why Don’t Students Like School. I’ve been rereading it, and it’s fascinating all over again. It’s also a very odd experience, because he wrote a lot about memory and how it relates to thinking. One of his most important points in the beginning is this. A mind [...]
Reading weirdness
After some intense days last week, I wanted words to flow past my eyes. That often means Project Gutenberg, because if I’m going to be undiscriminating about what I read, it’s best if I don’t also pay money for it. One category on the Project Gutenberg website is the latest uploads. In January, 2024, that [...]
If you want good analysis, you have to begin with facts.
I’ve read a lot, recently, about concerns over children using electronic media, too early in their lives, and too often. It’s been a concern for a long time; I remember my father pointing to his temple and saying “TV rots the brain.” There’s a book review by T. Mattingly on The Anxious Generation by Jonathan [...]
Am I going to like Russian short stories this time?
I’ve been reading a book about Russian short stories called A Swim in the Pond in the Rain by George Saunders. I can’t stand Russian writing in general, though I recognize that that is a highly personal taste. That is, I recognize that others have declared lots of Russian authors to be important and great [...]