Reply to comment

I'm a crossword puzzle fiend and will do a Suduko that I find in the paper infrequently and only if it's all I've got. My anxiety about completing the activity came from two areas---first, I suffer from some rather serious auditory distractability--it leaves me fairly unable to concentrate and pretty exhausted at the end of days that don't include some "quiet time." The need for quiet, reflective, wait or down time is why I frequently don't post until the evening or morning after a session.

The second anxiety prompter for me is working a puzzle on a computer screen--I don't really like reading off of a screen and even though I do crosswords everyday---don't choose to do them on the computer.

It is pretty amazing when you think about how many people were unsettled by the activity. We were actually agreeing on that point--though I wonder how many of us felt "in agreement" as we were discussing the experience. Maybe it was the adreline that was pumping? I wasn't hearing all of that----I was better able to "hear it" as I gained a little distance and read the posts.

I guess my take away is to spend more time thinking about Geneva's presentation--specifically the need to be heard and practice better listening. I know that there is nothing I find more annoying than when people are pigeon-holed, what I think are off-base assumptions are made, or folks attribute motives that couldn't be farther from the truth. I struggle equally with painting things with a broad brush. It is so much easier to be aware of and influence these things in my classroom, and to a certain degree, my school community. But walk outside of that self-selected culture and it gets hard. Joyce---we need to explore culture some more!