larryhammer | "You are a sliver of God on a platter"

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Link salad, with a side of dino:

How to do what you love (via a forgotten linker, alas)

Chicago Manual of Style vs. United States Marine Corps (via

cranky_editors)

Folding the MIT Logo (via Making Light)

To raise smart kids, don't tell them they're "smart" (via Geek Press)

The latest hot game from Schadenfreude Interactive (via Buzzfeed)

Kant attack ad (again via Making Light)

Yes, that's a quarter next to the steggie. Because I rock. (via my own two hands)

---L.

Current Music: In Small Things Forgotten, James Deetz

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

asakiyume.livejournal.com

I read that "To raise smart kids" thing some time ago and loved it because it confirmed what I thought (LOL! the narcissist's approach to approving of reading material) and also jived with my personal experience with daycare in Japan. The rewards for hard work were everywhere, and the expectations were high, and guess what? Every little three year old could do kerchief origami and traditional dancing, as well as plant potatoes and feed chickens (it was an awesome, awesome daycare--and it was state funded, bless the socialist government of Machida city!)

And that Kant attack ad? Just brilliant. And the stegosaurus is the prettiest miniature dinosaur I've ever seen.

From:

larryhammer

My four-year-old classmates in Sendai could read and write at least hirigana -- not fast or with good penmanship, but they were way ahead of me. I could, however, take the bus to school all by myself. (Most of the time.)

---L.

From:

palomapus.livejournal.com

That really is the prettiest stegosaurus. I remember being praised for working hard more than anything else and never considered myself all that smart. My parents were too busy trying to keep it all together for us, and in American kindergarden I was a bit of an anomoly because I could read and write. I just figured everyone else could too. I am fascinated by what you describe when you talk about your early childhood far, far away from U.S. ideas and such.

From:

larryhammer

In Japan, I was functionally illiterate, compared to my classmates -- I had to get an adult to read the farewell book they put together. I can't remember when I learned to read and write English -- some time during kindergarden, the next year, because at the start of first grade I was sorted into the already-reading group, who were sent into the corner to entertain ourselves with a textbook. Also, I signed and titled at least some kindergarden pictures. The first book I read all by myself was, of course, The Monster at the End of This Book, and I think I was five by then.

I don't remember what I was praised for. But I do know my parents did everything they could to avoid my taking an IQ test.

---L.