Math Knowledge

Two mathematicians were having dinner in a restaurant, arguing about the average mathematical knowledge of the American public. One mathematician claimed that this average was woefully inadequate, the other maintained that it was surprisingly high.

"I'll tell you what," said the cynic. "Ask that waitress a simple math question. If she gets it right, I'll pick up dinner. If not, you do." He then excused himself to visit the men's room, and the other called the waitress over.

"When my friend comes back," he told her, "I'm going to ask you a question, and I want you to respond `one-third x cubed.' There's twenty bucks in it for you." She agreed.

The cynic returned from the bathroom and called the waitress over. "The food was wonderful, thank you," the mathematician started. "Incidentally, do you know what the integral of x squared is?"

The waitress looked pensive; almost pained. She looked around the room, at her feet, made gurgling noises, and finally said, "Um, one-third x cubed?"

So the cynic paid the check. The waitress wheeled around, walked a few paces away, looked back at the two men, and muttered under her breath, "...plus a constant."

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I found this anecdote here. Do visit the site if you want to read more.

Copywriting syllabus

Copywriting syllabus for BMM (Mumbai University)

Semester V

Paper II

Objectives:

To familiarize the students with various types of copywriting and develop their inherent writing skills

To train students to generate, develop and express ideas

To familiarize the students with contemporary advertising techniques

Syllabus

(Lectures to be used both for theory and practical)

1. Writing for print media - parts of a press ad- the headline, subhead, body copy (4)

2. Writing for TV (5)

• Writing scripts and developing story-boards
• Briefing the producer
• Pre-production
• Shooting
• Post-production

2. Writing for radio (5)

• Characteristics of radio environment
• Message strategy
• Writing the radio script
• Radio production process

3. Writing for Internet (1)

4. Writing for outdoor

5. Writing for direct mail-letters, product brochures, leaflets, folders etc. (1)

6. Writing for innovative media (1)

7. The skill of proof-checking (1)

8. The grammar of copy-writing (1)

9. Copy for specialized areas (12)

• Corporate advertising
• Financial advertising
• Recruitment ads
• Retail advertising
• Sale/Clearance Advertising
• Advertising in Indian Languages
• International markets - Language and campaign transfer
• Political advertising
• B2B advertising
• Local advertising
• Classified ads
• Catalogue copy
• Image advertising
• Fashion and Life style advertising
• Trade Advertising
• Mail order advertising
• PR advertising
• Non-commercial / public service advertising
• Government advertising
• Awareness advertising
• Agricultural advertising
• Rural advertising
• Food and beverages
• Durables
• Personal products

10. Different types of copy (7)

· Advertorials

· Infomercials

· Slogan and jingle ads

· Humour/sex/fear/anxiety ads

· Feel-good ads

· Light fantasy

· Demonstrations/testimonials

· Use of celebrity

· Slice of life

· Reason why

· Fund raising copy

· Comparative copy

· Motivational copy

11. Contemporary copywriting (5)

· The creative strategies, visual imagery, and copy used in current advertising

· Theoretical premises and industry practices.

12. Copy for different audiences (4)

· Children

· Women-Homemakers, modern women

· Senior citizens

· Executives

· Youth

13. Use of non-verbal communication in advertising (2)

• Use of colours, shapes, gestures
• Manipulation of the environments

Booklist

1. Arthur A Winters and Shirley F Milton, The Creative Connection : ad copy writing and idea visualization -- Fairchild Publications - 1989

2. Herschel Gordon Lewis, On the art of writing copy - Amacom 2000

3. Luke Sullivan, Hey Whipple, squeeze this - A guide to creating greater ads - John Wiley and sons 1998

4. Robert W Bly, The copywriter's handbook - Henry Holt and Company 1985

5. James L. Marra, Advertising Creativity : Techniques for Generating Ideas - Prentice-Hall 1990

6. Hank Seiden, Advertising Pure and Simple - Macmillan 1963

7. John Caples, Tested advertising methods.

Critical Issues in School Improvement

To quote from the ncrel site,

'Q: What is a "Critical Issue"?

A: "Critical Issue" is a multimedia document that examines a particular issue being tackled by educators engaged in school improvement. Currently, more than 75 Critical Issues are available in the following 10 areas: Assessment, At-risk, Family and Community, Instruction, Leadership, Literacy, Mathematics and Science, Policy, Professional Development, and Technology in Education. For example, under Literacy, you'll find the Critical Issue "Using Technology to Enhance Literacy Instruction," as well as several other Literacy-related Critical Issues.'

The ncrel directory of critical issues can be found here.

There are n number of ways in which the issue of school improvement can be approached.

ncrel ( north central regional educational laboratory) has adopted the approach of defining critical issues and examining each one in details. We, in India, can also adopt this methodology and identify critical issues pertinent to our respective environments and compile such documents. e.g. critical issue: supporting ways parents and families can become involved in schools can be found here.

Attention

When a student is actively engaged in your lesson, he or she pays attention.

That may sound simple, but it isn’t. Some students look at the teacher, but their minds are actually a million miles away. Paying attention means that students are actually focusing on what is going on in the classroom. It’s important to craft lessons that require students to pay attention to the task at hand. In every lesson or activity, you should provide an opportunity for students to do something. Ask them to create an example, build a model, draw a picture, write notes, or stand up and demonstrate what they have learned.

If you want to read more about this, you can read "Classroom Instruction" by Barbara Blackburn. Sample chapters are available here.

Making The Buds Open

"He who can open the bud, does it so simply'' said Ravindranath Tagore. Technology, however, is about making the buds open.

''Technology coerces beings, which are governed by a hidden law of emergence and withdrawal, into perpetual presence." said Heidegger

Animus, 'a philosophical journal of our times' makes interesting reading on the net. Its volume 8 of 2003 is devoted to aesthetics. I particularly liked Sean McGrath's article on Heidegger's thesis.

Interestingly, he discusses technology that allows the beautiful to occur. He has summarized his contention as :

"The ecological problem is an aesthetic crisis. The world is becoming increasingly less beautiful because of technology. Leavening Heidegger with a measure of largely forgotten medieval aesthetics, I maintain that we have forgotten the ontological relevance of the beautiful, and the aesthetic relevance of the ontological. We have allowed our technology to develop without consideration for aesthetic effect. I offer three criteria for a technology that allows the beautiful to occur: fittingness, transparency, and self-containment."

For explaining fittingness he quotes Robert Grosseteste as: “Beauty is a concordance and fittingness of a thing to itself and of all its individual parts to themselves and to each other and to the whole, and of the whole to all things [italics mine].”

Putting forth the criterion of transparency, he argues thus, " To be beautiful in a technical way is to let nature show itself through technology.."

Describing self-containment, he aptly explains Heidegger's notion of "sparing":

"A self-contained technology lets form shine without eclipsing nature. Like the painter who knows when to leave a detail at the level of suggestion, the writer who knows when to leave something unsaid, the architect who resists the inclination to ornamentation, a technology that allows the beautiful to occur holds back and lets be. Heidegger calls this “sparing.”

Those who have had even a slight brush with Philosophy, will enjoy the article immensely.

Seeing is believing

There are many reference tools available on the net. Click here to find Merriam-Webster visual dictionary. I feel this site is very rich and useful for students. This is what the publishers say:

''The Visual Dictionary Online is an interactive dictionary with an innovative approach.
From the image to the word and its definition, the Visual Dictionary Online is an all-in-one reference. Search the themes to quickly locate words, or find the meaning of a word by viewing the image it represents. What’s more, the Visual Dictionary Online helps you learn English in a visual and accessible way. The Visual Dictionary Online is ideal for teachers, parents, translators and students of all skill levels. Explore the Visual Dictionary Online and enrich your mind. Perfect for home, school or work. Discover a visual world of information''

The Writer's Secret

Nobel lecture (2006) by Ferit Orhan Pamuk, the Turkish author made interesting reading.

''...So my father was not the only one: we all give too much importance to the idea of a world with a centre. Whereas the impulse that compels us to shut ourselves up in our rooms to write for years on end is a faith in the opposite, the belief that one day our writings will be read and understood, because people the world over resemble one another. This, as I know from my own and my father’s writing, is a troubled optimism, scarred by the anger of being consigned to the margins...

... The writer’s secret is not inspiration—for it is never clear where that comes from—but stubbornness, endurance. The lovely Turkish expression “to dig a well with a needle” seems to me to have been invented with writers in mind...''

Click here to read the lecture in full.

Evolution

The story of how I evolved into an amateur reader of books and articles about evolution and Darwinism, dates back to the 80s. It was the time when I used to frequent the reading rooms of The Asiatic Society of Mumbai. The Natural History Magazine was readily available and Stephen Jay Gould's column "This View Of Life" soon became a "not to be missed" favourite.

The column heading was borrowed from Darwin's famous quote "There is grandeur in this view of life." What made the column interesting was Gould's multi-disciplinary approach and his predilection for literary content. His pages were a treat, linking a concept from one discipline to another from yet another discipline, which made the column immensely content-rich for lay readers like me. His specialization as a paleontologist was certainly his strength but he must have faced severe criticism from his peers for his voyeurism away from his discipline.

And as a happy coincidence, I also found his books like the "Flamingo's Smile" at Strand Book Stall. His column ended with his heroic fight with cancer. The column continued under the same heading for some time but that view of life was not the same.

To anybody who wants to venture into this subject, I would unhesitatingly recommend Stephen Jay Gould. Some of his articles are available on the net and his official site is under construction. Read more about Gould here and here.

Obituaries I like (!)

You may think I am a queer sort of a guy if I confess I read the obituary column first whenever I lay my hands on a copy of "The Economist". Here you will find some of the best of the genre. You may not have even heard about the dead but it is interesting to know how the character is made alive in just a page length. These obituaries are nicely drafted and well-researched. When Boris Yeltsin died, the column wrote :

"...Though Mr Yeltsin was a Communist Party boss, he never turned into Homo sovieticus; he preserved the qualities and sensibilities of a Russian man. As Alexander Solzhenitsyn put it, he was almost too Russian. He was spontaneous, erratic, frequently drunk, talented, sincere, witty, full-hearted. His hugeness as a character matched the scale of the changes in his country..."

You may like to read the full text here.

See what the column says about Benzir Bhutto:

"... In one debate, an opponent described her father as “a tradesman of some description. A butcher, I gather.” Benazir looked as if she had been slapped in the face. Her father earned this sobriquet from the slaughter in East Pakistan as Bangladesh struggled to be born....

...After her assassination, a handwritten will was produced. Foreseeing her own untimely end, it bequeathed her party, like the dynastic heirloom it has become, to her husband, who said he would pass leadership to their 19-year-old son. For a woman who claimed to be driven by a burning desire to bring democracy to Pakistan, it was a curious legacy..."

You may like to read the full text here.

The New York Times is yet another publication where you get to read good obituaries. When Narsimha Rao died, Amy Waldman wrote..."Not known for his charisma, and loath to give interviews, Mr. Rao was a wily, even ruthless politician capable of outfoxing rivals in a faction-riddled party..." and you may like to read the full text here.

Acharya (P K) Atre was known to write well-remembered obituaries. I also recollect some leaders from "Kesari" Selections penned by none other than Lokamnya Tilak in the honour of the well-known of his times. For somebody who died young after a remarkable contribution, he would write मुहूर्तं ज्वलितं श्रेयो नश्चिरं धूमायते

In recent times of course, the name of remarkable obituary writer which easily comes to mind is that of 'Khushwant Singh.' and I have a copy of his 'Death at my my doorstep'

A reader's response

What does a reader read?
The reader reads his own mind in whatever he reads। In anything that challenges the limits of the projection of his mind, he finds a challenging read.
A true reader is always on the lookout for writings that are appealing and enriching to the accumulated whole of his experience - his mind. A writing without such personal appeal or character is something that is read only mechanically, without really listening to what it "says."
Successful writing is always writing created by a single mind because good writing that appeals always has a character and is characterized by an individual vision and style. Vision and style combine to form character or voice as it is often called. It is the writer's voice that prompts the writer employ certain ideas, words and phrases and combinations of these. It reflects a unique expression of soul, the voice, that transforms writing, otherwise a mere collection of words, into a thought.
A satisfied reader, having read this thought, may not respond to the writer - the physical person - as he already finds himself in tune and in a satisfying dialogue with the "voice" of the writing।
This is my humble addition to the possible explanations of Warnock's dilemma.

Personal productivity

Personal productivity is currently the most fervently discussed topic on the web. With his "First Things First" and "Seven Habits," Stephen Covey invaded the lives of managers and aspiring leaders in every field. David Allen's "Getting Things Done" made history with GTD becoming the buzz word. 'Geeks' and netizens flocked around the concept and chirped and croaked 'GTD' to no end. PIM (Personal Information Management) software applications like MS Outlook and the ever expanding G-mail incorporated GTD into their newer versions with modifications and add-ons. Many other productivity gurus joined the fray and tweaked the idea to develop their own "systems."

There are thus many "productivity schools." You have Mark Forster's 'Do It Tomorrow' (DIT), Neil Fiore's 'The Now Habit,' and ZTD - a combination of Zen Habits and GTD, to name a few. All these systems preach various systems of time management or life management.

Covey asks you to define various roles you need to play in life and classify your "to-dos" according to various combinations of urgency and importance with reference to your roles in life. The tasks are also classified as leading to spiritual and non-spiritual developmental goals and a conscious effort is advised to strike a balance.

David Allen's ('DA') system GTD advocates unloading psyche of its various minor or major preoccupations as to-dos into some system, a process of capture. The captured tasks are then classified as actionable and non-actionable and so on to the smallest actionable unit i.e. 'next action'. At any moment you choose from these next actions to act upon it, considering the elements of suitability viz. context, your level of energy etc. In this manner you progress bit by bit to your goal ('project') engaging in periodical reviews on the way, to gather your bearings. The aim of the system is to achieve a de-cluttered, stress-free, "mind like water" state akin to the idea of "flow" put forth by psychologist Mihály Csíkszentmihályi.

DIT advises you to take up only chewable bites and limit your daily tasks by "closing the lists" while The Now Habit teaches you to deal with procrastination issues and also incorporates the idea of "un-scheduling".

Finally, there is also a book called "The Perfect Mess" that theorizes 'hidden benefits of disorder'. (By Eric Abrahamson and David H. Freedman ).

There are various e-mail groups that discuss and explore these systems.

J Krishnamurti has classified time into three varieties. Genealogical Time, Mechanical Time and Psychological Time. With a marked shift from earlier years, the modern systems are venturing into psychological time management along with management of mechanical time. However, they seem to ignore the individual's appetite for leisure (the way we speak of the risk appetite of an investor). Any prior definition of leisure tends to lose its very essence and turns it into "work." The 'let go' approach should be inducted in the right doses to satisfy this appetite. (This I find in DIT to some extent). Otherwise, to quote Krishnamurti again, it becomes an "effort" 'to become' efficient/happy/successful rather than 'being' efficient/happy/successful "effortlessly".

Warning : Productivity literature is dubbed as 'Productivity Pron' (Euphemism for "porn") in which people indulge to get pseudo-satisfaction of being productive.

Blogging

Unless you already have a blog and/or website, I'd earnestly request you have your presence on the web. The blog (short for web-log) of course is the simplest way. It is not necessary to make your blog public, only you may view it or alternatively you can easily restrict the viewership to your colleagues associates etc. If you make it public, lay people like me will also benefit. Eventually you can make your blog into an e-book or a printed book.

The blog is actually your digital diary where you can store anything from videos, music, graphics, pictures and text. The beauty is in the ability to pack almost infinite information in a single textual word or character by simply hyper-linking it to the information you want to classify/store. You go on posting the way things come your mind. Then you can categorize with labels/tags and the posts get automatically classified. You need not publish under you own name. But when you publish something of value, why not?

It's a way of keeping your personal thoughts and knowledge effortlessly recorded. You can easily draw upon it as a resource pool in future. You can also save your posts as drafts indefinitely, before you ultimately publish them. Moreover you are not using your pc's valuable hard disk space. It is stored on some hosting company's server. Everything is free. (Just give yourself a Broad Band connection for ease of operation). More importantly, you do have a duty towards your talents. Your talent already known to others and as well as known only to a few but not others. Now could be the time to make it known too.

Through the ages the typical enlightened Indian mind is against perpetuating its footprint and its achievement. It is a sublime and insouciant stance of the recognised, against the impermanence of things and against materialism. As a result we have a glorious history and rich heritage of knowledge but little or no documentation. This is yet another reason why one should overcome the reluctance and/or phantasm (doubting relevance and utility of your writing) and start blogging.

Why add another project to your already heavy burden?
To help ease your psyche. While writing, you may write only a few sentences but in the process 'n' number of things cross your mind. Thereby your many conscious creations get automatically externalised, (though not actually recorded) giving you a much needed relief.

A thinker once said that he could see some promise in me as a writer. "Do you write?'' he asked me. When I replied in negative, he said I should write, write anything, even a diary, so that I should not repent later that I did not write. I started writing 20 years after that incidence and I am really repenting that I did not start earlier. My son was asking me to write a blog since last three years and I am repenting that I did not start writing it then.

From students and professionals to eminent scientists and thinkers, everybody is blogging. Why not you, and if you do, please let everybody know!