AWOL - Business of Being Born response

We watched and discussed almost all of "The Business of Being Born" - a 2008 documentary about childbirth in the U.S.

Please post on your blog a two-paragraph+ response to the movie that includes important facts, consideration of multiple points of view, and your own feelings and thoughts by Monday 8:30am.

Some questions to get you started: What were the most important moments in the film - for you? What was the most crucial information in the film that most people should know about? Who should watch this film? How did you feel at different points in the movie? How did viewing this documentary affect your own perspective towards childbirth? What questions most demand answers regarding the AWOB? How did this information compare or contrast with the information you discovered in your own questions to mothers, in your internet research, guest speakers, etc? What do you think was the thesis of the film - was it simple or nuanced - did the evidence prove the argument?

• For information and reaction from the dominant media please see this NYT article from November.
• For access to somewhat recent statistics of hospital births in NY state please see this site.

Grades in the NYT

This article in the NYT reminded me of some of our earlier discussions. If you read it you will notice that the crucial question - "What are grades for?" - is ignored.

When I read it, I can understand the students' point of view - which isn't very well described in the article. Here's how I would put it:
1. Our intelligence and academic preparation were considered acceptable by the college or else they would have rejected us.
2. I am going to college so I can make a career - I can't have below a certain GPA without endangering scholarships, parental support, and grad school chances.
3. I am paying a lot of money to the college.
4. If, in addition to my tuition, I also try hard to accomplish what professors ask of me, then I am upholding my end of the exchange. The college needs to provide decent teaching, decent grades, and a diploma - that is their end of the exchange.
5. If, despite my trying hard and doing what I'm told to do, the college gives me a poor grade then they should give me my damn money and time back.

What the quoted professors are really saying is, "We don't care about your deal with the admissions office, financial aid office, parents, or administrators. We run these courses and we categorize the students' work based on the quality of that work. We don't want to hear about anything else." And that's a position that I feel a lot of sympathy for - a rejection of the "Price is Right" delusional America that believes everything is for sale and that nothing is sacred and that if you pay for a ballet lesson and throw in lots of sweaty hip thrusts that the teacher should shake your hand and thank you for your exceptional efforts. The professors are working from a framework of apprenticeship and mentoring - mostly disappeared in our culture except in martial arts. But the students are operating from a business/contract model. Marx's theory of Base/Superstructure would predict that the students will eventually win this struggle - and higher education will become more and more completely a commodity.

How does this compare to our HS situation? The students, deeply shaped by capitalist culture, still approach HS the same way as the students in those colleges. They feel that if they basically do what the school tells them then they deserve a B and a leg up to the next stage in their career prep. If they work at all extra they think they deserve an A. Most students want effort to be the main differentiation and they want it in basically an A or B or C range. But as teachers in a state-provided and state-coordinated institution we don't have to follow capitalist logic quite the same way. Nonetheless I think this quid-pro-quo dynamic is a major one we have to be aware of in trying to create a coherent institutional culture - even if only as a model to be explicitly debated and challenged.

LDH2BM - Break HW

Please write a list of who you would invite to a "living funeral" like Morrie had, if you were the one who was given such a rough diagnosis. Please write a list of people who might invite you.

Do not post those lists. They're private - even in this world of Oprah and "reality-tv" and tabloids and giving everyone that asks your social security number and the government illegally tapping your phone - hold on to a little privacy!

Do write and post a paragraph about what you noticed or how you felt or thoughts you had in making the lists.

Have a good break - sorry this is late.

AWOL - AWOB - 1st Reaction to Natural versus Normal Lecture

Please write 1-2 paragraphs of your first reaction to the natural versus normal childbirth lecture. Post it up on your blog by Friday the 13th 9pm.

AWOL & LDH2BM - Late Work

All work that has been assigned this semester (except for the break hw) should be posted by Tuesday morning at 8am. That way your make-up work won't hang over our heads the whole vacation.

Do good work and figure stuff out!

AWOL - Break HW - American Way of Birth

Break HW - More on Natural Birth

Please view most or all of the following videos (and one short text). Some of them you might have to watch a couple of times to get more meaning. After you've watched the clips please type up a 1-2 page reaction and post it on your blog. For higher quality (and grade) re-read your own post and post up a new edited draft with clearer language, better transitions, and more thinking. Some framing questions you could use to start your mini-essay include - "Natural Birth or Normal Birth?", "Why don't people talk about this stuff?", "Doctor's In Charge - What's the Problem?", or "The Beauty of Our Planet".

1 - Giraffe gives birth.
2 - Dolphin gives birth.
3 - Human gives birth. Youtube thinks this one might not be for minors. Please consult with your family. It was shown at Columbia Nursing School this semester.
4 - C-Section - Youtube thinks this is fine for minors. I think its pretty scary, so be aware that you don't have to watch it if you don't want to.
Monty Python
Ina May Talk
Ina May Interview
Look around Youtube for other clips - "home birth", "midwife", and "birth" all lead to interesting videos.

If you'd like to hear a back and forth about natural childbirth versus normal childbirth - you can listen to this debate from National Public Radio if you've got Real Player software. Check out how the moderator pretends to be neutral but isn't, and check out who seems to be the most thoughtful.

This HW should take between 1.25 hours and 5 hours, depending on your available time, concentration, and interest.

LDH2BM & AWOL - Classwork and HW Feb 10

Select the 10-15 most interesting questions from yesterday's work. Use your notes and the blogs of people in other groups to find the questions. Try to research 5 of your own group's questions and the rest from the other groups. (It can be helpful to have some degree of depth - why the 5 from one topic area helps). If you were absent, or you just feel like it, make up some new questions in addition to stealing other peoples'.

Quickly research the questions. Research this like you'd skim a book. You're finding quick answers, not really looking for complexities, confirmations, or contradictions.

Please use the following three websites the most: Google, Wikipedia, and Google Scholar. If you are using Firefox you can usually search directly in the top right search bar and click to search directly in Wikipedia.

List the 10-12 questions and answers you unite into a blog post. Copy and paste the source website URL behind the answer (or just link it to make it prettier). Write a brief paragraph interpreting these results for significance in terms of the general topic (American Way of Birth or Old Folks and the G&ML).

The sequence I would suggest is:
1. Take 5 questions from your own blog post from last night. Cut and paste them into a new blog post.
2. Look at other peoples' blogs from your section and cut and paste questions into your new blog post.
3. When you get 15 questions start looking for answers.
4. Take the first question and google it. Find the answer, type it in, cut and paste the URL.
5. Save as draft. Repeat for 10-12 answers.
6. Write an interpretative paragraph.
7. Clean up your answers so they read easier.
8. Edit your paragraph.
9. Add to your paragraph.
10. Edit your paragraph again.
11. Publish post.

For instance - I took this question from Lauren's website - "What happens to the mother if she can’t afford the medical bill?" I decided to change it into an even more basic question - "How much does a regular birth cost - with no important complications?" I googled, - cost birth -, and found this website which gave a range of costs. I took the high estimates, since we live in NYC, and found out that a vaginal birth costs around $10,200 but that a C-Section costs around $15,200. So I would then write this as item 1 on my list and move on to question 2.

1. "How much does a regular birth cost - with no important complications?"
A vaginal birth costs around $10,200 but a C-Section costs around $15,200. website
2.

HW: Feb 9 - LDH2BM & AWOL

Post up the 15 or so questions that you and your group brainstormed. Each group was assigned a particular subtopic within the larger topics (Meaningful Life and Old Folks, American Way of Birth).

If you were absent you could post up 15 questions that you find interesting about the general topic.

Stuff like:
"Do the social roles and situations commonly available to old folks in our culture facilitate living a meaningful life?" or
"What factors conspire to increase the cesarean rate in the U.S.?"

Note: This is part of the exploratory segment of the "consider, explore, listen, integrate" sequence.

LDH2BM - Old Folks Assignments So Far

• A paragraph about your current feelings about old people - how much you interact with folks that are old, some of your experiences and impressions and reactions to old people. How you think of them and how they think of you.

• Collect 4-5 interviews with old folks about living a good and meaningful life. At least one should be someone you are actually connected to, personally. Please post on your blog by Monday, Feb. 9, at 8:30 a.m.
  

AWOL - 2nd Semester Assignments So Far

• Your feelings about birth - 1-2 Paragraphs about your feelings re: birth

• Birth stories collection - 4-5 Birth Stories - possibly including your own - as detailed as possible but anonymous. Ask about emotions, physicality, preparation, interventions, situations, difficulties, pleasant parts, etc. Due Monday, Feb 9 8:30am.