The revision continues and I am actually starting to remember some stuff. Hurrah!

P and les enfants are with his parents for the weekend - so he can run the Langdale horseshoe and I can panic about revise for my exam in peace.

I have been pretty productive today, but am having a break as my hand hurts from writing. I just hope I can toughen it up  for Wednesday. It feels very odd and quiet here, but nice. Just me and the cat and my books.

Criminal Minds 4 x 03

Minimal Loss

( rambling spoilers )

of course, procrastination helps when you are panicking . . .

A trailer for The Shining

8 days until my exam. Eek!

There is just so much to revise and what they want is nitpicky detail. I can do broad generalisations, but it is the nitpicky detail that takes so much time to embed in the brain. I need to do well in this and so I need lots of references to actual research and who did it and what they did and preferably when they did it.

Then there is the Seen Question which I have prepared but obviously, because we know what it is beforehand, we have to be more impressive and show off our research. I've written the essay, optimistically guessing at how much I can write in an hour - I guess the best way is to sit down, write for an hour and see how far I get.

Plus I fell down the stairs earlier. I slipped and then grabbed at the bannister to stop myself going all the way down on my arse and succeeded in really shaking myself up.

Criminal Minds 4 x 02 The Angel Maker

The Angel Maker

( spoilers )

Gadzooks it's cold.

And due the new Breakfast Cereal that is being forced on all of us - nice big bowl of Credit Crunch - I am trying to resist having the heating on more than is absolutely necessary. *shivers*

P is camping tonight before a fell running relay tomorrow. I shall think of him when toasty warm under my duvet.

In other news, for some reason, I was reminded of The Driving Stupid the other day.  P had them on a Garage Punk compilation and Horror Asparagus Stories is a true classic.

My revision continues. Today I have been reading about Theory of Mind and also how children develop mathematical and scientific knowledge.

The Theory of Mind stuff is all about understanding the viewpoints of others - which improves social skills - and also makes us better liars and manipulators. There are pros and there are cons *g*.

The maths and science learning is something that I can see in my own children - watching how the penny drops and new concepts become available to them. Sometimes in particularly infuriating ways - such as the morning that Small Boy demonstrated that he hadn't yet reached Piaget's Concrete Operations stage. In a moment of madness, I gave the children their juice in differently shaped glasses. Small Boy's was shorter and fatter than his sister's, so his juice didn't look as deep, and despite us demonstrating by pouring into a different cup that it was in fact the same amount, he threw a complete fit because "she's got more than me and it's not fair!".

One aspect that interests me is the concept of the value of cognitive conflict - children learn better when working with others who don't share their viewpoint. By debating and exploring their conflicting ideas, they develop these ideas and experience a change in their thinking. It has made me think about (and want to research when I have the time) the implications for adult learning. I wonder how I can use this in my own practice as a teacher and I'm also intrigued to see it working in practice.

This is the plus side of the revision - stirring up all this thinking. The downside is, of course, having to remember all the finer detail to reproduce in the exam.

Perhaps I am being far too simplistic about this whole World Financial Crisis. Maybe I just don't understand all the fine detail. However, I bet that for the vast majority of the world's population, the comings and goings of some British and American banks mean diddly squat. Life continues to be a struggle to survive

I am still flabbergasted though, that while 500 000 women are dying each year due to pregancy and childbirth related problems, and the WHO is asking for 7 billion dollars to help, the US Government is prepared to find 700 billion to bail out financial institutions who gambled and lost. I just don't get it. Normal people get into financial problems and end up going bankrupt. Very rich people do this and get bailed out by the government. Doesn't make sense.

Last night, as I got ready for bed, I spotted the most ginormous spider scuttling across the bathroom floor. Because we have recently finished Charlotte's Web,  I did feel slightly more benevolent towards it than usual, and decided to just leave it to do it's own thang and go to bed. Also, P was away and he is Spider-Catcher-in-Chief.

However, once I got into bed, I was so tense about that damn spider, that in the end I got up to try to catch it and put it out of the window. Of course, it wasn't there after I'd pumped myself up to deal with it. I was so wound up it took ages to get to sleep though.

Pathetic - why do I get so worked up about a blooming arachnid? Charlotte herself would have been quite disdainful.

Criminal Minds 4x01

Mayhem 
During this I was all "oooh" "ahh" "sniffle" but afterwards, I was pretty "meh". So I decided to watch it again and try to work out why. There will be spoilers below.

( Mayhem Spoilers )

Financial Crisis of dooooooooooooooooom
I think these guys put it better than me.

Cough of dooooooooooooooooooooom
I have a chest infection. I suspected as much as this cough has been lingering for ever and my chest is making all sorts of rattling and crackling noises. Second dose of antibiotics and an inhaler - here's hoping this has some effect.

This is not revision avoidance at all. Not one bit. And as I'm talking about psychology (a bit), technically, I am actually revising. So there.

( Dexter, The Dark Knight and the nature of evil  )

Of course, it's all so obvious when you think about it, but I never really stopped to consider why our urban spaces are not women-friendly. Town planning isn't exactly the most exciting of subjects (to me, anyway) but this has really made me think.

We've just been watching last night's Jools Holland, featuring The Kings of Leon and Metallica.

Even though Metallica do take themselves FAR too seriously, Enter Sandman still rocks. I could see P was only just resisting the urge to make spooky rock horns and their bass player is Hilarious.

Very excited about this - I will admit to having forgotten an awful lot of my Arthurian knowledge (it's been a while), but concentrating on Merlin, rather than Arthur seems like an interesting take on the story. I'm also liking the focus on them as youngsters.

( spoilers )

I am completely loving this song at the moment

Bloody stupid lingering cough. *death glowers cough*

I would really like it to just go away now so that I can

1. Get a good night's sleep

2. Get through a day without worrying that I am going to cough so hard I wet myself

3. Finish a sentence without hacking my lungs up

4. Present my client's case tomorrow without doing an impression of Bob Fleming

In other news, Tesco had "Billy Elliot" on DVD for £3.00, so I bought it and we watched it with the kids today. Yes, I know it is certificate 15 but that is because of the swearing and they've heard those words before . . . from their father, obviously. It was interesting trying to explain the Miner's Strike to kids who had no idea what it was, but both of them were entranced and Small Boy had a bit of a boogie on the way to bed . . .