744 Patricia Friedrichs Relational Summary Weather, Climate, and Behavior

Message no. 744[Branch from no. 736] Posted by Thomas Culhane (1311520071) on Monday, April 2, 2007 3:45pm Subject: Re: Patricia Friedrichs Relational Summary Weather, Climate, and Behavior

Wow Pat, this just gets better and better and more and more realistic and more and more fun! Reading your evolving posts is like going deeper and deeper into an RPG like "Final Fantasy" or "Doom". Each chapter the storyline goes up a level in complexity. Good job!

Class -- Pat is trailblazing here -- not just acting as a pioneer in the new environment she is confronting trying to create a realistic eutopia on a hostile planet, but acting as a pioneer in a form of education we call "edutainment" -- entertaining education that permits greater retention of factual material by contextualizing it in an emotionally charged scenario that is at once personal and universal.

Follow her lead if the method works for you, because by using your "eutopia" scenario as the basis for reporting on your new insights from the book and applying them in your relational summaries, you give us a unique focus on what the concepts mean to you and to your vision of a better environment.

Notice that Pat has continued to include at least three quotes with page numbers from the book, and at least three external links, but now uses them to support and justify her arguments and ideas. It is as though she is filling in puzzle pieces, making her experience in her daily real life (dust storms in Texas, for example) relate to the challenges she would face if trying to work with her family to make a world more to their liking.

The fact that Pat's scenario unfolds on Mars merely heightens the challenge. But you could do this in any environment.

The exercise is a good one, because so many people on Earth are facing or will soon face extreme environmental conditions, created by war, deforestation, terrorism, global climate change, pollution and toxic waste, disease, natural disasters etc.

Though it may sound scary, this exercise in envisioning and defending your own "eutopia" may help prepare you for some very real challenges that you and your loved ones will likely face in your lifetimes. Hopefully by thinking through them and preparing, you will not have to face life threatening or debilitating circumstances.

Great job Pat! Keep leading the way!