Not Immediate
Friends, comrades, countrymen: please. If you aren't already aware of this, please internalize the fact that progress does not happen immediately. Healing does not happen immediately. Confidence does not happen immediately. Learning does not happen immediately. And, for the love of all things academic, improved grades do not happen immediately.
Typically in academics, the closest thing to immediate results is called "cramming," and it's not results; it's a cheap bandaid that loses its stickiness very quickly. It's a cheap placebo that lets one pretend for a time that things are better.
I am a tutor. Time and time again, I have received complaints from parents about how slowly so-and-so's grades are improving. I don't know if you recall the last time you learned something meaningful or at least imperative, but it didn't bloody take only 4 hours to make it work.
Driving, which – if we're being really honest – is an easy skill, requires 65 hours of practice (if you're under the age of 18). The task that requires the pedal-pushing, wheel-turning brainlessness that we all do day in and day out legally requires minors to practice for 65 hours. And now you (the hypothetical parent) are expecting me to get your student academically ship-shape in under 3 hours, nay 5 hours, nay even 10 hours. That's just plain absurd.
You (the hypothetical parent) no longer have any idea how to do algebra 2 (for example) because you merely crammed for the test now expect me (the hypothetical tutor) to magically make your child (the hypothetical student) understand it in under 5 hours of work.
Here's your sign.
I just listened to that whole routine. I feel happier about things now.
Really though, people should have some sort of identification.
In any case, I'm wonking tired. One evening while I was trying to fall asleep, I was thinking to myself about how wonking tired I was. In my sleeplessness, I was trying to define "wonking" specifically in the context of being a modifier for "tired." Wonking tired – I decided – is when you are so tired that the only thing keeping you awake (and possibly alive) is a sheer force of will.
For now, that's ok. Another day, I'll establish consciousness based on something other than raw intensity.
I've recently become obsessed with this song. And this one.
It's terrible: I'm almost always tired. When I wake up, I think to myself, "I'm going to take a nap today, and/or I'm going to bed early." After I've been awake for a bunch of hours, I still feel tired, but I start to feel keen on doing things, so I end up going to bed late again. It's a cycle.
Shower time.
Typically in academics, the closest thing to immediate results is called "cramming," and it's not results; it's a cheap bandaid that loses its stickiness very quickly. It's a cheap placebo that lets one pretend for a time that things are better.
I am a tutor. Time and time again, I have received complaints from parents about how slowly so-and-so's grades are improving. I don't know if you recall the last time you learned something meaningful or at least imperative, but it didn't bloody take only 4 hours to make it work.
Driving, which – if we're being really honest – is an easy skill, requires 65 hours of practice (if you're under the age of 18). The task that requires the pedal-pushing, wheel-turning brainlessness that we all do day in and day out legally requires minors to practice for 65 hours. And now you (the hypothetical parent) are expecting me to get your student academically ship-shape in under 3 hours, nay 5 hours, nay even 10 hours. That's just plain absurd.
You (the hypothetical parent) no longer have any idea how to do algebra 2 (for example) because you merely crammed for the test now expect me (the hypothetical tutor) to magically make your child (the hypothetical student) understand it in under 5 hours of work.
Here's your sign.
I just listened to that whole routine. I feel happier about things now.
Really though, people should have some sort of identification.
In any case, I'm wonking tired. One evening while I was trying to fall asleep, I was thinking to myself about how wonking tired I was. In my sleeplessness, I was trying to define "wonking" specifically in the context of being a modifier for "tired." Wonking tired – I decided – is when you are so tired that the only thing keeping you awake (and possibly alive) is a sheer force of will.
For now, that's ok. Another day, I'll establish consciousness based on something other than raw intensity.
I've recently become obsessed with this song. And this one.
It's terrible: I'm almost always tired. When I wake up, I think to myself, "I'm going to take a nap today, and/or I'm going to bed early." After I've been awake for a bunch of hours, I still feel tired, but I start to feel keen on doing things, so I end up going to bed late again. It's a cycle.
Shower time.
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