Learning how to teach… myself?

Labas, labas (hello, hello). I have an interesting life update today.
About two weeks ago (EDIT: repost, this took place in June) I started an intensive 4 week TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) class with the International TEFL Academy to get my certification and, well, just as it sounds, learn to teach English as a foreign language. I kinda expected that it wouldn’t be too difficult in terms of topic, given I have been tutoring for years and love to learn languages, but what I did not expect was that even only halfway in, I am walking away from it with a lot of really solid information. Sure, things like creating lesson plans and writing up skill assessments have been new for me, but the methods and guidelines to actually impart information to my students have been surprising and even pointed out a lot of flaws in my own practices.
I’ll explain why in a second, but first look below at a small list of the more popular language learning methods that have popped up over time, in no particular order:



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Vogelkop Bowerbird

I thought I’d share an interesting species today.

I was watching some bird videos from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and found one of the Vogelkop bowerbird (Amblyornis inornata). It primarily lives in Western New Guinea, Indonesia, which made me wonder if it was part of the “Lost World” findings that went on in that area. Sadly, it looks like the only bowerbird included in that was the golden-fronted bowerbird (Amblyornis flavifrons). Bowerbirds in general live in Australia and New Guinea, with twenty species, both individual and shared, between the both of them. Things like size and egg number range depending on the species, but fancy courtship efforts seem to be the common theme among all. I am not going to go into much detail about it, but there are different types of bowers they build, vocal mimics they do, special ways of arranging their chosen items, sabotaging other males’ bowers, and more. I read that some species even arrange the items to create optical illusions and forced perceptions. 



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Mejor, pero peor también

Durante mis años de escuela secundaria, he tenido clases de español que me enseñaban gramática y vocabulario. Constantemente, yo tenía tarea, exámenes y lecciones que me dieron nuevos conceptos y también me ayudaron a mantener mis capacidades en el idioma. 

Después de todo de eso, ahora en la universidad, yo trato de mantener mi español sin clases. Por ejemplo, yo escucho a 93.5 Latino Mix todos los días cuando estoy conduciendo a la universidad (pues, antes de coronavirus). Yo leí las noticias en la aplicación BBC Mundo. Y si tengo tiempo, puedo ver un video de YoutTube (especialmente ASMR or Luisito Comunica!) en español, o a veces un especial de humor/”comedy”.



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Resupinate & Non-Resupinate Orchids

Wanna hear something mind-blowing? There’s a good chance every orchid flower you have ever seen was actually upside down.

I recently learned about resupination, which is a term used to describe plants that rotate their leaves or flowers upside down… err right side up, technically? This is practically the norm for orchid flowers. I was going to post an orchid time-lapse video that showed this (as I originally thought they all have funky twisting patterns as they physically open), but I looked and looked to no avail. So, after doing some research, it seems that this step can occur before or during blooming. (It kind of reminds me of how humans can have situs inversus, although I’m sure those individuals with it are very glad it happened in the womb.) Now, what I want to know is if this occurs during bud development, or just in a stage before the blooming is outwardly visible to bystanders but after the bud is already developed. I can confirm that this does not happen after opening, though.



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A Brief Evolutionary Look at Psilocybin

Hello! I decided to share an essay I wrote for my Environmental Physiology class as I found the topic rather interesting.
The prompt: “Discuss the evolution of a toxin or toxin delivery mechanism in an animal, plant, or other group of organisms. Explain the potential adaptive value of the toxin and discuss its potential cost to the organism.”



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Concept of Fluency (& Some Methods to Try)

My first post (about language learning) was a little bit too rant-y for my liking. Oops. Moving on.

“You can become fluent in two months with ____ program/book/method/etc.”

I kind of want to talk about what I have seen with “fluency,” and why using one *insert method here* to learn probably won’t deliver the results all us language learners crave.

I.M.O. fluency is very situational. You learn the language you use. I would obviously argue I am fluent in English, but I’m sure if you maxed the difficulty to some wild level or discussed topics with highly specific vocabulary without learning it first, it would start to become less intelligible. Enough of that, though, what about just a general fluency, that everyday language use, maybe take an exam to prove it type? With that, most agree that there are four aspects to it (the first two for input and the latter for output):
-Reading
-Listening/Understanding
-Speaking
-Writing
To be fluent like a native speaker, you’d theoretically need to master all four of those. What this means for you is you need to find ways to practice each of them.



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A little bit on orchid anatomy

Orchids are really freaking cool. Although not my favourite plant nor flower, they manage to captivate me with their beauty, and well, just really wicked evolved traits. Once the libraries open up again (thanks, coronavirus), I will look for a more detailed book on them, but for right now, I have a mix of Internet and previously obtained knowledge to share.

The Orchidaceae are a family of plants more commonly known as orchids. Many know them for their regal yet tropical look and their long lasting flowers. There are over 28,000 species of them according to our friend, Wikipedia the Great, and typically are classified as “orchids” by their anatomy. I could not find actual criteria for an orchid, but it pretty much seems that most non-orchids are not smart enough to bamboozle us, so anatomy is a good baseline. If the flower can make it past that test, there’s a good chance they’re the real deal. I think if we want any more substantial criteria, we’d have to go ask a taxonomist– they probably do have an actual checklist for what qualifies.



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Java and Minimalism

My question of the day:
How much coding ability qualifies as knowing how to code?
I was reading through some posts on what MD/PhD programs look for, and a lot of people suggested learning to code. I would not be doing that to look good for admissions, though, I’m not about that life, but rather because if it saves me the trouble later when I would actually need to use that skill, it would be worth it. I feel like there are a lot of different languages to program in, so how would you know for sure which will be needed? What I learned in AP Computer Science in high school gave me a pretty good introduction, but I don’t feel like I completely mastered Java or anything. It has, though, helped me mess with the html in Weebly and helped me find errors in the program my PI wrote when I did research in a cochlear implant lab. That program, though, was in Matlab, which looked similar to Java but most definitely was not the same. Since I will most likely do my later studies in STEM or linguistics (or both???), I looked up common languages.



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“___ is the hardest language!”

Howdy,
Not sure how to start off a blog so I’m just going to jump into a light discussion of something on my mind. I should also disclose that I am running on about 2 hours of sleep right now, so this is not going to be a post of quality.

Well, I like to learn languages. I don’t think I am necessarily that great at it, and it doesn’t help that I don’t spend nearly enough time studying. It is more of the overall concept I enjoy– techniques to learn best, or how languages are related, or how the grammar works (but not actually the work of memorizing all those words*), etc. The patterns and connections in systems and the ways multiple systems fit together pleases me. I personally believe that is why a biology major is a very good fit for me; every piece connects with each other at some point. (I am definitely calling out physics here *cough cough* general relativity and quantum mechanics inconsistencies bother me. I need answers.) I’m sure there are points where topics of biology don’t fit together nicely either, but everything feels more definite? Maybe it’s all in my head haha.* I enjoy learning it and being able to use it, but in natural ways, such as through using the word/grammar in a real conversation, or learning the meaning because you heard it in a song. Memorization without application is rather humdrum in my opinion.



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