Comments to Grad Students

February 2012

 

Here are three comments I made in the online classrooms for grad school. I know this has been way too much about brad school over the past few weeks and I’m sorry for that, but it is a big part of my life.

Comment 1:

You know, (Student 1), the trouble with emotional regulation in children is that they cannot understand the biological processes that go into feelings. I can’t count how many times I have had to advise parents about the dangers of caffeine and young children or the effects of large amounts of salt on mood.

The average American child has mental problems because their body is pounded with poisons every day as parents haven’t the knowledge to understand what they are putting in their children’s bodies.  

Comment 2: This was in response to folks calling my work simple and easy to understand. I think they were calling me dumb but who knows.

It will never stop amazing me how textbooks can take a topic someone is truly invested in and make it dry and dull. I always told myself that if I wrote textbooks I would write them to be relevant, interesting, and short.

I thank you all for letting me know that I have done that in this case and I mention that it is our duty to write papers well because we all have to read them.

My illness over the past few weeks took a toll on my work, but it pleases me to know that I was not completely without merit.

Comment 3: This was another point where someone had commented on my work stating that it was so very simplistic.

You know, (student 3), as one of the least, yet most diversely, educated people in this school I have seen the word simple applied to my work a surprising number of times. I believe it was five by week three.

I think this comes from explaining things to those who need to know rather than to those who already know.

Every night I have a conversation that may change a life but it is often with a person who operates from a limited understanding due to the hardships they have suffered.

Still, I do believe that every hour at you work you have conversations that change lives. This leads me to ask: how much time you use to explain why things are done to your clients? When I explain anger management I tell them how to undermine the emotional feedback loop, and then I explain how that loop works so that they trust my advice.