Firstly, it is of course great to get rid of stuff. In our case we cleared a load of stuff out of the basement storage room. There were a load of old skis, a hamster cage, two gigantic computer monitors, an old stereo, a broken TV, outgrown clothes and loads of other unwanted stuff.

Second reason is the good order of the place. It is clean(!), there are signs telling you exactly where to put things, it is very accessible and the staff is very knowledgable.

The environmental friendliness of it all makes up for another reason. It is very encouraging and reasuring to see that society take such fantastic responsibility when it comes to recycling. When I was an environmental activist, in my teens some thirty years ago, todays rubbish tips would have been considered totally utopic.

Kalli looking into a barrel full of old batteries. The brown bags in the background are for people to bring home to put organic stuff in for compost.

The fourth and last reason that comes to me might be the most exceptional one. Visiting the dump is also a very nice experience when it comes to the social side of things. The staff is extremely pleasant and helpful, always ready to help. As soon as I got the TV out of the car this young girl from the staff came up to me asking me if I needed help to carry it. It is also very sociable at the tip, because of all the people coming there. Living in a small town one knows about half the population, and one therefor always meet people to chat to. Of course there is always stuff to talk about; like the reason for you throwing the old garden furniture out or maybe memories concerning some thing you’re getting rid of.

At the bottom right you can spot the boys old LARP armor.

All done and ready to go home. On the way out we drove past this place where you can by soil produced from the compost at the tip.

In Sweden the head of state is the king. It is quite remarkable that, in a country which in so many ways is quite radical, this antiquated form of constitution still rules. The monarchical constitution goes against democratic ideals and the principles of everyone’s equal worth. It states that the function of head of state, is closed to everyone not happening to be closely related to the aristocratic family Bernadotte. This means it is closed to A LOT of people. Before 1980 (!) it was even closed to the king’s first born, if she happened to be a female that is.

Another aspect to be taken into consideration is the fact that the members of the royal family do not get to indulge in the human right of ruling over ones own life. Of course they are incredibly fortunate in a lot of ways when it comes to material matters; but maybe freedom is worth more when it comes to quality of life. What if Viktoria and Daniel had rather gotten married in Vegas…? (Of course the option of getting married in Vegas does not apply to most of the worlds population – but this is not the point here. Had Viktoria and Daniel been ordinary Swedish citizens they would have had the option. Also of course there is the option to opt out of the family and it’s demands, but this is probably a decision filled with a lot of heartache.)

Photo by: Karl Gunnarsson

The student ceremony was very lovely. The positive atmosphere with all these happy youngsters full of assurance and happiness is a thing very wonderful to experience. Thanks to all those of you that came to celebrate with us! Also a special thanks to my brother Ulf, whom took Stuart and his class mate for a ride around town in the newly acquired Jaguar. It had to be a British car of course, what else!?

My Kalli just tweeted: “At some point I might have been forced to find like minded individuals and sit in cafés or homes but now it’s the net. Chatting and drinking.” Kalli is at the moment talking to his friend Nick in California, with whom he has set up a photography blog, which they successfully manages to administer from two separate continents. The internet has opened so many doors for making friends, and I think it is truly wonderful. Kalli is part of a large photography community on the internet (his interest) and I am part of a large pedagogically geared community on the internet (my interest). I know many of the people on Kalli’s forums through him, and he knows many of the people on my forums through me.

Both of us have made some real friends through the internet and this is of course an interesting phenomena as it is reasonably new. We have also ourselves made each others acquaintance on the internet. What is up meeting/gaining friends through the internet; what is the allure? I think what internet friendships have got going for them is that they can become very sincere. What happens must be that you keep in touch (through comments, IM, ReTweets, direct messages, stars/favrs/hearts etc.) and in this way the people that you interconnect most with are the people that eventually become real friends.

When it comes to all the people I have met in real life after having befriended them on the internet I have been truly impressed. They have stood up to my expectations and more. All I can say to this is that making friends through the internet is a good thing.

The lyrics.

“Hacker: Don’t tell me about the press. I know exactly who reads the papers: the Daily Mirror is read by people who think they run the country; The Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country; The Times is read by people who actually do run the country; the Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country; the Financial Times is read by people who own the country; The Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country; and The Daily Telegraph is read by people who think it is.

Sir Humphrey: Prime Minister, what about the people who read The Sun?

Bernard: Sun readers don’t care who runs the country, as long as she’s got big tits.”

Also check out last years post.

I have 48 carefully selected RSS feeds. A lot of work-related stuff, some comics, and blogs like Boing Boing, Cynical-C Blog, Swissmiss and what have you. I am quite good at keeping up with it all, and I check everything out daily, even though it adds up to far over a hundred posts. Where I am getting with this though, is making the point of where my heart lies when it comes to my feeds. Fact is that if I had to take all of them away but one, I would keep “The FAIL blog”. The childishness in the humour of this stuff is just absolute dog’s bollocks (to use a crude idiom which I incidentally just learnt). The here posted clip from the FAIL-blog, I watched four times over, laughing out loud.

PS If there was one more feed I was allowed to keep, was I to loose all the rest, it would be “Cyanide and Happiness“.

In the meantime keep looking out for more of those pictures and videos of owned, pwnd and failed moments.

Last week I had two of the most fabulous days of my life. I attended the convention “Framtidens lärande” (possible translations: “Future learning”, “Futures curriculum” or ”21st Century Learning”) which was arranged by a number of organisations promoting the idea of internet and technology becoming important parts of education.

Apart from all the lectures and workshops being immensely interesting, the whole convention was very competently arranged when it came to practical matters. The technology worked wonderfully. I loved the fact that we were able to post questions and comments in a twitter-like manner throughout each lecture. (They can all be read here). The food was good, the wardrobes and toilets worked excellently, as did the wireless internet, the sound was great, the seats, the timetable; well in fact everything was top notch.

Important issues raised at the convention were:

- The fact that we are in the middle of a paradigm shift. People are communicating and learning in alternative ways. We have to change the way we look at learning and teaching and we need to review our roles as teachers and students.

- The implementation of aids for internet and communication needs to be speeded on by central/national directives. The one-to-one perspective has to be what is aimed for.

- Finding the resources for technological development is more about budgeting than about funds available.

Below are videos and slide shows of some of the lectures:

Bruce Dixon “Future Learning Today and Tomorrow

Bruce Dixon, Framtidens lärande 2009 from diu redaktion on Vimeo.

Thomas Fürth from Kairos Future “I möjlighetmaximerarnas land”

Thomas Fürth, Möjlighetetsmaximerarnas land, Framtidens lärande 2009 from diu redaktion on Vimeo.

Stephen Heppel “Be Very Afraid”

Among his quotes: “Every turned off device is a potentially turned off child “

Stephen Heppell, Framtidens lärande 2009 from diu redaktion on Vimeo.

A link to some of the slide shows.

I am just about to set of for the 40th birthday party of my colleague and good friend Niclas. This autumn I will have known Niclas for ten years. We met at registration for teacher training. One had to choose which course to start with and we both had History as our first choice. The next morning it was to be announced which course one got to take. We decided that the first one to find out would phone the other one to let him or her know what it was to be. My telephone rang at seven o’clock the next morning. Niclas had already been to Högskolan to find out, as he was anxious to go golfing – his prime hobby at the time.

We continued to do quite a few courses together during our teacher training and we had a lot of fun together with the other people in the gang we somehow formed. I think the first time we parted was when Niclas went to do Civics and I continued with the B-course of Science of Religion. Those were fun days and my training would not have been the same without Niclas at my side. Both regarding the studying and the partying on the side.

I started working some time before Niclas as I had rationalised my courses and studied during the summers and doubled up some courses. I started working at the Montessori School in June 2003. Niclas started a year later. I remember how nerve wracking it was before we knew it was to be Niclas that would end up with the job. We wanted him so much!

I like working with Niclas very much and there are several reasons for this. I love his sense of humour of course. I also like his professionalism and the way he so obviously is set on doing a good job. I also like the way he so clearly cares about his students and his fellow colleagues. Niclas always has time to stop for a chat and usually a very interesting one at that.

I also appreciate Niclas for being so patient with me as I know I can be quite a pain in the butt, being just that little bit too energetic and forceful.

Niclas! Have the best of birthdays and I wish you all the best for the future!

Hard at work during kick off at Dalgården

1. Pharyngula
2. Friendly Atheist
3. Cynical-C
4. Debunking Christianity
5. Atheist Media Blog

His own blog unreasonable faith is an interesting read. In the About section he describes his change from devouted christian to passionate atheist. One can also read about this in an interview on the blog Weird Things.

And now for some Richard Dawkins quotes:

“It is often said, mainly by the “no-contests”, that although there is no positive evidence for the existence of God, nor is there evidence against his existence. So it is best to keep an open mind and be agnostic. At first sight that seems an unassailable position, at least in the weak sense of Pascal’s wager. But on second thoughts it seems a cop-out, because the same could be said of Father Christmas and tooth fairies. There may be fairies at the bottom of the garden. There is no evidence for it, but you can’t prove that there aren’t any, so shouldn’t we be agnostic with respect to fairies”

“Out of all of the sects in the world, we notice an uncanny coincidence: the overwhelming majority just happen to choose the one that their parents belong to. Not the sect that has the best evidence in its favour, the best miracles, the best moral code, the best cathedral, the best stained glass, the best music: when it comes to choosing from the smorgasbord of available religions, their potential virtues seem to count for nothing, compared to the matter of heredity. This is an unmistakable fact; nobody could seriously deny it. Yet people with full knowledge of the arbitrary nature of this heredity, somehow manage to go on believing in their religion, often with such fanaticism that they are prepared to murder people who follow a different one.”

“The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.”

“Many of us saw religion as harmless nonsense. Beliefs might lack all supporting evidence but, we thought, if people needed a crutch for consolation, where’s the harm? September 11th changed all that. Revealed faith is not harmless nonsense, it can be lethally dangerous nonsense. Dangerous because it gives people unshakeable confidence in their own righteousness. Dangerous because it gives them false courage to kill themselves, which automatically removes normal barriers to killing others. Dangerous because it teaches enmity to others labelled only by a difference of inherited tradition. And dangerous because we have all bought into a weird respect, which uniquely protects religion from normal criticism. Let’s now stop being so damned respectful!”

Yes! Let’s now stop being so damned respectful!

The other day I (incidentally (or not) the day of Obama becoming president) I saw the most ingenious advertisement in the national paper Dagens Nyheter. It was published by Republikanska föreningen – an association working for the abolishment of the monarchical constitution; and it congratulates the American people on being able to choose it’s head of state. The clever lay-out of the advertisment made such an impression on me that I immediately joined.

As long as the head of state position is hereditary, Sweden should not be considered a true democracy.

]]> http://marielinder.net/2009/01/no-we-cant/feed/ 3 http://marielinder.net/2008/12/a-mild-coup/ http://marielinder.net/2008/12/a-mild-coup/#comments Fri, 26 Dec 2008 22:00:00 +0000 admin http://marielinder.net/?p=187 A group of our year nine students finished of the Christmas ensemble by playing the White Stripe’s “Seven Nation Army”. And bless their little cotton socks didn’t they take the opportunity for a little coup, changing the first line to “We’re gonna fuck you all!”. Those kids are the nicest kids imaginable and we shall be very pleased this is about as naughty as they’ll get. The number was rounded of by young Oscar exclaiming to the music teacher “Vi älskar dig Britta!” (“We love you Britta!”) Very sweet!

Photo: Karl Gunnarsson

David Crosby with his dad.

Is there any wonder he turned out very hmmm… creative….

Frank Zappa and parents

Might have known he was brought up with poodels!

Donovan and parents

More to be seen here