Comprehension of speaking with another person and comprehension of reading text aloud involve different sections of brain matter. It’s a similar thing to having trouble speaking a second language yet being able to write it fluently.
As a person who suffered TBI I can vouch for reading/writing/speech not all using the same parts of the brain. I have a mild aphasia that mostly goes away when I’m on the computer typing, but is worse when I’m speaking. It also gets worse when I’m under stress, but that’s something different. Anyway typing I can remember words more quickly and I retain more of my pre-injury vocabulary, but speaking my vocabulary is limited to about 3000 words +/-. IOW I sound pretty stupid when I’m talking because I have a hard time remembering what words mean what I’m trying to say and my speech is more halting with long pauses between words. You can see how I type…
Or her ear/brain has trouble processing sounds the same way humans do so when she repeats what she hears she’s doing what sounds right to her. Saying she is just “stubborn” sounds a lot like the comments leveled at people with dyslexia when they have trouble reading.
It is not very helpful to categorize problems like this as “lazy” or “stubborn”. Diagnosing more accurately, as what is happening here, helps solve the problem. Just shouting at the people to stop being “lazy” or “stubborn” does not actually solve the problem, but may help in making them feel very bad.
I really though we had left the point where people (who do not have mental problems or learning issues) claim that all that is needed to solve those is for the people who have them to stop being lazy. That is 19th century thinking.
In defense of those calling it Stubborn, Selkie has been reluctant on actually correcting the issue and doubled-down on her over pluralizing, deliberately leaning on it even harder when the subject was brought up.
Selkie’s “stubbornness” i..it’s, a lot of the time, just her being defensive when she’s hurt. I she acts stubborn to hide the fact that she genuinely has trouble understanding. She doesn’t want to look stupid. It’s was easier to say “There’s nothing wrong with me!” than to say “I need help.”
And also persisted WELL into the 20th Century, as many of students still alive can attest. If I had a dime for every time I put up with that crap, I could quit my job and retire.
It sounds EXACTLY like a neurological quirk which is probably ubiquitous among sarnothi. I say ‘quirk’ because most of them seem to grow out of it, in much the same way that humans with a childish lisp eventually lose it. I’d feel bad for the speech therapist trying to navigate his/her way through this issue, except that there’ll be a paper and increased professional respect at the end.
It’s speaking literacy vs. reading literacy in play. Humans process the three literacies differently, and for long periods of human history people would often learn only one or two. Learning all three prior to the modern era was quite rare; even most wealthy people could not do all three.
The third is writing literacy. There used to be people trained to write who could not read; they were the human form of copy machines, and a major reason why so much literature survived through the ages.
Those curious about speech impediments may want to go look up “Monster Study”, an experiment that happened in 1939… Just an FYI, before any conclusion-leaping takes place.
As a teacher myself I just have to say: No teacher has that beautiful kind of handwriting when writing on the board!
It is an unnatural position to write in, so it is all jagged up.
I don’t know about across the board, but my grandmother on my mother’s side was an English teacher all her life and she had such proper cursive handwriting that it actually was unreadable by most people because we have all gotten so used to the bastardization shorthand style that we get. She would send us letters and my mother would have to interpret them for us.
I imagine the sarnothi kids have to wait a bit to take off coat and hats because of the change in temp. So until their bodies have adjusted they might need those on to help adjust that little bit quicker.
Also class is PROBABLY about to start and Mina just wanted to draw Selkie aside for a quick second. It isn’t unheard of.
I remember the first time I heard my own voice, Christmas of 1974 when I got my own tape cassette player (look it up, youthful chums). I said EXACTLY the same thing!
An undiscovered city in the depths of Lake Superior? No problem. Members of an amphibious species successfully blending in with human society? OK. They can shoot laser beams out of their eyes and manipulate things with telekinesis? Sure. But a third grader in this day and age who can read cursive? C’mon Dave, do you really expect us to believe that?
I maintain, though, that if you’ve graduated from high school and can’t read cursive, you are handicapped as far as English goes.
If you need someone else to read cursive to you, that’s a handicap. Cursive is still one of the normal ways of writing English, and isn’t yet outdated. And, unlike a doctor’s scrawl, it’s generally legible.
North Carolina dropped cursive. The outcry was so great they put it back. When I was in grade school, “educators” were trying to improve education. I have concluded they have failed miserably. My evidence? That was in the early 1950s, and things are no better today, nearly 70 years on.
Given that my nephews (19 now?) still hunt-and-peck, I’m gonna say schools haven’t managed to teach *either*.
Honestly, I had to put a t-shirt over their hands to get an accurate reading on Stamina Typing Tutor; otherwise they kept looking between the screen and the keyboard.
I don’t know whether this has anything to do with where this is going, but an interesting observation on how the brain processes speech differently depending on how it’s “routed”:
I had a classmate in high school who had a fairly severe stutter, but if he was reciting something wrote, he would not stutter. So while it was occasionally a challenge for him to speak, he could act in plays or sing without issue.
And after my mother suffered a severe stroke she completely lost her ability to speak or write, although she was still able to clearly understand what was being said to her. If you asked her to write the alphabet she couldn’t get past “c”, and if you asked her to say her own name she couldn’t.
But when a speech therapist asked her (knowing, as an expert, what the result would be) to *sing* the alphabet, she could go all the way through without issue, because singing uses a different part of the brain. The “words” are not processed as language.
She could also recite somee prayers, apparently because they were stored in the same part of the brain as singing.
I’m assuming this has something to do with why there are singers who can sing with virtually flawless pronunciation in languages they speak with an accent or can’t speak at all.
And Selkie proves that it is indeed a form of laziness.
Comprehension of speaking with another person and comprehension of reading text aloud involve different sections of brain matter. It’s a similar thing to having trouble speaking a second language yet being able to write it fluently.
As a person who suffered TBI I can vouch for reading/writing/speech not all using the same parts of the brain. I have a mild aphasia that mostly goes away when I’m on the computer typing, but is worse when I’m speaking. It also gets worse when I’m under stress, but that’s something different. Anyway typing I can remember words more quickly and I retain more of my pre-injury vocabulary, but speaking my vocabulary is limited to about 3000 words +/-. IOW I sound pretty stupid when I’m talking because I have a hard time remembering what words mean what I’m trying to say and my speech is more halting with long pauses between words. You can see how I type…
I’d say stubborness, she just doesn’t want to cause she doesn’t see the point.
Or her ear/brain has trouble processing sounds the same way humans do so when she repeats what she hears she’s doing what sounds right to her. Saying she is just “stubborn” sounds a lot like the comments leveled at people with dyslexia when they have trouble reading.
Indeed.
It is not very helpful to categorize problems like this as “lazy” or “stubborn”. Diagnosing more accurately, as what is happening here, helps solve the problem. Just shouting at the people to stop being “lazy” or “stubborn” does not actually solve the problem, but may help in making them feel very bad.
I really though we had left the point where people (who do not have mental problems or learning issues) claim that all that is needed to solve those is for the people who have them to stop being lazy. That is 19th century thinking.
In defense of those calling it Stubborn, Selkie has been reluctant on actually correcting the issue and doubled-down on her over pluralizing, deliberately leaning on it even harder when the subject was brought up.
Selkie’s “stubbornness” i..it’s, a lot of the time, just her being defensive when she’s hurt. I she acts stubborn to hide the fact that she genuinely has trouble understanding. She doesn’t want to look stupid. It’s was easier to say “There’s nothing wrong with me!” than to say “I need help.”
And also persisted WELL into the 20th Century, as many of students still alive can attest. If I had a dime for every time I put up with that crap, I could quit my job and retire.
It sounds EXACTLY like a neurological quirk which is probably ubiquitous among sarnothi. I say ‘quirk’ because most of them seem to grow out of it, in much the same way that humans with a childish lisp eventually lose it. I’d feel bad for the speech therapist trying to navigate his/her way through this issue, except that there’ll be a paper and increased professional respect at the end.
I think Pohl described it as a learned quirk that can be unlearned, being a doctor and a sarnothi I think we can take his word on this.
Went and looked it up now just to be sure, and yep. Here for reference: https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie417/
It’s speaking literacy vs. reading literacy in play. Humans process the three literacies differently, and for long periods of human history people would often learn only one or two. Learning all three prior to the modern era was quite rare; even most wealthy people could not do all three.
You didn’t say what the third is… is it musical literacy?
These days you need media literacy.
Also financial.
The third is writing literacy. There used to be people trained to write who could not read; they were the human form of copy machines, and a major reason why so much literature survived through the ages.
Specifically Pork Chops!!!
30 minutes Dave. Goats are 15 minutes.
Those curious about speech impediments may want to go look up “Monster Study”, an experiment that happened in 1939… Just an FYI, before any conclusion-leaping takes place.
Okay I gotta make one little complaint here.
As a teacher myself I just have to say: No teacher has that beautiful kind of handwriting when writing on the board!
It is an unnatural position to write in, so it is all jagged up.
I don’t know about across the board, but my grandmother on my mother’s side was an English teacher all her life and she had such proper cursive handwriting that it actually was unreadable by most people because we have all gotten so used to the bastardization shorthand style that we get. She would send us letters and my mother would have to interpret them for us.
I know, but I’m tired of using my handwriting for every character. Partly because my handwriting is illegible even with good positioning.
Maybe she is using a smartboard, and is writing on tablet?
Ooh script fonts are the worst!
I don’t like Mina’s teaching style. Selkie hasn’t even taken her hat and coat off yet, and I imagine she has morning work to get done.
I imagine the sarnothi kids have to wait a bit to take off coat and hats because of the change in temp. So until their bodies have adjusted they might need those on to help adjust that little bit quicker.
Also class is PROBABLY about to start and Mina just wanted to draw Selkie aside for a quick second. It isn’t unheard of.
Selfie came to class early to deliver the note.
I remember the first time I heard my own voice, Christmas of 1974 when I got my own tape cassette player (look it up, youthful chums). I said EXACTLY the same thing!
Turns out, I was Welsh all along.
It has been confirmed by multiple people that my “customer service voice” sounds remarkably like Ellen DeGeneres.
My voice comes out as a half-an-octave-lower monotone no matter how expressive I thought I was whenever I listen to it on a recording.
Not that I or anyone I’d know can confirm or deny this, but “See Spot run” lets other agents know you’re using the bathroom
Not it. …just in case.
An undiscovered city in the depths of Lake Superior? No problem. Members of an amphibious species successfully blending in with human society? OK. They can shoot laser beams out of their eyes and manipulate things with telekinesis? Sure. But a third grader in this day and age who can read cursive? C’mon Dave, do you really expect us to believe that?
Well crap, I’m busted on this one.
Yeah, it’s hard to argue against.
Yah.
I maintain, though, that if you’ve graduated from high school and can’t read cursive, you are handicapped as far as English goes.
If you need someone else to read cursive to you, that’s a handicap. Cursive is still one of the normal ways of writing English, and isn’t yet outdated. And, unlike a doctor’s scrawl, it’s generally legible.
Technically, it’s still 2011 in-story… Maybe this school hasn’t yet abandoned cursive.
North Carolina dropped cursive. The outcry was so great they put it back. When I was in grade school, “educators” were trying to improve education. I have concluded they have failed miserably. My evidence? That was in the early 1950s, and things are no better today, nearly 70 years on.
I’m surprised Selkie can even read cursive, because schools have stopped teaching it.
Doh! Lunar already mentioned it.
They had to choose between cursive and keyboarding skills, not enough time to learn/teach both so cursive got the boot.
Given that my nephews (19 now?) still hunt-and-peck, I’m gonna say schools haven’t managed to teach *either*.
Honestly, I had to put a t-shirt over their hands to get an accurate reading on Stamina Typing Tutor; otherwise they kept looking between the screen and the keyboard.
That’s a canon skill, she’s been able to read Pohl’s handwritting when the other adults were baffled.
I don’t know whether this has anything to do with where this is going, but an interesting observation on how the brain processes speech differently depending on how it’s “routed”:
I had a classmate in high school who had a fairly severe stutter, but if he was reciting something wrote, he would not stutter. So while it was occasionally a challenge for him to speak, he could act in plays or sing without issue.
And after my mother suffered a severe stroke she completely lost her ability to speak or write, although she was still able to clearly understand what was being said to her. If you asked her to write the alphabet she couldn’t get past “c”, and if you asked her to say her own name she couldn’t.
But when a speech therapist asked her (knowing, as an expert, what the result would be) to *sing* the alphabet, she could go all the way through without issue, because singing uses a different part of the brain. The “words” are not processed as language.
She could also recite somee prayers, apparently because they were stored in the same part of the brain as singing.
I’m assuming this has something to do with why there are singers who can sing with virtually flawless pronunciation in languages they speak with an accent or can’t speak at all.