Couch 162: Let's Play Ball! (The Baseball Couch)

it's called a "reflection paper", and when I reflect, I reflect deeply lol

Being overlong is not the same as being marked down. It’s more that there’s several lessons to be learned in any written assignment besides the question asked, and one is concision. Editing too. (And you’ll probably be the only student who bothered to do that.)

Apparently a lot of people have said it.

I’m amazed Yogi Berra isn’t on that list.

Which is why I'm sure you probably advise your students what the maximum word count is. As student I would appreciate that greatly. I'm not a fan of ambiguity like what's being discussed here. My experience is with a minor in psychology where most of my classes were delivered online like Art's, so based on my experience 400 is a minimum.

Of course you can be thorough and concise.

The writing discussion reminded me of my eldest son, who came home from his writing class (ETA: his first college writing class) last week shocked that nearly 3/4 of the class did not complete the assignment by the due date.

He benefits because he’s not a naturally organized writer and got helpful feedback in that area, and now he and the few others who actually completed the assignment get an opportunity to rewrite their papers to improve their grade while the rest of the class finishes.

Maybe I shouldn’t be shocked? Is that normal?

"Four colours suffice."

He was not much of a writer, I suspect.

I’ve written IEP’s, implemented ones I haven’t written, and have a now-grown kid who was on an IEP all the way through school. A thoroughly and clearly written IEP is rare, in my experience.

I hope all of the folks who are benefiting from the IEP’s you’re writing appreciate the effort it takes, even if you don’t always get to hear it. Heck, I appreciate it, and I don’t have a clue who you’re writing them for. It’s an art to write an document that satisfies the legal requirements, and is readable and implementable.

What I look for is a 400 word essay with a crafted introduction that builds to a useful & interesting thesis statement. I want to see each paragraph address the thesis statement and reflect back to a sentence in the intro, expanding on a key idea in an organized, salient way. Each paragraph should begin with a topic sentence that offers a "hook"- an interesting idea. I like pertinent evidence from the text blended into your ideas.

I am considering reading a book in session with Blondie -- we both read (separate copies) and discuss.

Except so far every time I've tried to convey to her that a piece of writing would help explain oh so well what I'm trying to say, she seems to get into this mode of acting like I'm going to quiz her on it -- she then proceeds to give me a summary of what it said rather than her own thoughts on it (or even if she does say something that's not a summary of it, it'll be some utterly banal thing).

I don't want to impose it on her but at the same time, I'm super frustrated that she gets so weird about it because talking via literature (of all sorts) is rather normal to me and how I seem to connect best.

I wonder if anyone's tried doing something like this?

Btw, I'm pretty agnostic about what I could pick to read -- there's a lot of stuff I like / moves me and any of it would be fine. I have a slight inclination to pick translated poetry / stories type stuff from the motherland to talk about but I'm not wedded to that either.

AY, I did this with my therapist a few times, before everything went to hell in a handbasket. I think she/we read two books. And then she suggested one for me that we talked about. They were not psychology books. Two were fiction. My therapist is a big reader, so I will grant that she is great in that department and can do it without snapping at me or being hostile.

As a parent of a kid with an IEP, I like long and thorough!

One could request clarification. I suppose profs who allow this sort of going over the count have only themselves to blame for allowing it. A problem for me is the people who come to law school with these these sorts of experiences are quite shocked to find I mean what I say. And I wish undergrad would be more strict in teaching people to write well which to me includes writing concisely

Ease her in gently? Start with something she might enjoy?

I would bet Blondie would love Barbara Kingsolver. Somewhat highbrow popular fiction, etc.

I'm trying to write out some thoughts about Thursday's session for our phone call tomorrow. I feel like whatever I say is just going to make things worse. I feel like I've made mistakes and I keep making them and the more he sees of me the less he likes me. My husband used to call me a "social moron" and say that I had no social skills and I'm beginning to think he's right. I don't want to screw up my therapy relationship. I need him right now.

Your husband landed himself in jail — not exactly an authority on such matters, I’ll venture.

I wish it was as easy to discount his words for me as it is for outsiders. He had years to wiggle his way into my brain. And objectively speaking, he has had way more friends than I have. All of my friends, for the most part, were friends through him.

I’m sorry — I didn’t mean to be flippant.

NP—his words are familiar from my 2ex. But looking back I realize that what most damaged my social skills was him—all part of working to undermine my confidence so I wouldn’t leave him. And telling you that was meant to achieve the same effect.

None of us see another person objectively. So none of us, however well we know someone, can say that they are a “social moron” or similar. Your therapist doesn’t seem to agree with many of your husband’s thoughts about you, why would he agree with this one?

My husband created many of the very characteristics he then criticized in me. It’s part of the mind**** of emotional abuse.

I wasn't complaining about your response. I truly wish I could have a completely objective viewpoint, but it's hard.

He also told me that the people we used to work with, that none of them liked me and asked him why he was with me, that he could do so much better than me. (We used to work in a pizza place together when we were young.)

Part of me wants to think that he's just saying this to hurt me. But then another part, the part that has absorbed all the terrible things he said about me over the years, believes it. Why wouldn't they all hate me? I'm a terrible, unlikable person.

So I get the mind**** thing completely.

He told me people found me boring and I had no personality.

I’m now pretty sure neither is true. At least not for therapists.

ETA: He also used to tell me what a “great catch” he was. Yeah...

Your teacher must be young. I hate 11 pt font. If I ever become a professor I'm going to make my students do all their papers in 14 pt font. Sigh...I'm going to have to give in and get bifocals one of these days.

Are you sure we weren't married to the same guy?

I was also boring and had no personality. I "stole his youth". He could have had his pick of ladies, but he chose to be with me.

I hate Arial and all non-serif fonts. It’s well-known that serifs make it easier to read. And, yeah, what’s wrong with good ol’ 12-point?

And why oh why does MS Word now make its default font Calibri 11-point? It’s unbelievably ugly.