There is something amiss in Tea at the Cabin in the Woods

The sleet and snowy mix made walking across campus seem like trudging across the tundra. The wind turned the small umbrella inside out repeatedly, breaking the arms and leaving them to dangle freely. April is to be full of showers, but nothing like this, not even in New Hampshire. I got to the other side of campus and shook off the moisture, climbed the stairs and entered my classroom, all dark and quiet wondering if any of the students would brave the elements and actually get to class. Slowly they arrived, two thirds of them carrying coffees from the Starbucks on the main level. The others, were MIA. Then he walked in wearing his normal short sleeved T-shirt and jeans, showing off his six-pack and country boy smile. If I weren’t old enough to be his grandmother, I would have been interested in finding out more about him. As it was, being old enough to be his grandmother I asked him flat out, “Don’t you ever wear a jacket? Aren’t you freezing?” He looked at me and smiled and clear as day in his deep baritone voice said, “No Mam, it really doesn’t feel that cold to me.” REALLY? It’s 33 degrees out there without the wind chill… I just shook my head and said, “well, okay then.”

My lecture for the day turned into one about Development and the stages of Erikson’s theory, followed by Lawrence Kohlberg’s ideas on moral development. It got derailed several times when the question about when adolescence ends and young adulthood really begins. The majority of this class would still be adolescents by definition and they took offense to this. That lead me into asking the hard questions of having them define and explain the differences between the two and to convince me their views were more correct than the science. One of my bright and shining stars argued the the full development of the pre-frontal cortex would never be complete since the brain is always changing. I agreed the brain is always changing, new neuro-connections are always being made while unused ones are pruned away. But the pre frontal cortex is measured in size and shape in comparison to the other structures of the brain, indication a sense of judgement, higher order thinking skills and better decision making. I used the example of why they couldn’t rent a car until they were 25. “That really sucks!” was one of the comments. I also mentioned their car insurance, if accident free, will also go down once they hit 25. “That’s ageism, discrimination against young people!” And there you have it, yes, they are still adolescents.

OH, I am going to try to put a link on here to a show that airs in Sweden (it’s in English) that featured my son. Really cool and fun to watch. He’s such a goof… :-)