Otherwise
Julia Wise on effective altruism, parenting, and more
juliawise.netOtherwise is an independent blog covering personal and philosophy & ethics. It publishes on a weekly or bi-weekly basis, with 17 posts in its archive.
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Review of middle age: 3.5 / 4 stars
I’m 41, which is the statistical midpoint of an American woman’s life. My life is going pretty well! In seventh grade, on my science teacher’s birthday, one of my classmates asked if she was sad to be getting older. She smiled and said, “No, I like myself better as I get older.” I found that reassuring, and I’m writing this partly to give a picture of what a happy life can look like. In my dorky mom hat era I got lucky in my life structureMy mental health imp...
Use explicit teaching for kids
The longer I parent, the more appreciation I appreciate simple, back-and-forth structures for teaching. It’s tempting for adults to give long, one-sided instructions to young kids, but those don’t land well. Give them scripts Something vague like “use your words” requires a toddler to remember what word you’re looking for. Harder way Kid: MY SPOON FELL ON THE FLOORParent: Say it nicely.Kid: I WANT A DIFFERENT SPOON THIS ONE IS DIRTYParent: What’s the magic word?Kid: PleaseParen...
Spider shopping
I can’t remember where I heard this metaphor; apologies to whoever the original author is. A shopper walks into a pet store and asks, “Do you have any spiders?” The pet store owner says, “Yes, we have some.” The shopper runs into the street screaming “AUGHHH they have SPIDERS in there!!” Some writers are spider-shopping. Someone I know goes spider-shopping for evidence of wokeness ruining academia. He finds the worst examples of unreasonable things that happened at some department some...
Seeing too much peak and not enough normalcy
It’s the time of year when my rose plants are pumped with growth hormones. They’re shooting out new leaves, and every stem has buds ready to pop open. Search for “rose” and you get images showing this time of year, with fresh glossy foliage and newly opened flowers: The new buds look like teenagers to me, full of energy and growth. As with humans, what’s new and tender is vulnerable: many of my rose buds are covered in aphids sucking nourishment from them. This is also a rose plant...
Book review: Girl Scout Handbook 1956
For the last couple of years, I’ve helped run a camping trip with the girl scout troops my older kids are in. One camp gave us a copy of a 1956 Girl Scout handbook. It’s partly an orientation to what scouting is about, partly a list of badge requirements, and partly practical information. Given that it was from an era where gender was especially polarized, I was surprised that the authorship of this book felt sensible and balanced to me. No mid-century book for girls would be com...
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