Lower Your Voice to Persuade

Guest: Gregory Jackson, PhD, Assistant Professor of Integrated Studies, Utah Valley University Two leading nations in the EU – France and Britain – have held parliamentary elections in recent weeks, both with surprising results. Let’s consider what they tell us about the state of things in Europe right now.

Guest: Deanna Kuhn, PhD, Professor of Psychology and Education at Teachers College, Columbia University and Co-Author of "Argue with Me: Argument as a Path to Developing Students’ Thinking and Writing" The best way to find out if you really understand a concept – or political position - is to try and defend it in an argument. The back-and-forth will quickly show where the holes are in your own comprehension. Being able to clearly articulate an idea is a basic skill schools are expected to teach. But the way it’s traditionally done - the good old essay with thesis statement, evidence and conclusion - doesn’t work nearly as well as it could.

Guest: Daryl Koehn, PhD, Wicklander Chair in Professional Ethics at DePaul University, Recipient of 2017 Master Teacher in Ethics Award from BYU Wheatley Institution We learn in kindergarten to say we're sorry when we wrong someone. It's a basic tenet of good behavior. But only in the last decade or so has it become common for corporate CEOs to publicly apologize when their company makes a mistake. When it comes to corporate apologies, it turns out that saying sorry isn’t enough. Getting the apology just right really matters.

(originally aired May 11, 2017) Guest: Rick Huganir, PhD, Director of the Johns Hopkins University Department of Neuroscience When you’re cramming on a deadline late at night, or frustrated by a problem you can’t seem to fix, maybe you’ve been given the advice to “just sleep on it.” A recent Johns Hopkins University study shows that that’s probably a good idea. The study was done in mice and found that while they were sleeping, their brains were hard at work reconfiguring lessons learned during the day into memories that changed the mice’s behavior the next day. The researchers believe a similar thing happens when humans sleep.

(originally aired Feb. 21, 2017) Guest: Carrie Goldman, Author of “Bullied: What Every Parent, Teacher, and Kid Needs to Know About Ending the Cycle of Fear” According to the Cyberbullying Research Center, about half of young people have experienced some form of cyberbullying. Last year, during her husband’s campaign, Melania Trump said she had plans to make it her focus as First Lady. And rightfully so, since she and her 11-year-old son Barron have both experienced it firsthand before and after the election. Yet, five months after the inauguration, the First Lady has been slow to put anything specific in motion. Earlier this year, we spoke with Carrie Goldman about what parents and teachers can do to tackle the problem.