What Makes the Badlands Bad?

Start with a bit of Vulcan thinking. You find that part of the chapter is material that looks difficult for you. Obviously, the problem is not with you. If the problem were with you, everything in the chapter would look difficult to you. So what makes the badlands bad?

If you started in friendly territory, you already have a clue. What makes the friendly territory friendly? It is familiar. It connects with things you have already worked with before. It uses words you already own. It talks about events that you can imagine as events. You have already figured out the important descriptors (we will need to help people on this). You brain has already figured out how to organize things in ways that will fit you and the way you need to use the stuff.

Now back to the Badlands. How many of these descriptions apply to the Badlands? Probably not many. Coincidence? Or something more? You be the judge.

So what do you do with the Badlands? Put off the job as long as possible? Start memorizing by saying things over and over to yourself? Complain?

Or you might try none of the above. Here we suggest a few variations on none of the above. Since you already know what makes territory friendly, you have some idea about how to tame the Badlands.

Connect them with stuff you have worked with before. (Not just in a particular course. What is this like? If you can’t think of useful similes, try silly similes.)

You see some words you don’t own, grab them. (Get to know the McGuffin by imagery, talking with other people about it, making it into a dramatic story.)

Look for events you can imagine. (Look behind those technical terms.)

Figure out the key descriptors. (These are relevant attributes or dimensions of variation. They are the things you will want to know for multiple choice test. You find them by looking for clusters or separation. Explaining this is impossible, so it will take us a while to do it.)

Look for several ways to organize the stuff. (They don’t have to be better than what the text did. Try simple ways: ranked from least difficult to incomprehensible. Ranked from most concrete detail to most abstract. Two dimensional layout on these dimensions. Common attributes in scholastic work.)

(This is draft thinking for a page).