Olga Werby

Olga Werby, Ed.D., has a Doctorate from U.C. Berkeley with a focus on designing online learning experiences. She has a Master's degree from U.C. Berkeley in Education of Math, Science, and Technology. She has been creating computer-based projects since 1981 with organizations such as NASA (where she worked on the Pioneer Venus project), Addison-Wesley, and the Princeton Review. She conceived, designed, and illustrated the award-winning "Field Trips" series of programs distributed by Sunburst Communications. Olga has a B.A. degree in Mathematics and Astrophysics from Columbia University. Olga currently teaches interaction design and cognitive theory at the American University in Paris and the University of California at Berkeley Extension Program. She was part of the faculty of San Francisco State University's Multimedia Studies Program, the Bay Area Video Coalition, and the campus of Apple Computers. Olga is a member of the Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education. She also holds a California teaching credential and is part of the San Francisco Unified School District where she often tests science-related curriculum materials in public elementary and middle schools.

Newsletter, Working Memory

Room for Creativity

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The lion man from the Stadel Cave in Hohlenstein, Lonetal.

We often say someone is “creative”, but what is creativity good for? It’s not just for solving problems, although it takes a lot of creativity and expertise to figure out the thorniest issues. Creativity is a way we express ourselves and stand out; there are lots of experts but the best have both the creativity and the expertise to get a job done. While I believe most animals evolved to have some creativity, humans take this trait to the max (as we do with most things). Consider the Lion Man — a 40,000 year old statue of a humanized lion carved from ivory. Read the origin date again — it was created forty thousand years ago my cave men! It’s about a foot tall, has the head of a lion and body of human. It’s one of the earliest examples of human creativity we know about, in addition to all of the cave paintings that date to approximately the same time. But unlike cave painting which tend to depict scenes of real life, this statue is something else. It’s a fictional creature. Nothing like that ever existed in nature, it’s a figment of someone’s imagination. The statue, which was found…

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Newsletter

Reading the Same Stories Over and Over Again

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Gargoyles Reading Books

Lately, I feel like I’m reading the same story over and over again — a smart woman who might be a scientist or librarian meets a tall dark stranger with supernatural strength and military expertise and with an unlimited bank account; together, they save the world and may or may not have a romantic relationship (although very likely they do). Sounds familiar? It’s a very popular storyline; perhaps I should write something like that! But let me give you a few examples of these types of stories. These are all the books I’ve read. And don’t get me wrong, they are a fun ride…but it does get a bit repetitive. Vampires are some of the more popular strong, dark, handsome, and rich types. Augmented humans are another set that fit that bill — they have been made to be stronger and more intelligent than normal men. Then there are demons and an endless variation of humanoid mythical creatures (werewolves, angels, gods, mages and witches, etc.), aliens, cyborgs, and other superhero types. Immortality (or very long life span) helps with wisdom (they can speak any language), martial arts and military strategy training, and especially wealth. It is certainly easier to write…

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Newsletter, Scaffolding

Making Stories

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Nocturne in Blue and Silver

Every morning, my husband, cousin, and I play Wordle and share screen shots. It’s a gentle competition, and we laugh at our odd guesses — Aline? But it’s interesting how we arrive at the correct word via different paths, demonstrating that the same “prompt” leads to wide-ranging results. Below are three games from the same day recently where none of us did well. Even starting with the same first word, the path through to the solution is widely different. It’s similar to writing. Obviously, Wordle has it backwards — we all end on the same word if we solve the puzzle, it’s how we get there that’s different. For story ideas, it’s about the path forward from the original prompt. I have a story ideas folder that I regularly contribute to and shuffle as I look for ideas that might that fit a narrative I’m currently working on. I would like to give you a small example of one. The Changing Painting A woman regularly stops by a fine art museum on her way home, the Tate Gallery in London. She visits the same halls most nights on the way home; it helps her relax and switch gears from stresses…

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Book, Conceptual Design, Errors, My Books, Newsletter, Scaffolding

Summer Blues

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Covid

After four years of dodging COVID, we finally succumbed. It’s a nasty virus and, after two weeks in bed, I’m just starting to be able to write again. I did read a few books while sick, and I wasn’t fond of any of them! I didn’t find the characters interesting, and the storylines were boring, and frankly I didn’t see a point in the narrative. There were too many names and characters all introduced up front and I couldn’t keep track of who was who and why I should care. Given how I felt, I can’t leave reviews — I was in the wrong frame of mind. But it was interesting in retrospect. All readers are different. It’s not only our abilities, it’s our cultural backgrounds, our language skills, our availability to read at times when we are able to process information easily, our time in general. There are readings that are just like candy — fun and delicious. And there are those that are “good for you.” And, of course, there are books and articles that we read for professional advancement. All require different support structures to make the reader’s task easier. Indexes, bibliographies, just-in-time lookups, dictionaries, note taking,…

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Ethnographic & User Data, Long Term Memory, Newsletter, Product Design Strategy, Reference, Short Term Memory, Users, Working Memory

Expanding and Shrinking Horizons

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Itsy Bitsy Spider

It’s a Father’s Day weekend, and we have a lot to celebrate. My son’s graduation ceremony is on Father’s Day! He earned his doctorate in physics! He is also a great dad to a little girl and his birthday is a day before. It’s a full weekend of joy! Fatherhood can be complicated and all complicated things make great stories. I’ve considered which of my books has the most interesting father story and decided that Mirror Shards must be the one. So I’ve setup a giveaway of that ebook on Amazon for the next 5 days. Happy Father’s Day! When we are young, our conscious thoughts rarely extend beyond the immediate reality of our lives — playing with toys, visiting playgrounds, eating snacks, and receiving love and attention from our parents. Children seldom think beyond the next day or two. The ability to envision a longer future signifies maturation. As we grow older, our mental horizons broaden, we become more aware of the world, develop an interest in others, and learn to plan for the future. Yet, as we age, these horizons often narrow again. Some interpret this as a kind of selfishness of old age, but it truly reflects…

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book promotion, Newsletter

Essence

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Snow White

Stories can bring the salient details of life to light. Real life contains a lot of noise and extraneous detail that can obscure a through line. Fictional stories remove that noise to rise the core themes and emotions to the surface for observation and examination. Fictional stories both pare down and embellish real life. They zoom in on the important stuff and focus the reader’s attention squarely there. When the story captures something true about the lives of its characters, it binds us to them. Usually, we find a story engrossing when we care about the characters and want to see what happens to them. While some portrait painters insist on live sittings with their subjects, it’s easier — although perhaps more facile — to start with a photograph. Photographs manage to capture some essence of personality, to flatten it into something easier to paint, simplifying the process of portraiture. Caricatures identify particular features of their subjects and render them in a ruthless way. In the realm of words, identifying salient features in characters and their world makes them more memorable and makes their actions more comprehensible. Perhaps caricatures resemble jokes in this way. Last month, I wrote about fairytales.…

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