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thirteenemeraldcats · 3 months

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in one of your tags you mentioned-

'one of the things that gets chatted about A LOT in teaching is meeting students at their point of need- which ted does NOT do with jamie'

I would love to hear more of your thoughts on this! Both in terms of what that concept entails, and also what you think Jamie's point of need was at the time versus what Ted saw the situation needing

(You have excellent tags btw, don't know if anyone's mentioned that)

I HAVE MANY THOUGHTS ON THIS THAT I LOVE THAT YOU'D LOVE TO HEAR!

(I have more thoughts than I anticipated, this got errr, long. Whoops)

(potentially necessary/relevant background here is I am a high school teacher 👋)

Okie dokie, so, one of the principles of best practice in teaching is the idea I tag-rambled above; meet both the individual students and collective class at their point of need. Essentially this means practising differentiation in teaching and adjusting how content/ideas are communicated to students based on who they are as learners and people. Particularly if a student is performing outside the 'average' (either exceeding or still developing), this means adjusting to their needs by (among other things) curating differentiated resources and adapting delivery style. Differentiation is especially important in an all-abilities classroom, unfortunately public education is perpetually underfunded and overcrowded so everyone's just out here doing their best (the decent people of the world at least). BUT! WHILE I'M ON IT! SPEAKING OF THE THINGS I'VE TAG RAMBLED, the education system's (global) inability to adequately differentiate for students of different-abilities, particularly students with ADHD, ASD and Dyslexia, is perhaps the greatest failing of the whole dang thing and if anyone who ever stumbles across this is neuro-divergent and feels like they were a bad student or couldn't 'keep up' in mainstream education- THAT WAS NOT YOUR FAULT. You don't have to break yourself to 'fit', school is MEANT to bend for you. (Particularly when you're young, ESPECIALLY WHEN YOU'RE YOUNG)

ANYWAY, the fictional football of it all!

We don't see a lot of Ted actually coaching in this show (stick with me). The scenes in which he 'coaches' are typically him and various other coaching staff standing on the sidelines while the team skirmishes or occasionally runs drills, so me saying Ted doesn't differentiate is more based around his patented Ted-talks. NOW, Ted PROBABLY knows the team fairly well as individuals, particularly in season 2 and 3, purely by having spent quite a lot of time with them, despite this the only times we really see him 'adjust' his style with the team are ironically season 1 (examples include conferencing Jamie and Roy in 1x04 For The Children, and allowing/facilitating Nate's speech in 1x07 Make Rebecca Great Again). The moment that always sticks out to me as most significant is when he goes and seeks out Keeley's advice on how to get through to Jamie in 1x02 Biscuits.

Side note: I will be forever obsessed with Keeley jumping straight from 'blowjobs' to one of the four operant conditioning techniques (positive reinforcement) when asked about this. That woman is a very fascinating puzzle of a person.

Ted recognises that his typical perpetual-optimism-style isn't cracking the Jamie-Tartt-nut and seeks out a different opinion. This kind of collaboration and whole-system approach is key in teaching too, either by tapping the knowledge-well of a student's broader school context or the difficult-to-crack student's parents.

SO, having gotten the Jamie-Tartt-cheat-code from Keeley he DOES meet Jamie at his point of need, speaks clearly to him and communicates what he needs from him. AND IT WORKS! Temporarily! During the conversation between the two in Ted's office we see Jamie engage, he even practises self-reflection! Granted it's about his left foot cross, but still! The nut is cracked.

Jamie even maintains the perspective Ted has taught him for about two seconds while talking to Trent, until Jamie's other (definitely not positively-reinforced) behaviours rear up and he reverts to what James others have taught him.

On the other hand.

Multiple times throughout the show we see Jamie be visibly or verbally confused by Ted's communication style. Ted often talks in meandering metaphors that Jamie doesn't seem to be able to follow. We verbally hear him state 'Why doesn't he just say that then, do you know what I mean?' in 2x07 Headspace after Beard has to translate Ted's 'peas and carrots/beefchunks' analogy to 'starters and reserves'. Then there's the infamous 'What the fuck are Denver Broncos?' from 3x09 La Locker Room Aux Folles. The only notable time we really see Jamie 'get' one of these metaphors is the sewer-system-tunnels from 3x01 Smells Like Mean Spirit.

(His understanding of that specific metaphor, along with his use of the magnets to demonstrate total football in 3x07 The Strings That Bind, and a Watsonian-perspective of his near perfect mimicry of movements he saw two years ago when executing the decoy play in 3x12 So Long, Farewell, are actually all examples I use to head-canon Jamie as a primarily visual/physical based learner. For whatever that's worth!)

NOW! Ted's willingness to seek and apply alternate techniques in season 1 when he should know the team as both individuals and a collective the least, coupled with his inability or unwillingness to practise differentiation in later seasons when he DOES KNOW THEM is why I don't think Ted is meeting the team, specifically Jamie at their/his point of need. Any person's ability to differentiate behaviour to meet the needs/requirements/comforts of the individual or group they're talking to is increased the more they know them. (We all do this in life, consciously or subconsciously we typically try and 'match the vibe' of whoever we're communicating with [doubly so for people who're engaging in masking.])

Ted should and does learn more about Jamie as a person and his background as the show progresses. He listens to Jamie vocalise both his internal justifications for his actions and his reflections of those justifications/actions in 1x06 Two Aces, he sees him being explicitly physically abused in 1x10 The Hope That Kills You, he listens to him describe a spiralling mindset in 2x02 Lavender, he sees him being explicitly verbally abused in 2x08 Man City.

Of course, one of the fascinating things about Jamie is how much he learns and grows over the course of the show, and there are instances in which I don't think Ted is recognising that (primarily his dismissal of Jamie in 3x03 4-5-1 and not utilising Jamie's knowledge of total football as a resource from the beginning in 3x07 The Strings That Bind).

Ted understands and has previously applied Jamie responding well to positive reinforcement, yet at multiple times in the series doesn't respond in a way that reflects his perspective being informed by that knowledge. Essentially not practising the appropriate level of care/caution when interacting with/around Jamie.

There's not intervening on Jamie's behalf in 2x03 Do the Right-est Thing or 2x06 The Signal when the team and Roy are targeting or ignoring him respectively. The assumed absence of any follow up to the events of 2x08 Man City, the Zava of it all in season 3, and of course the eternal 'forgiveness' kicker from 3x11 Mom City.

POINT BEING. And to actually answer your inquiry lol, I think Jamie is someone who needs clear communication, ideally bracketed in positive reinforcement based operant conditioning as a learning technique (reward behaviour you want reinforced by offering something desirable [praise in Jamie's case]) and visual/physical aid/references for concepts; as a LEARNER.

AS A PERSON, there's more. Ted can readily infer from all he's heard and seen that Jamie's a victim of child abuse. The long term damage to the adult psyche that abuse during formative years has is astronomical, it literally changes the foundational structures of a person's brain. And yet, again, we never see Ted even acknowledge this. Jamie in 3x11 Mom City, incidentally compares his father to Freddy Krueger, Ted elaborates on the comparison, then Jamie reiterates that Freddy Krueger's 'fucking terrifying'. Ted doesn't reassure Jamie (the requirement of his point of need), he gives him a Ted-talk (and in doing so doesn't differentiate his perspective/communication technique).

As far as what Ted thought the situation needed... search me I've got no idea. I do think Ted projects onto Jamie a hell of a lot. That he gets Jamie's personhood and life experiences all tangled up in the emotions he has about his father's death and his consequent perceived abandonment, his insecurities about his own ability to parent Henry and even in his own inability to clearly communicate with his mother. I do think Ted relies on his own forced optimism to 'get by'. Like how a great white shark dies if it stops swimming, if Ted stops being 'Ted', if he stops swimming, his past and his fears and his feelings will catch up to him and swallow him whole. (For what it's worth, I do think Ted is more unwell than even the show explicitly tells us, much like Jamie experiencing ongoing trauma due to childhood abuse, the effects both short-term and long-term as well as potential causalities of having a parent die by suicide are... grim.)

(Essentially the entire fandom has talked about basically all of this at one point or another, I'm just using slightly different language.)

NOW! These characters are fictional (obviously) and I am judging them based on real-people conventions and the best-principles of my own profession, as well as my background in theoretical psychology (which I think I forgot to mention and is also probably [??] relevant). My Doylist-perspective of Ted and his coaching/communication style is ...kinder, but if I get too sucked into the narrative it results in either brief tag-rambles or... whatever this thing I've just typed is. I think it's been too long since I've written academically, my thoughts have gone circular 🫠

ANYWAY! I hope this made something-approaching sense! Thank you again for asking to hear my thoughts! Always happy to word vomit!

ALSO, thank you for saying my tags are excellent (you are the first and currently only to say so!) - The tags are where I send my thoughts to die (in a 'I must banish them to move on' kind of way rather than a 'I'm strangling them' kind of way) so you saying they're excellent is even MORE flattering than you realise! Makes my brain want to purr 💚🤣

#what do i even begin to tag this slab of text as YEESH #ted lasso #jamie tartt #theodore lasso #ask box is always open #come hit me up for teaching rambles or psych rambles or fandom rambles or general rambles ANYTIME #readwing #jamiesfootball #oh shit trigger warnings #suicide #child abuse #if this indeed makes no sense i would like to blame it on the fact i've written it while drinking wine through a straw #(it's my friday night okay)#i'll post this in the morning when i've had the chance to read it while NOT drinking wine through a straw #hola- it is now morning and i'm only slightly hungover! win!

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safyresky · 2 months

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Hello, hey, dropping in with a query.

Since CS has officially concluded (congrats by the way!) I wanna ask about your own interpretation of Mother Nature.

She is absolutely my girl, I adore her, queen, but I wanna know how exactly she fits into the CS world structure. How does she keep looking so young when everyone else ages normally? What was her relationship to Mother Gaia? What kind of magical creature is she and was mother Gaia also the same kind? How does she fit into the government structure? HOW IS SHE SO TALL???

Idk, she's been on my mind a lot and I'm assuming we'll know a bit more about all that at some point but I can't wait that long lol

Thank you!! You know, it's so funny, bc while I was oot and aboot yesterday/Friday I was like "I can take a breather from writing, just focus on other things--" and not 24 hours later I had the Into the Shadows plotting doc open, as I finally figured out what happens in Chapter 7 🫠🫠

I WILL NEVER KNOW PEACE! But what can I say, I love this world and I love writing. Shit's FUN

ANYWAY. YOUR QUERY MY GOOD FRIEND. I COME WITH ANSWERS IN POINT FORM NOTES

It's all kinda rough tbh??? More like scattery thoughts if anything but HERE YOU GO! HAVE SOME CS LORE!

Okay okay so Mother Gaia was essentially the personification of ALL nature, and as such, could wield all Nature :) She looks like a sprite, tho, and for all intents and purposes would call herself a sprite--same with Mother Nature

This also checks out bc in CS, sprites are specifically fae who can control weather/nature/the elements! :)

Gaia was the Goddess's connection to the people, and got a little lonely when the Goddess was like "everyone is safe, things are going well, take it easy, Gaia!" so, she created a companion. A fellow personification of nature that she named Tara, who could do everything she could do

The Goddess gave her a light life, which is like a little ball of life that brings things to life (I am soo creative at naming things I swear) and Gaia used it to give Tara, well. life!

So, Mother Gaia was in all senses of the word, Mother Nature's Mother! Tara called her Mother and meant it in all the ways :)

Gaia trained her, raised her, loved her very very much and eventually started training her to take her own place one day

And that day came faster than expected for Tara when Mother Gaia fucking SNAPPED mid fae war and scorched the land to stop the fighting, in a stretch that has since NEVER GROWN BACK. It's known as the scar. Autumn lives close to it in modern-day CS.

Once that happened, Gaia was like APPALLED. She'd been just as bad as the fae fighting over who was best, using her powers for what she wasn't meant to use her powers for: hurting the Earth

She was beside herself; went to go talk to the Goddess and was gone for DAYS. All the fighting stopped, tho!

Then she and the Goddess came up with Rosehaven and the Call, and Gaia went with the old fae during the Call, leaving Tara to be the Next Mother Gaia

And she chose the title Mother Nature and here we are!

SO. In modern day CS, she is: the connection to the goddess for the magibeans, if they need her to be; guards the magic of creation/life/balance??? (a system I'm still trying to figure out lol, I'll have to dig up those notes at some point), and heads the Council with Father Time.

She's on the Assembly because when it was formed NOBODY felt right not having her on there, so she's kind of like. She's the approver of decisions lol. She lets them do their thing but if they ever come to an impasse they turn to her, and her word is essentially law

That's sort of why when the Twin Princes were born she was called to choose who'd rule next! Well, Gaia was, but Gaia left the decision to Tara as they were at That Point in training: POLITICS. If magibeans had an issue that couldn't be solved amongst themselves OR by the royals, MN/MG would be called upon and what she'd say, GOES

Which left for a lot of last minute swerves bc Gaia was clever and MN is just as clever. See: that story about the two people fighting over the chicken???? I forget what it was, anyway, the person presiding went CUT IT IN HALF and one was like okay cool! And the other was like SOB NO MY CHICKEN and the person deciding was like GOT EM LOL. That sorta shit.

In the event of an emergency, Mother Nature and the CS Governor (so Blaise since this mans just can't seem to lose an election, and he has TRIED some years) become de facto co-rulers and both have to agree on decisions before acting on them. This would be like. In a nasty war or like. end of the world circumstance kinda thing

SO YEAH SHE'S BASICALLY JUST THE HEAD BITCH IN CHARGE. KEEPS MOTHER FUCKERS IN LINE. WILL TELL PEOPLE IF WHAT THEY WANNA DO IS STUPID. ALSO, CONTROLS ALL NATURE AND KEEPS THE SEASONS GOING AND THE LIKE.

Why is she so young looking compared to everyone else? Well, if you asked her, she'd say you're only as old as you feel and offer no explanation. In terms of height, she'd look at you quizzically and go "Why not?" and that'd be her answer

this is Dani for "bc she can choose how to present herself and that's how she chooses too!"

kinda like Steven's gem reacting to his mindset sort of thing.

and also, tall Mother Nature just fucking SLAPS. She SHOULD be tall as FUCK! I subscribe to that! I LOVE tall MN. EVERYONE looks up to her--quite literally!

Except for like giants and trolls and other very tall magibeans and folklore creatures and the like 🤭🤭🤭

Hopefully I got all your questions! Thank you for asking! I LOVE thinking of early CS lore, it's so FUN and Mother Nature is one of my FAVES. I get so ragey in tsc fics where's she's written as a HUGE MEANER, super angry, etc etc and even borderline villain? GOD. I JUST. SHE'S A BADASS AND VERY SWEET AND EVERYONE FORGETS THE SWEET BIT!!! SHE WAS SO KIND TO SANTA AND THE OTHER LEGENDS IN THE MOVIES AND EVEN WHEN JACK WAS JACKING ABOUT, SHE WAS GENTLY CHIDING HIM!!!!!!! FUCK MAN! I'M GONNA EXPLODE JUST THINKING OF BAD MN CHARACTERIZATION! AH!

Please excuse the rant and uh, enjoy the heckin answer 😅😅😅

#dani answers #alpharra #cs lore #ask box shenanigans #crystal springs #and i GUESS i'll tag it as #tsc #as well. but not the full tag; this is way more cs lore than it is fanlore tbh lol #there's also two types of sprites! seasonal sprites and elemental sprites #the seasons and the frosts are all seasonal sprites--they have the whole entire season at their fingertips #elemental sprites are more like benders--can manipulate water or ice or fire or rocks/earth or make plants grow #i've got a lot going on in this big ol world i've found myself in lmao #ANYWAY THANK YOU FOR THE ASK!! I LOVE ASKS! ASKS ARE MY FAVOURITE! ESPECIALLY ONES THAT DETAIL ALL THE LORE FOR CS!!#CS ADJACENT ASKS IN GENERAL! AH!#i actually have a lil story planned that's about half (re) written that introduces the call and light lifes and how the seasons came to be #maybe I'll square it up and post it this summer!! :)#long post #sorry for the lack of read more i didn't know where it would best fit without breaking up the text #APOLOGIES TO YOUR DASHES

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