New Post, Last Post

I just realised that I had forgotten to include ambience on my blog so I've put in a paragraph from my current PIO2 essay to cover my bases...

Ambience is described by Stroebele & De Castro (2004) as “parts of the environment that are hard to localise and that surround the organism integrally” (p.821). Ambience is the essence of an activity. The essence of an activity varies from person to person according to their personal interpretation of their occupations (Wicks & Whiteford, 2003). Many influences work together to determine these; life stories, personal history, culture, life-stage, and everything else that defines us as unique people. I find it easy to determine my own ambience in regards to baking. I feel as though it is something I have always done and will always do, but at the same time the reason that I have always done it is because of what it means to me. To me home is not where the heart is; it is where the baking is.

Wicks, A. & Whiteford, G. (2003). Value of life stories in occupation-based research. Australian            Occupational Therapy Journal, 50, 86-91.

Stroebele, N. & Castro, J. (2004). Effect of ambience on food intake and food choice. Nutrition, 20 (9), 821-838. doi:10.1016/j.nut.2004.05.012

Just for the record

Just for the record I have commented on other's blogs:
Grace
Dave
Shilmoni
Arnita

Ciao

Unrelated Rambling...

this week the rambling continues once more with me talking about how the particular need that baking is fulfilling in my life AT THIS EXACT MOMENT. So it is just ever so slightly different from last week.
This blog post is pretty much the result of a conversation with Fenja and Elise in class, as we all discussed the above topic, so all credit to them. On answering the deceptively simple question, "So why do you bake?" I then realised there was a wealth of information to be discovered. I nattered away for a significant amount of time before realised that all I had to say fitted into several short sentences:I bake because I am bored and I bake to interact with my flatmates. At the moment they are busy all the time and away all the time. I bake things they will eat. I watch the tins/jars of baked goods decrease and that is how I know my flatmates are still alive and kicking (and eating).
Just this week I've had a perfect example of that: Flatmate 1 is away on holiday, Flatmate 2 is doing shiftwork at the hospital, and Flatmate 3 is studying crazily for law exams. I have not even glimpsed Flatmate 2 since Sunday, but I know she is around as the cheese straws I made (with her in mind, as she likes savory things), which I left in the round tin, have been steadily decreasing. Flatmate 3, I have in fact seen, and interacted with, however only after about 9pm at night. I made some Rice bubble cake for her, ( to act as a study snack) because she LOVES sweet things, and rice bubble cake, containing sugar, honey, butter and rice bubbles seemed a perfect choice. I have also been tracking the progress of that baking and am happy to report that it too is decreasing. : )

Ramble Ramble Ramble...

So this week the topic of conversation circles around the question, what need does baking fill in my life?
I thought about it for a minute and then realised that I didn't think baking filled any particular needs in my life. But then I thought about it some more and realised that infact it did.

When I began baking (at a young, undentified age) it was because I liked it. It always got me so excited to bake bread, I was constantly amazed at things like yeast that made other things grow, and I used to sit in front of the oven and watch cakes, muffins, bread and biscuits spread then rise in the oven, however I was often a little bit too eager and so much of my baking resulted up being still slightly undercooked. The truth is I'm a very food-orientated person, lots of my best memories involve food, and I'm one of those people who clarify memories by food, ie typical conversation  "was that that time Liz brought those red velvet cupcakes? yes yes I remember that now".
 When I was a bit older I  baked for school lunches, I loved this as well as I felt it made me really important (even though it wasn't really important).
Now that I've moved away from home and I've got my own 'place' I cook to make it my home. I cook to use the ingredients and for satisfaction and to make nice smells to permeate the kitchen and lounge.  I cook for mastery and vanity (so people will say: "Yes, she's a very good cook") and if I need it an ego boost. In the winter I cooked because it made the kitchen warm and I could hang out in there without having to wear my puffer jacket.  However I do have to admit I don't really like eating baking. the other day I was standing in the kitchen and my flatmate asked me why I hadn't bothered to heat up my dinner (which was cold) and I thought about it and realised that the only meal I really make an effort to heat (if it needs it) is dessert. Any other food is just fuel, I don't really care what it looks or tastes like. Dessert however... mmm...
Today  I'm making a gingerbread house for a friend's birthday as a gift. I'm really excited, although I'm not quite sure how it's going to work. At the moment I plan to demonstrate (hopefully) Mastery and Fun.
Ciao

Affordances...Part Deux.

So Affordances again...
I was a little confused about what to write about. but I always am so I don't think it makes much difference this time.
I managed to stumble across a nice essay about affordances on the internet (however it is a bit obscure so the first 3 paragraphs are all that's really relevant) but I thought I'd post a link  to it and some choice quotes to help me to explain more fully what affordances actually are. It turns out that last week I was slightly wrong, now knowing slightly more about affordances I don't think they are actually very much like the butterfly effect. But I'll correct that now.
The essay uses  J.J. Gibson, a psychologist in the 70's to define affordances as "a relationship. They are a part of nature: they do not have to be visible, known, or desirable" (Norman, 2010).


Affordances: Connection/action properties
so the connection/action properties of my baking are more about finding out about other people. I have noticed (in my short yet fulfilled life) that often having the physical baking or even talking about baking quite often spawns a further conversation about baking ie:
do you make this?
what's your recipe? I use...
I find it good for... (potlucks)
I make it gluten free/vegetarian/dairy-free by substituting...
I think this kind of thing creates a bit of camaraderie between cooks. And (as an added bonus) helps you get to know people's best baking so you can request it if it is offered (one of my friends makes the BEST chocolate sauce ever, I use the same recipe but it just isn't the same).
One thing that is probably quite particular to me within the connection/action properties is that I also quite often like to collaborate with my friends/rocksolid kids to make stuff. Sometimes I let them choose the music that gets played in the kitchen(this is a big deal) and through this action it (I think) kinda helps them feel  like they belong in our kitchen.

Moral Properties
I feel that baking personally has a very moral aspect for me. I sometimes bake simply to calm myself down (in this instance I always bake either something chocolate or something dessert) and stop me getting angry or frustrated. I'm not entirely sure why this works, but I think it might simply be the satisfaction that comes from baking something that smells and looks so good. If that fails I normally eat copious amounts of what I have baked.
I often bake to give things away, this is inherited from various friends who got me on to the idea. I feel this is a morally right thing to do and it's always nice to see someone smile when you present them with their favorite baking/dessert/food if they are having a tough time. Having been on the receiving end of this I know that it just serves as a real reminder that someone cares : ).

Communication Properties
 Baking does provide opportunities for communications. I particularly find that what people like to bake/make as it tells you alot about their character. Things like what they are making, why they are making it, how complex the recipe is, when they are making it, if they give/take recipes and hints gives away  what kind of a person they are.
There's also a different type of communication, which comes with what you do with your baking. At my bible study bringing out the baking symbolises the end of the serious discussion and the beginning of social time, which is good for all us people with short attention spans.  When you give baking to a family in mourning, you are showing your support. When given to a family with a newborn you show that you are celebrating with them.

Well that's me for today. Off to bake some banana choc chip muffins for my flat (what does that tell you about me??)
Ciao

Norman, D. (2010). Affordances and design. Retrieved from http://www.jnd.org/dn.mss/affordances_and_design.html 27-9-2011.

Affordance

Affordance is... well using my own layman's knowledge of such things... supposed to be about outcomes of an activity, not necessarily the 'product' as such, but more like the butterfly effect (if you know what that is).
 my tale of affordance began 2 weeks ago when I made a chocolate cake for my friend's 20th birthday... (like in any good fairytale just imagine the sparkle sparkle sparkle that should go here).
So anyway the chocolate cake was a recipe from Sophie Gray's Destitute Gourmet cookbook. from memory I think it's called Dana's Chocolate Cake. It took a long time to cook (much longer than the book said) and I had to leave, so I left one of my flatmates (Steph) looking after it.
I got back a bit later on another (different) flatmate (Gwyn), and I discussed how we thought would be the best way to decorate it. I then decided that I was going to go to bed (I don't function well without my required 8 hours a night of beauty sleep) and do it in the morning (I like mornings). Gwyn then offered to do it for me that night and I gladly accepted, as I am not artistic (she is) and I didn't actually have any really amazing ideas on how to decorate it (like she did).
The next morning I got up expecting to see a beautifully decorated chocolate cake. And I did. As well as icing the cake Gwyn had also gone to the trouble of artfully making the top more normal-cake-shaped and filling it with jam, doing a much better job than I would have done.
I took the cake to my friends house (turned out he had a lecture and wasn't there anyway) and went back to the Library to continue on with my work.
There are many other parts to this story, including the part where I saved the cake from an untimely demise by a stormwater drain on harbour terrace,and the part where a lampshade fell on the freshly cleaned plate and broke it  but what really I'm trying to get at is that in this story the making of this cake was so much more than simply making a cake.  I managed to show my appreciation for my friend, show them that I wanted to celebrate their birthday with them, strengthened my relationship with my flatmates, let me recognise that I should step and let my flatmate decorate cakes in the future and many other things

So this goes to show that although the ultimate purpose was to bake a cake there was alot of other things to be gained from this activity. This is what we in OT refer to as affordances. 
thats all this time folks :)
Ciao

Errrgonomics! ! ! ! !

Somehow (I'm not sure how) I have already managed to miss a week of completing my blog so this week I'll have to make it up by writing two. It's actually harder than you'd think.
Sooo... Ergonomics is the topic for this blog. "So what exactly is ergonomics?" I hear you ask. Well I was just getting to that in my own awesome, sarcastic-yet-knowledgeable-while-still-being-cool-studenty kinda way. Rice (2008) defines ergonomics as optimising the relationship between the activity, the environment it is carried out in and the skills of the person completing it. this mattters to occupational therapists as we are required to “constantly make slight invisible adjustments to an activity to adapt to the needs of those taking part and ensure that it continues to work for its intended purpose” (Caulton & Dickson, 2007).
 So here we are:
Person:
I am competent,
I am young,
I have experience to adapt and change my own activity according to time or ingredients or needs/wants
I am organised
I am decisive
I have knowledge
and that is me.

Occupation:
Different levels of occupational engagement according to how I feel
Different levels of focus, attention or intricacy
I find baking has really good flow
Feelings differ greatly depending in what I can be bothered with, is it for lunches, for a party, as a gift?
can be individual or group task

Environment:
Kitchen, Specifically MY Kitchen; lots of bench space (to enable multiple things to be baked at same time)
Apron, essential part of environment as it always reminds me where I am and the context (ie I am in a kitchen. is it at my flat? my home? in an industrial kitchen? my gran's house? well the apron reminds me.
Loud music (so I can sing along, and get my baking mojo on).

That’s All Folks
Ciao

Caulton, R & Dickson, R. (2007). What's going on? Finding an explanation for what we do. In J. Creek & A. Lawson-Porter (Eds.) Contemporary issues in occupational therapy. Chichester: John-Wiley.
Rice, V. (2008 ). Ergonomics and therapy:an introduction. In K. Jacobs(Ed) Ergonomics for therapists (3rd.ed). MO: Mosby.