If you want to print the whole document, use the icon to go to tile view so all pages are shown. Then select Print.
Below are lyrics to the parable of the Prodigal Son presented as Gospel Song.The singing is from an Amazon.com preview of a collection of Gospel music from the early days of recording: Raw Pre-war Gospel (1926-36) - American Primitive, Volume I
January 18th, 2011 7:42 pmFree the Dictionary
CNN is now apologizing for the use of the word “crosshairs” in general political speech, as shown in the video after the “Read More” jump. The implication is that the word itself has been used to facilitate a hate crime. That is untrue, as former New York City Mayor Ed Koch observes. But maybe the belief is that if a lie is repeated for long enough then it eventually becomes true. Then power follows. “Real power is the ability to define what the fight is about.” The entire discussion moves into a rigged casino. Control words and you control truth. George Orwell understood this so well that he believed one of the first things every totalitarian ideology does is redefine the words in a language, purposefully, forcefully and relentlessly. In his novel 1984, he called this artificial language of totalitarianism Newspeak.
via pajamasmedia.com
Thomas Szass pointed out that "In nature, it is kill or be killed; in culture it is define or be defined." An important point to remember when entering the lists of our culture wars...
Theodore Roethke (1908-1963)
My Papa's Waltz
The whiskey on your breath
Could make a small boy dizzy;
But I hung on like death:
Such waltzing was not easy.
We romped until the pans
Slid from the kitchen shelf;
My mother's countenance
Could not unfrown itself.
The hand that held my wrist
Was battered on one knuckle;
At every step you missed
My right ear scraped a buckle.
You beat time on my head
With a palm caked hard by dirt,
Then waltzed me off to bed
Still clinging to your shirt.
via watilo.com
Cory Waitlo, who designed the template currently in use for jvjv.dot.posterous, notes the strange English that documents some Chinese electronics products. They are almost poetic in the way they tease...
| Why is this effective? What makes it "moving"? |
From Evernote: |
OLD GUY AND A BUCKET OF SHRIMP............. |
OLD GUY AND A BUCKET OF SHRIMP............. This is a true story.
It happened every Friday evening, almost without fail, when the sun resembled a giant orange and was starting to dip into the blue ocean. Old Ed came strolling along the beach to his favorite pier.. Clutched in his bony hand was a bucket of shrimp. Ed walks out to the end of the pier, where it seems he almost has the world to himself. The glow of the sun is a golden bronze now. Everybody's gone, except for a few joggers on the beach. Standing out on the end of the pier, Ed is alone with his thoughts...and his bucket of shrimp.
Before long, however, he is no longer alone. Up in the sky a thousand white dots come screeching and squawking, winging their way toward that lanky frame standing there on the end of the pier.
Before
long, dozens of seagulls have enveloped him, their wings fluttering and flapping wildly. Ed stands there tossing shrimp to the hungry birds. As he does, if you listen closely, you can hear him say with a smile, 'Thank you. Thank you.'
In a few short minutes the bucket is empty. But Ed doesn't leave. He stands there lost in thought, as though transported to another time and place.
When he finally turns around and begins to walk back toward the beach, a few of the birds hop along the pier with him until he gets to the stairs, and then they, too, fly away. And old Ed quietly makes his way down to the end of the beach and on home. If you were sitting there on the pier with! ! your fishing line in the water, Ed might seem like 'a funny old duck,' as my dad used to say. Or, 'a guy who's a sandwich shy of a picnic,' as my kids might say. To
onlookers, he's just another old codger, lost in his own weird world, feeding the seagulls with a bucket full of shrimp.
To the onlooker, rituals can look either very strange or very empty. They can seem altogether unimportant ....maybe even a lot of nonsense. Old folks often do strange things, at least in the eyes of Boomers and Busters. Most of them would probably write Old Ed off, down there in Florida . That's too bad. They'd do well to know him better. His full name: Eddie Rickenbacker. He was a famous hero back in World War II. On one of his flying missions across the Pacific, he and his seven-member crew went down. Miraculously, all of the men survived, crawled out of their
! ! plane, and climbed into a life raft. Captain Rickenbacker and his crew floated for days on the rough waters of the Pacific. They fought the sun. They fought sharks. Most of all, they fought hunger. By the eighth day their rations ran out. No food. No water. They were hundreds of miles from land and no one knew where they were.
They needed a miracle. That afternoon they had a simple devotional service and prayed for a miracle. They tried to nap Eddie leaned back and pulled his military cap over his nose. Time dragged. All he could hear was the slap of the waves against the raft.
Suddenly, Eddie felt something land on the top of his cap. It was a seagull!
Old Ed would later describe how he sat perfectly still, planning his next
move. With a flash of his hand and a squawk from the gull, he managed to grab ! ! it and wring its neck.. He tore the feathers off, and he and his starving crew made a meal - a very slight meal for eight men - of it. Then they used the intestines for bait.. With it, they caught fish, which gave them food and more bait......and the cycle continued. With that simple survival technique, they were able to endure the rigors of the sea until they were found and rescued (after 24 days at sea...). Eddie Rickenbacker lived many years beyond that ordeal, but he never forgot the
sacrifice of that first lifesaving seagull.. And he never stopped saying, 'Thank you.' That's why almost every Friday night he would walk to the end of the pier with a bucket full of shrimp and a heart full of gratitude. Reference: (Max Lucado, In The Eye of the Storm, pp..221, 225-226)
It happened every Friday evening, almost without fail, when the sun resembled a giant orange and was starting to dip into the blue ocean. Old Ed came strolling along the beach to his favorite pier.. Clutched in his bony hand was a bucket of shrimp. Ed walks out to the end of the pier, where it seems he almost has the world to himself. The glow of the sun is a golden bronze now. Everybody's gone, except for a few joggers on the beach. Standing out on the end of the pier, Ed is alone with his thoughts...and his bucket of shrimp.
Before long, however, he is no longer alone. Up in the sky a thousand white dots come screeching and squawking, winging their way toward that lanky frame standing there on the end of the pier.
Before
long, dozens of seagulls have enveloped him, their wings fluttering and flapping wildly. Ed stands there tossing shrimp to the hungry birds. As he does, if you listen closely, you can hear him say with a smile, 'Thank you. Thank you.'
In a few short minutes the bucket is empty. But Ed doesn't leave. He stands there lost in thought, as though transported to another time and place.
When he finally turns around and begins to walk back toward the beach, a few of the birds hop along the pier with him until he gets to the stairs, and then they, too, fly away. And old Ed quietly makes his way down to the end of the beach and on home. If you were sitting there on the pier with! ! your fishing line in the water, Ed might seem like 'a funny old duck,' as my dad used to say. Or, 'a guy who's a sandwich shy of a picnic,' as my kids might say. To
onlookers, he's just another old codger, lost in his own weird world, feeding the seagulls with a bucket full of shrimp.
To the onlooker, rituals can look either very strange or very empty. They can seem altogether unimportant ....maybe even a lot of nonsense. Old folks often do strange things, at least in the eyes of Boomers and Busters. Most of them would probably write Old Ed off, down there in Florida . That's too bad. They'd do well to know him better. His full name: Eddie Rickenbacker. He was a famous hero back in World War II. On one of his flying missions across the Pacific, he and his seven-member crew went down. Miraculously, all of the men survived, crawled out of their
! ! plane, and climbed into a life raft. Captain Rickenbacker and his crew floated for days on the rough waters of the Pacific. They fought the sun. They fought sharks. Most of all, they fought hunger. By the eighth day their rations ran out. No food. No water. They were hundreds of miles from land and no one knew where they were.
They needed a miracle. That afternoon they had a simple devotional service and prayed for a miracle. They tried to nap Eddie leaned back and pulled his military cap over his nose. Time dragged. All he could hear was the slap of the waves against the raft.
Suddenly, Eddie felt something land on the top of his cap. It was a seagull!
Old Ed would later describe how he sat perfectly still, planning his next
move. With a flash of his hand and a squawk from the gull, he managed to grab ! ! it and wring its neck.. He tore the feathers off, and he and his starving crew made a meal - a very slight meal for eight men - of it. Then they used the intestines for bait.. With it, they caught fish, which gave them food and more bait......and the cycle continued. With that simple survival technique, they were able to endure the rigors of the sea until they were found and rescued (after 24 days at sea...). Eddie Rickenbacker lived many years beyond that ordeal, but he never forgot the
sacrifice of that first lifesaving seagull.. And he never stopped saying, 'Thank you.' That's why almost every Friday night he would walk to the end of the pier with a bucket full of shrimp and a heart full of gratitude. Reference: (Max Lucado, In The Eye of the Storm, pp..221, 225-226)
The Bay Citizen
Bonus Payments to City Retirees Are Drawing Ire
By ELIZABETH LESLY STEVENS
Published: January 20, 2011
As San Francisco struggles under ballooning pension and health care costs, the city’s retirees will receive unexpected cost-of-living bonuses totaling $170 million. The city’s anticipated budget deficit for the coming year is $360 million.
via nytimes.com
Is there something wrong with our priorities?
From Evernote: |
National Great Books Curriculum - Research Guide to the Great Books - Shakespeare on the WebClipped from: http://www.nationalgreatbooks.com/modules/shakespeare.asp |
Shakespeare on the Web
Compiled by Prof. Mike Petersen
Compiled by Prof. Mike Petersen
Introductory/General Sites:
http://www.ulen.com/shakespeare/students/guide/
Surfing with the Bard is an introduction to Shakespeare for students. Included are sections on the poetry and unusual word arrangements, omissions and unusual words, a Shakespeare glossary, an interesting method of thoroughly understanding the plays through the use of a reading log (including a sample), another section that discusses and lists Shakespeare’s plays on film and which gives students advice on how to watch these films, and a final section that provides links to links to links. Also in this last section is a link to the next website, Shakespeare High’s Cafeteria.
From Evernote: |
Literature Circles: How to Study Novels in a Group SettingClipped from: http://www.brighthub.com/education/k-12/articles/20210.aspx |
What is a "Literature Circle"?
I'm sure at some point in your educational upbringing you were subjected to the torturous practice of reading a novel aloud in class. Either you had to listen to your peers read aloud like a robot, or better yet you had to listen to your English teacher read aloud who didn't attempt to hide his/her own boredom with the novel they have been teaching for thirty years! Literature Circles are an excellent way to spice up the way you teach and analyze novels by encouraging students to actively discuss and break down the literary works.
Assign Groups
Many teachers shy away from group work, because they feel it creates classroom management issues. This could be the case if your group work is not organized, but if you follow the Literature Circle steps below, you will find this to be your most pleasant group work experience! Having smaller, teacher-selected groups also help control the mayhem. You need to comb your roster and create groups of students that not only work well together, but who will also complement the other’s learning styles. Especially at the middle school level, it is essential that teachers assign the groups if you want Literature Circles to be successful in your classroom.
Assign Jobs
Doesn’t everyone function more efficiently when they understand their role in a group? Predetermine the “jobs” that each group member must perform. If you type “Literature Circles” into google, you will find tons of suggestions on how to set up a literature circle and different responsibilities to assign to each member. I usually assign a discussion director, vocabulary guru, illustrator, and summarizer for groups of four. After reading the assigned text, this is what each group member is responsible for completing in their Literature Circles:
- Discussion Director – this group leader is in charge of formulating questions to discuss at the end of the reading. While the discussion director is reading the text, they jot down possible topics the group can discuss as a whole. The discussion director should formulate three or four questions to share with the group.
- Vocabulary Guru – The guru identifies words that might cause other readers difficulty while they read the text. Selecting five to ten words (depending on the length of the assigned reading), the group will formulate definitions for the words by analyzing them within the context of the sentence.
- Illustrator – The illustrator draws one or two symbolic pictures that represent the events occurring in the reading. As a group, students discuss the drawings and decipher the illustrator’s deeper meaning behind the drawings.
- Summarizer – In one or two paragraphs, the Summarizer will do exactly what its job title entails – summarizes what they read. The group reviews the summary and adjusts or adds any details it sees fit.
Hold Groups Accountable
In order for any type of group work activity to be productive, you must hold students accountable for their activities. You can grade them based on participation, or print up individual job sheets that the groups fill out during each session and turn in for a grade. If students know that their job will be graded, they will actually do it according to your specifications. Group work is futile and pointless if you do not maintain some sort of accountability.