Blog #8

   

Prepositions: What are They?

Here Are Enough Prepositions to Drive You Crazy!

Now Click on the link below and read a selection of student authored poems that begin each line of poetry using a preposition.  Because this last week's grammar lesson is about prepositions, your assignment is to write a Preposition Poem and then post it by Friday, September 30th and Respond to two other classmates about their poems by Sunday, October 2nd.

Preposition Poems to Read
http://home.earthlink.net/~jesmith/Prep.poems.html

List of Common Prepostions and an Explanation About Prepositions
http://www.chompchomp.com/terms/preposition.htm

Assignment:  Worth 10 Points
Write a poem using a preposition as the first word that begins each line of your poem.  The poem must tell a story or has some kind of theme.  Length of poem is to your discretion.  As a rule of thumb, write until the poem feels complete.

5 Points EXTRA CREDIT to those students who post their poem with a picture or video.

Hint:  Google tinypic website and use this site in order to create a link to a personal photo.  Make sure that you copy/paste the link intended for blogs.

Or find a photo directly online and copy/paste the link associated with the photo.  You may have to select "Full Size Image" in order to copy/paste directly from the web.
Poem is due by Friday, September 30th.
Response to two of your classmates in which you discuss their poem is due by October 2nd.  No credit given if all you say is, "I really like your poem."  So highlight something about the poem's theme or imagery or rhyme scheme if it has one.

Have Fun!!

Blog #7

Localism Overload

By Good. Food. Stories. Contributor | February 17, 2010 |

The Good. Food. Stories. team is extra-pleased to present today’s guest post from Jessie Knadler, a former Manhattan magazine writer and editor who now lives in rural Virginia with her husband, 30-odd chickens, two rambunctious dogs, and a host of farm equipment. Her adventures as a city girl attempting country living are chronicled on her “awesome blog” (her words and our feelings exactly) Rurally Screwed. We’re eagerly awaiting her canning-focused cookbook with co-author Kelly Geary that will be published by Rodale in Spring 2011.

When I first moved from Manhattan to rural Virginia four years ago, I assumed I was saying goodbye to the foodie fascism that had taken hold of the city. I took it as a given I’d never have to overhear two Brooklyn yoga moms prattle on about the virtues of free-range eggs for little Dexter and Elliot or listen to well-meaning friends pester waiters with questions like, “Is this beef really grass-fed?” I was fed up with thinking I too had to define myself by what I ate.

If only I was a little more organic, a little more free-range, steel-cut, Meyer lemon-eating, blah-blah-blah, I’d somehow be a better person. To me, the pursuit of dietary asceticism seemed like just another form of subtle social stratification, right up there with carrying the right handbag, only somehow less shallow, more “real.”

So I was excited at the prospect of moving somewhere where people, I assumed, still ate Slim Jims and where cocktail party food centered around Philadelphia cream cheese in various guises. I thought the most probing food question I’d encounter here was “Does the chicken fried steak come with brown or white gravy?”

Well, this is what happens when a pampered urbanite moves to the middle of nowhere—you quickly realize how provincial and ignorant you really are. Organic piety, I’ve since realized, extends to small-town America as well, to conservative communities where the rebel flag still proudly flies and where 30-somethings don’t think much about living in a cabin or a yurt.

In fact, dietary hysteria is actually worse here than in places like Park Slope or Berkeley because people in my small southern community tend to lead less frenzied lives—there’s less pressure to get your kid into the “right” school, the cost of living is pretty cheap, and people generally live closer to the land since much of the local economy revolves around agriculture and construction.

Rewarding career opportunities, especially for women, are somewhat limited, so a lot of moms end up making the procurement of food—organic, locally grown food—their primary occupation. And some take it to an almost fetishistic degree.

(This chick is now an egg-laying machine)

Here’s one recent example: A couple of months ago, I attended a lunch for which I brought each guest a carton of eggs. (My husband and I have a flock of 30 chickens.) When one of the guests who was refusing to let her five-year-old even eat a Hershey’s Kiss because they’re “poison”—saw my carton of eggs, she hesitated. “I don’t know,” she said. “Let me look at them.” She opened the carton, eyeballed the eggs and, in a distinctly withering tone, said, “On second thought, I don’t need any.”

I was offended. I had no idea why she refused my eggs. My flock is clean, they free-range over eight acres, they eat bugs and grass and grubs. I wondered, were my eggs not white enough? Did she refuse them because the carton was Styrofoam and not more eco-friendly cardboard? Or was it because she knew my husband and I supplement our chickens’ diet with—shudder—commercial feed from the farmer’s co-op?

The incident illustrated that food snobbery is not limited to the upwardly mobile in coastal cities, but also to people who live in cabins in the woods. It’s everywhere. There’s no getting away from it. It’s an entrenched part of the national conversation and I keep waiting for the day when it will all kind of go away, like the rollerblade craze of the early ’90s.

This is not to suggest that food awareness—knowing where your food comes from—isn’t important. Every time you turn around, there’s another study linking processed food to obesity, ADD, asthma… the list keeps growing. And the way animals in factory farms are raised is unconscionable at best. It is precisely because I am concerned with these matters that I now have two freezers stocked with three deer, shot for us by our rifle-toting neighbor, plus half a pig and half a cow (both locally raised and butchered, natch.)

(Even deep-friend Twinkies are not off limits from time to time.)

I have a huge garden and can my weight in fruits and vegetables like a deranged pioneering lunatic in the warmer months. My husband brews his own beer. We churn our own ice cream. We bought chickens so we wouldn’t have to eat the watery, jaundiced specimens that pass for eggs at the grocery store.

I’m about as homestead-y as you can get without owning a carpet beater, but I try not to look down my nose about it because the truth is, I still occasionally eat Funyuns. I sometimes eat fried mozzarella sticks dunked in Sysco marinara sauce. I snack on Milk Duds and processed crackers and hoover up the remaining flavor dust residue from my husband’s Roy Rogers French fries.

Even I spotted the food nazi who refused my eggs—the same one who won’t eat ice cream down at the local ice cream parlor because it’s “too full of fillers”—inhaling a plate of chili cheese fries down at the drive-in a few months prior! I’m no Michael Pollan, but I’m pretty sure the cheese on those fries didn’t come from a cow up the road, but a pump. In my mind, that made her refusal of my eggs more a rebuke of me than it was a stand for organically pure ovum. Which is to say, I probably won’t be inviting her to my next potluck.

So this is my gentle plea for 2010: Can we all please stop talking about localism and organic food now? Everyone’s a locavore anymore. (Or those that want to be anyway.) We get it. The eggs are free-range. The meat in the freezer is from a farmer down the road. The fish is sustainably caught. Understood. Here’s a gold star.

I welcome the day when we can all just sit down to the table and take it as a given that what we’re eating is good wholesome, nutritious food without feeling the urge to itemize the sourcing of each dish. You know, sort of like they do in Europe. Besides, odds are, somewhere along the line a Dorito will probably pass your lips.

Answer the following question with a brief paragraph:

1.) What is the point that Jessie Knadler is trying to make within her essay?

2.) Now, in another brief paragraph, identify a particular food or food issue that is exclusive to Kauai and explain why it is exclusive to Kauai.( This should take only 2 or 3 sentences)  Once you indentify that food, then bullet a quick list of things you associate with that food or food issue.

Post your response to me by Friday, September 16th.

Respond to two other classmates about their food item by Sunday, September 18th.

Blog #6

Let's Start Thinking About Our Connection to Food

http://www.ted.com/talks/jennifer_8_lee_looks_for_general_tso.html

Click on the link above and watch Reporter Jennifer 8. Lee talk about her hunt for the origins of familiar Chinese-American dishes while exploring the hidden spots where these two cultures have (so tastily) combined to form a new cuisine.

As you view the video, note the many myths she reveals about Chinese food.  What surprised you the most?  Write a brief comment about that myth in a small paragraph. 

Then, on a different note, write another paragraph about one of your favorite foods.  Next week we are going to begin a series of several writing assignments that will lead to the creation of a cookbook full of recipes connected to personal narratives.  Hopefully by December we are all going to become little "Foodies" where each of us will share and celebrate that one special food that holds our fondest memories.  Yum-Yum!

Your Response to me is due by Friday, September 9th.  Then please comment to two other classmates regarding their response by Sunday, September 11th.

This assignment is worth 6 points.

Blog #5

Happiness

Wayne Coyne - Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

As heard on NPR’s Morning Edition, February 26, 2007    http://thisibelieve.org/essay/24791/

 

You can read the essay below or listen to the essay by clicking on the link above.

 Wayne Coyne is a singer and guitarist for The Flaming Lips, an indie-rock band he founded. Coyne believes happiness isn’t a cosmic coincidence, but something we have the power to make within ourselves.

Creating Our Own Happiness

I was sitting in my car at a stoplight intersection listening to the radio. I was, I guess, lost in the moment, thinking how happy I was to be inside my nice warm car. It was cold and windy outside, and I thought, “Life is good.”

Now this was a long light. As I waited, I noticed two people huddled together at the bus stop. To my eyes, they looked uncomfortable; they looked cold and they looked poor. Their coats looked like they came from a thrift store. They weren’t wearing stuff from The Gap. I knew it because I’d been there.

This couple seemed to be doing their best to keep warm. They were huddled together and I thought to myself, “Oh, those poor people in that punishing wind.”

But then I saw their faces. Yes, they were huddling, but they were also laughing. They looked to be sharing a good joke, and, suddenly, instead of pitying them, I envied them. I thought, “Huh, what’s so funny?” They didn’t seem to notice the wind. They weren’t worried about their clothes. They weren’t looking at my car thinking, “I wish I had that.”

You know how a single moment can feel like an hour? Well, in that moment, I realized I had assumed this couple needed my pity, but they didn’t. I assumed things were all bad for them, but they weren’t and I understood we all have the power to make moments of happiness happen.

Now maybe that’s easy for me to say. I feel lucky to have fans around the world, a house with a roof, and a wife who puts up with me. But I must say I felt this way even when I was working at Long John Silver’s. I worked there for eleven years as a fry cook. When you work at a place that long, you see teenagers coming in on their first dates; then they’re married; then they’re bringing in their kids. You witness whole sections of people’s lives.

In the beginning it seemed like a dead-end job. But at least I had a job. And frankly, it was easy. After two weeks, I knew all I needed to know, and it freed my mind. The job allowed me to dream about what my life could become. The first year I worked there, we got robbed. I lay on the floor; I thought I was going to die. I didn’t think I stood a chance. But everything turned out all right. A lot of people look at life as a series of miserable tasks but after that, I didn’t.

I believe this is something all of us can do: Try to be happy within the context of the life we’re actually living. Happiness is not a situation to be longed for, or a convergence of lucky happenstance. Through the power of our own minds, we can help ourselves. This I believe.

Wayne Coyne is singer and guitarist for the Grammy Award-winning rock band, The Flaming Lips. He wrote and directed “Christmas on Mars," a science-fiction film featuring the group. Coyne and his wife, Michelle, a photographer, live in Oklahoma City.

Now read this next essay from This I Believe website and be thinking about what the two essays have in common or how they are different in terms of happiness.

http://thisibelieve.org/essay/8865/   (There is no audio for this essay)

By Aaron - Huntington, West Virginia   (high school author)

Entered on December 2, 2005

                                       Happiness is a Choice

When we are young children, one of the first lessons we are taught is to “play fair”. We are taught to share and treat others as we would like to be treated, “The Golden Rule”. We then expect that if we treat others fairly, we will be treated fairly. As we mature we discover that regardless how fair we treat people, life is not fair. As we confront issues in our lives and realize things are not always just, it is important to have a positive attitude and choose to be happy. While social unjust should not be endured, physical impairments must be accepted to be overcome.

In some way I feel that life has been rather unfair to me from the beginning. I was born with an extreme visually impairment. I use a long cane to travel and read Braille as my preferred school medium. The print textbook for my math class is only one book, while the Braille version is fifty-one bulky volumes. I learned early in my education that I might have to work harder than the other students in certain areas. I tend to have more homework, so when other students are playing video games and watching television, I am doing homework. For years I would complain, “It’s not fair!” to my mother to which she would reply, “Well Aaron–.Life isn’t fair”. Throughout my life I have found this to be true at times, and have accepted it as a fact and moved past it.

I have made the choice to be happy in my life. Although I have much school work to complete, I am able to go to school with my friends and live at home instead of being sent to a school for the blind eight hours away. Instead of looking at the things in my life that get me down, I try to focus on the blessings God has given me. I have been blessed with an excellent memory ability which has aided me in remembering vast amounts of information for my school work. Support from my immediate and extended family as well as friends, teachers, and organizations have been more than one can fathom.

I believe that being happy is a choice you make. I was on the wrestling team at my middle school for three years. Instead of focusing on the fact that I never won a match for the first two years, I enjoyed being part of the team and participating in a sport like the other students. Currently I’m on my high school swim team and perform with the High School Jazz band.

Everyone has times in their lives that are not fair. A broken family, an ill parent, or too little money may make life seem unfair. Having a positive attitude and being thankful for the blessings you are given is the key to being happy. Life is not perfect for anyone. It is only in dealing with the “unfairness” of our lives that enriches the life we live. Sometimes we are the bug, something we are the windshield. Life cannot be perfect. If it were perfect, there would be nothing to live for.

 Respond by Sunday, Sept. 4th. to me where you compare and/or contrast the two essays above IN PARAGRAPH FORMAT.  Then in another paragraph, state your beliefs about happiness. 

1.) Make sure to include at least one direct quote. 

2.) Make sure to reference both of the authors by name when you discuss their views.

Please note that your first paragraph response is not if you agree or disagree with either author.  Your response is to find those things that are similar or different between the two essays.  After you compare the two authors, then you can discuss your feelings on the topic of happiness in a separate paragraph.

This response should be two very well developed paragraphs.  Remember to use transition words and to lead in before you write a direct quote.  Never start a sentence with a direct quote.

This time you do not need to respond to two classmates:>)

Blog #4

http://www.ted.com/talks/sarah_kay_if_i_should_have_a_daughter.html

Sarah Kay is the 22 year-old founder of Project V.O.I.C.E.(Vocal Outreach Into Creative Expression).  Click on the link above and listen and watch her inspirational Spoken Word poem and message.  The video is 18 minutes long; but it may be the best 18 minutes of your entire week.

Comment about something specifically that Sarah highlights--something that struck a chord with you--something that you can really relate to--and share it in the comment section.

Your response to me is due by Friday, August 26th.
Your response to two other classmates is due by August 28th.

Blog #3

Following in Beyoncé's 'Single Ladies' Footsteps Strips 7-year-olds of Innocence

By Sarah Kaufman

Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, May 15, 2010

Watch The Commentary from The Early Show on ABC by Clicking on the Link below.

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=6483349n
Next Read the Aritcle Below.

Following in Beyoncé's 'Single Ladies' Footsteps Strips 7-year-olds of Innocence

Network News XProf

By Sarah Kaufman

Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, May 15, 2010

The signs are all there: The hip-grinding come-ons. Legs kicked up to the ear. Skin-baring lingerie.

This particular video remake of Beyoncé's hit "Single Ladies" follows a rubric of raunchy moves straight out of the pole-dance manual.

But the performers, according to published reports, are 7-year-olds.

Their satin-and-lace hooker look screams Lolita. The whole two-minute display seems one crotch-shot short of illegal.

And with nearly 2 million hits, the clip of five enthusiastically gyrating grade-schoolers (dubbed "Little Girls Going Hard on Single Ladies") taped at the World of Dance competition in Pomona, Calif., last month has gone viral.

We could get child psychologists on the phone to opine about what a bad thing this is, to shed light on the vulnerable 7-year-old psyche and the crucial development of a girl's sense of self at that age. But we know what they would say: That global girldom needs more emphasis on intellect and independence, not less. That being cheered on for dressing and moving like strippers teaches girls a disturbing, belittling lesson. And that's what's so bewildering about this video: We know it's wrong. Didn't their parents know it was wrong?

It isn't prudish to think 7-year-olds ought to look like 7-year-olds. It's prudent. Twisted minds are surely drooling over the exhibitionism of the Beyoncé bunch. Pedophiles don't need more kindling on their deranged fires, but displays like this one shovel it on. And put other little girls at risk.

What's troubling here is more than just the moves these kids are making -- it's the element of adult manipulation behind them. Sexy children, pushy parents: Think back on JonBenet Ramsey, the rouged and blow-dried beauty pageant princess, dead at 6. The irony is that kiddie pageants back then -- she was killed in 1996 -- were undoubtedly tamer than some of them are nowadays, with skimpy attire and dirty dancing all the rage. (Look at the one depicted in the 2006 film "Little Miss Sunshine," in which Abigail Breslin's young character performs a striptease.) Same thing on certain dance competition circuits -- like the one that launched this video.

I watch this bunch of energetic 7-year-olds and wish that, with those kicks and their apparent athleticism, they were outside on a soccer field, enjoying a sport that focuses on play -- and not so much on the body.

I have a 7-year-old daughter, and her passion at the moment is turning perfect cartwheels, playing baseball and inventing dramatic scenarios for her collection of tiny plastic animals. Peer pressure doesn't seem to be an issue yet, but then again, most of her friends are into the same things -- gymnastics, storytelling, inventive play. Happily, my daughter seems to have a view of herself that has nothing to do with starlet underdressing, sexuality beyond her years or the latest trend in music videos.

Will this always be the case? I can only say I hope so -- and I know for sure that one way to grow a head case with low self-esteem and a body-image problem is to plunk her in front of music videos that hype sex appeal and tell girls their greatest asset is that thing they're sitting on.

Of course, the Beyoncé Five have gone a whole lot of steps beyond just watching the grown-up moves. I'm impressed by their flexibility and clean execution. But at the same time I wonder, what kind of dance teachers (paid by the parents) drilled them for hours and hours in the chilly perfection of a routine that feels so exploitative of their energy, innocence and charm? Soon enough, these girls, like girls everywhere, will have to navigate tricky adolescent waters, learning to dodge what's unsafe and unwise, and finding out what true power, self-respect and individuality look like.

This performance gives them a big shove in the wrong direction.

Want to see the entire dance routine?  Then view the video below.

Response Directions:

1.) Discuss your first reaction to the dancers.

2.) Then discuss your reaction to the opinions from the commentators from The Early Show on ABC and/or the commentary from the article above by weaving in citations from either source.  A good way to do this is to think about something they said that you either agree with or disagree with and then use their quote as a springboard.  After you agree or disagree with something they've said, then explain why.  Be mindful to choose quotes that support your reaction to the video so that your response will represent one unit of interrelated ideas that form a well-bodied paragraph.  Remember, if you introduce a new idea into your response, then you need to create a new paragraph. 

To receive credit for this assignment you must cite something, either directly or by summarizing or by paraphrasing. 

MLA Citation Guidlines:
You must show proper citations by placing direct quotes within quotation marks followed by a parenthesis indicating the source of the quote.  If you are summarizing or paraphrasing, then you must follow the last word of your summary or paraphrase with a parenthesis that has the name of the television show or the name of the author who wrote the article above..  Then close the parenthesis followed by a period.

Examples:
I.Cite The Early Show commentators by doing this:

While some claim that: “ . . . . . . . . . …ya-ta-dah, ya ta dah . . . . . .” (The Early Show).

II.

I have a hard time agreeing with the concept that,"  . . . . . . .ya-ta-dah, ya-ta-dah . . . . "(Kaufman).

III.Show a summary or citation like this:

In fact, one of the news commentators compares the dance routine to cheerleading (The Early Show).

Please pay attention to where you place the period after a citation.  In short quotes, summaries, or paraphrases, it always comes after the clsoing parenthesis.

Your response to me is due by Friday, August 19^th.  You must include a citation in order to receive

credit.

Your response to two of your classmates is due by Sunday, August 21^st.

Blog #2

It is an old saying that actions speak louder than words.  The attached video starring Danny Glover is nothing more than actions.  Your task is to give words to the meaning of the actions by answering the following questions.

1.) What message is the film maker trying to convey?

2.) Why do you think the homeless man follows the business woman at the end of the video?

3.) What, if any, is the significance of the red kite?

**By Friday, August 12th, respond to the above questions and direct your response to me.  Make sure to use an appropriate greeting and closing.

**By Sunday, August 14th, respond to what two of your classmates had to say about the video.  Make sure that you also use the appropriate greeting and closing to your post.

If you have problems viewing the video, you may need to download a media format such as Real Player.  Just click on the link and select Free Download. http://www.real.com/realplayer/search