Today's Team Saturdazzle is just a quick compilation of stories, clips and jokes.
Like many days when I was a kid it starts with Sesamee Strret and it ends with a snack,
One of the things I liked about Sesamee Street from an early age was the guest appearances. One of the ealriest I remember probably since I like puns so much is when the cast of Bonanza came on the show. They were on a lot of season 2 and did segments where they counted or recited the alphabet or demonstrated math problems like the video below.
In the episode I remember they do a play on the Ernie and Bert banana in my ear sketch (original sketch below) except instead of saying banana in my ear they actually say Bonanza in my ear. Epic!
Sesamee Street has continued with their guest appearances. I just discovered this gem with Billy Joel and Marlee Matlin (CODA, West Wing, Children of a Lesser God) . I'm a big Billy Joel fan and also love writing new lyrics to old songs and Joel does this by tweaking one of his standards and adapting it to Oscar The Grouch.
Yesterday I had one of my days where I was out of the house at 6:30 and not back for good until after midnight. I was home for about 90 minutes in the afternoon. My wife and daughter were preparing for an impromptu game night, where they had invited several people a day or less before the party was slated to begin. A few people did manage to come, but when I was home the only people they had heard from were unable to attend. This gave me an idea for a wry observation which I shared on my personal FB page:
A lot of times when people can't make it to an event youv'e asked them to attend, they will respond something like that sounds great, but I'm busy that day. Just once can't they say that sounds like an awful time, but I'm not doing anything see ya at 7?
This morning, Amy and I were judging another speech tournament. This time it was at held at Lucy's old high school. When you walk in the hallowed halls of a high school there are pictures of accomplished student athletes and plaques with the names of students who received accolades, awards, accomplishments, and some words that don't start with A like scholarships. None of those halls in any of those schools contain my picture. I wasn't that kind of athlete, and I was not that kind of student. However the apple must have fallen far from the tree because my daughter class of 2024 is pictured at least twice and her name is engraved on a plaque as a recipient of a scholarship for mastery in Language Arts.
Ending the day with a snack
My college friend Angela Rumbold's birthday was earlier this week. We had many fine times over the years. When she first moved from Illinois to Georgia, I had occasion to visit her there and she introduced me to boiled peanuts. It was love at first soggy bite. years later when I lived in South Carolina for 2 years the boiled peanut became my go to snack as there was a street vendor outside our local Walmart. I generally did not go more than a fortnight without grabbing me a bag.
When I ventured back to Illinois in '97 to forsake all others and marry my best friend, I also ending up forsaking regular visits with my favorite boiled legume. This +25 year absence of a boiled peanut routine ended about 2 years ago when I discovered inside A BP in Frankfort, Illinois where my sister in law lives, a boiled peanut station. So now 4 or 5 times a year on visits to her family I get the fruits of Jimmy Carter's first job (Boiled Peanut deliverer).
Tonight was one of those nights. My Niece Gracie was in a production of Finding Nemo Jr. Which is not it turns out a quest to find Nemo's progeny but a children's adaptation of the musical Finding Nemo. I was glad to attend, but everyone in my family knew there was a boiled peanut quid pro quo in my attendance.
Well that's all the Team Saturdazzle I have for you today. We learned some math, heard some jokes, watched some videos, I shared some stories and even had a snack. It's not exactly 3 points and a poem, but it will have to do.
This weeks prompts for Weekly Writers Workshop hosted by the inimitable (I should know, I try to imitit him all the time, and I am not able) John Holton on his blog, The Sound of One Hand Typing, are: write a post on the word medications, write a post in exactly 12 sentences, write about what would induce you to give up life as you know it and face the unknown, tell us the story of your personal experience with rejection, write about a bad habit you'd like to eliminate from your life, and write about a time you had to let go of someone you cared for. I'm sure you have deciphered by the enormity of the first sentence, and the title of this post which prompts I have chosen.
There have been at least 5 times in my adult life that I have given up life as I knew it and faced the unknown: moving across the state at the age of 22 to attend university, moving across the world to serve 2 years as a Southern Baptist missionary in Far East Russia in 1992 a few months after the country had opened it's doors to Western missionaries, moving across the U.S. to attend seminary, moving across the country again back to my native Illinois to court the woman who would become my wife, and finally moving against the grain by staying at home for 6 years and homeschooling my children. In each of these cases I gave up life as I knew it and faced the unknown; in the first 4 I also had to let people go that I cared for (the 6th prompt).
What motivated me those 5 times varied by degree but they all had to do with a path I have tried to follow since becoming a follower of Jesus more than 40 years ago and that path has been putting the needs of others before my own. I am not perfect, so I haven't been perfectly motivated and I sure haven't perfectly followed this path but the path has certainly led many times to leaving life as I then knew it.
My first three travels were all based on what I thought would be the life of a missionary. When I left South Carolina where I had attended seminary for a year to pursue marriage with Amy, I had already become uncertain of a career as a missionary, but one of the myriad reasons I had fallen in love with her was because I had seen in our 7 years of friendship that she was also on the path to putting others needs before her own. So I envisioned that we would attempt to meet those needs together, which we have for 26 years and continue to do so however imperfectly.
The needs of my wife and children motivated me as a home educator, they also prepared me for my current job as a substitute teacher. With all our children out of high school, there may come a day when Amy and I, as a couple give up life as we know it and face the unknown. I am certain that the same motivations that directed in the past would lead us into any new unknown.
I know would like to lead you back to the known, which is a variety pack of other submissions that can be found in the comments section of this weeks edition of the Weekly Writer's Workshop.
I'm sure I have written a post like this before with a similar title. I am taking another stab at the subject. My youngest brother Keith was born on Nov 11th 1970 aka Veterans Day. . This is the 54th anniversary of his birth. I was born in September of 1964, so I was already 6 years old when he was born.
. Keith's last Veteran's Day was 16 years ago when he turned 38. He died 5 months later in an Elgin nursing home when I was 44. Since then I've turned 60 and he's perpetually 38. Keith loved math and I'm pretty sure if he was still around he'd call me up today to announce that he had now been alive for 90% of my lifetime. The truth is that he was on;y alive 63.33% of my lifetime time and that number goes down each year I outlive him.
Now Keith would want me to provide a more accurate accounting of that number by factoring in the 5 months between his 38th birthday and that day in April of 2009 when he shuffled off this mortal coil. Let's be real, Keith would want me to calculate the percentage down to at least the day, factoring in the leap days as well. He probably wouldn't be satisfied with even that and want it down to the last minute.
But That's not what I would want. What I would want of course, is that his multiple health problems were all resolved and that he was here with us celebrating his full deck plus 2 jokers (that's 54th please try to keep up) birthday with us. What I would want is that his children now in their 20s would still have their Dad with them instead of hardly remembering him or not remembering him at all. What I would want, is that instead of struggling to recall his legendary dumb jokes, there would be another 15 1/2 years worth of them to smile and nod at. But I did not get what I wanted. Instead, I got grief. Now Veterans Day means more than just Keith's birthday to me. It reminds me that I'm a veteran, a veteran of grief.
I'm going to spend the rest of this post unpacking the last sentence of the previous paragraph. When Keith died Amy and I had been attending a small group at our church for only a few weeks. We knew the leader of the small group pretty well because he was the children's ministry pastor and all our children were in the children's ministry at the time and we were both volunteering there. So when he showed up at Keith's visitation I wasn't too surprised. What did surprise me, however, was that the couple whose house the small group met at came to the visitation. We had just met them a few weeks before. They didn't have children, and they didn't attend the same service as we did. It really meant a lot that he came. He explained to me that a few years before when his father had died, he had a similar experience. Some people he hardly knew came to the funeral because they had lost someone and knew how important it was having people there not only to pay respect to the person they lost but to also be there for those who had lost someone. Both the couple who came to Keith's visitation and the people who had gone to his Dad's funeral had one thing in common, they were veterans of grief.
When I think of a war veteran I think of someone who's been through something devastating and life-altering and has been permanently changed by it. Grief has that same effect on you. There is something else I've learned about veterans they try to be there for each other. There is a camaraderie, a family bond. It's a community that doesn't require serving in the same unit or even the same war. The same could be said about a veteran of grief. I don't know if this is true of all veterans be it war, grief, or something else. But as I dealt with losing Keith, empathy for those encountering the same thing grew in me. I was never one to shy away from the funerals of people I knew, but I started gravitating to the funerals of family members of people I knew. As a veteran of grief, I have been able to comfort people and try to help in tangible ways as people begin their journeys with loss and grief.
Keith is often front and center in my heart and mind during these times. I have not yet lost someone closer than a sibling and have not experienced what it is like to lose a child, a parent, or a spouse. I have done my best to comfort those who have lost more significant people in the time since Keith's passing. A dear friend lost his father and wife in short order. I have to be honest I can't imagine losing Amy. I know it would devastate me completely and while I know God would bring me through it, I know it's just a drop in the bucket in comparison to losing Keith. Amy herself lost both her parents within a few years of each other. It broke my heart to see her "orphaned" knowing that her loss was far greater than mine. Yet knowing how God has helped me through this lesser loss of Keith has helped inform me how I can minister to others as they become more experienced with grief.
I still miss Keith, especially on days like today. Tomorrow my remaining brother and I head over to Keith's house to help his widow with some practical needs. It will be bittersweet just a day after his birthday. All my siblings have tried to look out for our sister-in-law and our niece and nephew and I think we would all say that we wished we could do more. In sports veteran players often act as a surrogate coaches to rookies and other new team members. Grief is not a team that anyone chooses to play for. Isaiah 53:3 prophesies about Jesus describing Him as a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. Jesus, His word, and His people have equipped me as a veteran of grief. I'm not sure if I'm paying forward, or pointing backward but regardless of the direction I'm so glad to try to be there for others when grief has them upside down.
Today at school was the readathon day. Instead of having core classes (Math, Social Sciences, ELA, & Science) are middle school students were able to read in those classes and have teachers and other staff read to them as well.
As a building sub I don't usually know who I'm going to be that day. Today I subbed for a paraprofessional in one of our SPED classes. This particular class is rather low functioning so the books read to the students were geared for much younger children. There was one book the teacher read called Interrupting Chicken by David Ezra Stein. The title reminded me of the old knock knock joke:
A: Knock Knock
B: Who's There
A: Interrupting Cow
B: Interrup
A: Moo
I was able to find a read aloud version of the book on you tube. This is not that difficult of a thing to do. I have considered in the past having an A to Z challenge of children's books being read aloud on you tube videos.
Poetry Friday is being hosted this week by Tracey at Tangles & Tails
Today there was no school as there was a snow day. All the snow reminded me of an incident from 14 years ago when I was teaching a unit on poetry to my children when I was homeschooling them. The original post is found here.
Each of my children wrote a poem, but my 8 year old at the time son was originally a little reluctant to write his. Before producing the picture poem below, he recited something like Winter, winter I hate winter.
Later when I had some time to myself. I reflected on the incident and wrote a poem as if it was written by an 8 year old who did not want to write a poem.
It reminds me of something that P.D. Eastman of Go Dog Go, or The Best Nest might write.
I write this poem almost 14 years ago. The youngest of the three children I was home schooling at the time is a senior now in high school. I am working as a building substitute (a substitute teacher who works at the same building all year) at a middle school I think of this poem from time to time when I encounter reluctant writers or winter activities.
I was not always the physical specimen that blogs before you. In Jr. High, I was a 6'1 stick figure of a kid whose social awkwardness was matched only by his lack of physical coordination. I was in Jr. high in the 70's when bullying was not only not frowned upon but was an elective in many school districts. I was teased quite a bit for many things but in the Fall of 1977 and 1978 I got teased on Monday's for what someone else did on Sunday. That someone just happened to share my name.
Football in the 1970's was a pretty big thing. The biggest football rivalry in my area was that of the Chicago Bears and the Green Bay Packers. In 1977 Walter Payton the Bears running Back was having a breakout year and was voted MVP of the league by the Associated Press. Payton led the Bears to a 9-5 record that year and their first playoff appearance in my lifetime. The Pack went 4-10 but had one player with a familiar name who helped lead the defense.
His name was familiar to me at least, as his name was Dave Roller. And as Robin might say Holy John Jacob Jingelheimer Schmidt Batman, that's my name too
.
When some of my fellow students at Elk Grove Jr. High heard my name on their televisions on Sunday afternoons, they would let me know about it on Mondays. It was always funny to them how different a professional football player and a gawky kid could be even if they had the same name. It wasn't a big deal but it did become a bit of a ritual in the Falls of 78 and 79. There were always a couple of kids in my math class who would comment about how well I played the day before.
In reality Roller played pretty well for the Packers. He led them in 1977 with 8 sacks was once carried off by the fans after a Packer victory and I believe was one of the first players in the NFL to celebrate after a tackle with a sack dance.
I have never met the former NFL player who shares a name with me and my father. In Jr. High it was just one of many things to be teased about. But when I think about it now, it's cool to share with your name with someone who achieved excellence in their field. Even if it's just Lambeau Field.
2016 was a big year at the movies for Walt Disney Studios. According to Box Office Mojo, they had 5 of the top 7 grossing films released in that year. It was also a big year for animated children's movies with 3 of the aforementioned top 7. Zootopia was 7th on the list grossing 341.3 million in the U.S. alone.
By gkaidan - Own work, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=42701886
Zootopia - Disney Enterprises Inc.
Zootopia features Ginnifer Goodwin (Once Upon A Time) and Jason Bateman (Arrested Development) as the voices of Judy Hopps and Nick Wilde a bunny on the Zootopia police department, and a fox, a hustler, and a condog (a male fox is called a dog, look it up.).
This movie follows the standard buddy cop movie plot. A by the book, play by the rules cop is partnered with an informant who flaunts and plays fast and loose with the laws. As they learn to work together they go deeper and deeper to uncover a vast conspiracy.
This plot also underlies the main theme of the movie that biases and prejudices don't really show what the true heart of a person, or in this case an animal is.
Positive Tomato: Sure to speak to kids d grown-ups alike, Zootopia unfolds a poignant lesson about how prejudice can hurt people, but also how it can be overcome. And it does all this in a wonderfully fun film. Kristy Pucko - Pajiba
Top 100: I enjoyed this film quite a bit, but it is nowhere near my top 100, I doubt it would even make the top 200.
A to Z Connections: Bonnie Hunt who voices Judy's over-protected Mom also appears in Dave as a very eager White House tour guide. She co-starred, co-wrote, and directed Return To Me.
Welcome to the 164th edition of the Playful Math Education Carnival
I am Dave your host for this month. This is my first time hosting this carnival and I'm not quite sure what I'm doing. But in true growth mindset lingo, I don't know what I'm doing yet. As Dr. Teeth says in The Muppet Movie, "There ain't nothin' to it but to do it."
Thanks to the incomparable Denise Gaskins for giving me a chance to host. Before we get into gear just a little bit more about me ...
I started this blog 14 years ago back when I was a home educator and this blog was named Home School Dad. During that time I was a frequent participant and host of the Carnival of Homeschooling. I loved that carnival and especially loved hosting it. I also loved all the great math ideas I would see in Blogs like Denises.
When I was a home educator, I would often teach math games classes at our local home school cooperative. 5 years ago when I became a substitute teacher I would love to see all the great ideas that the teachers I was subbing for and all the wonderful resources that are out there.
This winter I became a building sub in my district. When I'm not in for another teacher I go from class to class and am an extra set of hands, this usually will happen during Math and ELA instruction and I was hoping to share a lot of the games and activities the teachers use in today's post.
Unfortunately, almost immediately into the semester I started subbing for the P.E. teacher for almost 2 months, and now I'm subbing in a special-ed classroom for the rest of the year, so I haven't gleaned as many ideas as I hoped I would. I think though I have assembled some good stuff for this month's edition. So let's give it a go.
She began by telling us some info about the number 163 so I'll start by giving you a little info about 164.
164 hours is about a week. In fact, if you take 164 hours (6 days 20 hours) and add 164 minutes (2 hours 44 minutes then add 164 seconds (2 minutes 44 seconds) you would have a total of 6 days 22 hours 46 minutes and 44 seconds which would be approximately 1:15 minutes less than a week.
164 is what I call an A square B number. It is the product of 41 times 2 squared.
Here is an idea I use as a parlor trick but have also been bringing into the classroom. This can be done on the whiteboard or smart board with one individual or you could have each student do it on their own whiteboard, paper, or computer
First, have the student write their date of birth month date, and year.
Our example student was born ten years ago 4/28/13
The next thing I have the students do is write in one column 4-year increments from their birthday until the day before their birthday 4 years later.
Our example student:
4/28/13 - 4/27/17
4/28/13 - 4/27/21
Once you cannot add any more increments of 4 years then you go by single years
4/28/21 - 4/27/22
4/28/22 - 4/27/23
Hopefully, while you are explaining this you'll get a student or two who will tell you that they don't have to do all that, the birthday person just simply needs to multiply their age times 365 and that will show how many days they've lived.
I will go ahead and have them make the calculation but then I'll go back and have them write out a 2nd column showing how many days they actually lived in a 4 year period:
4/28/13 - 4/27/17 1461
4/28/13 - 4/27/21 1461
4/28/21 - 4/27/22 365
4/28/22 - 4/27/23 365
I will then have them add the 2nd column up and compare it to their calculation. (1,462 to 1,460). At some point, a student will realize the first calculation did not account for leap days. I would then ask is this how many days our birthday friend has lived? I will then remind them that they lived today so they have lived 1.463 days.
Movies and Math
I have spent most of this month blogging about movies for the A to Z Challenge.
Katherine Johnson - One of the Nasa computers featured in Hidden Figures
Click here for a brief biography of Katherine Johnson from Mathigon
April 11th was my 25th wedding anniversary
and it made me wonder if there were any math milestones in April.
It turns out that April 11th, 1936 is the day Konrad Zuse (who looks in the picture below like a combination of baseball broadcaster Harry Carey and cartoonist Charles M Schulz.) filed a patent for the automatic execution of operations while working on the first German computer, the Z-1.
On April 11th 2020 mathemetician , John Conway died of complications to Co-vid 19. The above referenced link to April 11th,1936 contains this quote which I think is apropos to a Playful Math Carnival :
...You get surreal numbers by playing games. I used to feel guilty in Cambridge that I spent all day playing games, while I was supposed to be doing mathematics. Then, when I discovered surreal numbers, I realized that playing games IS mathematics.
Her journaling prompt about variations of tic-tac-toe got me thinking of other pen-and-paper games like the dot game. I did some research and learned about a game called Chomp.
By Lord Belbury - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=86379139
I'm sure that all of you out there are probably more familiar with it than I was., but just in case here is a video describing the gameplay.
While researching this game I got to thinking of the 1999 classic book The Hershey's Milk Chocolate Bar Fraction Book.
I don't write many math posts on my blog, but if I did I would write posts entitled "Why do all the good children's books go out of print?" If I were a bookstore owner I'd always have 3 copies of this book on my shelf.
Teachers who don't have access to this book can borrow it virtually from Internet Archive.
I decided to make a version of Chomp for fractions. I call it Fraction Chomp, but I'm very creative with my titles. It's played exactly like described in the video except all grids should have pieces that are divided by 12 (examples 3by4, 8by3, 6by8,...) The players "chomp" a fraction of the pieces off the grid. The fractions they can use or 1/2 1/3/ 1/4 and 1/6. The play continues until one player can not make a fraction of the remaining pieces that is a whole number.
Imagine a 3 by 4 grid ...
The first player chomped 1/3 of the pieces leaving 8 left.
The 2nd player might chomp 1/4 of the remaining pieces leaving 6 left.
The first player would then chomp 1/3 and 4 would remain.
At this point if the second player then chomps 1/4th of the pieces he will eventually win since their opponent will have no choice but to chomp 1/3 allowing the second player to chomp 1/2 and the first player will lose.
However, if player 2 chomps 1/2 of the remaining 4 pieces they would lose as player 1 would also chomp 1/2 the remaining pieces for the victory.
The second link isn't a game but could still be fun in a group. It is from the blog Emergent Math and asks the question: Is The Subway Footlong Pass Worth It?
April was National Poetry Month
I participated in an online progressive poem.. Each day in April A poet added another line to a poem and posted it on their blog. Here is a link to the poem as of April 28th.
This got me to thinking about poetry and math in 2 different ways.
1. Progressive Story Problems
Have one of the students write a story problem. Then have a second student write another story problem that starts somehow with the answer to the first problem. A man has 6 horses 2 goats and 2 sheep. How many more horses does he have than the other animals combined? The answer is 2 Horses. The next question might start with 2 horses weigh as much as 10 sheep. The horses weigh a combined 2000 pounds what is the average weight of the sheep? The next question could start with about 200 pounds of anything and so on and so on.
2. Fibonacci Poem Problems
A Fibonacci Poem or Fib is a poem whose syllables follow the Fibonacci sequence
They are typically 6 lines and follow the pattern
1 syllable
1sylabble
2 syllables
3 syllables
5 syllables
8 syllables
Here is one I just wrote about my favorite ball team's current streak of ineptitude
I've enjoyed hosting for the first time. Next time I won't sign up for my busiest month of the year and I will start preparing much earlier than I did, Next month's carnival will be at Nature Study Australia
Two places near and dear to me are ending their work as we know it in the coming months. These places are Camp Timber-Lee in East Troy, Wisconsin, and Trinity College in Deerfield, Illinois. Both of these establishments have long histories, both recently celebrating a milestone. In 2022 Trinity College celebrated its 125th anniversary and Timber-Lee celebrated its 75th. If this were the Electric Company short, Letter Man, The villainous Spellbinder would take out his magic wand and change the first E to a second L making milestone, millstone. I'm not sure what to call the millstone. Perhaps it was Covid, perhaps a change in the culture of education, perhaps a change in the paradigm of Christian camping; likely a combination of all 3. But the millstone around Trinity International University whose umbrella is around both Camp Timberlee and Trinity has caused business as usual in the college's case and possibly business altogether to come crashing to a halt in the very near future.
I was never a student at Trinity, but I have visited their campus on multiple occasions over the past 40 years. I have slept in their dorms, eaten in their cafeterias, and played frisbee in their courtyards. I have attended classes, visited students, and borrowed materials from their library. I even at one time had a Trinity library card.
In 2016, Camp Timberlee was gifted by the Evangelical Free Church Association (EFCA) to Trinity International University (TIU). I have a long history with Camp Timber-Lee. I was baptized in their lake in 1986 at a church picnic. I did a polar plunge in the same lake in January 2020. My wife Amy and our children once attended a home school camp there and our family slept in one if their famous cabooses. I have visited friends who worked there on multiple occasions. I even flipped over a snapping turtle who had was trapped on his back bicycling near their grounds while visiting a staff member. I was bicycling near the camp, I'm assuming the snapping turtle was a pedestrian.
Over the past 15 years, I have chaperoned a half dozen or so arctic blast and winter X-treme trips with our church kids groups and youth groups which has included at least one of my children on each occasion. 3 of my favorite things to do at those winter retreats are
1. A trip to their nature center where there is always an obligatory snake pic taken of one of my children.
2. To spend hours playing gaga ball with students.
3. To spend hours playing nine-square with students.
There is a multitude of other things to do at Timber-Lee: Ropes course, rec room, x-country skiing, zip line, sledding, tubing, tobogganing, horseback riding, broomball, and karaoke, just to name a few. Of course, camps are a lot of fun and make lasting memories. But Timber-Lee was all about sharing the gospel and promoting Christian growth. This spiritual aspect of their ministry is the main reason why so many people are shocked and saddened about its demise.
When camps like these go under there is often talk of getting new funding and continuing the ministry. Sometimes something comes out of it like the recent change of ownership of what used to be called Cedar Campus in the upper peninsula of Michigan. Timber-Lee has a plethora of staff, campers, and alumni who would love to see the ministry continue to grow.
As for Trinity College the class of 2023 seems to be the last class as a residential college as they make the transition to distance learning only. TIU sees this as a new beginning that fits with its global strategy. I, for one, hope that is true, but need time to reflect on the past and what will surely be missed.
My Friend Allen Levi is one of the most prolific music artists that no one has ever heard. He performs one song called You'll be famous when your dead" I'm not sure that he wants to be or ever will be famous. But if he ever does catch on, his 16 albums on Spotify will keep the public saturated for a while.
I had been listening to one song from each of his albums on Spotify for the past 15 days now, so today when I was grading papers after work, I put the only one on Spotify that I hadn't heard a song from yet and listened to it in it's entirety.
The album called People in my Town is a kind of a concept album. Levi interviews people in his town (thus the title), writes a song based on the interview and then plays them back to back on the album.
Here is the title track from the album that introduces the concept ...
.
In about the middle Allen interviews a middle school teacher who had been deeply effected by his teachers when he was in middle school.
Levi then performs a touching song about the dedicated teachers who love on students. When I first heard this album, I kind of glossed over this song as I was not a professional teacher at the time. The song resonates much more with me now as I am a long term substitute in a middle school setting. But I think this song should resonate with anyone who has worked with young people either as a parent, an educator, or any type of yout leader.
If these songs or interviews have resonated with you in anyway consider going tot he bandcamp platform and purchasing these songs or perhaps the full album or maybe sample some more of Allen's music. WHo knows? You might make him famous before he's dead.
I have been a long term sub for art since the beginning of the school year. I teach one thing to the kindergarten through 2nd graders and something different for the3rd through 5th graders; Sometimes I will even break it into 3 levels. I have wanted to do the same project for some time now and with the 2nd semester starting at the new year I found my perfect opportunity. I had all my students make posters for the new year. For the kindergartners, I kept it simple :we folded a paper in quarters and wrote 2022 with 1 number in each quadrant. I then instructed them to draw and color circles in one quadrant, squares in another, triangles in the third and hearts in the 4th.
With the 1st and 2nd graders I had them write 2022 on their paper and then color it in, When that was completed, I taught them a little about collage. Instead of using pictures, we cut out shapes and then glued them around the 2022.
With the 3rd through 5th graders I taught about the 7 elements of art, (to read an excellent piece on why the elements are important click here) which are:
Line
Shape
Space
Form
Color
Value
Texture
I then ask them to make a poster about 2022 and incorporate at least 3 of the 7 elements of art.
The students have produced some excellent work. This third grader's response shows how many of our kids are eager to get out from under the cloud of Co-vid.
While they are working or when they show me their finished product, I point out the elements that I see they incorporated. This one has at least one example of color (the co-vid molecules), value (the cloud and the rain), shape (the mask), space (spacing is used very effectively in all of the panels) , line (the rain) and texture (The mask). When I point out these elements I ask if they planned them. Many say they have and many have not. At the end of class, I advise how most art work has at least 3 if not more of those elements. Finally, I encourage in them to look for these elements not only in their work but in all manners of art.
I found out this week that the school has hired a new art teacher. I am very glad for the opportunity I have had to teach these students for so long. I have not only seen the growth of the students but my growth as an educator.. I share the hopefulness of this artist for the coming year. I wrote several pieces last year about surviving 2021. My recent successes among other things have inspired me that 2022 could indeed be the best year ever and it is possible to thrive in difficult times.
I recently listed my work as a substitute teacher among things I'd like to post more about here. There is certainly no dearth of topics in that regard so let's start with one of the things that has surprised me about my job as a sub, all the running.
I primarily teach in elementary schools. It seems like all of the elementary schools in my district could be called Forrest Gump Elementary because wherever most students are going they are runn-ning.
Most of the running takes place when individual or small groups of students are walking (and I use that term loosely) in the halls during or between classes, for example on their way back from their locker or the bathroom. This also happens before or after school on the way to or from lunch or recess, or on their way to or from specials (STEM, P.E, and Music to name a few). If it seems like it happens all the time it's because it happens all the time. I stop students from running at least 30 times a day.
Before you get the impression that the running is all done in the hallways there is plenty of running in the classroom itself. I have students who are just going 10 feet to the pencil sharpener but as soon as they get up, they are sprinting.
This is where I get most conflicted with my job as an educator/traffic cop. I have been the long term art sub at my school since the beginning of the school year. I have 4 rules I tell my kids. The 3rd is be safe, and running in the halls, classrooms, and stairs is, in the words of Ralph Nader, unsafe at any speed. My conflict stems from the fact that the first and last of my rules are have fun. As a teacher, I never want to crush the childlike spirit in my students. There is a natural exuberance that comes with being a kid. My oldest daughter never walked anywhere until she was about 7. Until then she skipped everywhere she went. She was homeschooled back then but regardless I would have not have wanted to be the teacher who had to tell her to stop skipping everywhere.
As the art teacher, I travel every day into the student's classrooms pushing a cart with supplies for our activities. As I mentioned, I stop at least 30 kids a day from running while rolling from class to class. These are often the same students over and over again. I'll stop a kid they will walk a few steps and then just start running again unaware or not caring that I still have eyes on them.
The biggest bang for your buck, running wise , at our school is at 2:10 when students begin to get dismissed for the day. I teach a class downstairs until 2:05 and as I walk my cart to the elevator, the hallway is like a parking lot filled with clown cars. Children pour out of every classroom to go wait for their parents cars to pick them up, followed by a second burst of kids through every door to get in line for the busses. While many kids are walking a good sized and speedy minority is off to the races. The process repeats itself when I get off the elevator on the second floor.
I have run in 3 5k's this semester and I have to admit that somedays I just want to run down the hall with them and I can't deny that some of them show some really good form. Perhaps I should get off my safety kick, get a stop watch in hand and start recruiting these kids to colleges on a track scholarship.
I work as a substitute teacher in a local school district. I have been doing this for the last 4 school years and have found that I really enjoy it and seem to be good at it. Since January of this year, I have been doing mostly long term subbing which usually means filling in for a teacher or paraeducator on maternity leave.
A few days before the beginning of this school year I was contacted by my wife/s principal (My wife is a school pyschologist) who wanted to know if I would teach her schools art classes while they searched for a permanent art teacher. I had previously done two shorter stints subbing for the art teacher at that school and found that while it was a little out of my comfort zone it also landed firm in my sweet spot. Buoyed my my previous experience I quickly agreed.
My students range from kindergartners to 5th graders. II like tend to teach between 2 or 3different lessons to encompass all the age groups. The activities, and types of content will vary. With the younger students I like to supplement the activities with stories and songs. Jack Hartmann. a forever young 71 year old children's singer with unbridled makes some of my favorite videos for the pre-school to 2nd grade set. I'm currently starting my k-2 classes on warm and cool colors with this great Jack Hartmann video.
Clive Staples(C.S.) Lewis was a professor, author, apologist and theologian. Lewis was born in 1898 in Ireland, but he is best known as being from Oxford, England where he essentially lived from 1917 to his death in 1963.
The two most influential women in Lewis's life was his mother who died when he was 9 and his wife Joy Davidman Gresham who came to faith in Christ through reading Lewis's books. Both women died of cancer.
Lewis, who is certainly my favorite author, who may be best known for his children book series , The Chronicles of Narnia was a gifted author of many genre's running the gamut from poetry and science fiction to literary criticism and Christian apologetics.
Lewis passed away on November 22, 1963. If that day seems somewhat familiar to you it is because that is the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Also dying on the same day along with Kennedy and Lewis was Brave New World author Aldous Huxley.
This coincidence prompted author and professor Peter Kreeft to write the book Between Heaven and Hell which is a fictionalized conversation between Lewis, Kennedy and Huxley that took place immediately after their death. Kreeft uses the conversation as an opportunity to examine both the claims of Christ and the theistic, humanistic and pantheistic world views that the 3 people represented. It is a quick and thought provoking read.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy Aldous Huxley
35th Presdient of the U.S.
Years Lived before 1921: Four Years lived before 1921: Twenty-eight
Years lived after 1921: Forty-twoYears lived after 1921: Forty-two
A To Z Easter Eggs
A to Z Archives: The Last Battle by C.S. Lewis at Random Acts of Roller. A review of the aforementioned last book in the Chronicles of Narnia.
Voyage of the Dawn Treader and An Open Letter to My Narnia Classes at HSD. The first post is a review I wrote of the film adaptation of Dawn Treader. The 2nd are reflections on some Narnia books from a class I taught at a home school co-op 10 years ago.
After you've looked at the additional content from my other blogs head back to the challenge and explore continue exploring.
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