Getting Ready Again

Ahh!!!. Another Sunday night and I find myself getting ready for school again. Just cleaned the kitchen. Not much snow this weekend. Glad this is a short week, for President Day's weekend. Searching facebook looking for JF and PL and didn't locate them. Wondering how cold it will be in the morning. MP did a great video for church on Haiti. He said is showed it to his television production class and they liked it. I made a copy of the dvd and hoped to show it to a few class at school.

Just Another Day

We have an essay contest for Black History Month going on. I recruited AC and SB who I know are good writers and will be serious about the research. We met in the computer lab during lunch. Both of them have computers at home. I wanted to start some research with them. We went to Google. One of them chose Jesse Owens and the other Thurgood Marshall. I tried to print out some preliminary documents on the subjects but the printer was out of paper. I'm going to do some work tonight and give them both a folder. I have also asked C to join us, I want her to do something on Black Women. Stallings gave the topic on the effect of BH on the writer.

Giving Detention

I had to call more that half the class since Monday to give them detention. Behavior in the classroom is inexcusable. The talking and fooling around is really detracting from instructional time. It's time to concentrate on the major problems and let them know there will be a consequence for their actions. Have to fill in for Mrs. M this week. Going over NJ Ask prep work with her classes.

Working Hard

Worked on preparing for class tomorrow. Made several calls to parents for students that skipped detention. Will start class with NJ Ask work on answering multiple choice and then open-ended questions. Cynthia's sister's funeral this week. I called Darnell in Virginia and she said her step-father died.

Hopkins and YouTube

Hopkins Green Frog was an internet meme that began to circulate throughout cyberspace in late 2004. According to Wikipedia, the original add was posted by a 17-year-old autistic boy in Seattle. The boy had actually created a poster for a lost toy frog. The posters with the child’s writing on it asked for people to return the toy if it was found. Several people noticed the drawing the child had made along with some of the text the child had written on the flier that was posted looking for the toy. Webusers started to use photoshop software to create versions of Hopkins Green Frog. The internet users would use the drawing they created of Hopkins and attach the new image to other pictures like, World War II propaganda posters and other images. A recent search of Google shows 572,000 entries for Hopkins. According to Richard Dawkins, a geneticist who created the term meme, and developed the successful conditions for why they become of interest to other people. Dawkins said that Hopkins retained fidelity, the ability to be copied easily. Also the image had fecundity, which was described as the rate at which an idea is copied and spread. Finally, the image showed longevity or the ability to remain relevant over time to the users.
While searching through YouTube I saw how the site uses videos to convey messages and information. I was interested in the presidential politics section that has to controversial videos on. One of the videos does a parody of an old commercial showing Senator Hillary Clinton speaking to a group of people who look paralyzed by her speech. The other is a parody of Sen. Barack Obama. These commercials have been written about by the media. This shows the influence that the site can have on the political races. I also was able to watch highlights from NCAA Tournament Basketball Games. It seems that YouTube can give you selective categories of information whenever you want to find something.

Being A Reader

I definitely consider myself a reader. Now that I find myself teaching reading I am very interested in understanding what makes reading click for middle school kids. I came to my interest in reading not directly I must admit. I became interested in journalism shortly after leaving college and always thought about writing more as a profession. But by writing, it seemed to lead be back to reading more and more things and trying to pattern what I was trying to say after writers that crafted their message well. I like the Star Ledger to see what's happening in New Jersey and the New York Times gives you a good perspective on world events. During the school year it seems I don't get a chance to read for my own enjoyment, but I always read something out of the NYT Book Review on Sunday and I like C-Span2 does BookTV on the weekend. Recently I've become a big fan of NPR and they always have some profile on a book or an interview on a writer that is interesting. The last two books I read for my own enjoyment were Malcolm Gladwell's Tipping Point and Blink. Two books I read over the Summmer just to get ready for this school year were; The English Teacher's Companion, by Jim Burke and Meet Me in the Middle by Rick Wormeli.
I'm still trying to find myself being comfortable in the classroom and reaching reading. When I work with my students I have the best result when I have one-on-one exchanges with then about they are reading and what is going on with their comprehension. Using a Guided Reading technique is always fruitful because your working with text in manageable portions and supporting understanding of confusing words. Graphic organizers on stories are helpful also because many students need a visual representation or writer ideas.

Watching the Matrix

Watching the Matrix again and listening closely to the plot to follow the details of the storyline is very intriguing. The whole premise that scientists will be able to create artificial intelligence on a level that was portrayed in the movie is something that leaves me awestruck. There was an entry on Wikipedia that said the film borrowed heavily from Japanese anime (cartoon series) stories.
The plot which revolves around a group of humans that have escaped from the Matrix which controls the world and humans who are part of the world they seized control of. The movie have plenty references to cyperpunk and hacker subcultures. The film is known for popularizing and evolving the use of a visual effect known as bullet time, which allows the viewer to explore a moment progressing in slow-motion as the camera appears to orbit around the scene at normal speed, according to the Wikipedia page on the movie. This has had a strong effect on action film-making in Hollywood.
The movie was given good reviews when it debuted and given praise for its special effects. The movie received Oscars for film editing, sound effects editing, visual effects and sound. In 2001, the Matrix was placed 66th on the American Film Institutes, “100 Years …. 100 Thrills” list. When you Google Matrix “The movie Matrix you get over 5 million entries.