Period 4, 5, 6, 7 Podcasts-Presentation of Thesis

Period 6 podcast

 Period 4 Podcast

 Period 7 Podcast

5th period Coping Poems

Coping

The beautiful fall days
Remind me of the
pain
Where my heart is
alone
an awful sick feeling
in my stomach questions
my reason for existence
extinguishing
the joy of life
Routine and sleep
help me to cope
friends say they’re
here to help the
torturous
memories will never pass.

~Kristina H.

Coping

2 more months of tapping fingers
36 days of biting nails
123 classes of twirling pencils
147 hours of fidgeting
8790 minutes of daydreaming
527,400 seconds of doodling
then…
Summer

~Ryan S.

Coping

I listen to the Ticking
Ticking of the rhythm of songs that distract me from the Ticking
Ticking of the repetition of the day
Ticking of the time away
Ticking the minutes off
Ticking the hours off
Ticking days off
Ticking me of

~Brandon J.

Poem-AnnaMarie M.

Words
are just
letters.
Letters thrown together.
Yes, they supposedly
have meaning when they're combined.
Words like need, want, love
thrown around.
Some know
the real meaning
Others say I need you,
say I want you,
say I love you
without knowing the real meaning.
They're just words
for some,
3 words
mean the world
only for one...
3 words, 8 letters,
I love you.

~Senior English Student: AnnaMarie M.

Thinking

Well, I have been considering the value of thinking lately. My consideration is connected with our new poetry unit of which many students claim to hate---loathe---detest the idea of reading poetry. If I step outside of my cozy little English cocoon and consider the world at large, could I find ways of thinking or imagining that I detest? Let's see...if one were to ask me to make sense of a physics problem would I hate it? Or describe the significance of a Picasso painting? What about if I had to recite the conjugations of Latin verbs? I am not sure I can say I would hate any of those subjects, but I know I would find all three examples a challenge to my brain. I still am pretty fascinated by those who know how to study and appreciate physics, art, and Latin.

So, what makes poetry different? It is like putting a dog in front of a cat--ooh scary raising of the hair on the back. Or maybe it is more like telling a four-year-old he needs a nap---"No, I don't Mommy!" Or being told sit ups are good for you. C'mon, who needs this pain?

I'd like to connect poetry to thinking; sometimes poetry is hard and it asked for our imagine to be stirred; our analytical skills to be honed; or our ability to make connections to be ignited. It works the brain. We've been using words for how long-oh yeah, our entire lives, so looking at a few words on a page must be easy. Here comes the hair on back, no I won't take a nap and I'd rather have a flabby belly reaction because making meaning of the words on the page is not always easy. Poetry is NOT just words on a page; rather, it is speaker, voice, meter, images, language, structure, and words all working together to share an idea with the reader.

It is all a clever way to get someone to THINK! Just like all those crazy physics laws get us to think, so do the laws of poetry. My next few blogs will be posting of student's poetry---stay tuned for some thinking! I hear Colin Sabie wrote a great poem about...hating poetry! Sigh.

Then versus Than

Are Cats Better Then Dogs? - Free videos are just a click away

Is it better to think about it than write about it then?

Just a quick blog about the difference between then and than.  I am convinced this homonym lesson was stricken from the text books after 1985, so it is no fault of students that they do not know the word THAN exists.  For a few years now I have been noticing the complete and absolute lack of the use of THAN.  So here goes:

Then is a time

Than is a comparison

Finish your paper and then celebrate!  (When should I celebrate?  THEN!)  Then= Time

Is 11th grade English harder than 12th grade English?  (I don't know how to answer the question.  You tell me.)

Than=Comparing 11th to 12th

Need a good laugh?  Check out the video I attached.  Notice they incorrectly compare the dog to the cat.  It should read:  Is the cat better THAN the dog?  By the way: the DOG is way better THAN a cat!!

Be Amazed

What do you find amazing?  Send in your posting to share.  What needs to be solved?

One of my favorite shows as a little girl was the Flinstone's.  I loved Pebbles!  I wanted to babysit her.  I was convinced that if I could just crawl through the TV screen that I could play with her.  It never worked; it is a good thing I didn't smash the screen to get her out. (I thought about it.) 

I remember watching a few James Bond movies, 007.  The only part I remember from any of the movies is that he could talk on a phone in his car.  It was beyond belief that someone could talk on a phone outside of a kitchen!   I have a picture of me (a really bad photo-perm and all) sitting on the floor of our kitchen talking to my boyfriend.  Why was I on the floor of my kitchen?  Because the phone was connected to a cord and the cord could only reach to the middle of the kitchen.  There was no way to imagine that a phone could be so small; so ubiquitous; so universal.  But it has happened...and more.

Remember the chapel we had with David Batsone, Emily's uncle?  He encouraged us to be CURIOUS!  What are you curious about?  Imagine something amazing could come true in your lifetime and you could make it happen.    

Pay Attention

Lawrence Kushner advises us to remember how Moses paid attention to God. In the book God Was in This Place and I, I Did Not Know he writes: "When Moses [paid attention], God spoke. The trick is to pay attention to what is going on around you long enough to behold the miracle..." We move too fast; we don't pay attention. We are a Sesame Street one-minute-attention-span culture. If someone is not entertaining us, it might not be worth noticing him.

I was waiting in the parking lot of the high school this week and two senior girls were laughing and talking while running to their car. I was full of smiles watching them have so much fun. It was a time to pay attention and notice joy.

Freeze frame today-notice the bush around you; it might not be burning but God's voice just might be calling from within.

Dont Walk

This idea in this blog is brought to you by Kristina H. who noticed the lack of apostrophe in the don't walk sign which is actually written "dont walk." It begs the question: how does language create meaning? She made the astute observation that without the apostrophe the sign is really just meaningless letters. So why should we care about spelling and punctuation? Has there ever been a fatality when a person attempted to cross the road when the sign said "dont walk" but the person was so confused and headed right across a street with cars whizzing to and fro? Hopefully not!

As I am writing this, my student teacher is ensuring students know how to properly punctuation a letter written to a Sir or Madam. The lesson demonstrates a colon must follow the Sir or Madam for a formal letter. Would a person receiving a letter be put off if a measly little comma followed her name rather than a colon? Or does it matter if a student writes me an email and doesn't capitalize my name? I guess you probably know my answer: yes, it matters! Just as it shows more respect to have a firm handshake than a weak handshake, it shows respect to the recipient when care is taken to properly punctuate a letter/document.

Another perspective is to understand rules are made to help and to direct. Rules give our diverse population a simplified way to understand one another. So, I say, change the "dont walk" sign to a hand that shows stop. I also say, if you email a teacher, be sure to capitalize her name. And by the way, English is always capitalized. News to you??