Saturday, February 28, 2009
Friday, February 27, 2009
Student Work
This is a draft of an essay in response to the Washington Post story I had my students read called "Pearls Before Breakfast." I then had them reflect on the nature of beauty and what that means to them.
I turned them loose to put their thoughts into their own words. My only caveat: use voice and be original.
Here is Brady's essay. I'm still in awe, and I read this two weeks ago. Don't worry. I got his permission to share it and post it on here.
I also learned from his mother at conferences yesterday that Brady has earned a scholarship to Richmond University in London. When you read this, you will know why.
Beauty
When I started this assignment, I had no idea what I was going to focus on. I rarely procrastinate, but this time I took as long as possible before writing. The idea of the paper had to be an offshoot from beauty – that I knew – but that was general and not something I was particularly excited about. So, sitting here listening to Smetana’s “Die Moldau,” I finally know what I want to write.
I don’t think beauty is abstract. I am a realist. I live relentlessly in reality and anything full of cheese or intangible makes me mad.
“Oh really, you think France is 30,000 miles away? Yeah, more like 4,000 – 30,000 miles is like going around the Earth twice, Ptolemy. Nice try.”
Beauty is not a young boy making a craft from macaroni noodles and then handing it to his mother, who cries a single silver tear.
Beauty is not the first black president of the United States. Though it is wonderful, it is not beautiful.
And beauty is certainly not a middle aged woman who lost 60 pounds all by herself.
Beauty is something we can hear. Maybe something we can see, read. Something we can touch. It is an Aston Martin, da Vinci’s Virgin of the Rocks, Moart’s “Marriage of Fiaro,” Goethe’s Faust, Prague, and flawless foie gras – not too salty, not too boring.
Beauty is not a woman or a man. I have on simple stipulation for beauty: it has to be made. Yes, humans are made, but not in the same way. Humans are born, but born being attractive is not beauty. Lucky you, your DNA assembled in a way where you happen to have a normal nose and large almond eyes.
But when someone puts effort into something, crafting it with their own hands and mind – a piece that rustles up emotions in another individual – that is beauty. One the other hand, the idea of beauty is in the eye of the beholder holds some truth. One might not think Faust is good or that Virgin of the Rocks is a bit dull, but I think they are both pretty substantial pieces of human expression (pardon the cheese – sometimes you just need a big slice of bushe de chevre to wash the Savignon down).
There are a lot of beautiful things in this world, probably millions. Maybe even billions, but that’s hasty – most people don’t realize that a billion is a thousand million, which is a hell of a number. Yet with all these billions of beautiful things, none of them are humans. None of them are acts, none of them are an event, and not a single one has ever involved MTV.
I have a PhD in Truth, and you just got my prescription.
I turned them loose to put their thoughts into their own words. My only caveat: use voice and be original.
Here is Brady's essay. I'm still in awe, and I read this two weeks ago. Don't worry. I got his permission to share it and post it on here.
I also learned from his mother at conferences yesterday that Brady has earned a scholarship to Richmond University in London. When you read this, you will know why.
Beauty
When I started this assignment, I had no idea what I was going to focus on. I rarely procrastinate, but this time I took as long as possible before writing. The idea of the paper had to be an offshoot from beauty – that I knew – but that was general and not something I was particularly excited about. So, sitting here listening to Smetana’s “Die Moldau,” I finally know what I want to write.
I don’t think beauty is abstract. I am a realist. I live relentlessly in reality and anything full of cheese or intangible makes me mad.
“Oh really, you think France is 30,000 miles away? Yeah, more like 4,000 – 30,000 miles is like going around the Earth twice, Ptolemy. Nice try.”
Beauty is not a young boy making a craft from macaroni noodles and then handing it to his mother, who cries a single silver tear.
Beauty is not the first black president of the United States. Though it is wonderful, it is not beautiful.
And beauty is certainly not a middle aged woman who lost 60 pounds all by herself.
Beauty is something we can hear. Maybe something we can see, read. Something we can touch. It is an Aston Martin, da Vinci’s Virgin of the Rocks, Moart’s “Marriage of Fiaro,” Goethe’s Faust, Prague, and flawless foie gras – not too salty, not too boring.
Beauty is not a woman or a man. I have on simple stipulation for beauty: it has to be made. Yes, humans are made, but not in the same way. Humans are born, but born being attractive is not beauty. Lucky you, your DNA assembled in a way where you happen to have a normal nose and large almond eyes.
But when someone puts effort into something, crafting it with their own hands and mind – a piece that rustles up emotions in another individual – that is beauty. One the other hand, the idea of beauty is in the eye of the beholder holds some truth. One might not think Faust is good or that Virgin of the Rocks is a bit dull, but I think they are both pretty substantial pieces of human expression (pardon the cheese – sometimes you just need a big slice of bushe de chevre to wash the Savignon down).
There are a lot of beautiful things in this world, probably millions. Maybe even billions, but that’s hasty – most people don’t realize that a billion is a thousand million, which is a hell of a number. Yet with all these billions of beautiful things, none of them are humans. None of them are acts, none of them are an event, and not a single one has ever involved MTV.
I have a PhD in Truth, and you just got my prescription.
Now this is cool
I know most of the staff thinks it is asinine that we don't have access to blogs or youtube. I wholeheartedly agree.
Here is why we should be using blogs.
This is Luke Erickson's blog. He is a former student of mine who is teaching in Alexandria. His school - SHOCK GASP AWE - actually insists that their teachers keep blogs and use them with their classes.
http://wca-hpe.blogspot.com/
How cool would that be?
Here is why we should be using blogs.
This is Luke Erickson's blog. He is a former student of mine who is teaching in Alexandria. His school - SHOCK GASP AWE - actually insists that their teachers keep blogs and use them with their classes.
http://wca-hpe.blogspot.com/
How cool would that be?
An interesting widget
I wonder how long it would take for most of our English curriculum to come up? At least, mine . . . Fahrenheit 451, To Kill a Mockingbird, "The Lottery," The Crucible, "The Yellow Wallpaper." And how about my College Comp class . . . Faulkner, Hemingway, Plath, Orwell, Morrison . . .
The commerical that started it all . . .
This was the commercial that convinced Kristie we needed a baby. The look on my face when the father returns home from business to his wife and daughter sealed the deal.
Now we've got Kenzie.
Who was quite the handful today. She was wide awake at 7 am when I was not. Then right when I had her back to sleep and was trying to get some things done, Gail was up preparing to leave for the weekend. Since she needed her car out of the garage, I headed out to move the vehicles around. When I got back in, there she was holding Kenzie in the chair!
"Oh, she just woke up, he he he he," she said.
Instead of leaving well enough alone (since when have you ever known a mother to leave well enough alone?) while I was out moving the cars around so she could get hers out of the garage, she had to kiss her goodbye or try and hug her or who knows what!
Not only did I not get much done but then Kenzie had the cheap old lady perfume Gail insists on wearing - as opposed to the expensive and excellent perfume Karla bought her for Christmas.
So, I tried feeding her (Kenzie not Gail. At least not yet) some oatmeal with apple juice, but she was having none of it.
After making a fine mess of things I had to resort to formula, which she promptly devoured and drifted off after her meal.
I was then able to get some more things done.
However, disaster struck when I tried to change her. For whatever reason Kenzie has the habit of peeing all over when I change her. She always times it right between taking off the old soiled one and grabbing the new one and getting it into place.
So I had to clean her up and put on a new outfit.
That lasted until the afternoon when she pulled the same stunt again! I couldn't believe it. I swear she had a smirk on that little face of hers this time.
I've never looked so forward to five o' clock (when Kristie gets off work) in my life!
Now we've got Kenzie.
Who was quite the handful today. She was wide awake at 7 am when I was not. Then right when I had her back to sleep and was trying to get some things done, Gail was up preparing to leave for the weekend. Since she needed her car out of the garage, I headed out to move the vehicles around. When I got back in, there she was holding Kenzie in the chair!
"Oh, she just woke up, he he he he," she said.
Instead of leaving well enough alone (since when have you ever known a mother to leave well enough alone?) while I was out moving the cars around so she could get hers out of the garage, she had to kiss her goodbye or try and hug her or who knows what!
Not only did I not get much done but then Kenzie had the cheap old lady perfume Gail insists on wearing - as opposed to the expensive and excellent perfume Karla bought her for Christmas.
So, I tried feeding her (Kenzie not Gail. At least not yet) some oatmeal with apple juice, but she was having none of it.
After making a fine mess of things I had to resort to formula, which she promptly devoured and drifted off after her meal.
I was then able to get some more things done.
However, disaster struck when I tried to change her. For whatever reason Kenzie has the habit of peeing all over when I change her. She always times it right between taking off the old soiled one and grabbing the new one and getting it into place.
So I had to clean her up and put on a new outfit.
That lasted until the afternoon when she pulled the same stunt again! I couldn't believe it. I swear she had a smirk on that little face of hers this time.
I've never looked so forward to five o' clock (when Kristie gets off work) in my life!
Thursday, February 26, 2009
We Didn't Start the Fire
I stole part of our next research project in College Comp II from a former friend. He used to use this song, which is basically a list of historical, political, and pop culture references from the '70's and '80's. My friend would then have his students select one term and find two different sources on it and cite them correctly.
I stole that and put my own twist on it. I gave my students two references from the song. Then I charged them with finding two sources (one on-line and one print) on each reference. Next, they will write a summary of each topic, using a quote or paraphrase from each source. Finally, they will create works cited for each summary.
After that, I want to have them devise a list of ten or fiften historical, political, and pop cultural references from the '90's and '00's. From their list of items, students will then choose one to develop into a short research paper (around four pages or so).
That's the tentative plan. I am also considering having them create web pages via google and then using that web page to create their own version of wikipedia for their list of topics. The emphasis here would not only be on summarization and citation but also in finding connections for each topic that would allow a reader to hop from topic to topic on their webpage, just as you do with wikipedia.
I stole that and put my own twist on it. I gave my students two references from the song. Then I charged them with finding two sources (one on-line and one print) on each reference. Next, they will write a summary of each topic, using a quote or paraphrase from each source. Finally, they will create works cited for each summary.
After that, I want to have them devise a list of ten or fiften historical, political, and pop cultural references from the '90's and '00's. From their list of items, students will then choose one to develop into a short research paper (around four pages or so).
That's the tentative plan. I am also considering having them create web pages via google and then using that web page to create their own version of wikipedia for their list of topics. The emphasis here would not only be on summarization and citation but also in finding connections for each topic that would allow a reader to hop from topic to topic on their webpage, just as you do with wikipedia.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Zigzag
I finished Tom Romano’s memoir Zigzag: A Life of Reading and Writing, Teaching and Learning on Sunday.
I first came across Romano’s work while in grad school at Bemidji State. I can’t remember exactly how I came across his work. I know it was when I was doing a paper attacking the thesis-support/five paragraph theme format (which proved to be the basis for “The McEssay: Choking the Voice out of Student Writing" (see the link -- http://teacherscribe.blogspot.com/2008/05/mcessay.html).
Mike Morgan, my rhetoric professor, steered me toward the works of Ken Macrorie, William Coles, William Zeiger, and Peter Elbow. They radically changed how I viewed teaching writing.
The next semester Mark Christensen, my thesis advisor and colleague with whom I team taught two methods classes, recommended Donald Murray’s A Writer Teaches Writing. I think it was probably there that I came across Romano’s name.
I quickly ordered his book, Clearing the Way. But I filed it away while I worked on finish grad school.
It was not until I went back to teaching high school a year later that I actually got around to reading it.
Clearing the Way reinforced all of the theories I had learned in grad school: emphasize voice, introduce students to free writing, teach writing as a process, which Romano referred to percolating, de-emphasize the formal teaching of grammar, focus on narrative as well as expository formats, teachers must write with their students and model the same strategies they are advocating to students, and the importance of publishing student work – even if it’s producing a class anthology or just hanging essay on the board or sharing them at the end of a unit . . .
Even now when I take it off the shelf and open it, I see my notes and comments filling the margins. Good stuff.
Years later, I would see another of his books, Crafting Authentic Voice. This was one of the first teaching textbooks that I read all the way through. I didn’t skip any chapters or get bogged down in research and analysis. Romano was practicing what he was preaching.
What I liked about the book was that it looked at the writing process as a craft. Which, of course, it is. That is why I maintain there is no outline or formula that will help you produce real writing.
I’m not talking about fake writing: five paragraph themes and stuff like that (Romano has a great chapter entitled “The Five Paragraph You Know What” ).
I’m talking about writing that is full of voice and personality. Teachers need to get students to view writing as a craft, an art. The way real writers do.
The second thing about Crafting Authentic Voice that I loved was that last word in the title: voice. That is what we all read for (whether we realize it or not).
Now you might claim, I read the news, and there’s little voice in there. Oh, there’s voice. It’s just that of an unbiased (well, if you don’t listen to Fox news anyway) reporter. But again, I’m talking about real writing.
I know some might argue that some writing may actually be hindered by voice. Take directions, for example. Those have to be completely clear and concise. You can’t have voice or style cluttering that precision.
Give me a break. I’ve put together enough pieces of furniture and what not since we moved into our house and since Kenzie came along, I’ve realized that whoever is able to write directions with voice and style will instantly become a millionaire (in fact, that would make a hell of a blog idea. Take directions for the most complicated things and rewrite them full of voice and style. Then put it to the test. Which way is easier and most effective?).
If you doubt me, then ask yourself why are those Car Talk guys on NPR are so popular? They take complicated information and break it down and repackage it in a way that is full of voice and style so it is easily digestible.
That’s good writing. That’s what Crafting Authentic Voice is all about.
When I saw on amazon that Romano had a new memoir coming along (actually, I think I read an excerpt in English Journal) I looked forward to hearing more of his voice and getting an inside peek into the author’s life.
Here are some of my favorite snippets from Zigzag.
On watching his students make discoveries through writing:
“I liked seeing them discover what they wanted to say – often, in fact, learn what they wanted to say as they actually wrote words on paper, stringing together language in sentences, arriving at deeply felt information they could not have articulated in an outline prior to writing.” (85)
That’s why I love the quote from E.M. Forster, “How do I know that I think until I see what I want to say?”
On his days teaching high school English at Edgewood High School in Ohio where the staff was incredibly passionate and willing to test new ideas:
“We were hungry teachers seeking to learn more about our subject matter. We were committed to finding relevant reading and writing assignments for our students, and we strove to teach them better . . . Learning was an adventure for teachers. We wanted learning to be an adventure for students. There was structure: there was autonomy within the structure. Pedagogical dreams could become reality . . . When we came to new ideas or strategies or literature, we tried them out. Teachers followed their literature passions. In classrooms they enacted their evolving understanding and philosophy of teaching and learning.” (106)
That is one thing I enjoy about the Red River Valley Writing project at UND. For four weeks, English teachers read deeply in their field, discuss what matters most to them (improving how they teach reading and writing), present on our best strategies and practices (the focus being on teachers teaching teachers), and getting plenty of opportunities to write.
Talking about his work at UNH with the legendary Donald Murray, “And always we talked about teaching writing as well as writing writing.” Note the difference. (202).
“Writing writing.” Love that phrase. How much of that actually takes place in a school? Not enough. Students need to write and to explore and discover what they think and have to say. They can’t do that doing ‘canned’ writing.
On the writing process and crafting his first book –
“I lived for revision.”
Romano also talks about a conversation he had with Murray where he states that for a real writing, the grade or outcome of a piece is not the main point. The main point is the process (or as I like to say ‘getting lost in the writing). When I write, I get lost in revision because most of what I do is revision. Even while I’m writing this blog entry, I’m revising. Part of me is pondering what words will come together to form the next sentence while another part is thinking over the previous sentences to make sure I’m on track. Yet another part of me is looking to add asides, jokes, and anecdotes. Revision is what it’s all about.
And finally, this advice he received via a work by either Murray or Donald Graves on how to write a book without a clear end in sight:
“It’s [writing] like driving a car at night. You never see further than your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way” (E. L. Doctorow)
What a metaphor for writing. That’s always how I write. Sometimes I have a sharp curve appear suddenly in the headlights and I have to lay off the throttle. Sometimes I find a long straight stretch of pavement ahead and I can press the pedal down and just go. Other times, I never know what will leap across my path. But it is always a journey. And a worthy one at that.
I first came across Romano’s work while in grad school at Bemidji State. I can’t remember exactly how I came across his work. I know it was when I was doing a paper attacking the thesis-support/five paragraph theme format (which proved to be the basis for “The McEssay: Choking the Voice out of Student Writing" (see the link -- http://teacherscribe.blogspot.com/2008/05/mcessay.html).
Mike Morgan, my rhetoric professor, steered me toward the works of Ken Macrorie, William Coles, William Zeiger, and Peter Elbow. They radically changed how I viewed teaching writing.
The next semester Mark Christensen, my thesis advisor and colleague with whom I team taught two methods classes, recommended Donald Murray’s A Writer Teaches Writing. I think it was probably there that I came across Romano’s name.
I quickly ordered his book, Clearing the Way. But I filed it away while I worked on finish grad school.
It was not until I went back to teaching high school a year later that I actually got around to reading it.
Clearing the Way reinforced all of the theories I had learned in grad school: emphasize voice, introduce students to free writing, teach writing as a process, which Romano referred to percolating, de-emphasize the formal teaching of grammar, focus on narrative as well as expository formats, teachers must write with their students and model the same strategies they are advocating to students, and the importance of publishing student work – even if it’s producing a class anthology or just hanging essay on the board or sharing them at the end of a unit . . .
Even now when I take it off the shelf and open it, I see my notes and comments filling the margins. Good stuff.
Years later, I would see another of his books, Crafting Authentic Voice. This was one of the first teaching textbooks that I read all the way through. I didn’t skip any chapters or get bogged down in research and analysis. Romano was practicing what he was preaching.
What I liked about the book was that it looked at the writing process as a craft. Which, of course, it is. That is why I maintain there is no outline or formula that will help you produce real writing.
I’m not talking about fake writing: five paragraph themes and stuff like that (Romano has a great chapter entitled “The Five Paragraph You Know What” ).
I’m talking about writing that is full of voice and personality. Teachers need to get students to view writing as a craft, an art. The way real writers do.
The second thing about Crafting Authentic Voice that I loved was that last word in the title: voice. That is what we all read for (whether we realize it or not).
Now you might claim, I read the news, and there’s little voice in there. Oh, there’s voice. It’s just that of an unbiased (well, if you don’t listen to Fox news anyway) reporter. But again, I’m talking about real writing.
I know some might argue that some writing may actually be hindered by voice. Take directions, for example. Those have to be completely clear and concise. You can’t have voice or style cluttering that precision.
Give me a break. I’ve put together enough pieces of furniture and what not since we moved into our house and since Kenzie came along, I’ve realized that whoever is able to write directions with voice and style will instantly become a millionaire (in fact, that would make a hell of a blog idea. Take directions for the most complicated things and rewrite them full of voice and style. Then put it to the test. Which way is easier and most effective?).
If you doubt me, then ask yourself why are those Car Talk guys on NPR are so popular? They take complicated information and break it down and repackage it in a way that is full of voice and style so it is easily digestible.
That’s good writing. That’s what Crafting Authentic Voice is all about.
When I saw on amazon that Romano had a new memoir coming along (actually, I think I read an excerpt in English Journal) I looked forward to hearing more of his voice and getting an inside peek into the author’s life.
Here are some of my favorite snippets from Zigzag.
On watching his students make discoveries through writing:
“I liked seeing them discover what they wanted to say – often, in fact, learn what they wanted to say as they actually wrote words on paper, stringing together language in sentences, arriving at deeply felt information they could not have articulated in an outline prior to writing.” (85)
That’s why I love the quote from E.M. Forster, “How do I know that I think until I see what I want to say?”
On his days teaching high school English at Edgewood High School in Ohio where the staff was incredibly passionate and willing to test new ideas:
“We were hungry teachers seeking to learn more about our subject matter. We were committed to finding relevant reading and writing assignments for our students, and we strove to teach them better . . . Learning was an adventure for teachers. We wanted learning to be an adventure for students. There was structure: there was autonomy within the structure. Pedagogical dreams could become reality . . . When we came to new ideas or strategies or literature, we tried them out. Teachers followed their literature passions. In classrooms they enacted their evolving understanding and philosophy of teaching and learning.” (106)
That is one thing I enjoy about the Red River Valley Writing project at UND. For four weeks, English teachers read deeply in their field, discuss what matters most to them (improving how they teach reading and writing), present on our best strategies and practices (the focus being on teachers teaching teachers), and getting plenty of opportunities to write.
Talking about his work at UNH with the legendary Donald Murray, “And always we talked about teaching writing as well as writing writing.” Note the difference. (202).
“Writing writing.” Love that phrase. How much of that actually takes place in a school? Not enough. Students need to write and to explore and discover what they think and have to say. They can’t do that doing ‘canned’ writing.
On the writing process and crafting his first book –
“I lived for revision.”
Romano also talks about a conversation he had with Murray where he states that for a real writing, the grade or outcome of a piece is not the main point. The main point is the process (or as I like to say ‘getting lost in the writing). When I write, I get lost in revision because most of what I do is revision. Even while I’m writing this blog entry, I’m revising. Part of me is pondering what words will come together to form the next sentence while another part is thinking over the previous sentences to make sure I’m on track. Yet another part of me is looking to add asides, jokes, and anecdotes. Revision is what it’s all about.
And finally, this advice he received via a work by either Murray or Donald Graves on how to write a book without a clear end in sight:
“It’s [writing] like driving a car at night. You never see further than your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way” (E. L. Doctorow)
What a metaphor for writing. That’s always how I write. Sometimes I have a sharp curve appear suddenly in the headlights and I have to lay off the throttle. Sometimes I find a long straight stretch of pavement ahead and I can press the pedal down and just go. Other times, I never know what will leap across my path. But it is always a journey. And a worthy one at that.
The movie that made me want to be an English teacher
I think we watched this in Mr. Sorenson's English class my sophomore year.
Wednesday
Of tardiness
I have been late to school more this year than the other 10 years combined. Our schedules revolve around Kenzie’s and when she wakes up. Now that she is sleeping through the night, well mostly through the night, I have often had to hold her and cuddle her while Kristie hops in the shower and while Gail gets ready for the day. As a result, I often don’t head for work sometimes until as late as 7:20, which puts me here about 7:55 or later, depending on the traffic (and that crew headed to Digi Key is a stubborn bunch. If there is a trace of ice on the road, you can bet at least one car is dead set on slowing down to around 45. I won’t even mention the idiots who pull out in front of me at the elevator in St. Hilarie or at the junction of the Hwy 32 and what is known as the “St. Hilaire cut across to Grand Forks”).
So on Monday, I was a good 10-15 minutes late for the big meeting with the superintendent on budget reductions and cuts.
Not good.
Of course, I was not alone. There were a few who didn’t even bother to show up. I seriously though about skipping it too, but as co-president of the EA, I should have been there.
It was no coincidence that we got an email reminding us about our duty time.
Rightfully so too.
But out of all the days to be late, I had to pick that one!
When I mentioned this to Kristie, she said, “Well, what about the hours you put in on Sunday correcting papers all day.”
That’s true too. No one sees those hours though.
****
Conferences are tomorrow. Twelve hours worth of them. So far I have 8 parents signed up.
What to do with the rest of the time?
PLENTY!!
I never lack anything to do.
Monday we also had conferences, from 4-8. I think I had about six parents come in. But I was able to get my room cleaned and organized (trust me. That’s no small task.) In fact, I had not cleaned or organized since fall conferences, which seem just like a few weeks ago.
On my agenda for tomorrow:
Grade essays for College Comp.
Read drafts for College Comp and College Comp 2.
Grade my Lit & Lang 11 tests on “The Crucible,” which they are taking today.
Read some of my new book, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong by James W. Loewen.
Get some writing done.
Lesson plan for the second half of third quarter.
Put some Keynote presentations together for the next set of essays in my college classes.
Write three letters of recommendation for students.
Put together a couple of paragraphs for a biography to submit to the editors of the text in which my essay “The McEssay: Choking the Life Out of Student Writing” is being published in.
Well, those are just the ones I’ve thought up off the top of my head. Who knows what else will present itself.
*****
I have been late to school more this year than the other 10 years combined. Our schedules revolve around Kenzie’s and when she wakes up. Now that she is sleeping through the night, well mostly through the night, I have often had to hold her and cuddle her while Kristie hops in the shower and while Gail gets ready for the day. As a result, I often don’t head for work sometimes until as late as 7:20, which puts me here about 7:55 or later, depending on the traffic (and that crew headed to Digi Key is a stubborn bunch. If there is a trace of ice on the road, you can bet at least one car is dead set on slowing down to around 45. I won’t even mention the idiots who pull out in front of me at the elevator in St. Hilarie or at the junction of the Hwy 32 and what is known as the “St. Hilaire cut across to Grand Forks”).
So on Monday, I was a good 10-15 minutes late for the big meeting with the superintendent on budget reductions and cuts.
Not good.
Of course, I was not alone. There were a few who didn’t even bother to show up. I seriously though about skipping it too, but as co-president of the EA, I should have been there.
It was no coincidence that we got an email reminding us about our duty time.
Rightfully so too.
But out of all the days to be late, I had to pick that one!
When I mentioned this to Kristie, she said, “Well, what about the hours you put in on Sunday correcting papers all day.”
That’s true too. No one sees those hours though.
****
Conferences are tomorrow. Twelve hours worth of them. So far I have 8 parents signed up.
What to do with the rest of the time?
PLENTY!!
I never lack anything to do.
Monday we also had conferences, from 4-8. I think I had about six parents come in. But I was able to get my room cleaned and organized (trust me. That’s no small task.) In fact, I had not cleaned or organized since fall conferences, which seem just like a few weeks ago.
On my agenda for tomorrow:
Grade essays for College Comp.
Read drafts for College Comp and College Comp 2.
Grade my Lit & Lang 11 tests on “The Crucible,” which they are taking today.
Read some of my new book, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong by James W. Loewen.
Get some writing done.
Lesson plan for the second half of third quarter.
Put some Keynote presentations together for the next set of essays in my college classes.
Write three letters of recommendation for students.
Put together a couple of paragraphs for a biography to submit to the editors of the text in which my essay “The McEssay: Choking the Life Out of Student Writing” is being published in.
Well, those are just the ones I’ve thought up off the top of my head. Who knows what else will present itself.
*****
Definition Essay for College Comp II
Here is a keynote presentation for the definition essay. I exported it to imovie and added some touches and upoaded it.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Saturday, February 21, 2009
On discipline II
There was some feedback to my previous post that really got me thinking, so instead of leaving a response, I thought I'd turn it into a blog entry.
Here it goes . . .
Determined delinquents.
Now that is an interesting phrase. Many of the students who cause me trouble though, just don’t fit that mold. They’re often the athletes or ‘preps’ or snots in fact.
I often tell my students, “some of my favorite students have failed my classes.” And that’s true.
I TRY to get most everyone in a class. I should not claim to get everyone in; some choose not to partake. I have no solution for apathy. That frustrates the hell out of me, but there is nothing I can do.
You're right. My classes are great. But that usually changes when I teach a summer session - or two- at the ALC. If you review any of my blog entries from any random summer, you'll see plenty of frustration in those.
What I learned from those kids – most of them have serious problems and would some would fit in with ‘determined delinquents’ – was that most kids just want to be heard.
I always struggle with getting work in from them (and this is true in all of my classes), until I spend some time during class wandering around and getting to know them. I have found that to be one of the most effective ways to ‘discipline’ kids.
Once they see that I’m interested in them – and not simply the “teacher” who is there to enforce rules – well, the walls come down a bit and I’m able to get them to buy in a little bit more.
I think most students buy in to my classes because I make them relevant. If it’s one thing I do well, I think it’s that I can make the most esoteric and stuffy literature or writing assignments relate to the kids and their lives.
I tell them all the time that I could never teach math or science. I could not get kids to learn about someone else’s theory or concept. But in English and composition, the students – and their lives – are really our textbooks.
Where else do they hear that? Let’s read “Young Goodman Brown” and see what they think about it. Let’s write an essay in which they analyze a time they were hurt or reflect on what they do best.
That makes my job so much easier.
Of course, that doesn’t always work.
When I realized that some kids are not going to buy in no matter how nice I am, no matter how I try to connect with them, no matter how interesting I try to make a lesson, I was okay with that. As I said in the previous blog, I cannot make a kid do anything they don't want to do.
Some don't want to do anything. I move on without those who don't want to do something.
I don't lose any sleep over it either.
But those cases are pretty rare for me. I find if I connect with them on some level - giving them a nickname, knowing what sports they are in, handing them a book to read that I think they'll like, giving them a hard time when I see them in the hallway or at Hugo's or at Walmart - it makes it easier to get them to buy in.
One of my favorite things is to just walk down the hall. I’ll say hi to a dozen kids and give crap to another dozen.
But, ultimately, the ball is in the student’s court. They hold the ultimate control. They can buy in and get something out of the class, or they can dig in their heels and make it a pain for everyone involved.
When the latter happens, I do everything within my power to get them out of my class. This is not always easy, but if I make the attempt, the student will know that I expect them to buy in to my class.
Honestly, I can’t remember the last time I actually gave out a detention. I don’t post my classroom rules (where could I find room? I have too many posters, works of art – both professional and from students, student assignments, and other junk).
We go over the rules on the first day of class when we go through the syllabus, but I try to get through that as quickly as possible. I mean there are far too many interesting things to get to.
Some of my colleagues go on for the entire first day of class going over their rules and procedures – and that’s great for them – but for me, I’d just as soon get done with the syllabus and move on to something cool. I mean who wants to talk about using the bathroom pass (not that I have one) or whether to raise their hands or not when we could be reading “The Lottery” or they could be writing about an embarrassing moment or their favorite film.
Now, I also found the most important thing to remember when it comes to discipline is to make your classroom management match your personality. The way I handle kids won’t work for others. It’s all about doing what you’re comfortable with.
The one thing a teacher should avoid is trying to be someone they are not. Students see right through that.
When I was a freshman, we got a new math teacher who was also our football coach. He was a hard ass on the field and mean as hell in the classroom (tossing chalk at kids and so forth), but that fit his personality.
If you are not a hard ass, never try to be one in front of the kids. They’ll see right through that.
For instance, while still in high school, we had a substitute who we all knew (he was a former graduate). Yet, when he was subbing, he tried to be like our math teacher and football coach, yelling and screaming and trying to be something he just wasn’t.
We ate him alive. We never had an ounce of respect for him. We knew that wasn’t who he really was.
I’m not a hard ass, so it would be futile for me to act like that. That’s why I never put any stock in the old adage that you have to be mean to the kids for the first few months before you can lighten up. You know, let them know who is boss.
The reality is that the kids are the bosses. They are the ones who make the class run. Once I realized that and bought in to that, teaching became a whole lot more enjoyable.
If I wanted to control people and bark orders, I would have gone into the military.
Instead, I have the greatest job in the world. The bottom line, for me anyway, is connecting with the kids. Or at least as many as possible.
Here is the first time I realized ‘my’ way of disciplining kids --
That first year teaching, I had a hell of a sophomore class. Six sections. One student in particular, Adam, gave me fits. He was a typical sophomore. He was not interested in Shakespeare or A Separate Peace or the Harlem Renaissance.
But I got to know him, and that made all the difference. Adam was quite the cusser, so I told him that every time he swore, he’d have to do some push ups. He was the class clown too, so he ate it up. Later in the year, he would eat lunch in my room with me since he was trying to quit smoking and he said that if he went with his friends for lunch, he’d end up smoking. So we spent a month worth of lunch periods eating in my room.
It didn’t take long before Adam was an ally. If some of his friends were talking or being jack asses, Adam helped me reign them in. He respected me, I think, because he knew I made time for him and that he meant something to me.
Once my stapler turned up missing. I don’t know who stole it (I had my suspicions), so I told Adam to be on the look out. Well, it was not a week later and I was in the middle of class when I heard someone calling my name from the hallway.
I went to the door.
What did I see?
There was Adam with the top of a locker pried open.
“Reynolds! Your stapler’s in here. Reach in and grab it!” he called as he held on to the top of the locker with both of his hands.
There was maybe three inches worth of room, but I was able to spot my stapler and snatch it out.
Adam was quite pleased with himself.
I had won him over.
Now, was he a straight A student after that? Ha. Far, far from it. But he behaved and worked rather well. He was never going to an English major, but he enjoyed coming to class every day.
Sometimes that’s all you can ask.
Three years later, on the last day of his senior year, Adam tagged a long with my journalism class as we went to the Dairy Queen.
“Reynolds?” he asked as we walked down the sidewalk.
“Yeah?”
“There’s something I have to tell you,” Adam said with that guilty smirk in the corner of his mouth.
“What?”
“Well, remember that Julius Caesar booklet we did in your class?”
“Yep,” I said recalling vividly how when I finally got around to grading them, Adam’s was mysteriously absent. He spent the better part of the next week swearing up and down that he had turned it in and that I had lost it – not something that was completely out of the realm of possibility.
“Well,” Adam went on, that smirk growing wider. “Remember when I said I turned it in. Well . . . I never turned it in,” he said sheepishly.
“That’s okay,” I replied slapping him on the shoulder, “Remember when I said I believed you and would give you credit for it anyway. Well, I never really gave you credit for it.”
The look on his face was the highlight of that year.
Here it goes . . .
Determined delinquents.
Now that is an interesting phrase. Many of the students who cause me trouble though, just don’t fit that mold. They’re often the athletes or ‘preps’ or snots in fact.
I often tell my students, “some of my favorite students have failed my classes.” And that’s true.
I TRY to get most everyone in a class. I should not claim to get everyone in; some choose not to partake. I have no solution for apathy. That frustrates the hell out of me, but there is nothing I can do.
You're right. My classes are great. But that usually changes when I teach a summer session - or two- at the ALC. If you review any of my blog entries from any random summer, you'll see plenty of frustration in those.
What I learned from those kids – most of them have serious problems and would some would fit in with ‘determined delinquents’ – was that most kids just want to be heard.
I always struggle with getting work in from them (and this is true in all of my classes), until I spend some time during class wandering around and getting to know them. I have found that to be one of the most effective ways to ‘discipline’ kids.
Once they see that I’m interested in them – and not simply the “teacher” who is there to enforce rules – well, the walls come down a bit and I’m able to get them to buy in a little bit more.
I think most students buy in to my classes because I make them relevant. If it’s one thing I do well, I think it’s that I can make the most esoteric and stuffy literature or writing assignments relate to the kids and their lives.
I tell them all the time that I could never teach math or science. I could not get kids to learn about someone else’s theory or concept. But in English and composition, the students – and their lives – are really our textbooks.
Where else do they hear that? Let’s read “Young Goodman Brown” and see what they think about it. Let’s write an essay in which they analyze a time they were hurt or reflect on what they do best.
That makes my job so much easier.
Of course, that doesn’t always work.
When I realized that some kids are not going to buy in no matter how nice I am, no matter how I try to connect with them, no matter how interesting I try to make a lesson, I was okay with that. As I said in the previous blog, I cannot make a kid do anything they don't want to do.
Some don't want to do anything. I move on without those who don't want to do something.
I don't lose any sleep over it either.
But those cases are pretty rare for me. I find if I connect with them on some level - giving them a nickname, knowing what sports they are in, handing them a book to read that I think they'll like, giving them a hard time when I see them in the hallway or at Hugo's or at Walmart - it makes it easier to get them to buy in.
One of my favorite things is to just walk down the hall. I’ll say hi to a dozen kids and give crap to another dozen.
But, ultimately, the ball is in the student’s court. They hold the ultimate control. They can buy in and get something out of the class, or they can dig in their heels and make it a pain for everyone involved.
When the latter happens, I do everything within my power to get them out of my class. This is not always easy, but if I make the attempt, the student will know that I expect them to buy in to my class.
Honestly, I can’t remember the last time I actually gave out a detention. I don’t post my classroom rules (where could I find room? I have too many posters, works of art – both professional and from students, student assignments, and other junk).
We go over the rules on the first day of class when we go through the syllabus, but I try to get through that as quickly as possible. I mean there are far too many interesting things to get to.
Some of my colleagues go on for the entire first day of class going over their rules and procedures – and that’s great for them – but for me, I’d just as soon get done with the syllabus and move on to something cool. I mean who wants to talk about using the bathroom pass (not that I have one) or whether to raise their hands or not when we could be reading “The Lottery” or they could be writing about an embarrassing moment or their favorite film.
Now, I also found the most important thing to remember when it comes to discipline is to make your classroom management match your personality. The way I handle kids won’t work for others. It’s all about doing what you’re comfortable with.
The one thing a teacher should avoid is trying to be someone they are not. Students see right through that.
When I was a freshman, we got a new math teacher who was also our football coach. He was a hard ass on the field and mean as hell in the classroom (tossing chalk at kids and so forth), but that fit his personality.
If you are not a hard ass, never try to be one in front of the kids. They’ll see right through that.
For instance, while still in high school, we had a substitute who we all knew (he was a former graduate). Yet, when he was subbing, he tried to be like our math teacher and football coach, yelling and screaming and trying to be something he just wasn’t.
We ate him alive. We never had an ounce of respect for him. We knew that wasn’t who he really was.
I’m not a hard ass, so it would be futile for me to act like that. That’s why I never put any stock in the old adage that you have to be mean to the kids for the first few months before you can lighten up. You know, let them know who is boss.
The reality is that the kids are the bosses. They are the ones who make the class run. Once I realized that and bought in to that, teaching became a whole lot more enjoyable.
If I wanted to control people and bark orders, I would have gone into the military.
Instead, I have the greatest job in the world. The bottom line, for me anyway, is connecting with the kids. Or at least as many as possible.
Here is the first time I realized ‘my’ way of disciplining kids --
That first year teaching, I had a hell of a sophomore class. Six sections. One student in particular, Adam, gave me fits. He was a typical sophomore. He was not interested in Shakespeare or A Separate Peace or the Harlem Renaissance.
But I got to know him, and that made all the difference. Adam was quite the cusser, so I told him that every time he swore, he’d have to do some push ups. He was the class clown too, so he ate it up. Later in the year, he would eat lunch in my room with me since he was trying to quit smoking and he said that if he went with his friends for lunch, he’d end up smoking. So we spent a month worth of lunch periods eating in my room.
It didn’t take long before Adam was an ally. If some of his friends were talking or being jack asses, Adam helped me reign them in. He respected me, I think, because he knew I made time for him and that he meant something to me.
Once my stapler turned up missing. I don’t know who stole it (I had my suspicions), so I told Adam to be on the look out. Well, it was not a week later and I was in the middle of class when I heard someone calling my name from the hallway.
I went to the door.
What did I see?
There was Adam with the top of a locker pried open.
“Reynolds! Your stapler’s in here. Reach in and grab it!” he called as he held on to the top of the locker with both of his hands.
There was maybe three inches worth of room, but I was able to spot my stapler and snatch it out.
Adam was quite pleased with himself.
I had won him over.
Now, was he a straight A student after that? Ha. Far, far from it. But he behaved and worked rather well. He was never going to an English major, but he enjoyed coming to class every day.
Sometimes that’s all you can ask.
Three years later, on the last day of his senior year, Adam tagged a long with my journalism class as we went to the Dairy Queen.
“Reynolds?” he asked as we walked down the sidewalk.
“Yeah?”
“There’s something I have to tell you,” Adam said with that guilty smirk in the corner of his mouth.
“What?”
“Well, remember that Julius Caesar booklet we did in your class?”
“Yep,” I said recalling vividly how when I finally got around to grading them, Adam’s was mysteriously absent. He spent the better part of the next week swearing up and down that he had turned it in and that I had lost it – not something that was completely out of the realm of possibility.
“Well,” Adam went on, that smirk growing wider. “Remember when I said I turned it in. Well . . . I never turned it in,” he said sheepishly.
“That’s okay,” I replied slapping him on the shoulder, “Remember when I said I believed you and would give you credit for it anyway. Well, I never really gave you credit for it.”
The look on his face was the highlight of that year.
On discipline
As I wrote earlier, I’m finally hitting my stride with my third quarter classes. None too soon as conferences are Monday and Thursday with mid-quarter falling on Tuesday.
My College Comp II class is, maybe, the best class I’ve ever had. There are some of the best writers in our school in that class. If I get permission, I’ll be posting one student’s essay, and you’ll see what I mean.
My College Comp class, though quiet and tentative when it comes to sharing their work and discussing, is anything but that in their writing. This class is quite good too.
I didn’t know what to think of my final class, Lit & Language 11. They are divided right down the middle. One group of kids sits on the right side of the classroom while another sits on the left, with a few kids mingling in the middle. It’s quite the dichotomy in there.
Initially, I was worried about this.
Why not devise a seating chart then? You ask.
I’m too damn lazy for that.
No, actually I hate seating charts. I don’t think I’ve put one together since my second year of teaching. It’s always been my belief, and now more than ever, that I simply have far more important things to worry about in a class than where kids sit.
What the hell? Let them sit where they want.
I still didn’t know what to think until this week. On Wednesday I had to get a crown put on during fourth block. Luckily, I was able to find a fellow English teacher to fill in. Now I admit I was a bit uneasy about leaving her with this crew. It’s not that they’re bad kids. You just always get nervous leaving your class with someone else. What if it all goes bad? What will your colleague think of you? That’s always a fear of mine.
But after having my temporary crown pop off – I knew I should not have had that blasted Rice Kristie bar at the parent appreciation lunch after KoKo’s game on Saturday – and having the tooth very (and I can’t stress that adverb enough) to hot and cold, I was willing to take any appointment I could get.
When I returned to school, with just a few minutes left in the day, I snuck up on my room hoping for the best . . . and that is exactly what I got.
My colleague said that they read quietly and working very well.
I knew things were going well when one of my students looked up and said, “This play makes me mad,” referring to Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible.”
“Why?” I asked, figuring it might be the language or the fact that they had to read a play, one of most horrifying things I can imagine. Plays are to be seen and performed. I have always disliked reading them. But “The Crucible” is just so cool and ties in to so many other things, that I bite the bullet and teach it.
“Well, I can’t believe how they all turned on Proctor,” he said.
I was impressed.
“I mean, you think he’s going to get everything straightened out, and they all just turn on him!” he said, and closed his book.
That’s my class! I was proud of them. I even promised them treats the next day – Butterfingers and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.
The next day, since they had worked so well, I laid off them a bit. I thought of an old ‘rainy day’ assignment I had in my drawer (a series of ‘pundles’ or visual puzzles that students had to interpret in order to figure out their meanings. For example, there might be a picture of a large number one with a hole in it. The answer to this ‘pundle’ would “a hole in one.” The words “life form” may appear twice at the bottom of one picture. The answer to this is “lower life forms.”)
Did the student tear into these! They went nuts over them. I just got the heck out of the way and watched.
Actually, I got out of the way by wandering around and getting to know them. I joked with some about sports, their choice in shoes, their taste in music, older siblings of theirs I had known, movies or TV shows they were interested in, and so on.
Soon we were laughing and having quite a good time.
I think I didn’t really win this class over until then. Now I know each by name. I also know more about them. They, too, know more about me. I had to let my guard down, and they did the same.
It seems to me that this is why I don’t use seating charts. To me, seating charts are a form of discipline. I gave that concept up a long time ago.
I spent many hours my first year at LHS just wishing I had some way to control the kids in my class. I wished I were coaching for the high school instead of the local community college because they I could threaten their playing time to get them to behave.
Then one day after Christmas break, it hit me – I can’t really control them. I mean I could yell or assign detention or punish them by moving them away from their friends or kick them out of class, but I could not make them do anything they didn’t really want to do.
So I had to get them to want to learn and be in my class.
Now, how I did that is a topic for an entire other entry. But once I changed my focus from wanting to make them behave to wanting them to learn and enjoy doing it, well, things have never been the same.
Things haven’t always been easy. But, for the most part, I have enjoyed every class since.
I think now I am at the point where my fourth block Lit & Lang 11 kids want to come to class and get something out of it. Better yet, I want to be in there teaching them. That, unfortunately, isn’t always the case in high schools across America.
Yesterday, as we finished reading “The Crucible,” I thought of a great way to cap not only a great piece of literature but also a great week: I’d give a comprehensive quiz on acts 1-4.
The catch, though, was that I put at the end of the directions that if the students read the directions and read through the test, all they would have to do would be to sign their name at the top of the quiz and turn it in. They need not even take it!
I think I had six students catch on and actually read the directions. The rest attacked the quiz, which I made intentionally vague and difficult. So when those who didn’t read the directions began to argue and ask questions, those who knew what was going on, had to bite their tongues to keep from laughing out loud.
Finally, when the last quiz was in, several students demanded that we grade it right then and there.
So I grabbed one quiz and handed it to a student.
“Rachel,” I said, “read the directions out loud.”
Of course, she didn’t. She just read them silently.
“Read them out loud! Come on! Let’s correct it!” several students called.
At first, it didn’t dawn on Rachel what was going on.
Then it hit her.
“Oh, it says if we read the directions, we just need to sign our name and turn it in.”
“AWWWWW!”
“What?”
“That’s not fair!”
“Who reads the directions?”
“Boo.”
These were just a few of the reactions that I caught.
I was too busy laughing at them and attempting my version of the moonwalk in front of the class.
My College Comp II class is, maybe, the best class I’ve ever had. There are some of the best writers in our school in that class. If I get permission, I’ll be posting one student’s essay, and you’ll see what I mean.
My College Comp class, though quiet and tentative when it comes to sharing their work and discussing, is anything but that in their writing. This class is quite good too.
I didn’t know what to think of my final class, Lit & Language 11. They are divided right down the middle. One group of kids sits on the right side of the classroom while another sits on the left, with a few kids mingling in the middle. It’s quite the dichotomy in there.
Initially, I was worried about this.
Why not devise a seating chart then? You ask.
I’m too damn lazy for that.
No, actually I hate seating charts. I don’t think I’ve put one together since my second year of teaching. It’s always been my belief, and now more than ever, that I simply have far more important things to worry about in a class than where kids sit.
What the hell? Let them sit where they want.
I still didn’t know what to think until this week. On Wednesday I had to get a crown put on during fourth block. Luckily, I was able to find a fellow English teacher to fill in. Now I admit I was a bit uneasy about leaving her with this crew. It’s not that they’re bad kids. You just always get nervous leaving your class with someone else. What if it all goes bad? What will your colleague think of you? That’s always a fear of mine.
But after having my temporary crown pop off – I knew I should not have had that blasted Rice Kristie bar at the parent appreciation lunch after KoKo’s game on Saturday – and having the tooth very (and I can’t stress that adverb enough) to hot and cold, I was willing to take any appointment I could get.
When I returned to school, with just a few minutes left in the day, I snuck up on my room hoping for the best . . . and that is exactly what I got.
My colleague said that they read quietly and working very well.
I knew things were going well when one of my students looked up and said, “This play makes me mad,” referring to Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible.”
“Why?” I asked, figuring it might be the language or the fact that they had to read a play, one of most horrifying things I can imagine. Plays are to be seen and performed. I have always disliked reading them. But “The Crucible” is just so cool and ties in to so many other things, that I bite the bullet and teach it.
“Well, I can’t believe how they all turned on Proctor,” he said.
I was impressed.
“I mean, you think he’s going to get everything straightened out, and they all just turn on him!” he said, and closed his book.
That’s my class! I was proud of them. I even promised them treats the next day – Butterfingers and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.
The next day, since they had worked so well, I laid off them a bit. I thought of an old ‘rainy day’ assignment I had in my drawer (a series of ‘pundles’ or visual puzzles that students had to interpret in order to figure out their meanings. For example, there might be a picture of a large number one with a hole in it. The answer to this ‘pundle’ would “a hole in one.” The words “life form” may appear twice at the bottom of one picture. The answer to this is “lower life forms.”)
Did the student tear into these! They went nuts over them. I just got the heck out of the way and watched.
Actually, I got out of the way by wandering around and getting to know them. I joked with some about sports, their choice in shoes, their taste in music, older siblings of theirs I had known, movies or TV shows they were interested in, and so on.
Soon we were laughing and having quite a good time.
I think I didn’t really win this class over until then. Now I know each by name. I also know more about them. They, too, know more about me. I had to let my guard down, and they did the same.
It seems to me that this is why I don’t use seating charts. To me, seating charts are a form of discipline. I gave that concept up a long time ago.
I spent many hours my first year at LHS just wishing I had some way to control the kids in my class. I wished I were coaching for the high school instead of the local community college because they I could threaten their playing time to get them to behave.
Then one day after Christmas break, it hit me – I can’t really control them. I mean I could yell or assign detention or punish them by moving them away from their friends or kick them out of class, but I could not make them do anything they didn’t really want to do.
So I had to get them to want to learn and be in my class.
Now, how I did that is a topic for an entire other entry. But once I changed my focus from wanting to make them behave to wanting them to learn and enjoy doing it, well, things have never been the same.
Things haven’t always been easy. But, for the most part, I have enjoyed every class since.
I think now I am at the point where my fourth block Lit & Lang 11 kids want to come to class and get something out of it. Better yet, I want to be in there teaching them. That, unfortunately, isn’t always the case in high schools across America.
Yesterday, as we finished reading “The Crucible,” I thought of a great way to cap not only a great piece of literature but also a great week: I’d give a comprehensive quiz on acts 1-4.
The catch, though, was that I put at the end of the directions that if the students read the directions and read through the test, all they would have to do would be to sign their name at the top of the quiz and turn it in. They need not even take it!
I think I had six students catch on and actually read the directions. The rest attacked the quiz, which I made intentionally vague and difficult. So when those who didn’t read the directions began to argue and ask questions, those who knew what was going on, had to bite their tongues to keep from laughing out loud.
Finally, when the last quiz was in, several students demanded that we grade it right then and there.
So I grabbed one quiz and handed it to a student.
“Rachel,” I said, “read the directions out loud.”
Of course, she didn’t. She just read them silently.
“Read them out loud! Come on! Let’s correct it!” several students called.
At first, it didn’t dawn on Rachel what was going on.
Then it hit her.
“Oh, it says if we read the directions, we just need to sign our name and turn it in.”
“AWWWWW!”
“What?”
“That’s not fair!”
“Who reads the directions?”
“Boo.”
These were just a few of the reactions that I caught.
I was too busy laughing at them and attempting my version of the moonwalk in front of the class.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Kenzie rolled over for the first time. Kristie just called to brag. She is home for Presidents’ Day and got to see it.
Dr. Connolley said that when she was on her stomach, she would arch her back and head and through her shoulder over and just swing right over. As he examined her and saw how much head control she had and saw how she could nearly get her toes in her mouth he declared that it wouldn’t be long now.
So when we got her home, I had her on her tummy practicing some. Whenever she would get close, she’d become frustrated, and I’d put her on her back and watch her playing with her feet.
Sure enough, when Kristie got up with Kenzie she put her on the floor and she rolled right over! And I missed it after all the hard work I had put in with her.
Then the little rascal did it later in the afternoon with KoKo. I wasn’t able to see her do it until that evening.
Now I just have to catch it on video.
Nothing. I repeat. Nothing is trivial.
Dr. Connolley said that when she was on her stomach, she would arch her back and head and through her shoulder over and just swing right over. As he examined her and saw how much head control she had and saw how she could nearly get her toes in her mouth he declared that it wouldn’t be long now.
So when we got her home, I had her on her tummy practicing some. Whenever she would get close, she’d become frustrated, and I’d put her on her back and watch her playing with her feet.
Sure enough, when Kristie got up with Kenzie she put her on the floor and she rolled right over! And I missed it after all the hard work I had put in with her.
Then the little rascal did it later in the afternoon with KoKo. I wasn’t able to see her do it until that evening.
Now I just have to catch it on video.
Nothing. I repeat. Nothing is trivial.
It’s taken half the quarter for me to get my legs under me with my new classes. I have tried to bring very little work home since Kristie has so much of her time taken up by Kenzie (she is quite the mamma’s girl!).
However, I had to spend a good part of Sunday getting some correcting done. I do have an 85 minute prep period, but I use that to plan for the rest of my day rather than to correct.
What has been taking up so much of my time is my College Comp II class. I have never taught it before, so it is taking up quite a chunk of my time. However, this week I finally feel like I have the class buying in and doing some good writing. They finished their first theme, a position paper on any topic they found interesting. Since the class is research based, they had to find at least one source to use in their papers. I have these on my desk ready to read tomorrow.
In the meantime we started our second theme, a definition essay.
Like all of our themes, I have students write three essays. They share these and peer edit them. From those three, they decide which one to develop into a theme.
A year or so ago, I was intrigued by an report I read in the Washington Post via countryscribe, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040401721.html, in which the reported had one of the world’s greatest musicians, playing some of the world’s greatest music on one of the greatest instruments at one of the busiest locations. The writer simply wanted to see if anyone would notice the beauty of the music or the greatness of the performer . . . or if they would just walk on by.
I had students read the story and then we brainstormed the topic of beauty. After that I printed out some famous quotes on beauty. With our discussion and the quotes in mind, I had students define their personal ideas or views on beauty.
After that, I will have them choose their own topics or ideas to define for the remaining essays.
Finally, we have a clear direction. And I have some breathing room.
*****
I forgot to mention that a month ago we bought Casey a car.
The pick up his grandfather gave him is in wonderful condition, but given the gas prices and the vehicle’s gas mileage, it just isn’t economically feasible. Plus, with Casey looking at college parking in the fall, we have been on the lookout for a vehicle.
Then Kristie heard that a great couple in town were selling their car. While the miles are high, it is in mint conditon and fully loaded.
Casey and I went to look at it one late afternoon.
We took it for a test drive.
Wow. I was tempted to buy it for myself.
We drove home and Kristie hopped in while I watched Kenzie.
When they returned, she said, “Well, what do you think?”
In less than half an hour, I was writing the check and transferring the deed.
This process took less than an hour. I only say that because it was the total opposite of what my father put me through when looking for vehicles.
Dad was like Bill Cosby in that episode from the Cosby Show where Cliff takes Theo car shopping and dresses in his rattiest clothes and chides the car dealer (played by Sinbad) for the best deal possible.
That was exactly what Dad did. He’d throw on his work jeans, which really were bits and pieces of about half a dozen Levis that Mom was able to stitch together, his dirtiest cap, and a flannel shirt and head into town.
I can count on two hands the number of cars we tried out. Some were vehicles Dad was interested in (I recall a beautiful Chevy Silverado. We took it out for a test drive, which was really something because usually Dad would just sit in the car dealer’s office for half an hour shooting the breeze. Maybe once in awhile he would consent to allow Gary, the car dealer, to bring a vehicle in to the shop for us to take a look at. So at test drive was a big, big deal. I thought we’d be taking that Silverado home. That was until Gary wanted to really show off to Dad and popped the hood. He bragged how there was a built in drop light that one could use to work on the engine. Gary grabbed that little light and pulled it out to exam the fan, the radiator, and the battery. I was sold. Then Gary tried to put the light back and the cord wouldn’t recoil. “Well, there you go,” Dad said, absolutely gleaming! I was heartbroken. And I swore to never get suckered in to going along with him again).
That was until he took me in to try out a new GEO Storm that Thibert’s had on their lot. It was the closest thing to a sports car I had ever seen. It was green with a moon roof.
We even took that sucker out for a spin. But Dad passed on it, and I swore I would never ever ever ever go get suckered in to trying out another car with Dad again.
When I bought my first new car, a 1999 Cavalier, it was my turn to antagonize Dad. He went in thinking we were just going to be looking. But I promised myself that I would be buying a car that day. No matter what! Just to spite all those years of pure torture.
Sure enough, I bought it that same day too. Dad was horrified. I can still hear his famous words, “Well, we’ll look around and let you know.”
“Uh, Dad. I think I’ll take it,” I said.
Gary, who know doubt had been antagonized by Dad for years too, grinned broudly and began punching numbers into the computer and getting the paper work ready.
Revenge!
So when it came time to buy Casey’s car, and given the go ahead from Kristie, who like me is an impulse buyer, I didn’t see any need to put him through the torture Dad had inflicted upon me.
When Kenzie is old enough to drive, though, it might be a different story.
However, I had to spend a good part of Sunday getting some correcting done. I do have an 85 minute prep period, but I use that to plan for the rest of my day rather than to correct.
What has been taking up so much of my time is my College Comp II class. I have never taught it before, so it is taking up quite a chunk of my time. However, this week I finally feel like I have the class buying in and doing some good writing. They finished their first theme, a position paper on any topic they found interesting. Since the class is research based, they had to find at least one source to use in their papers. I have these on my desk ready to read tomorrow.
In the meantime we started our second theme, a definition essay.
Like all of our themes, I have students write three essays. They share these and peer edit them. From those three, they decide which one to develop into a theme.
A year or so ago, I was intrigued by an report I read in the Washington Post via countryscribe, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040401721.html, in which the reported had one of the world’s greatest musicians, playing some of the world’s greatest music on one of the greatest instruments at one of the busiest locations. The writer simply wanted to see if anyone would notice the beauty of the music or the greatness of the performer . . . or if they would just walk on by.
I had students read the story and then we brainstormed the topic of beauty. After that I printed out some famous quotes on beauty. With our discussion and the quotes in mind, I had students define their personal ideas or views on beauty.
After that, I will have them choose their own topics or ideas to define for the remaining essays.
Finally, we have a clear direction. And I have some breathing room.
*****
I forgot to mention that a month ago we bought Casey a car.
The pick up his grandfather gave him is in wonderful condition, but given the gas prices and the vehicle’s gas mileage, it just isn’t economically feasible. Plus, with Casey looking at college parking in the fall, we have been on the lookout for a vehicle.
Then Kristie heard that a great couple in town were selling their car. While the miles are high, it is in mint conditon and fully loaded.
Casey and I went to look at it one late afternoon.
We took it for a test drive.
Wow. I was tempted to buy it for myself.
We drove home and Kristie hopped in while I watched Kenzie.
When they returned, she said, “Well, what do you think?”
In less than half an hour, I was writing the check and transferring the deed.
This process took less than an hour. I only say that because it was the total opposite of what my father put me through when looking for vehicles.
Dad was like Bill Cosby in that episode from the Cosby Show where Cliff takes Theo car shopping and dresses in his rattiest clothes and chides the car dealer (played by Sinbad) for the best deal possible.
That was exactly what Dad did. He’d throw on his work jeans, which really were bits and pieces of about half a dozen Levis that Mom was able to stitch together, his dirtiest cap, and a flannel shirt and head into town.
I can count on two hands the number of cars we tried out. Some were vehicles Dad was interested in (I recall a beautiful Chevy Silverado. We took it out for a test drive, which was really something because usually Dad would just sit in the car dealer’s office for half an hour shooting the breeze. Maybe once in awhile he would consent to allow Gary, the car dealer, to bring a vehicle in to the shop for us to take a look at. So at test drive was a big, big deal. I thought we’d be taking that Silverado home. That was until Gary wanted to really show off to Dad and popped the hood. He bragged how there was a built in drop light that one could use to work on the engine. Gary grabbed that little light and pulled it out to exam the fan, the radiator, and the battery. I was sold. Then Gary tried to put the light back and the cord wouldn’t recoil. “Well, there you go,” Dad said, absolutely gleaming! I was heartbroken. And I swore to never get suckered in to going along with him again).
That was until he took me in to try out a new GEO Storm that Thibert’s had on their lot. It was the closest thing to a sports car I had ever seen. It was green with a moon roof.
We even took that sucker out for a spin. But Dad passed on it, and I swore I would never ever ever ever go get suckered in to trying out another car with Dad again.
When I bought my first new car, a 1999 Cavalier, it was my turn to antagonize Dad. He went in thinking we were just going to be looking. But I promised myself that I would be buying a car that day. No matter what! Just to spite all those years of pure torture.
Sure enough, I bought it that same day too. Dad was horrified. I can still hear his famous words, “Well, we’ll look around and let you know.”
“Uh, Dad. I think I’ll take it,” I said.
Gary, who know doubt had been antagonized by Dad for years too, grinned broudly and began punching numbers into the computer and getting the paper work ready.
Revenge!
So when it came time to buy Casey’s car, and given the go ahead from Kristie, who like me is an impulse buyer, I didn’t see any need to put him through the torture Dad had inflicted upon me.
When Kenzie is old enough to drive, though, it might be a different story.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Me and My Big Fat Mouth
Me and my big fat mouth.
I just had to go and blog about how many days I would be missing. Then the week from hell arrives.
Monday brings a hellacious storm. School canceled.
Tuesday brings supposed jury duty. But the stipulation is one must call after FIVE the day before the scheduled jury duty to see if you need to show up or if there has been a settlement (never mind you already have to take time off for it by then). Well, I call the number and the lady on the message informs me that the trial has been postponed to Wednesday due to the weather. Wonderful. It is now 5:30 and I already have a sub coming in on Tuesday and now I need one for Wednesday as well.
Wednesday. Gone for jury duty.
Thursday. I plan to actually work this day.
Friday. Gone for RTi training. Plus, Kenzie has her second round of immunization shots.
But the most aggravating thing is that our school email system blows. At least trying to access it from home blows. I spent, and I’m not kidding here, an hour trying to email a colleague my sub notes and lesson plans so he can give them to his wife, who is subbing for me. But it takes forever to load. Then when I get everything attached and typed it, the damn thing refuses to send.
Then I have to open my fat mouth about how wonderful technology is. And I can’t send an email with attachments when I need to.
I just had to go and blog about how many days I would be missing. Then the week from hell arrives.
Monday brings a hellacious storm. School canceled.
Tuesday brings supposed jury duty. But the stipulation is one must call after FIVE the day before the scheduled jury duty to see if you need to show up or if there has been a settlement (never mind you already have to take time off for it by then). Well, I call the number and the lady on the message informs me that the trial has been postponed to Wednesday due to the weather. Wonderful. It is now 5:30 and I already have a sub coming in on Tuesday and now I need one for Wednesday as well.
Wednesday. Gone for jury duty.
Thursday. I plan to actually work this day.
Friday. Gone for RTi training. Plus, Kenzie has her second round of immunization shots.
But the most aggravating thing is that our school email system blows. At least trying to access it from home blows. I spent, and I’m not kidding here, an hour trying to email a colleague my sub notes and lesson plans so he can give them to his wife, who is subbing for me. But it takes forever to load. Then when I get everything attached and typed it, the damn thing refuses to send.
Then I have to open my fat mouth about how wonderful technology is. And I can’t send an email with attachments when I need to.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Firsts
First, Kenzie discovers her feet.
First, she abandons her index finger in favor of her thumb.
This week has been full of firsts.
First, Kenzie tries cereal.
First, Kenzie tries formula. But she does not like it one bit.
I can't believe how big she is getting. I included some pictures for comparison.
First, she abandons her index finger in favor of her thumb.
This week has been full of firsts.
First, Kenzie tries cereal.
First, Kenzie tries formula. But she does not like it one bit.
I can't believe how big she is getting. I included some pictures for comparison.
Monday, February 09, 2009
The Wagon Debacle
“Let’s build a fort.”
Now there are few more important words to a child than those four. So when my neighbor and best buddy Lance mentioned them, I agreed wholeheartedly.
This led to an exhaustive search of our neighborhood.
Over the 30 years since then, I’ve often wondered what our neighbors must have thought of us rapscallions trudging, crawling, scampering, and snooping around their yards, homes, and basically anywhere that looked interesting.
We thought of our entire neighborhood as an extension of our parents’ property.
I recall constantly stopping by Mr. Curry’s garage, which stood on the west end of our neighborhood. It was situated right at the beginning of the alley that ran behind my house. So it just seemed logical to me to swing in and see what he was up to from time to time.
He always wore green overalls, a soiled railroaders capped knocked crooked and back on his head. He was nice and visited with me. His wife was even nicer, for she often invited me in for cookies, though she did once call the cops on me when I was hanging around some older friends who decided to raid her garden and chuck tomatoes at each other.
What amazed me most about his garage, though, was that he employed a technique that was both fascinating and frustrating. On one full wall of the garage, he had pegboard hanging with all of his tools neatly organized on it. I remember eyeing up his hammer and pliers, just thinking about how I could use a pair just like those. But what made it nearly impossible to borrow (i.e. steal) them was that he had ingeniously traced their outlines on the pegboard, so if you were to snatch one, he would easily spot that it was missing.
On the opposite end out the alley stood Mr. Simonoski’s garage. This one fascinated us for completely different reasons. He had a nudie girl calendar hanging up in there. We would sneak around the edge and wait for him to shuffle off into his house before craning our necks around to see what Miss July was not wearing. Unlike Mr. Curry, Mr. Simonoski had no time for us. As soon as we heard his door open, we beat it out of there and safely over to Lance’s garage, usually under a barrage of scolding from the old man.
Those two garages were the boundaries for our neighborhood, but everything else in between was fair game.
We scaled any trees we wished. Lance and I would crawl under steps and porches. In the evenings when we played kicked the can, we used every house, doghouse, and picnic table for cover.
So when Lance came up with the brilliant idea – and this was big for Lance because brilliant ideas were usually my department – of building a forte, we had to make sure that we could find the perfect spot.
After a few weeks of investigation, we determined the best spot to simply be the lilac bushes between my house and the Miller’s.
They were located right next to our small driveway. From our vantage point, we could see Third Street, which ran in front of our house. But we could also get a view of the alley. We also had a good view of the entrance to the hill leading down to the football field, hockey rink, river, and park that was just across Third Street.
They were dense enough to offer us complete anonymity. However, they were close enough to allow us to spy on the neighborhood going ons. From the lilacs we could keep tabs on Robbie’s family (they lived a block to the south of us) and on Brendan’s family (they lived to the north of us, just across third street).
An added bonus of the lilacs was that the Miller’s house was literally about four feet from us. There was the narrowest of walks ways behind the bushes. That way we could avoid any ambush attempts from our mortal enemy, Jbird Sullivan, who lived a couple blocks away.
The only trouble with our plan was that about a thousand honeybees already occupied the lilacs. Let me tell you now, if there was one thing Lance and I were terrified of, it was honeybees. Mosquitoes we could swat and wood ticks we could pluck, but bees were our worst enemies (again, outside of Jbird).
Lance recalled how we had vanquished a ‘barn’ spider that had nested by their fuel oil pipe on the side of their house (we put on all of our army gear – my dad had picked up a bunch of stuff for us at an army outlet store). Once we had our helmets, belts, boots, and canteens (what we would use those for, I have no idea) ready, we next raided the contents of our mother’s cleaning supplies beneath their sinks.
With our arms full of Clorox, Windex, Pledge, and Ajax, we did battle. That poor spider didn’t stand a damn chance. I’m surprised we didn’t poison ourselves in the process or blow ourselves up by mixing all of those things together. Today, homeland security would have been notified and we’d have found ourselves being water boarded.
However, our moms were on to us and we couldn’t get any cleaning supplies. So we simply used the ammunition we found in our driveway: sand and rocks.
It was a battle of attrition as Lance and I hurled handfuls of sand at the bushes and then ran like hell whenever a squadron of bees took flight. However, after several systematic campaigns we were able to rid the bushes of the bees. Now that I think about it, the bees probably had just finished pollinating all of the blossoms on the lilacs and naturally moved on to the next target. I wonder what the Millers must have thought as we shelled the east side of their house with enough sand to fill a sandbox.
Once it was safe, Lance and I settled in to a little opening in the left side of the bushes.
Now, here is where our plan kind of began falling apart.
We figured that since we were pretty much out of the house and on our own, we would need some essentials. Lance was able to acquire a large cushion from the old couch his mom stored in their garage while I acquired some Oreos. With shelter and food taken care of, we turned our attention to the next objective: a source of heat.
We figured that since we’d moved in, we might want to prepare for winter. Lance came up with the idea to build a fireplace. We both peered at the middle of the bushes and imagined a large red brick fireplace and chimney soaring out of the bushes with some delight.
It didn’t seem to enter our minds that not only was this absolutely freaking impossible but it would also spoil the covert location of our fort.
But we didn’t really think of that, like the time we thought we could connect our houses with tunnels. We should have known our plan was doomed from the get go, I mean we were the geniuses who devised a game where Lance would ride on the back pegs of my bike. Since it was spring, Lance would pull my stocking cap over my eyes while I steered. He then would give me directions. What I didn’t know was that Lance was not too sharp on his lefts and rights just yet. Needless to say, I was quite shocked when we collided with a parked car and Lance when flying over me onto the hood of the car.
While we debated how to go about building our fireplace, we noticed one day on our scavenger hunts around the surrounding neighborhoods (we had exhausted our own for raw materials) that a neighbor three blocks down the alley was adding on to his house.
And what did he have a surplus of? Bricks!
It was the best news of the summer.
The only problem was how to acquire them. Lance wanted to use my Coast-to-Coast wagon.
Now I’ll say here that this was one of my most prized possessions. I was the only kid in the neighborhood to have one. And boy did I lord that over them all. And here Lance wanted me to scratch it all up with bricks!
No way.
I kept that wagon in mint condition. I polished it and even had Dad make some large side panels for it out of plywood so I could have my own ‘topper’ for it like some pick ups had.
I hardly let anyone even sit in it. In fact, I recall tying it up to the back of my bike and tearing around the neighborhood and refusing rides to anyone else, even if they didn’t have bikes. They could just run along with me if they wanted. But they weren’t getting in my wagon.
The worst part was those red plastic covers on the wheels that snapped on over the bolts that held the axles to the wheels. They were always popping off, and I had to spend hours scouring the neighborhood to find them. I was not going to have a hubcap missing from my wagon and pull it around like some white trash wagon. That was for sure.
However, after a week or two of begging, Lance finally wore me down. I relented and agreed to use my wagon to load up the bricks.
After carefully laying half a dozen of my mother’s dishtowels in the back of the wagon to prevent any possible scratches, Lance and I headed out.
We had to wait a bit until the man quite mowing his lawn and went into his house. Once he did, we quickly pulled the wagon out of the bushes and began loading the bricks.
Now here is where my memory is distorted by my 8-year-old imagination. Here are the details I recall for sure.
We were loading the bricks. We heard the man’s screen door slam. Lance said, “Run!”
Those are the details I recall. But my imagination blew things out of proportion. I seem to remember having a quarter ton of bricks in my poor wagon. I recall hearing the man yell at us that he was calling the cops and hearing Lance yell, “Let’s get the hell out of here!” Since neither of us had yet been fascinated with cussing, I knew that this was serious.
I recall imagining the man taking my wagon and impounding it at the police station. I had images of Boss Hog always threatening the Duke boys with doing the same thing with their General Lee.
Once we tore down the alley, my memory sharpens once again.
I recall grabbing the handle of my wagon and pulling with all my might. Lance leaned down and began pushing on the back of the wagon.
I must have had a major shot of adrenaline for the wagon seemed weightless. I chalked it up to that same theory that Dr. Banner proposed during the pilot episode of “The Hulk” where he talked about people under great stress were capable of amazing feats of strength, such as a mother lifting her car off a pinned child and so forth.
I recall breezing by several homes and across Chicago Ave without even looking. Then I hit our block. I recall flying down that alley. I saw that Mr. Curry’s garage door was open. I briefly thought of pulling in there, but what if he ratted us out? What if he noticed that in the upper right corner of his pegboard that there was an outline for a monkey wrench, which was stashed under a pile leaves in the lilacs.
I recall Lance shouting, “Run . . . Run . . . Oh my God! He’s catching up . . . Run, Kurt, Run!”
I recall tears forming.
I recall breezing past the Millers house.
I recall Lance shouting “Hurry up! He’s right behind us! Pull!”
I recall running right past our homes.
I recall breaking into sobs thinking of my wagon being confiscated.
Then I couldn’t help but face a major decision. We were coming to the end of the alley. There was just an empty lot beyond the street we were quickly coming to.
I knew I couldn’t abandon my wagon. I knew we couldn’t dash into Mr. Simonoski’s garage. That was worse than getting my wagon confiscated.
Lance seemed to believe we could just jump that damn street and keep on going right through the empty lot . . . “Run . . . Run . . . Oh my God! He’s catching up . . . Run, Kurt, Run!”
Then I recall giving in to my burning lungs. I ground to a halt and peeked back at Lance, finding if funny that he still wasn’t pushing hard even though he still as shouting how we were going to get caught and that the man was right on our heels.
While my imagination had blown many of these details way out of proportion. I am sure this image is one hundred percent accurate for it is etched in my mind forever.
There was no man chasing us. In fact, there never had been. The alley was completely empty. However, Lance was perched on the back of my wagon. His short legs dangled over the end. His feet touching the gravel and having carved two long marks down the alley. The marks traveled all the way back to the man’s house. Lance was still encouraging me to “Run . . . Run . . . Oh my God! He’s catching up . . . Run, Kurt, Run!”
Again, he was not the sharpest kid. But he was sharp enough to enjoy a three-block ride in the back of my wagon like it was some damn rickshaw!
He was lucky too that I was so winded. Because that little shit shot out of the back of my wagon and ran right past Mr. Simonoski’s garage and into the safety of his house while I almost fell over after taking a half dozen steps in hot pursuit.
He didn’t show his scrawny hide outside of his house for two days too. He knew better. All the while I sat in our damn fort plotting my revenge.
But without anyone to talk to or play with, the fort just didn’t seem to have the appeal it once did. Besides, the measly four bricks were managed to steal weren’t much good for anything. So I sat on his rotten cushion from his garage, ate my Oreos and plotted my revenge.
Now there are few more important words to a child than those four. So when my neighbor and best buddy Lance mentioned them, I agreed wholeheartedly.
This led to an exhaustive search of our neighborhood.
Over the 30 years since then, I’ve often wondered what our neighbors must have thought of us rapscallions trudging, crawling, scampering, and snooping around their yards, homes, and basically anywhere that looked interesting.
We thought of our entire neighborhood as an extension of our parents’ property.
I recall constantly stopping by Mr. Curry’s garage, which stood on the west end of our neighborhood. It was situated right at the beginning of the alley that ran behind my house. So it just seemed logical to me to swing in and see what he was up to from time to time.
He always wore green overalls, a soiled railroaders capped knocked crooked and back on his head. He was nice and visited with me. His wife was even nicer, for she often invited me in for cookies, though she did once call the cops on me when I was hanging around some older friends who decided to raid her garden and chuck tomatoes at each other.
What amazed me most about his garage, though, was that he employed a technique that was both fascinating and frustrating. On one full wall of the garage, he had pegboard hanging with all of his tools neatly organized on it. I remember eyeing up his hammer and pliers, just thinking about how I could use a pair just like those. But what made it nearly impossible to borrow (i.e. steal) them was that he had ingeniously traced their outlines on the pegboard, so if you were to snatch one, he would easily spot that it was missing.
On the opposite end out the alley stood Mr. Simonoski’s garage. This one fascinated us for completely different reasons. He had a nudie girl calendar hanging up in there. We would sneak around the edge and wait for him to shuffle off into his house before craning our necks around to see what Miss July was not wearing. Unlike Mr. Curry, Mr. Simonoski had no time for us. As soon as we heard his door open, we beat it out of there and safely over to Lance’s garage, usually under a barrage of scolding from the old man.
Those two garages were the boundaries for our neighborhood, but everything else in between was fair game.
We scaled any trees we wished. Lance and I would crawl under steps and porches. In the evenings when we played kicked the can, we used every house, doghouse, and picnic table for cover.
So when Lance came up with the brilliant idea – and this was big for Lance because brilliant ideas were usually my department – of building a forte, we had to make sure that we could find the perfect spot.
After a few weeks of investigation, we determined the best spot to simply be the lilac bushes between my house and the Miller’s.
They were located right next to our small driveway. From our vantage point, we could see Third Street, which ran in front of our house. But we could also get a view of the alley. We also had a good view of the entrance to the hill leading down to the football field, hockey rink, river, and park that was just across Third Street.
They were dense enough to offer us complete anonymity. However, they were close enough to allow us to spy on the neighborhood going ons. From the lilacs we could keep tabs on Robbie’s family (they lived a block to the south of us) and on Brendan’s family (they lived to the north of us, just across third street).
An added bonus of the lilacs was that the Miller’s house was literally about four feet from us. There was the narrowest of walks ways behind the bushes. That way we could avoid any ambush attempts from our mortal enemy, Jbird Sullivan, who lived a couple blocks away.
The only trouble with our plan was that about a thousand honeybees already occupied the lilacs. Let me tell you now, if there was one thing Lance and I were terrified of, it was honeybees. Mosquitoes we could swat and wood ticks we could pluck, but bees were our worst enemies (again, outside of Jbird).
Lance recalled how we had vanquished a ‘barn’ spider that had nested by their fuel oil pipe on the side of their house (we put on all of our army gear – my dad had picked up a bunch of stuff for us at an army outlet store). Once we had our helmets, belts, boots, and canteens (what we would use those for, I have no idea) ready, we next raided the contents of our mother’s cleaning supplies beneath their sinks.
With our arms full of Clorox, Windex, Pledge, and Ajax, we did battle. That poor spider didn’t stand a damn chance. I’m surprised we didn’t poison ourselves in the process or blow ourselves up by mixing all of those things together. Today, homeland security would have been notified and we’d have found ourselves being water boarded.
However, our moms were on to us and we couldn’t get any cleaning supplies. So we simply used the ammunition we found in our driveway: sand and rocks.
It was a battle of attrition as Lance and I hurled handfuls of sand at the bushes and then ran like hell whenever a squadron of bees took flight. However, after several systematic campaigns we were able to rid the bushes of the bees. Now that I think about it, the bees probably had just finished pollinating all of the blossoms on the lilacs and naturally moved on to the next target. I wonder what the Millers must have thought as we shelled the east side of their house with enough sand to fill a sandbox.
Once it was safe, Lance and I settled in to a little opening in the left side of the bushes.
Now, here is where our plan kind of began falling apart.
We figured that since we were pretty much out of the house and on our own, we would need some essentials. Lance was able to acquire a large cushion from the old couch his mom stored in their garage while I acquired some Oreos. With shelter and food taken care of, we turned our attention to the next objective: a source of heat.
We figured that since we’d moved in, we might want to prepare for winter. Lance came up with the idea to build a fireplace. We both peered at the middle of the bushes and imagined a large red brick fireplace and chimney soaring out of the bushes with some delight.
It didn’t seem to enter our minds that not only was this absolutely freaking impossible but it would also spoil the covert location of our fort.
But we didn’t really think of that, like the time we thought we could connect our houses with tunnels. We should have known our plan was doomed from the get go, I mean we were the geniuses who devised a game where Lance would ride on the back pegs of my bike. Since it was spring, Lance would pull my stocking cap over my eyes while I steered. He then would give me directions. What I didn’t know was that Lance was not too sharp on his lefts and rights just yet. Needless to say, I was quite shocked when we collided with a parked car and Lance when flying over me onto the hood of the car.
While we debated how to go about building our fireplace, we noticed one day on our scavenger hunts around the surrounding neighborhoods (we had exhausted our own for raw materials) that a neighbor three blocks down the alley was adding on to his house.
And what did he have a surplus of? Bricks!
It was the best news of the summer.
The only problem was how to acquire them. Lance wanted to use my Coast-to-Coast wagon.
Now I’ll say here that this was one of my most prized possessions. I was the only kid in the neighborhood to have one. And boy did I lord that over them all. And here Lance wanted me to scratch it all up with bricks!
No way.
I kept that wagon in mint condition. I polished it and even had Dad make some large side panels for it out of plywood so I could have my own ‘topper’ for it like some pick ups had.
I hardly let anyone even sit in it. In fact, I recall tying it up to the back of my bike and tearing around the neighborhood and refusing rides to anyone else, even if they didn’t have bikes. They could just run along with me if they wanted. But they weren’t getting in my wagon.
The worst part was those red plastic covers on the wheels that snapped on over the bolts that held the axles to the wheels. They were always popping off, and I had to spend hours scouring the neighborhood to find them. I was not going to have a hubcap missing from my wagon and pull it around like some white trash wagon. That was for sure.
However, after a week or two of begging, Lance finally wore me down. I relented and agreed to use my wagon to load up the bricks.
After carefully laying half a dozen of my mother’s dishtowels in the back of the wagon to prevent any possible scratches, Lance and I headed out.
We had to wait a bit until the man quite mowing his lawn and went into his house. Once he did, we quickly pulled the wagon out of the bushes and began loading the bricks.
Now here is where my memory is distorted by my 8-year-old imagination. Here are the details I recall for sure.
We were loading the bricks. We heard the man’s screen door slam. Lance said, “Run!”
Those are the details I recall. But my imagination blew things out of proportion. I seem to remember having a quarter ton of bricks in my poor wagon. I recall hearing the man yell at us that he was calling the cops and hearing Lance yell, “Let’s get the hell out of here!” Since neither of us had yet been fascinated with cussing, I knew that this was serious.
I recall imagining the man taking my wagon and impounding it at the police station. I had images of Boss Hog always threatening the Duke boys with doing the same thing with their General Lee.
Once we tore down the alley, my memory sharpens once again.
I recall grabbing the handle of my wagon and pulling with all my might. Lance leaned down and began pushing on the back of the wagon.
I must have had a major shot of adrenaline for the wagon seemed weightless. I chalked it up to that same theory that Dr. Banner proposed during the pilot episode of “The Hulk” where he talked about people under great stress were capable of amazing feats of strength, such as a mother lifting her car off a pinned child and so forth.
I recall breezing by several homes and across Chicago Ave without even looking. Then I hit our block. I recall flying down that alley. I saw that Mr. Curry’s garage door was open. I briefly thought of pulling in there, but what if he ratted us out? What if he noticed that in the upper right corner of his pegboard that there was an outline for a monkey wrench, which was stashed under a pile leaves in the lilacs.
I recall Lance shouting, “Run . . . Run . . . Oh my God! He’s catching up . . . Run, Kurt, Run!”
I recall tears forming.
I recall breezing past the Millers house.
I recall Lance shouting “Hurry up! He’s right behind us! Pull!”
I recall running right past our homes.
I recall breaking into sobs thinking of my wagon being confiscated.
Then I couldn’t help but face a major decision. We were coming to the end of the alley. There was just an empty lot beyond the street we were quickly coming to.
I knew I couldn’t abandon my wagon. I knew we couldn’t dash into Mr. Simonoski’s garage. That was worse than getting my wagon confiscated.
Lance seemed to believe we could just jump that damn street and keep on going right through the empty lot . . . “Run . . . Run . . . Oh my God! He’s catching up . . . Run, Kurt, Run!”
Then I recall giving in to my burning lungs. I ground to a halt and peeked back at Lance, finding if funny that he still wasn’t pushing hard even though he still as shouting how we were going to get caught and that the man was right on our heels.
While my imagination had blown many of these details way out of proportion. I am sure this image is one hundred percent accurate for it is etched in my mind forever.
There was no man chasing us. In fact, there never had been. The alley was completely empty. However, Lance was perched on the back of my wagon. His short legs dangled over the end. His feet touching the gravel and having carved two long marks down the alley. The marks traveled all the way back to the man’s house. Lance was still encouraging me to “Run . . . Run . . . Oh my God! He’s catching up . . . Run, Kurt, Run!”
Again, he was not the sharpest kid. But he was sharp enough to enjoy a three-block ride in the back of my wagon like it was some damn rickshaw!
He was lucky too that I was so winded. Because that little shit shot out of the back of my wagon and ran right past Mr. Simonoski’s garage and into the safety of his house while I almost fell over after taking a half dozen steps in hot pursuit.
He didn’t show his scrawny hide outside of his house for two days too. He knew better. All the while I sat in our damn fort plotting my revenge.
But without anyone to talk to or play with, the fort just didn’t seem to have the appeal it once did. Besides, the measly four bricks were managed to steal weren’t much good for anything. So I sat on his rotten cushion from his garage, ate my Oreos and plotted my revenge.
Sunday, February 08, 2009
Kenzie is now eating food. Well, rice cereal mixed with milk. But she gobbled it up for the first time today.
We thought she was ready for food prior to our last doctor's visit, but Dr. Connolly thought we should wait until Kenzie had greater neck control.
But over the past few weeks, she began to look at you enviously if you happened to be eating.
Finally, Kristie broke down and bought her some real food.
As I said, she gobbled it up today.
Kristie, having done this already with two kids, was quite impressed. Kenzie opened her mouth and ate quite well.
It's amazing how such small things have now become life changing. As I said when my parents passed: nothing is ever trivial.
Here she is after her second feast.
We thought she was ready for food prior to our last doctor's visit, but Dr. Connolly thought we should wait until Kenzie had greater neck control.
But over the past few weeks, she began to look at you enviously if you happened to be eating.
Finally, Kristie broke down and bought her some real food.
As I said, she gobbled it up today.
Kristie, having done this already with two kids, was quite impressed. Kenzie opened her mouth and ate quite well.
It's amazing how such small things have now become life changing. As I said when my parents passed: nothing is ever trivial.
Here she is after her second feast.
KoKo's Tournament
Spent Saturday up in Warroad at KoKo's 8th grade basketball tournament.
After a looooong ride north, we made it to the school just in time to see the girls square off against Greenbush. They beat them twice, once in double overtime there and once soundly in RLF. However, they came up just short in their first game, losing 22-23.
Of course, it is easy to blame the officials, after all you never really know what kind of reffing you're going to get at these tournaments. When Kristie used to coach 5th and 6th grade basketball, tournaments like these were the worst. The organizers often had to resort to using high school students as officials. The only problem with this is that they are either afraid to call fouls or more interested in trying to shoot three pointers or dunk during time outs and half time. One parent oberved, "If we get good officiating, we can't be beat."
I don't know about that. The officiating was not the greatest, but it's not like they favored one team. They at least called some fouls, which sometimes is all you get.
There was a good wait until RLF squared off against Warroad in their second game. This tournament had a much better format that the CYBA (Crookston Youth Basketball Association) tournament. That is a farce. I recall the format usually looking like this Crookston's A team facing off against two significantly smaller schools for the first bracket. Then they'd take other schools (RLF or TRF) and stack them against the Fargo or GF schools in the opposite bracket. That way Crookston is almost assured of a place in the championship. If they earn that. Fine. But at least evenly stack the format.
Anyway, this tournament was pretty well stacked. RLF trailed by ten at halftime against Warroad, who put the press on the Eagles, and they struggled mightily. However, Warroad (for some unknown reason) took off the press, and RLF was able to run and gun and pulled out a two point win. However, RLF was up by four points with just a few seconds left before they gave up a cheap basket to Warroad. This would prove costly because overall points scored would factor into deciding the tournament champion.
RLF faced an unfamiliar team in Big Fork for their final game. This was a bloody battle with an utterly classless team. I never appreciated the teams we play on a regular basis (the Greenbush girls attended the RLF games and cheered us on while they also talked outside in the hall and wished each other good luck).
It didn't help that the officiating was terrible. The officials didn't call a traveling foul until the second half. They made the officials from the first game look like NBA caliber. The point of officiating is to benefit each team, not hurt them. I mean what good is to practice some of the finer skills when poor officiating renders those skills obsolete when they never call anything. When officiating is this horrible, it just hurts both teams. Of course, I am biased, but RLF was clearly the better team. Big Fork could hardly get the ball up court without double dribbling, traveling, or carrying the ball - and sometimes all in one possession.
Worse yet, they swung their elbows like they were in a back alley and threw their shoulders like they were playing for the football team. At one point, one of our players took an elbow to the face as the opponent was surrounded (but because she was never taught how to dribble out or pass) and because the refs never called traveling, she was allowed to swing her elbows for several seconds. Of course, by this time our player's mouth took a shot and she tumbled to the floor, battered and bloody. The girl was finally given a technical foul and benched by the official (Big Fork's coach never said a word to her) nor did the girl show the slightest inkling of remorse.
We joked that we should have waited to schedule KoKo a dentist appointment where she had to have seven baby teeth pulled (right around $114 a tooth) when playing this team could have done the job for us!
Finally, the RLF coach put on a full court press and broke the game wide open, allowing RLF to win by nearly 20.
KoKo's team eventually finished third. Warroad took first, though we beat them, because they scored more points in their wins.
Even though lost out on the championship because of their one point loss to Greenbush, the girls were upbeat and happy.
Monday the have a tough challenge, traveling to TRF. Last year they split with TRF, but this year TRF has handled them twice. We'll see if RLF can pull out a win this time.
After a looooong ride north, we made it to the school just in time to see the girls square off against Greenbush. They beat them twice, once in double overtime there and once soundly in RLF. However, they came up just short in their first game, losing 22-23.
Of course, it is easy to blame the officials, after all you never really know what kind of reffing you're going to get at these tournaments. When Kristie used to coach 5th and 6th grade basketball, tournaments like these were the worst. The organizers often had to resort to using high school students as officials. The only problem with this is that they are either afraid to call fouls or more interested in trying to shoot three pointers or dunk during time outs and half time. One parent oberved, "If we get good officiating, we can't be beat."
I don't know about that. The officiating was not the greatest, but it's not like they favored one team. They at least called some fouls, which sometimes is all you get.
There was a good wait until RLF squared off against Warroad in their second game. This tournament had a much better format that the CYBA (Crookston Youth Basketball Association) tournament. That is a farce. I recall the format usually looking like this Crookston's A team facing off against two significantly smaller schools for the first bracket. Then they'd take other schools (RLF or TRF) and stack them against the Fargo or GF schools in the opposite bracket. That way Crookston is almost assured of a place in the championship. If they earn that. Fine. But at least evenly stack the format.
Anyway, this tournament was pretty well stacked. RLF trailed by ten at halftime against Warroad, who put the press on the Eagles, and they struggled mightily. However, Warroad (for some unknown reason) took off the press, and RLF was able to run and gun and pulled out a two point win. However, RLF was up by four points with just a few seconds left before they gave up a cheap basket to Warroad. This would prove costly because overall points scored would factor into deciding the tournament champion.
RLF faced an unfamiliar team in Big Fork for their final game. This was a bloody battle with an utterly classless team. I never appreciated the teams we play on a regular basis (the Greenbush girls attended the RLF games and cheered us on while they also talked outside in the hall and wished each other good luck).
It didn't help that the officiating was terrible. The officials didn't call a traveling foul until the second half. They made the officials from the first game look like NBA caliber. The point of officiating is to benefit each team, not hurt them. I mean what good is to practice some of the finer skills when poor officiating renders those skills obsolete when they never call anything. When officiating is this horrible, it just hurts both teams. Of course, I am biased, but RLF was clearly the better team. Big Fork could hardly get the ball up court without double dribbling, traveling, or carrying the ball - and sometimes all in one possession.
Worse yet, they swung their elbows like they were in a back alley and threw their shoulders like they were playing for the football team. At one point, one of our players took an elbow to the face as the opponent was surrounded (but because she was never taught how to dribble out or pass) and because the refs never called traveling, she was allowed to swing her elbows for several seconds. Of course, by this time our player's mouth took a shot and she tumbled to the floor, battered and bloody. The girl was finally given a technical foul and benched by the official (Big Fork's coach never said a word to her) nor did the girl show the slightest inkling of remorse.
We joked that we should have waited to schedule KoKo a dentist appointment where she had to have seven baby teeth pulled (right around $114 a tooth) when playing this team could have done the job for us!
Finally, the RLF coach put on a full court press and broke the game wide open, allowing RLF to win by nearly 20.
KoKo's team eventually finished third. Warroad took first, though we beat them, because they scored more points in their wins.
Even though lost out on the championship because of their one point loss to Greenbush, the girls were upbeat and happy.
Monday the have a tough challenge, traveling to TRF. Last year they split with TRF, but this year TRF has handled them twice. We'll see if RLF can pull out a win this time.
Saturday, February 07, 2009
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If you have followed this blog at all over the past three years, you know I have been critical of our school. I don’t do this just to rant, though. I truly care about this place and the kids here. That is one reason I get so down on this place sometimes. I care and I want this place to be what it can be. I hate to see all of us settle for what it is at times.
I had the pleasure of serving on a committee to interview superintendent candidates with two of my students. At one point, one candidate asked the students to tell her about their experiences at Lincoln.
They talked about how proud they were to be part of the school and its traditions. Both students had siblings who attended her and did great things. They commended the community for the support they felt as students of Lincoln.
It made me proud to work here.
I don’t think we hear enough from the students.
Now I know you could talk to several other students and get just the opposite reaction, but these kids really made me proud to be their teacher.
While I was thinking about this and the type of kids we have hear, I noticed that some students had set up a fundraiser for one of their classmates who has been diagnosed with leukemia. The students were selling T-shirts to support their friend. One hundred percent of the profits went to the student and her family. I overheard them say that they had already sold close to 200 T-shirts.
I think that too speaks volumes of the kids we have here.
****
One of the superintendent candidates said something that really intrigued me at her interview: “We have to catch up to the kids.”
I like that idea.
Too often we think of students having to catch up to us in terms of curriculum and core knowledge. That might be true. But I think in terms of technology, real world skills, multi tasking, and being entertained, we absolutely have to catch up to the kids.
Now, I know several people will shake their heads at having to entertain kids in school. I am probably one of those. But those are the kids we have created. If you can’t entertain them and keep them laughing or intrigued, you have lost them.
I am reminded of a quote Alfie Kohn used in a past article, “The best way to get information from the teacher to the students’ tablets without touching their brains is to lecture.”
We can’t just teach the way we were taught in high school or even in many of our college classes. Professors don’t have to worry about AYP or test scores, so they can force the students to suffer through their classes.
We don’t have that luxury.
I think of my new College Comp II class. You want to talk about a Who’s Who among gifted students.
I find myself working twice as hard just to keep up with them. This means reading more articles than I ever have before to hit them where they live – technology and entertainment.
I wish you could just sit in on a class. When I turned them loose the other day, I overheard some kids contemplating physics and math formulas. I’m not making that up. Another day, we had an informal discussion on science fiction literature.
What a group.
*****
I found an MIT lecture series featuring Thomas Friedman on my ipod. Friedman is discussing his novel The World is Flat. I then shared his ideas with the students. I can’t imagine the world they will work in. It doesn’t even exist yet. But it’s coming.
That is the key message of Friedman’s book. I like what he used to tell his daughters: “I used to tell them at dinner to finish their vegetables because people in Asia were starving; now I tell them to finish their homework because people in Asia and India are starving for their jobs.”
I think that threat is all too real.
He focuses on ten things that helped flatten our world. Here is a quick synopsis of the top four and how they affected the world and my little place in it.
1. 11/9/89 – the fall of the Berlin Wall came down and the liberation of the old Soviet Empire to capitalism. He also notes that it is no coincidence that five months later Microsoft’s Windows shipped. The wall came down and the windows went up. Not only was capitalism spreading but now there was an operating system like never before.
2. 8/9/95 – maybe the biggest flattener of all, the date Netscape went public. I can still remember the first time I ever went online right around 1996 or so. I had an education class focused on inculcating technology into the classroom. Our professor took us down to the computer lab, which I had only ever used for word processing, and had us get on the internet and search until our heart’s content. Life has never been the same. Think about it, whether it’s email or just surfing the net, how many days have you NOT been online? Here was the beginning of a web browser that fundamentally changed people’s lives. It was not long before I discovered Amazon and began to find all of my favorite books just a click away. I found homepages that were devoted to my favorite teams and subjects. All routinely updated and freely accessible whenever I wanted. No more hurrying home from work to catch NFL Live or sitting through Sportscenter hoping to catch John Clayton’s “Inside the Huddle.” Now, it was all on espn’s home page. For free. Even today, a little over 13 years later Netscape is old news, but google has wormed its way into our every day vernacular. “Google
3. Work Flow Software – This was powered by the PC movement and Windows. This allowed everyone in an office to run a program that allowed them to all work together and share information instantly. Imagine going from handwritten files or using type writers that were painstakingly slow (well, painstakingly slow compared to computers and email). Once Microsoft began overhauling the computer programming services of entire offices and companies, suddenly workers could share data and content effortlessly, as long as they all ran the same programs. Now this did not happen over night, but once it caught on, it fundamentally changed how businesses operated and how information was shared. Instead of typing up a document in book keeping and taking it up to accounting or personnel, the document could be typed in Word and sent via email instantly to accounting and personnel. It sounds like a small change, but having typed several of my early college papers – and spending hours doing it – being able to manage data on a computer and saving it to a disk (albeit a large floppy disk) and being able to take it to another computer in another building or city and being able to open it back up and work on it just as easily was a total revelation for me.
4. Standards on top of standards – once such standards as HTML or HTTP or PayPal or JPEG were set up, the information really began to flow. Companies stopped competing over various systems and started focusing on improving interchangeable content. Look at what PayPal can do. Anyone with a PayPal account and an email address can send money to anyone else with a PayPal account. Just look what PayPal did for ebay. Amazon has not caught up with that yet. Whenever I bought something from Amazon in the past, I had to use a credit card (itunes still functions this way – they must get some form of kick back from the credit cards for this), now they do allow me to use my checking account. However, buying something – or selling something – on ebay is easy because to do so you can use PayPal (like an online banking system). It’s heavily protected and it allows me to choose how I would like to pay for something I bought on line (mostly from ebay but there are other online stores that use PayPal). From my PayPal account I can pay for an item using a credit card or my bank account. And the service is free. Just imagine how simple things will be when itunes, amazon, and any other online store adopts PayPal as its payment process.
Thanks to the JPEG standard, we can send digital pictures or post them to any and all relatives for free. I remember when Mom and Dad had an instant Polaroid camera – you know the kind that spit the picture out and you had to shake it while it developed. I thought that was damn near magic when I was a kid.
Well, those days are forever gone. Now every single cell phone has the ability to take a picture and develop it instantly. Every single cell phone stores that picture as a JPEG or TIFF or whatever digital format is in fashion. Years ago you had to either wait for relatives to visit in order to show off your Polaroids (or else send them via the US Postal service, which could take quite a bit of time). Now, though, I can take a picture of Kenzie on my camera and email it to anyone (or send the picture right to their phones). I can download the picture in seconds and have it posted on my blog in a few more seconds for any distant relatives to instantly see.
Even now, Kristie took a great picture of Kenzie during her lunch break. She sent it to my phone, but it’s dead. So I had her email me the picture. I saved it to my desktop. This allows me to send it instantly to all relatives with an email account. Or I could post it on my blog for anyone to see. All in the matter of no more than a minute. Just imagine what businesses can do with this type of efficiency. That’s how we get McDonald’s that take a picture of you when you’re in the drive through and then take your order which is sent instantly to someone sitting in their home on their computer taking and managing your order. Then they send it back to the MacDonald’s so the worker can then get your order, match it up with your picture to ensure accuracy. It also explains why Indian accountants did tax returns for about 400,000 Americans last year. All electronically. All because Indian accountants work for a fraction of what American accountants do.
Now, most of this efficiency has happened in the past five years. Imagine what the next five will bring. That’s the world we need to prepare our kids for.
I had the pleasure of serving on a committee to interview superintendent candidates with two of my students. At one point, one candidate asked the students to tell her about their experiences at Lincoln.
They talked about how proud they were to be part of the school and its traditions. Both students had siblings who attended her and did great things. They commended the community for the support they felt as students of Lincoln.
It made me proud to work here.
I don’t think we hear enough from the students.
Now I know you could talk to several other students and get just the opposite reaction, but these kids really made me proud to be their teacher.
While I was thinking about this and the type of kids we have hear, I noticed that some students had set up a fundraiser for one of their classmates who has been diagnosed with leukemia. The students were selling T-shirts to support their friend. One hundred percent of the profits went to the student and her family. I overheard them say that they had already sold close to 200 T-shirts.
I think that too speaks volumes of the kids we have here.
****
One of the superintendent candidates said something that really intrigued me at her interview: “We have to catch up to the kids.”
I like that idea.
Too often we think of students having to catch up to us in terms of curriculum and core knowledge. That might be true. But I think in terms of technology, real world skills, multi tasking, and being entertained, we absolutely have to catch up to the kids.
Now, I know several people will shake their heads at having to entertain kids in school. I am probably one of those. But those are the kids we have created. If you can’t entertain them and keep them laughing or intrigued, you have lost them.
I am reminded of a quote Alfie Kohn used in a past article, “The best way to get information from the teacher to the students’ tablets without touching their brains is to lecture.”
We can’t just teach the way we were taught in high school or even in many of our college classes. Professors don’t have to worry about AYP or test scores, so they can force the students to suffer through their classes.
We don’t have that luxury.
I think of my new College Comp II class. You want to talk about a Who’s Who among gifted students.
I find myself working twice as hard just to keep up with them. This means reading more articles than I ever have before to hit them where they live – technology and entertainment.
I wish you could just sit in on a class. When I turned them loose the other day, I overheard some kids contemplating physics and math formulas. I’m not making that up. Another day, we had an informal discussion on science fiction literature.
What a group.
*****
I found an MIT lecture series featuring Thomas Friedman on my ipod. Friedman is discussing his novel The World is Flat. I then shared his ideas with the students. I can’t imagine the world they will work in. It doesn’t even exist yet. But it’s coming.
That is the key message of Friedman’s book. I like what he used to tell his daughters: “I used to tell them at dinner to finish their vegetables because people in Asia were starving; now I tell them to finish their homework because people in Asia and India are starving for their jobs.”
I think that threat is all too real.
He focuses on ten things that helped flatten our world. Here is a quick synopsis of the top four and how they affected the world and my little place in it.
1. 11/9/89 – the fall of the Berlin Wall came down and the liberation of the old Soviet Empire to capitalism. He also notes that it is no coincidence that five months later Microsoft’s Windows shipped. The wall came down and the windows went up. Not only was capitalism spreading but now there was an operating system like never before.
2. 8/9/95 – maybe the biggest flattener of all, the date Netscape went public. I can still remember the first time I ever went online right around 1996 or so. I had an education class focused on inculcating technology into the classroom. Our professor took us down to the computer lab, which I had only ever used for word processing, and had us get on the internet and search until our heart’s content. Life has never been the same. Think about it, whether it’s email or just surfing the net, how many days have you NOT been online? Here was the beginning of a web browser that fundamentally changed people’s lives. It was not long before I discovered Amazon and began to find all of my favorite books just a click away. I found homepages that were devoted to my favorite teams and subjects. All routinely updated and freely accessible whenever I wanted. No more hurrying home from work to catch NFL Live or sitting through Sportscenter hoping to catch John Clayton’s “Inside the Huddle.” Now, it was all on espn’s home page. For free. Even today, a little over 13 years later Netscape is old news, but google has wormed its way into our every day vernacular. “Google
3. Work Flow Software – This was powered by the PC movement and Windows. This allowed everyone in an office to run a program that allowed them to all work together and share information instantly. Imagine going from handwritten files or using type writers that were painstakingly slow (well, painstakingly slow compared to computers and email). Once Microsoft began overhauling the computer programming services of entire offices and companies, suddenly workers could share data and content effortlessly, as long as they all ran the same programs. Now this did not happen over night, but once it caught on, it fundamentally changed how businesses operated and how information was shared. Instead of typing up a document in book keeping and taking it up to accounting or personnel, the document could be typed in Word and sent via email instantly to accounting and personnel. It sounds like a small change, but having typed several of my early college papers – and spending hours doing it – being able to manage data on a computer and saving it to a disk (albeit a large floppy disk) and being able to take it to another computer in another building or city and being able to open it back up and work on it just as easily was a total revelation for me.
4. Standards on top of standards – once such standards as HTML or HTTP or PayPal or JPEG were set up, the information really began to flow. Companies stopped competing over various systems and started focusing on improving interchangeable content. Look at what PayPal can do. Anyone with a PayPal account and an email address can send money to anyone else with a PayPal account. Just look what PayPal did for ebay. Amazon has not caught up with that yet. Whenever I bought something from Amazon in the past, I had to use a credit card (itunes still functions this way – they must get some form of kick back from the credit cards for this), now they do allow me to use my checking account. However, buying something – or selling something – on ebay is easy because to do so you can use PayPal (like an online banking system). It’s heavily protected and it allows me to choose how I would like to pay for something I bought on line (mostly from ebay but there are other online stores that use PayPal). From my PayPal account I can pay for an item using a credit card or my bank account. And the service is free. Just imagine how simple things will be when itunes, amazon, and any other online store adopts PayPal as its payment process.
Thanks to the JPEG standard, we can send digital pictures or post them to any and all relatives for free. I remember when Mom and Dad had an instant Polaroid camera – you know the kind that spit the picture out and you had to shake it while it developed. I thought that was damn near magic when I was a kid.
Well, those days are forever gone. Now every single cell phone has the ability to take a picture and develop it instantly. Every single cell phone stores that picture as a JPEG or TIFF or whatever digital format is in fashion. Years ago you had to either wait for relatives to visit in order to show off your Polaroids (or else send them via the US Postal service, which could take quite a bit of time). Now, though, I can take a picture of Kenzie on my camera and email it to anyone (or send the picture right to their phones). I can download the picture in seconds and have it posted on my blog in a few more seconds for any distant relatives to instantly see.
Even now, Kristie took a great picture of Kenzie during her lunch break. She sent it to my phone, but it’s dead. So I had her email me the picture. I saved it to my desktop. This allows me to send it instantly to all relatives with an email account. Or I could post it on my blog for anyone to see. All in the matter of no more than a minute. Just imagine what businesses can do with this type of efficiency. That’s how we get McDonald’s that take a picture of you when you’re in the drive through and then take your order which is sent instantly to someone sitting in their home on their computer taking and managing your order. Then they send it back to the MacDonald’s so the worker can then get your order, match it up with your picture to ensure accuracy. It also explains why Indian accountants did tax returns for about 400,000 Americans last year. All electronically. All because Indian accountants work for a fraction of what American accountants do.
Now, most of this efficiency has happened in the past five years. Imagine what the next five will bring. That’s the world we need to prepare our kids for.
Thursday, February 05, 2009
From Worst to Best
Here is a list - in no specific order - of my take on the best songs of all time. You saw my take on the worst, now for the best --
Now, I know there's no Led Zeppelin or Elvis or Pink Floyd or U2. I left off two excellent songs "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" and "American Pie," but they could just have easily made the list.
Here is what I came up with.
“Sympathy for the Devil” - The Rolling Stones
Lyrically, it is brilliant. I often use this in class a long with “Young Goodman Brown.” How many rock songs do you know that reference the Kennedys, Pontious Pilate, Troubadours, Anastasia, and Nazis?
“Hotel California” - The Eagles
Talk about perfect lyrics. I know there was some talk of it being about Satan worshipping and other ludicrous stuff of that nature, but that foolishness has faded. This song is always relevant. I know it was written during the ‘70’s, but how perfectly it fits the indulgent and wasteful times in which we live right now. That final line, “You can check out any time you like but you can never leave” and then the guitar solo, are unforgettable.
“King of Pain” - The Police
Again, brilliant lyrics. That piano is haunting. The repetition of the first verse is a great touch. What imagery. Now, Nickelback could never write anything close to this –
“There's a little black spot on the sun today
It's the same old thing as yesterday
There's a black hat caught in a high tree top
There's a flag-pole rag and the wind won't stop”
And that’s just the first verse.
“Suite Judy Blue Eyes” - Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young
This song seems so simple, yet it is incredibly complex. It is actually a suite of several songs gelled together. Each develops the theme of love and loss even though musically the are not quite the same.
“For What It's Worth” - Buffalo Springfield
The guitar alone gets this song on the list. This song fits the protest movement perfectly. I can’t think of a song that is better suited for its historical context, or one that conveys the mood of the times better than this one.
“Sweet Child O' Mine” - Guns N Roses
Maybe the best rock song to come out of the ‘80’s. Slash’s riff borders on ridiculous at times as the song opens, but the lyrics are beautiful and real. Though at its core it’s a cliche love song, the way G-N-R pull it off is reminiscent of how the mighty Zeppelin are able to pull off classic songs about the same type of overworked subject matter.
In the hands of far lesser bands like Poison or Motey Crue or Skid Row, this would have descended into typical crotch rock that dominated the ‘80s, but that is what makes G-N-R the best band to come out of the ‘80’s. If only Axl had not been a psycho.
“Cult of Personality” – Living Colour
Lyrically similar to “Sympathy for the Devil.” This song made me interested in history. It also has one of the strongest riffs in all of rock. When guitarist Vernon Reid unleashes it on the listener, they feel like they have been assaulted. Then the lyrics, which are quite intelligent, kick in and the listener isn’t sure what the hell is going on.
"Moondance" - Van Morrison
The lyrics are perfectly matched with the music and tempo.
That first verse gets me every time –
“Well, its a marvelous night for a moondance
With the stars up above in your eyes
A fantabulous night to make romance
‘neath the cover of October skies
And all the leaves on the trees are falling
To the sound of the breezes that blow
And I’m trying to please to the calling
Of your heart-strings that play soft and low
And all the nights magic seems to whisper and hush
And all the soft moonlight seems to shine in your blush”
Again, Nickelback or Steven Taylor could never pull that off.
Every time I listen to this, I see the leaves turn and feel the familiar nip of autumn.
“Jeremy” - Pearl Jam
I know “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana gets all the credit for ushering in the grunge movement of the early 90’s and killing the hair bands of the 80’s, but it was this song, and its incredible video, that, at least for me, marked the death of all those bands I had followed so religiously as a kid.
Here was a song so original and dark and intriguing that I didn’t know what to think. I just knew it was brilliant.
I like to use the analogy of art when talking about the music shifts from 70’s through the ‘90’s. I think of rock in ‘70’s like those paintings of dogs sitting around a bar playing cards or shooting pool. The rock in the ‘80’s was more akin to the crude artwork one might find scrawled on a bathroom wall. The grunge movement was more like abstract art. It was dark and misunderstood.
Even the lyrics that Pearl Jam included on their liner notes were vague, often just a few lines from a song or maybe just a chorus.
The video, which depicts a young kid being picked on by his peers and shunned by his parents who eventually kills himself in front of his classmates, was also abstract and vague.
It was unlike any video I had ever seen. It was the total opposite of the usual rock videos of the ‘80’s where the bands – take your pick from Motley Crue, Poison, Warrant, Whitesnake, and so on – either played live or packed the video as full of overly enhanced blond bimbos as possible.
No wonder after this song broke, Pearl Jam’s Ten would go on to sell roughly 10 millions copies.
Just check out the video here –
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gskAeWgEExk
“Don’t Stop” - Fleetwood Mac
For Kristie this song is forever linked to Bill Clinton’s inauguration. However, that was how I rediscovered it. After watching VH1’s behind the music on Fleetwood Mac, they showed the band playing this at Clinton’s inauguration and was reminded of how great a song this in. The lyrics are nothing special, but as a whole, this song is about perfect. Listen to it, and then try to get it out of your head.
Photograph – Def Leppard
Maybe the most perfect pop-metal song of the ‘80’s. If Leppard had not released this, we would never have heard of Ratt, Dokken, Poison, Black and Blue, and the thousand of imitators that mimicked it later in the decade.
While neither the lyrics nor the music are exceptional, together they create the perfect hard rock song. When you through in Mutt Lang’s perfect production, it is a classic.
This was the song that marked Leppard’s rise in the ‘80’s. It was also this song that helped a hard rock band like Leppard sell enough copies to be mentioned right along with other big artists of the time – all of them absolutely not rock and roll – like Lionel Ritchie and Michael Jackson. In fact, had it not been for Jackson’s monster Thriller, Leppard’s Pyromania would have hogged the #1 spot on the Billboard charts.
“Like Suicide” – Soundgarden
The last track on their classic Superunkown. It is an epic that is a total assault on the listener. You have Chris Cornell’s watery and raspy voice chanting the ominous lyrics while Matt Cameron pounds away on the drums and Kim Thayil, maybe the best guitarist of the grunge movement, unleashes a hellacious riff. The lyrics are pure poetry and the songs builds to a crescendo that is more complex and powerful than anything to come out of either the ‘80’s or the ‘90’s.
I always thought Cornell was the best lyricist. Check this imagery out –
“Bit down on the bullet now
I had a taste so sour
I had to think of something sweet
Loves like suicide
Safe outside my gilded cage
With an ounce of pain
I wield a ton of rage
Just like suicide”
I don’t know what the hell that means. But it perfectly sums up all of the angst and flannel and Doc Martens that were the mid to late ‘90’s.
“Hurt” – Johnny Cash
The only cover song that made it. The Nine Inch Nails version is upsetting and painful. Cash’s version, and its phenomenal video, are hauntingly beautiful. This is one cover – a long with Hendrix’s “All Along the Watch Tower” – that is equal, if not superior to, the original version.
What a way for Cash to cap his career.
“Lady Madonna” – The Beatles
I know, I know. Everyone loves “Yesterday” or “Let it Be” or “Hey Jude.” But this song has been stuck in my head ever since I heard it when I was just a kid. There’s something about the piano and rhythm that just got inside my skull. The lyrics are great. Even Kenzie can rock out to this one. And she doesn’t even have higher order thinking skills yet. But there is something so basic and primitive in this song that even a four and a half month old can recognize it and coo and smile.
Now, I know there's no Led Zeppelin or Elvis or Pink Floyd or U2. I left off two excellent songs "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" and "American Pie," but they could just have easily made the list.
Here is what I came up with.
“Sympathy for the Devil” - The Rolling Stones
Lyrically, it is brilliant. I often use this in class a long with “Young Goodman Brown.” How many rock songs do you know that reference the Kennedys, Pontious Pilate, Troubadours, Anastasia, and Nazis?
“Hotel California” - The Eagles
Talk about perfect lyrics. I know there was some talk of it being about Satan worshipping and other ludicrous stuff of that nature, but that foolishness has faded. This song is always relevant. I know it was written during the ‘70’s, but how perfectly it fits the indulgent and wasteful times in which we live right now. That final line, “You can check out any time you like but you can never leave” and then the guitar solo, are unforgettable.
“King of Pain” - The Police
Again, brilliant lyrics. That piano is haunting. The repetition of the first verse is a great touch. What imagery. Now, Nickelback could never write anything close to this –
“There's a little black spot on the sun today
It's the same old thing as yesterday
There's a black hat caught in a high tree top
There's a flag-pole rag and the wind won't stop”
And that’s just the first verse.
“Suite Judy Blue Eyes” - Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young
This song seems so simple, yet it is incredibly complex. It is actually a suite of several songs gelled together. Each develops the theme of love and loss even though musically the are not quite the same.
“For What It's Worth” - Buffalo Springfield
The guitar alone gets this song on the list. This song fits the protest movement perfectly. I can’t think of a song that is better suited for its historical context, or one that conveys the mood of the times better than this one.
“Sweet Child O' Mine” - Guns N Roses
Maybe the best rock song to come out of the ‘80’s. Slash’s riff borders on ridiculous at times as the song opens, but the lyrics are beautiful and real. Though at its core it’s a cliche love song, the way G-N-R pull it off is reminiscent of how the mighty Zeppelin are able to pull off classic songs about the same type of overworked subject matter.
In the hands of far lesser bands like Poison or Motey Crue or Skid Row, this would have descended into typical crotch rock that dominated the ‘80s, but that is what makes G-N-R the best band to come out of the ‘80’s. If only Axl had not been a psycho.
“Cult of Personality” – Living Colour
Lyrically similar to “Sympathy for the Devil.” This song made me interested in history. It also has one of the strongest riffs in all of rock. When guitarist Vernon Reid unleashes it on the listener, they feel like they have been assaulted. Then the lyrics, which are quite intelligent, kick in and the listener isn’t sure what the hell is going on.
"Moondance" - Van Morrison
The lyrics are perfectly matched with the music and tempo.
That first verse gets me every time –
“Well, its a marvelous night for a moondance
With the stars up above in your eyes
A fantabulous night to make romance
‘neath the cover of October skies
And all the leaves on the trees are falling
To the sound of the breezes that blow
And I’m trying to please to the calling
Of your heart-strings that play soft and low
And all the nights magic seems to whisper and hush
And all the soft moonlight seems to shine in your blush”
Again, Nickelback or Steven Taylor could never pull that off.
Every time I listen to this, I see the leaves turn and feel the familiar nip of autumn.
“Jeremy” - Pearl Jam
I know “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana gets all the credit for ushering in the grunge movement of the early 90’s and killing the hair bands of the 80’s, but it was this song, and its incredible video, that, at least for me, marked the death of all those bands I had followed so religiously as a kid.
Here was a song so original and dark and intriguing that I didn’t know what to think. I just knew it was brilliant.
I like to use the analogy of art when talking about the music shifts from 70’s through the ‘90’s. I think of rock in ‘70’s like those paintings of dogs sitting around a bar playing cards or shooting pool. The rock in the ‘80’s was more akin to the crude artwork one might find scrawled on a bathroom wall. The grunge movement was more like abstract art. It was dark and misunderstood.
Even the lyrics that Pearl Jam included on their liner notes were vague, often just a few lines from a song or maybe just a chorus.
The video, which depicts a young kid being picked on by his peers and shunned by his parents who eventually kills himself in front of his classmates, was also abstract and vague.
It was unlike any video I had ever seen. It was the total opposite of the usual rock videos of the ‘80’s where the bands – take your pick from Motley Crue, Poison, Warrant, Whitesnake, and so on – either played live or packed the video as full of overly enhanced blond bimbos as possible.
No wonder after this song broke, Pearl Jam’s Ten would go on to sell roughly 10 millions copies.
Just check out the video here –
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gskAeWgEExk
“Don’t Stop” - Fleetwood Mac
For Kristie this song is forever linked to Bill Clinton’s inauguration. However, that was how I rediscovered it. After watching VH1’s behind the music on Fleetwood Mac, they showed the band playing this at Clinton’s inauguration and was reminded of how great a song this in. The lyrics are nothing special, but as a whole, this song is about perfect. Listen to it, and then try to get it out of your head.
Photograph – Def Leppard
Maybe the most perfect pop-metal song of the ‘80’s. If Leppard had not released this, we would never have heard of Ratt, Dokken, Poison, Black and Blue, and the thousand of imitators that mimicked it later in the decade.
While neither the lyrics nor the music are exceptional, together they create the perfect hard rock song. When you through in Mutt Lang’s perfect production, it is a classic.
This was the song that marked Leppard’s rise in the ‘80’s. It was also this song that helped a hard rock band like Leppard sell enough copies to be mentioned right along with other big artists of the time – all of them absolutely not rock and roll – like Lionel Ritchie and Michael Jackson. In fact, had it not been for Jackson’s monster Thriller, Leppard’s Pyromania would have hogged the #1 spot on the Billboard charts.
“Like Suicide” – Soundgarden
The last track on their classic Superunkown. It is an epic that is a total assault on the listener. You have Chris Cornell’s watery and raspy voice chanting the ominous lyrics while Matt Cameron pounds away on the drums and Kim Thayil, maybe the best guitarist of the grunge movement, unleashes a hellacious riff. The lyrics are pure poetry and the songs builds to a crescendo that is more complex and powerful than anything to come out of either the ‘80’s or the ‘90’s.
I always thought Cornell was the best lyricist. Check this imagery out –
“Bit down on the bullet now
I had a taste so sour
I had to think of something sweet
Loves like suicide
Safe outside my gilded cage
With an ounce of pain
I wield a ton of rage
Just like suicide”
I don’t know what the hell that means. But it perfectly sums up all of the angst and flannel and Doc Martens that were the mid to late ‘90’s.
“Hurt” – Johnny Cash
The only cover song that made it. The Nine Inch Nails version is upsetting and painful. Cash’s version, and its phenomenal video, are hauntingly beautiful. This is one cover – a long with Hendrix’s “All Along the Watch Tower” – that is equal, if not superior to, the original version.
What a way for Cash to cap his career.
“Lady Madonna” – The Beatles
I know, I know. Everyone loves “Yesterday” or “Let it Be” or “Hey Jude.” But this song has been stuck in my head ever since I heard it when I was just a kid. There’s something about the piano and rhythm that just got inside my skull. The lyrics are great. Even Kenzie can rock out to this one. And she doesn’t even have higher order thinking skills yet. But there is something so basic and primitive in this song that even a four and a half month old can recognize it and coo and smile.
Wednesday, February 04, 2009
A colleague mentioned how it had been some time since she had missed a day of school. That got me thinking about the amount of time I have missed this year. Football took some time away early on in the year. Next, I missed a chunk of time for Kenzie's birth.
Then came some time for the MNHS grant I'm in. Then I missed time to run KoKo to the dentist. I missed time to take Kenzie to get her shots. Then came time for jury duty. I missed twice for common prep presentations. Then I burned a couple of personal days to be with Kenzie.
Now I had to miss for the superintendent interview committee. Next week I miss one day for jury duty again. Then I miss another day for the RTI committee I'm on.
I now wonder if there has been more than a few weeks that I haven't missed. That's scary. I remember my first few years when I never even bothered to use all of my personal leaves days.
Then came some time for the MNHS grant I'm in. Then I missed time to run KoKo to the dentist. I missed time to take Kenzie to get her shots. Then came time for jury duty. I missed twice for common prep presentations. Then I burned a couple of personal days to be with Kenzie.
Now I had to miss for the superintendent interview committee. Next week I miss one day for jury duty again. Then I miss another day for the RTI committee I'm on.
I now wonder if there has been more than a few weeks that I haven't missed. That's scary. I remember my first few years when I never even bothered to use all of my personal leaves days.
Here we go again . . .
Apparently there is an objection to the letter the teachers drafted (and administration approved) that goes home to parents concerning Kaffir Boy. It seems the objection is to the fact (and note the emphasis on that word) that Kaffir Boy is referred to as a part of the curriculum, which it is. In fact, it meets a very important aspect of the curriculum and standards, as does the choice parents have if they object to Kaffir Boy's content. Now the whole issue will be reviewed again. Hopefully, we can work to reword the letter and move on without a lot of controversy.
Tuesday, February 03, 2009
Monday, February 02, 2009
Worst Songs
Worst songs of all time
Music is a large part of our lives. Whether it’s listening to the ipod on our way to Grand Forks or tuning in to the XM radio stations on our TV or Kristie listening to the Big Dogs on KJ 108 as she gets ready for work, we have a constant stream of music flowing throughout our home.
A few weeks ago, a certain song came over the TV and both Kristie and I were clamoring for the remote to change the station. The same happened a few days later.
This got me to thinking about the songs I despise the most.
Now, I excluded all country and rap from the list. It is just a given that both of those genres are horrible and I couldn’t compile a list long enough to cover the atrocious music country and rap have contributed to the airwaves.
I also excluded some songs that I hate, not because they are bad but simply because they were/are so overplayed that they a fine song soon became an instrument of torture. Some examples: “Good Riddance/Time of Your Life” by Green Day (have you ever attended a graduation where this was NOT played?), “It’s the End of the World as We Know it” by R.E.M. (when Y2K rolled around, this song became sickening), and “Run-Around” by Blues Traveler (this would have been a fine song, but our pitiful excuse for a radio station XL93 picked it up and played it once an hour all summer long).
Others have been excluded because ALL of their catalog is terrible (any boy band you can think of, Celine Dion and Meat Loaf would be two excellent examples).
So, keep those in mind as you read my list. If you have any additions, let me know.
10. Take on Me – a-ha.
Now, I’m a bit biased here. I think you’ll find a wealth of songs on her from the craptacular year for rock music that was 1985. Only three ‘rock’ albums sold over a million albums that year – Motley Crue’s “Theatre of Pain,” Ratt’s “Invasion of your Privacy” and Deep Purple’s reunion album. Slim pickings for a rock junky like me. Now, there was plenty of synth rock on the radio (Springsteen, Tears for Fears, Level 42, and the Outfied) that year. But the majority of it sucked.
If I’m not mistaken this terrible excuse for music also came out in 1985. I am convinced that it had not been for the popular cartoonish video, this song would have quickly faded. As it is, because of the video, this song hounded the airwaves and drove me to my beloved cassettes. Is it any wonder I wore out my “Pyromania,” “Stay Hungry,” “Shout at the Devil,” and “Powerslave” cassettes?
9 Jump – Van Halen.
Wait a second. What am I doing putting a decent rock song on here? That’s the problem. It’s not a decent rock song. Granted this dominated the airwaves in 1984, but it doesn’t even come close to comparing to “Panama” or “I’ll Wait” from that same album. Plus, this song – while Van Halen’s most popular – marked the end of the David Lee Roth version of the band. Plus, it signaled the death of guitar rock for the 1984 and 1985.
When I heard this, I thought it was great. You can’t get Eddie Van Halen’s synthesizer out of your head. But then I listened to their classic first album with “You Really Got Me,” “Atomic Punk,” “Jamie’s Cryin’,” “Eruption,” and “Running with the Devil.” That’s real rock. This sounds like disco compared to the sonic vibrations from their first album.
Plus, the lyrics make no damn sense.
8. Wake Me up Before you Go Go/Careless Whisper – Wham
A double whammy. Have there ever been two crappier songs in the history of man kind? God forbid aliens ever siphon some of our airwaves and hear this. The martian death rays will be here within seconds. How could any intelligent life form create such drivel?
The first song is so annoyingly upbeat it makes me want to gag. The worst part was we had to listen to this song seemingly every day on the way home on the bus. It’s as if the radio station knew I was a captive inside the yellow cage and played it precisely at 3:10 just to torture me.
Plus, if you have ever seen the short, shorts and hair legs in the video, that’s grounds for the death penalty right there.
The second song is a miserable ballad that haunted the airwaves of – you guessed it – the God awful year of 1985. I don’t think there is one song that sums up how terrible and shallow the music of 1985 was quite like this one.
7. Invisible Touch – Genesis
In the 70’s Genesis put out some good music. However, when they got back together in the 80’s, though I think this song is from ’86, not the dreaded ’85, they released some horrible music. What the hell is an invisible touch anyway?
Is there even a decent guitar riff in this song? It’s all synth and foolish lyrics. This marked the end of anything cool from Genesis. No wonder Phil Collins’ damn hair fell out. He was never the same. He had some okay solo stuff in the ‘80s – “In the Air Tonight” and so on, but then he went bald and nuts. Didn’t he do a Disney song? Enough said.
6. Walk This Way – Aerosmith
You know you’re a craptacular band with an even more craptacular song when it takes a RAP group (Run-DMC) to make your music relevant again.
Everything I hate about Aerosmith – besides Tyler’s mutated lips and over the top voice – can be summed up in the brilliant lines “The cheerleader was a real young bleeder.”
Not exactly Bob Dillon or Chris Cornell lyrics there.
5. Fly Away – Lenny Kravitz
Talk about horrible lyrics. How many times can you sing the line “I want to fly away”?
How long do you think it took Lenny to come up with the first stanza:
“I wish I could fly/Into the sky/So very high/Just like a dragon fly”?
He must have taught Nickelback a thing or two about rhyming every single line in a song.
Lenny was not going to include this song on the album (which is too bad because this was the only hit off of it – outside of his cover of “American Woman,” which was added to later editions of the album after its release), but he decided to include it at the last second.
4. Photograph – Nickelback
This one was overplayed. But if it had just been played once, it still would be horrendous. And it’s too bad because Nickelback had some decent songs early on in their careers (“Leader of Men”), but then they released “All the Right Reasons” and totally sucked.
How about this phenomenal first stanza –
“Look at this photograph
Every time I do it makes me laugh
how did our eyes get so red?
And what the hell is on Joey’s head?”
What the hell is on my radio? Is a more appropriate question.
Oh it gets better –
“This is where I grew up
I think the present owner fixed it up
I never knew we ever went without
The second floor is hard for sneakin’ out”
They don’t even rhyme new words! Are they that stupid they can’t come up with something else to rhyme with ‘up’ and ‘out’? I know Ozzy did this on “Warpigs” (generals gathered in their masses just like witches at black masses) but that’s Ozzy, the man has enough drugs in his body at any given time to kill several large farm animals.
Now for the brilliant third stanza –
“This is where I went to school
Most of the time had better things to do
Criminal record says I broke in twice
I must’ve done it half a dozen times”
Here they give up trying to rhyme. By the time the chorus kicks in, any sane person is looking for a gun.
3. All I Want to Do (Is Make Love To You) – Heart
This is one of those horrible ‘story’ songs. A lady picks up a young guy in the rain, has a one night stand, comes around a year later, sees him, picks him up again, only this time he sees that she has a child with him, and the child has his eyes, he gave her what her husband couldn’t. Retching, retching, retching.
My favorite line from the song
“I am the flower you are the seed
We walked in the garden
We planted a tree “
I couldn’t make crap like that up if I tried.
2. Money for Nothing – Dire Straits.
Dire Straits indeed. Maybe no song sums up how terrible music was in ‘85 like this song. Like aha’s blathering, had this song not had a cartoonish video, we might never have heard it. But given that it references MTV, it was a lock to make it into heavy rotation on the channel.
Songs like this make me happy that MTV doesn’t play videos anymore.
Is there a more annoying synth line or chorus (Get Your Money for Nothing and Your Chicks for Free)? Even having sting add some vocals doesn’t help this piece of trash. It’s hard to believe this is the band once gave us “Sultans of Swing.”
1. We Built this City – Starship
By FAR the worst song ever. Again, from 1985.
It’s so terrible, and such a sell out, that Jefferson Airplane/Jefferson Starship didn’t even want their band’s name associated with it, so they just called themselves Starship on this one.
Of course they claim “We Built this City on Rock and Roll,” but what comes out of the speakers is anything but rock and roll.
When I think of rock and roll, I think of a little “When the Levee Breaks,” or “You Shook me all Night Long” or “In the White Room” or “
Music is a large part of our lives. Whether it’s listening to the ipod on our way to Grand Forks or tuning in to the XM radio stations on our TV or Kristie listening to the Big Dogs on KJ 108 as she gets ready for work, we have a constant stream of music flowing throughout our home.
A few weeks ago, a certain song came over the TV and both Kristie and I were clamoring for the remote to change the station. The same happened a few days later.
This got me to thinking about the songs I despise the most.
Now, I excluded all country and rap from the list. It is just a given that both of those genres are horrible and I couldn’t compile a list long enough to cover the atrocious music country and rap have contributed to the airwaves.
I also excluded some songs that I hate, not because they are bad but simply because they were/are so overplayed that they a fine song soon became an instrument of torture. Some examples: “Good Riddance/Time of Your Life” by Green Day (have you ever attended a graduation where this was NOT played?), “It’s the End of the World as We Know it” by R.E.M. (when Y2K rolled around, this song became sickening), and “Run-Around” by Blues Traveler (this would have been a fine song, but our pitiful excuse for a radio station XL93 picked it up and played it once an hour all summer long).
Others have been excluded because ALL of their catalog is terrible (any boy band you can think of, Celine Dion and Meat Loaf would be two excellent examples).
So, keep those in mind as you read my list. If you have any additions, let me know.
10. Take on Me – a-ha.
Now, I’m a bit biased here. I think you’ll find a wealth of songs on her from the craptacular year for rock music that was 1985. Only three ‘rock’ albums sold over a million albums that year – Motley Crue’s “Theatre of Pain,” Ratt’s “Invasion of your Privacy” and Deep Purple’s reunion album. Slim pickings for a rock junky like me. Now, there was plenty of synth rock on the radio (Springsteen, Tears for Fears, Level 42, and the Outfied) that year. But the majority of it sucked.
If I’m not mistaken this terrible excuse for music also came out in 1985. I am convinced that it had not been for the popular cartoonish video, this song would have quickly faded. As it is, because of the video, this song hounded the airwaves and drove me to my beloved cassettes. Is it any wonder I wore out my “Pyromania,” “Stay Hungry,” “Shout at the Devil,” and “Powerslave” cassettes?
9 Jump – Van Halen.
Wait a second. What am I doing putting a decent rock song on here? That’s the problem. It’s not a decent rock song. Granted this dominated the airwaves in 1984, but it doesn’t even come close to comparing to “Panama” or “I’ll Wait” from that same album. Plus, this song – while Van Halen’s most popular – marked the end of the David Lee Roth version of the band. Plus, it signaled the death of guitar rock for the 1984 and 1985.
When I heard this, I thought it was great. You can’t get Eddie Van Halen’s synthesizer out of your head. But then I listened to their classic first album with “You Really Got Me,” “Atomic Punk,” “Jamie’s Cryin’,” “Eruption,” and “Running with the Devil.” That’s real rock. This sounds like disco compared to the sonic vibrations from their first album.
Plus, the lyrics make no damn sense.
8. Wake Me up Before you Go Go/Careless Whisper – Wham
A double whammy. Have there ever been two crappier songs in the history of man kind? God forbid aliens ever siphon some of our airwaves and hear this. The martian death rays will be here within seconds. How could any intelligent life form create such drivel?
The first song is so annoyingly upbeat it makes me want to gag. The worst part was we had to listen to this song seemingly every day on the way home on the bus. It’s as if the radio station knew I was a captive inside the yellow cage and played it precisely at 3:10 just to torture me.
Plus, if you have ever seen the short, shorts and hair legs in the video, that’s grounds for the death penalty right there.
The second song is a miserable ballad that haunted the airwaves of – you guessed it – the God awful year of 1985. I don’t think there is one song that sums up how terrible and shallow the music of 1985 was quite like this one.
7. Invisible Touch – Genesis
In the 70’s Genesis put out some good music. However, when they got back together in the 80’s, though I think this song is from ’86, not the dreaded ’85, they released some horrible music. What the hell is an invisible touch anyway?
Is there even a decent guitar riff in this song? It’s all synth and foolish lyrics. This marked the end of anything cool from Genesis. No wonder Phil Collins’ damn hair fell out. He was never the same. He had some okay solo stuff in the ‘80s – “In the Air Tonight” and so on, but then he went bald and nuts. Didn’t he do a Disney song? Enough said.
6. Walk This Way – Aerosmith
You know you’re a craptacular band with an even more craptacular song when it takes a RAP group (Run-DMC) to make your music relevant again.
Everything I hate about Aerosmith – besides Tyler’s mutated lips and over the top voice – can be summed up in the brilliant lines “The cheerleader was a real young bleeder.”
Not exactly Bob Dillon or Chris Cornell lyrics there.
5. Fly Away – Lenny Kravitz
Talk about horrible lyrics. How many times can you sing the line “I want to fly away”?
How long do you think it took Lenny to come up with the first stanza:
“I wish I could fly/Into the sky/So very high/Just like a dragon fly”?
He must have taught Nickelback a thing or two about rhyming every single line in a song.
Lenny was not going to include this song on the album (which is too bad because this was the only hit off of it – outside of his cover of “American Woman,” which was added to later editions of the album after its release), but he decided to include it at the last second.
4. Photograph – Nickelback
This one was overplayed. But if it had just been played once, it still would be horrendous. And it’s too bad because Nickelback had some decent songs early on in their careers (“Leader of Men”), but then they released “All the Right Reasons” and totally sucked.
How about this phenomenal first stanza –
“Look at this photograph
Every time I do it makes me laugh
how did our eyes get so red?
And what the hell is on Joey’s head?”
What the hell is on my radio? Is a more appropriate question.
Oh it gets better –
“This is where I grew up
I think the present owner fixed it up
I never knew we ever went without
The second floor is hard for sneakin’ out”
They don’t even rhyme new words! Are they that stupid they can’t come up with something else to rhyme with ‘up’ and ‘out’? I know Ozzy did this on “Warpigs” (generals gathered in their masses just like witches at black masses) but that’s Ozzy, the man has enough drugs in his body at any given time to kill several large farm animals.
Now for the brilliant third stanza –
“This is where I went to school
Most of the time had better things to do
Criminal record says I broke in twice
I must’ve done it half a dozen times”
Here they give up trying to rhyme. By the time the chorus kicks in, any sane person is looking for a gun.
3. All I Want to Do (Is Make Love To You) – Heart
This is one of those horrible ‘story’ songs. A lady picks up a young guy in the rain, has a one night stand, comes around a year later, sees him, picks him up again, only this time he sees that she has a child with him, and the child has his eyes, he gave her what her husband couldn’t. Retching, retching, retching.
My favorite line from the song
“I am the flower you are the seed
We walked in the garden
We planted a tree “
I couldn’t make crap like that up if I tried.
2. Money for Nothing – Dire Straits.
Dire Straits indeed. Maybe no song sums up how terrible music was in ‘85 like this song. Like aha’s blathering, had this song not had a cartoonish video, we might never have heard it. But given that it references MTV, it was a lock to make it into heavy rotation on the channel.
Songs like this make me happy that MTV doesn’t play videos anymore.
Is there a more annoying synth line or chorus (Get Your Money for Nothing and Your Chicks for Free)? Even having sting add some vocals doesn’t help this piece of trash. It’s hard to believe this is the band once gave us “Sultans of Swing.”
1. We Built this City – Starship
By FAR the worst song ever. Again, from 1985.
It’s so terrible, and such a sell out, that Jefferson Airplane/Jefferson Starship didn’t even want their band’s name associated with it, so they just called themselves Starship on this one.
Of course they claim “We Built this City on Rock and Roll,” but what comes out of the speakers is anything but rock and roll.
When I think of rock and roll, I think of a little “When the Levee Breaks,” or “You Shook me all Night Long” or “In the White Room” or “
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