Another homeschool year ends successfully. Here are the kids with their external evaluator, Susan Richman.

Similar:After lights out, the girl is knitting.PersonalLiving Room PhysicsI’ve blogged before about my eight-year-…EducationI’m still teaching journalism and my usual courses, but after 21 years I’ve stepped aside …I’m still teaching journalism and my usu…AcademiaQuoth the ramen, "Eat some more!"PersonalHere's a close look at the scepter leading the procession. #SetonHillGrad 2016 starts…PersonalDress rehearsal for Mamma…

Nerdling spots typo in space exploration textbook.

Similar:Merry Christmas 2018PersonalAnonymous comment cards from student journalists at the end of the second week. These folks are amazing! It’s such a…AcademiaFrom Shakespeare to Sondheim to Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker, everything you "dew&#0…PersonalPractice, practice, practice. Making many things in #Blender3D. Arranging them to make a t… AestheticsNational Dance DayIn the restaurant parking lot after dinn…CultureSpring 2022…

The Course of True Fun Never Did Run Smooth: A Midsummer Night’s Dwarf Fortress Reflection

I am in rehearsals to play Oberon in a community theatre production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. He is a fairy king who manipulates the lives of humans who wander into his realm. I am also playing Dwarf Fortress, an insanely complex game in which the player indirectly manages a community of dwarves. I’ve been surprised by the connections I’ve observed.

Blade Runner | Typeset In The Future

This is nerd heaven — a deep analysis of all the text that appears in the 1980s cult science-fiction film Blade Runner. (I really want this typeface to be Caslon, but despite everything else matching nicely, the top of the 6 is just wrong. I can only apologize for the discrepancy.)UPDATE: Several folks have noted in the comments…

A selfie with a Chekov action figure after learning of Anton Yelchin’s death

Similar:Rocky Horror Show Live 2012 — Stage Right GreensburgThrow toast at the actors and get spaced…AmusingWest Side Story (Aug 9-12) #somethingscomingCultureHello, I’m Dr. Jerz, I’ll be your server tonight for Christmas on the Hill. Hello, I’m Dr. Jerz, I’ll be your serv…PersonalShatoetry iPhone app lets you put… words… in… William Shatner's… mouthWilliam Shatner and technology…

“Moorish girl” in Man of La Mancha. (Vulcan Moorish girl.)

Similar:FULL BLOOM at Latrobe’s Olde Main, Aug 30-Sep 2.CultureLook what I found on my shelf in a closet. #history #archaeology #media Look what I found on my shelf in a cl…PersonalTo DoTo Do (Jerz’s Literacy Weblog) 5: …AcademiaCarolyn and Alex in “The King and I”PersonalI pulled out a shelf on my teaching station and was greeted…

There was a hand, too. Did you bring the hand?

Similar:MoonBot is back. This time he fights a new adversary. #Blender3D physics practice.I submitted midterm grades at about 11 l…AestheticsBooks Come Alive! Catalina Magdalena Cast (Stage Right Greensburg) The cast for “Catalina Mag…Books"I don't view Shakespeare's work as intimidating anymore." — midterm reflection from coll… “It has made me more confident in my…AcademiaThings may be…

Facebook is predicting the end of the written word

Facebook’s video push threatens the edited TV news package as much as it threatens the written word. I’ve definitely noticed a difference in traffic when I post a YouTube video (which generally gets modest attention on FB but often accumulates views over time) vs when I post similar content directly within Facebook (which FB seems…

Study confirms that ending your texts with a period is terrible.

Language evolves, so oldsters like me should get just used to it, right? Well, langauge was evolving long before “text” was a verb, and that’s exactly the reason why the English of Dickens and Shakespeare and Chaucer looks so different from our ordinary speech. I still use a pay-as-you-go dumb phone, and have to pay…

Gawker Media Files for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy

This is fallout from losing an invasion of privacy lawsuit, filed in the name of wrestler Hulk Hogan and backed by tech investor Peter Thiel (co-founder of Paypal and an early investor and current board member for Facebook, and in his younger days also co-founder of the Stanford Review). Gawker slogan: “Today’s gossip is tomorrow’s…

‘Thought Leader’ gives talk that will inspire your thoughts

Saving this for the next time I assign an oral presentation. Now that doesn’t sound important, and it’s not. But if I repeat it three times, I’m making you believe that it is important… Let’s look at a picture of the planet for no reason …. Slowing my speech, lowering the volume of my voice, by…

Teaching Shakespeare in a Maximum Security Prison

Good essay by Mikita Brottman. When I read Macbeth for the first time, I understood almost nothing. The play’s immediate subjects (kingship, Scottish history, nations at war) did not engage me, nor did I have any interest in theater. I loved Macbeth not for its story but for its language. I was fascinated by the…

Franz Joseph and Star Trek’s Blueprint Culture

In 1977, when I was about nine, I saw the original Star Wars, and I certainly enjoyed it, but unlike many of my friends, I kept my allegiance to Star Trek — which was on every afternoon in reruns, and was also available as an animated series, novels, comic books, etc. My fourth-grade classmate Dean…

English Teacher Re-Titles Classic Poems As Clickbait In Last-Ditch Effort To Trick Students Into Learning

Funny and clever. Via Excuse the Bananas “Confessions Of An Angst-Ridden Sailor Who Took Out His Emotions On The Wrong Bird” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge “13 Ways To Have No Chill When It Late At Night & You Lonely AF” by Edgar Allan Poe “This Tyger Is Way Too Turnt” by William Blake “3 Foods…

Why I Was Wrong About Liberal-Arts Majors

It’s a little bit shallow and solipsistic to say a liberal arts degree is valuable because it can make you a better Borg drone in the technohive, but this guy seems to mean well. Most liberal arts degrees encourage a well-rounded curriculum that can give students exposure to programming alongside the humanities. Philosophy, literature, art,…

Ex-Pope Benedict says the Selfish Gene is science fiction. He’s half right

The Selfish Gene is a brilliant phrase. It’s also accurate, so long as you realise that “selfish” doesn’t mean selfish, “gene” doesn’t mean gene, and the definite article is a bit of an abstraction. But taken as the literal truth, it’s about as much use as “In the beginning was the word”. Given Dawkins’s hostility…

Work-Life Balance, from 11(!) Years Ago

I think I’m managing work-life balance pretty well. I’m not ready to give up the sweet cheeks and sticky paws — not yet. I’m being pawed and kissed by a lollipop-slurping preschooler at the moment, so I’m signing off for now. Everything else is going to have to wait. Source: So, What’s in It for…

New Graphic for MLA Style Paper Handout

The other day, I noticed that if you Google for “mla style paper,” the first two images that appear are from my website — but out of context, they aren’t terribly useful. They’re just screenshots of sample papers. I’ve added some callouts with visual tips. Not the best graphic I’ve ever created, but certainly more useful…

At 96, Dr. Heimlich finally uses his life-saving technique

The 96-year-old inventor of the eponymous anti-choking procedure had never actually used it to save a life — until the woman sitting next to him at a retirement facility got a bite of hamburger lodged in her throat. When he heard that a resident was choking, Perry Gaines, maître d’ for the Deupree House dining room,…

Katie Couric Gun Documentary Undermined By Manipulative Editing : NPR

Interviewer Katie Couric asks a group of gun owners the question: “If there are no background checks for gun purchasers, how do you prevent felons or terrorists from purchasing a gun?” The gun owners respond right away, according to audio recorded by one of the participants. But in the documentary Under the Gun, footage taken from elsewhere…