If you’re legally present on a public street or sidewalk, you can legally photograph anything in plain view. (This includes children and crime victims… but just because it’s legal doesn’t mean it’s always a good idea.) If law enforcement engages you, ask whether you are free to go; if so, then move out of the…
Standardized testing rewards standardized thinking, while excluding creativity, resilience & other “soft” skills. I have started gong out of my way to remind students in my classes that I am not comparing their papers to a “correct answer” in the back of my book — I want them to learn a habit of mind that…
It’s a good day when one’s nerdiness is an asset to a colleague. Similar:I’ve finally started to create female uniforms for the #neovictorian fantasy #steampunk æt…PersonalI'm just getting around to watching this speech from Arnold Schwarzenegger. Impressive!I really never paid much attention to Sc…AestheticsWhat happens to local news when there is no local media to…
I’m a happy, responsible, and no-longer-obligated-for-jury-duty citizen. Similar:I have for some reason reached another #duolingo milestone.CultureThe daughter is in “Very Berry Dead,” a new play which opens this Friday and runs for two …The daughter is in “Very Berry Dead,” a …AmusingAmenities are limited on a short range excursion craft, but we can still meet…
Keep a local backup of anything important you’ve entrusted to online services. There’s no guarantee that, years from now, those services will honor the terms you agreed to. Backed by new investors, including singer Justin Timberlake, Myspace (after dropping the capital ‘S’) has been rebranded as a music-streaming service, with a new sleek interface, and…
Penn and Teller are involved with this story. Worth a read. The only record of the game’s existence was a handful of review copies that had been sent out to journalists in the weeks before the publisher went bust, in 1995. The game remained a curious rumor until September, 2005, when Frank Cifaldi, a freelance…
Judge: Apple conspired to fix eBook prices. #ethics #books The Federal lawsuit claimed that Apple, led by then-CEO Steve Jobs and senior vice president of Internet Software and Services Eddy Cue, conspired with HarperCollins, Hatchett, Macmillan, Penguin and Simon & Schuster to drive e-book prices up from the $9.99 price point Amazon had established. –readwrite.com Similar:Into the…
RT @spj_tweets: How TV could suffer the fate of newspapers: @alanmutter shares the second installment of his two-part blog – http://t.co/l… Similar:It's been nice knowing you, iPad3 It’s been nice knowing you, iPad3, but…TweetsProto iPads and Paper Coexist in Classic Star TrekRewatching the classic Trek episode “The…CybercultureJury Duty UpdateI’m a happy, responsible, and no-longer-…GovernmentParallel structure…
RT @DepressedDarth: Dear J.J. Abrams, If the new Star Wars is bad, you will forever be known as Jar Jar Abrams. Sincerely, Star Wars fans Similar:Dear daughter, let Miley Cyrus be a lesson to youI am intrigued by the possibility that M…CulturePortraits of my 11yo: Pretty, Goofy, and Pretty GoofyAmusingCliffhanger from ST:TNG Best of Both…
I really like MailChimp’s “Social” plugin, which not only publishes a WordPress blog entry to Twitter and Facebook, but also collects responses from Twitter and Facebook users and collects them as WordPress comments. Today I installed a different plugin, Twitter Tools, which is really just a single tool — it lets you create a WordPress…
Habits for happiness: tips for looking on the bright side of life. At bedtime, in order to avoid a nightly litany of complaints, I ask my glass-is-half-empty-and-I-hate-the-pirate-glass-and-there’s-a-bug-in-it tween to list three good things, two neutral things, and one sad thing about her day. Sometimes if she needs to share more than one sad thing, I…
While researching my obligations for #juryduty Thursday, I came across this “Juror’s Creed.” The gender-specific reference to men, the instruction to reflect upon the virtues of democracy, and the instruction to respect the judge’s education all hint at a historical context for the creed. Institutions never put their creeds into writing unless they feel those…
Spent a productive work day doing nothing but optimizing my blog. Added a very nice plugin for displaying thumbnails of related posts. Similar:I am a dog and I am a good boy and I am prepping my Spring courses.AcademiaIconic 'West Side Story' still resonates todayCarolyn Jerz of Greensburg will be playi…ArtIt's been nice knowing you,…
RT @mykidcancode: Managing Your Preschooler’s Fascination with Apps – bit.ly/lv1ZyR #parenting #technology Similar:The Game (#StarTrek #TNG Rewatch, Season 5, Episode 6) Cadet Crusher vs Fun Risian GadgetRewatching ST:TNG Cadet Crusher visit…GamesUpdated a handout on writing a process analysis. TechnologyA new study says young Americans have a broad definition of newsI expect that many of my students…
Not kidding — 254,460 spam comments in my trash folder! Similar:Restoring the first websiteVery important bit of history. For a st…CybercultureInterior Detail of Steampunk Convertible Gazebo Spent much of Tuesday wrestling with co…AestheticsWe Are Hopelessly Hooked [on our Gadgets]We check our phones 221 times a day—an a…CultureWhy is Elon Musk attacking Wikipedia? Because its very…
“Bach is not for the weak of mind.” — Miss Renee, my kids’ piano teacher. “I’m in trouble.” — Peter, my son. Similar:#AugustWilson #CenturyCycle Three week intensive course (whew!) All the students did very …PersonalHelp! I may be running out of excuses for not wearing…Help! I may be running out of excuses fo…CultureJustine Sacco Is…
While I am uncomfortable with the whole “classroom as marketplace” metaphor, since it’s pretty much gamifying without the fun, I am nonetheless interested in this strategy for encouraging students to collaborate by having them attach a value to the artifacts they present to the class for sharing.. We shop for everything from apps to ideas.…
The researchers found that each singer’s heartbeat was linked to the song’s melody – i.e. the speed and structure of the music. They also found that when the choir sang together, their heart rates tended to increase and decrease at similar times. “As soon as the singing begins, (the hearts) start following each other,” Vickhoff…
We live in an elegant universe. The cosmos is like a string symphony. Genes are selfish. There is an endless battle between thermodynamics and gravity. Do you love these statements, or hate them? The reading world gets pretty divided over whether or not it’s okay to apply metaphors and similes to descriptive science writing. It…
Literature majors and students otherwise drawn to literature courses can be an introverted bunch. Students overall can at times resist course projects that fall outside the expected parameters of a given discipline. Yet my class proved my assumptions wrong. Many of the students were nervous, to be sure, but overall they seemed to enjoy the…