I asked my 10yo why she was moping. “Because I don’t want to be a dancing mushroom,” she said, in a tone that added an unspoken “duh!” Like most of her theater friends, she is on pins and needles, waiting for Stage Right to announce the cast list for next month’s production of Annie “What…
My favorite story comes from the week I held my office hours in the Brother Gorch Pool Hall. Named for the Congregation of the Holy Cross monk who spent decades in charge of our student center and sometimes played pool with students, it was the perfect location for office hours the week we discussed William…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGh6MasSUVc The Search for IT Relevence – YouTube. Similar:R Grammar Gaffes Ruining The Language? Maybe Not : NPRMatthew Gordon, a linguist at the Univer…CultureOklahoma Was Never Really O.K. (Frank Rich, Vulture)”Oklahoma! was greeted as jingoistic ent…AestheticsSteve Strauss: Why I Hire English MajorsDoing things correctly earns you points …AcademiaCoined by Shakespeare? Think againFor years, Shakespeare has…
Fan Video Win Similar:The Decline and Fall of the English MajorThis essay is yet another reminder of ho…AcademiaJournalists Prefer "Said"Journalists prefer the neutral “said” to…EducationEye of the Beholder (#StarTrek #TNG Rewatch, Season 7, Episode 18) Troi probes a crewman's… Rewatching ST:TNG An agitated eng…AmusingGalaxy’s Child (#StarTrek #TNG Rewatch, Season Four, Episode 16) LaForge meets the…
Similar:Rules of Engagement #StarTrek #DS9 Rewatch (Season 4, Episode 18) Worf is accused of destr…Rewatching ST:DS9 After a nightmare f…Justicedungeon.jpg (JPEG Image, 2535×1616 pixels)Great Zork map.AestheticsSpot of sunlight seems to be sliding down an escalator. View t…AestheticsAdventure | T.M. CampGreat story of nerdiness and discovery a…CybercultureThe Story of Rolf and the Viking Bow: Icelandic…
The 18th Annual Interactive Fiction Competition has ended. Congratulations to Marco Innocenti, whose “Andromeda Apocalypse” took first place! The top three games were: Andromeda Apocalypse, by Marco Innocenti Eurydice, by Anonymous Guilded Youth, by Jim Munroe The winners of the Miss Congeniality contest were: Guilded Youth, by Jim Munroe Escape From Summerland, by Joey Jones…
Wonderful story! I still remember that chilly December day, sitting in science class. I’d finished a worksheet early and decided to get a TIME for Kids magazine off of Mrs. Estevez’s bookshelf. It was the 2008 Invention Issue, but that wasn’t the only thing that caught my eye. In the magazine, there was an article…
It’s not surprising, then, that being a woman in geek culture was for a long time a profoundly gender-deviant act. “Girl” and “geek” were a zero-sum dichotomy: to claim space in one, you had to relinquish equivalent claim to the other. Recently, though, there’s been a dramatic change: a sudden surge not only in the…
A handful of vignettes communicating the point that mobile use of the Web is on the rise. It’s a challenge to teach students everything that will truly benefit them in a changing world, so for now all I can do is touch on how to use CSS to deliver different versions of a website for…
Have I mentioned lately that I have some really awesome students? Here’s a narrated screencast, presenting a progress report on a term project that involves programming in Inform 7 to create a text-adventure game designed to teach student journalists how to cover a campus event. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKxPi3L6aDs This is what a 21st-century English major can do,…
I’ll have to look into this. Popcorn Maker. https://popcorn.webmaker.org Similar:MS-Word's helpful "View -> Focus" mode delays stress-related breakdowns.You won’t usually catch me saying anythi…CybercultureMy Tween Preps to Program a Lego Hobbit GameAs part of a course I’m teaching on “Dig…CybercultureHow professors use their time: faculty time allocationInteresting social science approach to h…AcademiaRebound Rumble, FIRST Robotics…
It’s a prototypical Silicon Valley ethos, with one exception: The Khan Academy, which features 3,400 short instructional videos along with interactive quizzes and tools for teachers to chart student progress, is a nonprofit, boasting a mission of “a free world-class education for anyone anywhere.” There is no employee equity; there will be no IPO;…
Set phasers to “Squeee!” ThinkGeek. Similar:Time article with clickbaity headline: Web users annoyed by marketing tricksThis Time magazine article is a good one…CybercultureDetails for a modular mid-range scoutship, from the #steampunk #neovictorian bedtime stori…Details for a modular mid-range scoutshi…AestheticsIn Purgatory's Shadow #StarTrek #DS9 Rewatch (Season 5, Episode 14) Garak answers a coded …Rewatching ST:DS9 Kira…
On the mobile version of my WordPress website, I made the subtlest stylesheet tweaks — adjusting the date text a few pixels to the right to align with the title text, resizing the comment box so that it fits on the screen, adjusting the whitespace ever so slightly. Most of the world will never notice…
Whether you are trying to raise money for your business or just want to perfect your business strategy, a solid elevator pitch is an essential tool for achieving your goals. An elevator pitch can be delivered either verbally, ideally in 60 seconds or less, or as a one-page overview of your business. Think of the…
I don’t text message much. As my kids (age 10 and 14) have become more socially active, and as I find myself volunteering and mentoring for their activities and coordinating with the parents of their peers, I find myself texting more. But it’s not my preferred medium. In countries around the world, text-message traffic has…
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She guarded her late husband’s literary legacy following his death in 1965. Valerie Eliot also allowed Andrew Lloyd Webber musical Cats to be based on TS Eliot’s whimsical verses, Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats. The stage show became a global hit that brought in huge sums for the Eliot estate, and enabled her to…
One of the charges of the journalist is to make the important interesting. Advertisers and celebrities are already so good at packaging what is fundamentally trivial that journalists have to work very hard to compete. Infographics are a useful tool for the news industry, but like all tools, they require skill. Similar:Hacking the WordPress Social…
I’m talking about you, Havingsaidthat. You have wriggled your way into the mouths of every Letterman, every shiny-tied anchorman, every political pundit who can now read one poll every way but sideways, every Fox News body language “expert,” and every reality talent show judge. Even the humble weathermen and subway station apocalypto (2013 end of…