A former student sent me a link to a Republican spoof of FaceBook, BarackBook. It’s an interesting piece of new media campaigning, where the RNC has created an entire Facebook parody displaying the social network of Barack’s friends. I know you go to great lengths to remain unbiased in the classroom (which is awesome!) but…
My son created a game in Scratch, “Hector’s Catch and Avoid.” Here’s a short video showing what Scratch looks like from the inside: Hector.swf My Son the Science Teacher Similar:Daughter doing a thing. Interviewing the Pittsburgh Dance Council’s Randall Miller for Bur… AcademiaMy new inspiration as I work on my syllabuses I applaud you, person…
A student in my “History and Future of the Book” class today referred to how some students in a different class got caught “sparking the texts instead of reading them.” I knew she was referring to Spark Notes, but I’d never heard the name being used as a verb before. Similar:August Wilson Trifecta (Two Trains,…
E.D. Hirsch (2000) The progressive theory that students should gain knowledge through a limited number of projects instead of by taking courses in separate subjects is based on the following reasoning. If you learn a bunch of facts in separate, academic courses you will passively acquire a lot of inert, fragmented knowledge. You will be…
From the University of Toronto’s Representative Poetry Online: “Poems to be memorized and spoken to your sweetheart.” They came to tell your faults to me, They named them over one by one; I laughed aloud when they were done, I knew them all so well before, — Oh, they were blind, too blind to see…
Non-Gamer: Why is it called “Dance Dance Revolution?”Me: Because the demographic wouldn’t go for “Dance Dance Establishment.” Similar:Arsenal of Freedom (TNG Rewatch, Season 1, Episode 21)With an A-plot that comments on the Cold…CultureMy new inspiration as I work on my syllabuses I applaud you, person who, halfway …AcademiaMy mentor interrupted me. “Ignore your students from…
Via Language Log: It is a small but not insignificant recent change in written English that in Britain the newspapers have started spelling acronyms in lower case with capital initial instead of all in caps. The Universities and Colleges Employers Association and the the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs are not UCEA and…
Via MetaFilter: You’ve got just over two weeks to make it to the John Henry celebration in Leeds, Alabama, where some folks believe the legendary steel driving contest actually took place. Maybe you already made it to John Henry Days in Talcott, West Virginia (or read a fictionalized account), where some more folks claim the…