Saturday, July 30, 2011

Conversations and Memories-xtranormal

Here is the link for my xtranormal video. The write one!!!

Hope you enjoy it.

Whew! We lived through July!!!!!!
Blessings on the rest of your summer, fleeting though it will be.

Cheers,
Sharron
hoodlum
smuldoon

Just got this e-mail-What a great example of writing!!

Subject: BEATING A DEAD HORSE

The tribal wisdom of the Dakota Indians, passed on from generation to generation, says that,

"When you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount."

However, in government, education, and in corporate America, more advanced strategies are often employed, such as:

1. Buying a stronger whip.

2. Changing riders.

3. Appointing a committee to study the horse.

4. Arranging to visit other countries to see how other cultures ride dead horses.

5. Lowering the standards so that dead horses can be included.

6. Reclassifying the dead horse as living-impaired.

7. Hiring outside contractors to ride the dead horse.

8. Harnessing several dead horses together to increase speed.

9. Providing additional funding and/or training to increase dead
horse's performance.

10. Doing a productivity study to see if lighter riders would improve the dead horse's performance.

11. Declaring that as the dead horse does not have to be fed, it is less costly, carries lower overhead and therefore contributes substantially more to the bottom line of the economy than do some other horses.

12. Rewriting the expected performance requirements for all horses.

And of course....

13. Promoting the dead horse to a supervisory position.

Don’t forget:

Establishing the dead horse category as a disadvantaged minority with concomitant entitlements

Calling dead horses an endangered species, and encouraging the shooting of live horses to increase the dead horse population

Pointing out through a vigorous media campaign that dead horses suffer greatly and unfairly from global warming, justifying further expenditures to benefit Al Gore

Awarding a Nobel Prize to the pioneer that raises the consciousness of the public to the plight of dead horses

100% us

Subject: 100% us Poem Challenge
Personally, I want to add another 100% for Encouragers, at least as far am I am concerned. Thank you all for blessing me with your gifts.

Writer-18
Reader-11
Researcher-7
Questioner-12
Teacher-5
Thinker-9
Learner-10
Pot-luckers-3
Laughers-13
Hikers
[Coffee drinkers]
[Teach drinkers]
Drinkers
Copy cats
Warrior-poets
Vulnerable
Standers on giants
Poster-makers-3
Bloggers-12
Worriers

Thursday, July 28, 2011

The dog ate my NAEP blog (not really)

The NAEP article we read early on in the class discussed Process Writing and shared some amazing statistics about how students benefit from pre-writing and writing more than one draft. My favorite quote is, "Students of teachers who always encourage particular elements of process writing, such as planning and defining purpose and audience, were found to be generally better writers than students of teachers who reportedly never encourage these activities" thus underpinning many of the other articles we have read in class. Yest another reason for using Writer's workshop this fall. Some solid stats for administrators and parents as well.

Conversations and Memories-xtranormal

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

One liner

Some seed words are taken in, evaluated and then spit our - too bitter or too hard; some I share are easily swallowed by others, luscious and sweet.

Digital Story-Memories of our Dad

http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/12332021/peepz-movie?listid=24778814