zappa on crossfire, 1986

Zappa on Crossfire | Viral | SPIKE.com

watch frank zappa mop the floor with robert-traitorous-douchebag-novak when he says, "the biggest threat to america today is not communism--it's moving america towards a fascist theocracy."

i wanna new drug

make your own medicine, here.

did we date once?

click on image to enlarge

i get mean

music and drawings by edie brickell.

pew news IQ test

i got 10 out of 12 correct--83 percentile--meaning i scored better than 83% of americans that participated. according to the survey, 84% know that oprah winfrey campaigned for obama, but only 24% know the current senate majority leader, and only 28% know how many americans have died in iraq... that's our inept corporate media for ya!

what's your news IQ? take the test here.

I'm Glad I'm Not A Mollusk

thanks to kathy speake (our wonderful school secretary) for the opportunity to play at her 4th OF JULY EXTRAVAGANZA! here's an outtake of THE THINGZ doing their patriotic duty...

tip of the energy dome to laura velez for the video and support!

war hero dies of drug overdose

sad...

Editor & Publisher:

PINEHURST, N.C. A former Army medic made famous by a photograph that showed him carrying an injured Iraqi boy during the first week of the war has died of an apparent overdose, police said.

Joseph Patrick Dwyer died last week at a hospital in Pinehurst, according to the Boles Funeral Home. He was 31. The photograph, taken in March 2003, showed Dwyer running to a makeshift military hospital while cradling the boy. The photo appeared in newspapers, magazines and television broadcasts worldwide, making Dwyer became a symbol of heroism.

His mother said the military could have done more to help with post-traumatic stress. “He just couldn’t get over the war,” Maureen Dwyer said. “He just couldn’t do it. Just wasn’t Joseph. Joseph never came home.” Read on…

from crooks & liars

new ride

for the last few years, my garage could have be considered a "battle ground state:" two red mountain bikes (of course!) versus a blue BMX and chamille, my blue altima. but this election year change is in the air. once stalwart red states are looking more purple--some have turned almost completely blue, sick and tired of republicans running roughshod over the constitution. the sea change is evident in my garage as well. say hello to. . .

miles
(seems like a good name since he looks kind of blue in this picture!)

my "lanyard"

talk about a time machine--this image sent me reeling back to 1979, scooby doo cartoons, and minnesota summers... THE GALAXY EXPLORER

read all about the "secret lego vault" that contains all the sets ever made (with video!) here.

poetry pt. II

after my students struggled with "the lanyard" (see previous post), i saw the title of this poem--also by billy collins--and immediately thought of my students.

The Trouble with Poetry

The trouble with poetry, I realized
as I walked along a beach one night --
cold Florida sand under my bare feet,
a show of stars in the sky --

the trouble with poetry is
that it encourages the writing of more poetry,
more guppies crowding the fish tank,
more baby rabbits
hopping out of their mothers into the dewy grass.

And how will it ever end?
unless the day finally arrives
when we have compared everything in the world
to everything else in the world,

and there is nothing left to do
but quietly close our notebooks
and sit with our hands folded on our desks.

Poetry fills me with joy
and I rise like a feather in the wind.
Poetry fills me with sorrow
and I sink like a chain flung from a bridge.

But mostly poetry fills me
with the urge to write poetry,
to sit in the dark and wait for a little flame
to appear at the tip of my pencil.

And along with that, the longing to steal,
to break into the poems of others
with a flashlight and a ski mask.

And what an unmerry band of thieves we are,
cut-purses, common shoplifters,
I thought to myself
as a cold wave swirled around my feet
and the lighthouse moved its megaphone over the sea,
which is an image I stole directly
from Lawrence Ferlinghetti --
to be perfectly honest for a moment --

the bicycling poet of San Francisco
whose little amusement park of a book
I carried in a side pocket of my uniform
up and down the treacherous halls of high school.

why i weep not for tim russert

i stole this directly from this modern world. written by the always succinct and brilliant jonathan schwarz of a tiny revolution, based on sam husseini's correspondence with him, it gives but one (BIG) reason why i never liked tim russert--his cheerleading for the invasion of iraq.

December 19, 1999: With Al Gore as guest, Tim Russert says on Meet the Press: “One year ago Saddam Hussein threw out all the inspectors who could find his chemical or nuclear capability.” Russert asks Gore what he’s going to do about this.

Soon afterward: Sam Husseini leaves a message on Russert’s answering machine, and speaks to two of his assistants, telling them the inspectors were withdrawn by the UN at the request of the United States.

January 2, 2000: With Madeleine Albright as guest, Tim Russert repeats the error on Meet the Press: “One year ago, the inspectors were told, ‘Get out,’ by Saddam Hussein.” Russert asks Albright what she’s going to do about this.

January 21, 2000: Sam Husseini writes a letter to Russert, again laying out the facts, and requests a correction.

January 22, 2000-March 19, 2003: Russert never corrects his error.

March 19, 2003-present: Hundreds of thousands of people die in Iraq War. Russert dies, not in Iraq War. Official Washington weeps copious tears for Russert and his Extraordinary Journalistic Standards.

More details with Sam Husseini’s letter.

poetry

i was recently introduced to billy collins while watching PBS late one evening. he performed this poem, and i immediately thought i had to share it with my students since they sometimes made lanyards at lunch... unfortunately, the innocence and irony was lost on them... so sad... in a few years they'll understand better... (not to worry, i edited out "milk from her breasts.")

The Lanyard
Billy Collins

The other day I was ricocheting slowly
off the blue walls of this room,
moving as if underwater from typewriter to piano,
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
when I found myself in the L section of the dictionary
where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.

No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one into the past more suddenly—
a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp
by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid long thin plastic strips
into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.

I had never seen anyone use a lanyard
or wear one, if that’s what you did with them,
but that did not keep me from crossing
strand over strand again and again
until I had made a boxy
red and white lanyard for my mother.

She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sick room,
lifted spoons of medicine to my lips,
laid cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light

and taught me to walk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,
which I made with a little help from a counselor.

Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth,
and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,
and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now,
is a smaller gift—not the worn truth

that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took
the two-tone lanyard from my hand,
I was as sure as a boy could be
that this useless, worthless thing I wove
out of boredom would be enough to make us even.

Billy Collins, the U.S. poet laureate from 2001 to 2003, is the author of seven collections of poetry and is a distinguished professor of English at Lehman College of the City University of New York. He serves as the poet laureate of New York state.

why i'm voting republican...

from http://www.imvotingrepublican.com/

let the games begin

standardized testing started today. we began with the always-coma-inducing reading language arts section (42 questions). this "80-90 minute" test took two of my students 3 hours--one actually fell asleep! even after we stretched out and ran a few laps this morning. even after we made a big deal about getting enough sleep and eating a good breakfast.

face down in the middle of "the fox and the mole" story...

but the most forehead-slapping-est moment came when one of my best readers, finished her test and took out her writer's notebook. i noticed she had a movie ticket stub that she was ready to affix within, so i stole a peak at it--

KUNG-FU PANDA
sunday, june 8, 9:35 PM

i leaned over and whispered, "you went to the movies that late?!
what time did you get to bed, alisha?"

"midnight."

800 API, HERE WE COME!!!

dane cook is a douche

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

they're BAAACK!

at first i thought this was a kid's ball, stuck in my tree--
then i realized...
after three years of not producing any "berries,"
my avocado tree was finally bearing fruit!
i'll be giving them away when they mature--
first come, first served!

MR. C., MA, ED.

WAA HOO!!!
May 29, 2008 at California State University, Long Beach

love to my family for all the support--
thanks for celebrating this achievement with me!

what do teachers make?

in case you haven't seen this...

tip o' the energy dome to big sis for the link.

tribe names

since we're a tribes school, i let my students name their 5-6 student table-tribe (TT). it's a good exercise in compromise as well as creativity. their names must have unanimous approval of the TT, and they must work together to decorate their name tag (i've got to come up with a better name for this... placard?) actually, it's more of a mobile since it hangs from the ceiling of my bungalow... (shhh, don't tell ed, or the LB fire department!) they end up looking pretty good--especially by the third trimester--they pull out all the stops! here are a few examples:

THE DEAD ROBOT CHICKENS OF DOOM

dragon (thinking): "NEXT"
chicken 1 (thinking): "something smells good."
chicken 2 (thinking): "i know."


L-R: sovany (lead vocals), "WE LOVE YOU, LONG BEACH!"; alula (lead guitar), "ROCK ON!!"; arlena (keytar), "I'M ROCKIN' ON THE KEYTAR"; james (drums), "I AM THE KING OF THE DRUMS!"; lee (bass), "I'M ROCKIN' ON THE BASS!"; juny (keyboards), "THE KEYBOARD PLAYER"

and my personal favorite...

enough said.

5th anniversary

this piece from fairness and accuracy in reporting (F.A.I.R) collects the quotes of both "liberal" and "conservative" television pundits from february to may of 2003,when this
top-gun-cod-piece-of-theater occurred.

what's astonishing is the sheer breadth and scope, indeed the totality of triumphalism and self-righteousness displayed. on fox news it's to be expected, but NPR, PBS? REALLY?!


HOW CAN THESE PEOPLE STILL BE TRUSTED?

maybe it's true what somerby so succinctly states:
you can't run a middle-class democracy with a multimillionaire press corp.

read 'em and weep:

"Iraq Is All but Won; Now What?"
(Los Angeles Times headline, 4/10/03)

"Congress returns to Washington this week to a world very different from the one members left two weeks ago. The war in Iraq is essentially over and domestic issues are regaining attention."
(NPR's Bob Edwards, 4/28/03)

"We had controversial wars that divided the country. This war united the country and brought the military back."
(Newsweek's Howard Fineman--MSNBC, 5/7/03)

"We're all neo-cons now."
(MSNBC's Chris Matthews, 4/9/03)

"The war winds down, politics heats up.... Picture perfect. Part Spider-Man, part Tom Cruise, part Ronald Reagan. The president seizes the moment on an aircraft carrier in the Pacific."
(PBS's Gwen Ifill, 5/2/03, on George W. Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech)

"Why don't the damn Democrats give the president his day? He won today. He did well today."
(MSNBC's Chris Matthews, 4/9/03)

"What's he going to talk about a year from now, the fact that the war went too well and it's over? I mean, don't these things sort of lose their--Isn't there a fresh date on some of these debate points?"
(MSNBC's Chris Matthews, speaking about Howard Dean--4/9/03)

"If image is everything, how can the Democratic presidential hopefuls compete with a president fresh from a war victory?"
(CNN's Judy Woodruff, 5/5/03)

"Now that the war in Iraq is all but over, should the people in Hollywood who opposed the president admit they were wrong?"
(Fox News Channel's Alan Colmes, 4/25/03)

"I doubt that the journalists at the New York Times and NPR or at ABC or at CNN are going to ever admit just how wrong their negative pronouncements were over the past four weeks."
(MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, 4/9/03)

conservative columnist cal thomas should have been looking in the mirror when he declared:

(THOMAS 4/16/03) "All of the printed and voiced prophecies should be saved in an archive. When these false prophets again appear, they can be reminded of the error of their previous ways and at least be offered an opportunity to recant and repent. Otherwise, they will return to us in another situation where their expertise will be acknowledged, or taken for granted, but their credibility will be lacking."

EAT F'N CROW, YOU FILTHY WAR PIG! 4,000 DEAD AMERICANS AND COUNTING, HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF IRAQI DEATHS, AND NOT ONE OF YOU HAS APOLOGIZED FOR YOUR COMPLICITY?!?!*

SHAME ON YOU. SHAME. ON. YOU.

the worst part is, these people aren't rush limbaugh or sean hannity (of course, they, too, were spewing this same tripe every day of the week, along with hundreds of other conservative AM talk radio show hosts across the country). these people are considered legitimate political pundits! and guess what?

they still have their jobs!

they who confuse and divide our country.

and they're going to cover our election this november?



*that's not to mention the pentagon pundit scandal that the new york times broke last week exposing television news organizations (such as NBC) using "retired generals" with lucrative lobbying and weapons contracts as "military experts" during their reports on iraq without revealing their vested interests.

LAKERS!!!

first team to sweep their opponents 4-0 in the first round of the play-offs!

tragedy

i just found out that my former colleague and musical comrade, tony carbone died last month. he'd been battling brain cancer for the last few years and finally passed away in his sleep at his home.

i met tony in 1999, my first year teaching at whittier. he was a fellow sub and my next-door-bungalow neighbor in 3rd grade. he was also a musician, so naturally, we became buddies. his students loved him, and he was a very creative teacher, but when he was unceremoniously "let go," our contact became sporatic (although we did manage to coordinate a thingz/bikeride show). i was overjoyed when he got a job teaching 4th grade at lee elementary, just up the street from my house. whenever i'd see him drive by on his scooter, he'd always wave or stop by for a quick chat to catch up. he was always very positive and funny, no matter his circumstances.

he was also very humble, despite the fact that his band bikeride were an international sensation! well... maybe that's over-stating their fame since you've prolly never heard of them, but they did tour the globe and release 4 records, garnering positive reviews in the LA times and rolling stone, as well as kajillions of other indie rock 'zines. he was an AMAZING song writer and an AMAZING human being. he brought joy to everyone he met--kids and adults alike. he is definitely missed.

go check out--better yet, go BUY--some bikeride music. if you like beatles-style pop songs and beach boys harmonies with a little brazilian-prog-country-rock mixed in, you'll be happy you did.

RIP, tony.

new favorite website

no. that's not me.
my... um... ego's not that big.

if "pictures of hot chicks with total and complete douche bags" makes you laugh just to keep from crying, check out my new favorite website...
hot chicks with douchebags!

VERY funny stuff. the commentary is also quite... trenchant. poetic, even.

cotsen

about a month ago, some people from the cotsen organization gave a presentation to our staff soliciting recruits for their foundation. in a nutshell, their philosophy is that teaching is a fine art--an art form that each teacher personalizes and makes his or her own. they believe in nurturing teachers' individual strengths through fellowship and collaboration with mentors. no one style or method is advocated (since there is no ONE RIGHT WAY TO TEACH), but that the end result--great teaching--is a product of personal expression.

since music is a medium though which i express myself, i thought this might be an opportunity for me to learn more fully how to integrate music into the language arts and mathematics curricula. i've already begun using songs that i developed in collaboration with the company, teacher created materials, to teach some reading comprehension skills, but i'd like to more fully utilize music across the academic spectrum, in different disciplines including science and social studies. this looked like an opportunity for me to realize that.

this year we were lucky enough to hire one former cotsen fellow, glenda bishop away from our neighboring school, alvarado. she's a complete dynamo! the level of work her 3rd graders did--and the amazing work she is currently doing in 5th grade with readers' workshop--is a testament to her incredible passion for teaching and learning and a huge endorsement of the cotsen philosophy. if you don't believe me, just click here and watch her for yourself. (check out the other videos, too--they're pretty incredible... and also short!)

st. mccain redux

donald graves pt. I

since there's been some complaints about the quantity of education-related posts, i present a report (written for my masters class) on "my distant teacher," donald graves... (sorry for the formatting issues--blogger cannot seem to double space and indent my paragraphs the way m.s. word does--weak.)

...

Since you are able to read and comprehend the words on this page, you implicitly understand the value of the comprehension skills necessary to be a proficient reader. These skills are a prerequisite for making my words and letters comprehensible. Most teachers understand this and work hard to reinforce reading skills with their students. These skills have become an integral part of reading instruction curricula largely due to the fact that so much research exists in this area of literacy (Graves, 2000). But what about the value of being able to actually write comprehensibly?

Given that one cannot practice comprehension skills without words, and words need authors to write them, it would seem reasonable that researchers would have investigated the development of children’s writing as well as reading. But in the 1970’s, student writing was not considered when researchers studied reading. It was a consciousness of this deficit—this neglect of examining student writing—that was the impetus for Donald H. Graves’ doctoral dissertation on children’s writing in 1971 (Graves, 2000).

As a Distinguished Educator, Graves’ work in the area of children’s writing has spanned more than 30 years (Graves, 2002). After receiving his Doctorate from the University of Buffalo, Graves began his career as a Professor of Early Childhood Education at the University of New Hampshire in 1973. Soon thereafter Graves’ expertise was sought in Washington D.C. on planning educational research for the 1980’s (Graves, 2000). This led to his study of children’s writing for the Ford Foundation in 1976—which produced Balance the Basics, Let Them Write (1978)—its purpose was to investigate what type of writing was being encouraged in classrooms: “authentic” (student-generated, student-selected) pieces or “fill-in-the-blank” writing (Graves, 1991).

After receiving a grant from the National Institute of Education for a longitudinal study of children’s writing, Graves, Lucy Calkins, and Susan Sowers spent the next six years documenting the developmental stages of children’s writing. This led to the publishing of Graves’ Writing: Teachers and Children at Work in 1983 and many articles in Language Arts (Graves, 2000).

From 1982 until 1988, Graves worked with Jane Hansen (from the reading department of the University of New Hampshire) studying the relationship between reading and writing. Graves’ “The Reading/Writing Teacher’s Companion series… resulted from this work.” For the next several years, Graves began to study the impact of the writer’s portfolio on evaluation, and published Portfolio Portraits in 1992, the year he retired from the University of New Hampshire (Graves, 2000).

This did not stop his publishing career. Originally intending to simply revise and update Writing: Teachers and Children at Work, Graves produced A Fresh Look at Writing in 1994 as a partial rebuttal to critiques of his earlier work (Graves, 2000). Graves (1995) again addressed questions about the validity, value, and logistics of student-centered writing workshops after being bombarded with questions from teachers following speaking engagements around the country.

In 1996 Graves published his first children’s book Baseball, Snakes and Summer Squash: Poems About Growing Up. He has since published How to Catch a Shark and Other Stories About Teaching and Learning (1998) and Bring Life Into Learning (1999). The latter was a response to teachers—with increasingly impacted time schedules—who focused primarily on plot instead of character, ignoring the humanity in literature. “When people are bypassed the children are bypassed and the emotion of learning is often lost.” Graves wrote (2000). Given that “emotion is the engine of our intellect,” Graves (2002) felt plot should be subordinate to character, since characters drive the plot through their actions (Graves, 1991).

Recently Graves (2002) studied the effects of “No Child Left Behind” (and its requisite standardized testing) on classroom teachers’ instruction. While Graves was quick to commend President Bush for addressing public education in his first term of office, he cautioned that measuring progress through standardized testing did not necessarily produce high achievement in students, and he admonished the administration for mistakenly thinking that “a test is good because it is a test.” In other words, testing (or test prep) was not teaching. Increasingly, though, Federal money is being tied to test scores, and more teachers are spending valuable teaching time focusing on test preparation (Graves, 2002).

Instead, teachers should teach reading and writing skills—life skills that encourage long, deep thinking as opposed to the short, “5-meter sprint” of one-answer-only questions found on most standardized tests (Graves, 2002). Only “Long Thinkers,” (like Einstein, Jefferson, and Darwin) have the capacity needed to sustain thought—a requirement for solving the tough problems of Business and Democracy—a necessity for our country to survive. To wit: the strength of our democracy—and indeed, capitalism—is in its ability to innovate, invent, and/or improve solutions to problems, not in finding the One And Only Answer (Graves, 2002).

According to Graves (2002), standardized testing, “conditioned” students to look for that mythical One and Only Answer—with the misguided belief that that was learning—consigning critical and creative thinking to a secondary status. In an interesting proposal, Graves suggested a role reversal: let those who make the tests, take the tests as well! Some parents did take these tests and found more than one answer to some of the problems. Still they received no credit for their ingenuity.

donald graves pt. II

Graves (2002) work on teachers’ energy issues—what provided energy and what took it away—was itself empowering. He noted that it took energy to get energy—“energy begets energy”—and that teachers needed to “find energy in what they did well and practice it,” instead of focusing—like we so often do—on what’s not going well. He listed four sources for filling up our teacher-energy-tanks:

· Students (through humor and rapport)

· Colleagues (through collaboration and friendship)

· Curriculum (through characters, rather than events)

· Asking questions (“How does this policy/practice result in learning?)

Teachers teach because we love learning and want to instill this love of learning in our students, so that they in turn become life-long learners. This takes a lot of time and energy, everyday. Unfortunately, the numbers of energy-filled teachers is on the decline—more teachers are quitting citing stress, fatigue, exhaustion. Thankfully, learning generates energy, which in turn generates creativity, which generates more energy, and so on—it’s cyclic—teachers need to understand this: it behooves us to be constantly seeking knowledge because as educators, we feel most energy-filled when we learn ourselves (Graves, 2002).

* * * *

Graves’ work is inspiring for a number of reasons. I was literally energized by his research on teachers’ energy issues. It was quite revelatory, since I’ve always struggled with having enough energy to be effective meeting the needs of all the students in my classroom. Indeed, I drew energy—I felt truly motivated—from reading about this study and the notion that “creativity generates energy.”

At our school we call these energy-providing situations “treasure moments”—those times when “little things” (like a student’s question or response) invigorate a lesson or enliven a school day by virtue of their creativity or poignancy. Graves did this through his study—I actually gained energy from reading it—which again illustrates his point: “Energy begets energy.”

It was great to see Graves mention “Long Thinkers” like Jefferson and Darwin as paragons of intellect and thinking since they are heroes of mine. I believe that an informed populace is the only way to have a functioning democracy, so it was encouraging to see Graves support and champion this notion. Indeed, had we accepted a deep-thinker as President seven years ago, we wouldn’t be stuck in Iraq at this very moment… but I digress.

“Writing a research paper is like writing a poem,” Graves (1991) said; “Trust the Shadows.” This intrigued me. When I realized what he meant—that while researching or drafting we must first say “yes” to all information, (even the shadows) before we say “no” during revision—I was able to apply this knowledge successfully to my writing as well as my teaching. This process of distilling information has helped me compose poetry and prose, and has been a valuable lesson to teach reticent or struggling writers when they are confronted by The Bothersome Blank Page.

Since I use the Columbia Writing Program in my classroom, I am completely aligned with Graves’ principles of student-centered, authentic writing. It’s a far cry from the prompt-generated writing that students were producing a few short years ago. The quality and investment that students make in their craft is quite remarkable. This is because students feel empowered to make writing decisions themselves. When students exercise this sovereignty, they are doing the work of real authors, and they in turn feel empowered and motivated (Remember: Energy begets creativity and vice versa.)

This small sampling of Graves’ work compels me to read more. He’s a wealth of information as well as an inspiration. I will continue to implement Graves’ techniques and strategies in my classroom to build life-long learners—learners that will one day be asked to make the tough decisions that are required of the populace in a free and functioning democracy.

st. mccain

the washington post exposes their deep liberal bias by featuring two hard-hitting pieces on john mccain. here's one:

PAGE SPRINGS, Ariz., March 2 -- If he loses the presidency, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) will have a career as a barbecue chef to fall back on.

At his weekend cabin just outside Sedona on Sunday afternoon, McCain took a break from campaigning and grilled ribs and chicken for three dozen reporters, some staff members and a few Republican friends from the Senate...

....

McCain offered a tour of the property, which if he is elected will no doubt become the latest incarnation of the "Western White House," the equivalent of Ronald Reagan's Santa Barbara ranch, President Bush's place in Crawford or the first President Bush's Maine retreat. . .

McCain's aides said the three-hour gathering was intended as a "social event," not a glorified news conference. And by and large, reporters agreed to those rules, asking him substantive questions only a few times.

....

The idea, McCain said, was to allow reporters to get to know him and his staff under less stressful circumstances. (The fact that the media spent the weekend at a resort called Enchantment probably contributed to that feeling.)

isn't that cozy? i wonder if the post paid for the "resort." either way, if this is what passes for press objectivity, let's just skip the election and swear him in now.

for the masochists, here's the other fluff piece.

THINGZ-TRUMENTAL

HAPPY QUADRA-ANNUAL LEAP-YEAR CUSP-DAY!
let's celebrate with the sounds, if not the sights of...
THE THINGZ LIVE @ FERN'S, 2-29-08!!!

tip of the energy dome to ms. velez for the video.
THANKS FOR THE SUPPORT!

we're with stupid

one of the reasons i'm a teacher is to do daily battle with ignorance--for a democracy can only exist with an informed populace. politicians and pundits are constantly lauding the american people for their intelligence, but if this article in the new york times is any gauge, i'm absolutely HORRIFIED!

for those with hopes of seeing a democrat reclaim their rightful place in the white house this november, don't get your hopes up too high--read the article--you'll see why...

tip of the energy dome to somerby for the link/post inspiration.

I HEART CHEAP TRICK!!!!

i could (and prolly should) write a whole post about how cheap trick live at buddokan changed my life... it is the first LP i remember listening to in its entirety (albeit, inadvertently).

in the summer of 1979. everyday. for a whole month. my sister woke the entire house up each morning with,

"ALRIGHT, TOKYO!!" audience screams
"ARE YOU READY?" louder screams
"WILL YOU WELCOME, EPIC RECORDING ARTISTS,
CHEAP TRICK!!!" pandemonium

enter rick neilson's (pictured above) crunchy guitar...
bun e. carlos' tight snare hits followed by...
robin zander's rock salutation,

"HELLO THERE, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!
HELLO THERE, LADIES AND GENTS!
ARE YOU READY TO ROCK? (with tom petersson's bass)
ARE YOU READY OR NOT?!"

hell yeah, i'm ready to ROCK!!! i'm also WIDE AWAKE now.

suffice to say, the indoctrination (inROCKtrination?) worked--i love cheap trick! so when my sister gave me tickets to see them this christmas, it fulfilled a childhood dream. thanks, raquel!

actaully, in 1986, cheap trick would have been my first concert had my parents let me venture from behind the orange curtain to see them play fender's international grand ballroom right here in the LBC! here's a bit of trivia: guess which soon-to-be-huge band opened for them?


G'N'F'N'R!!!
(guns 'n' roses)

argyle

it's a benchmark book--or at least it was--so it's teaching-related! ;>

"gloriously silly"

the thingz get a nice plug in the LA WEEKLY!

come see us at mr. t's bowl this saturday with the guilty hearts...

it'll be fun!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

from all of us at YDNFTF, have a great 2008!

my resolution this year was to register as a democrat, and i did that today! i'm excited: now i get the chance to actually affect the presidential election by voting in the primary february 5 (since i live in solidly-blue california, my vote in november is pretty much a moot point).

here's to finally throwing out the bush/cheney junta!

merry xmas!

merry christmas to you and your loved ones from YDNFTF!

music=student success

The cyclic nature of U.S. public education has, once again turned regressive. Progressive education proponents—descendants of Dewey (1897)—find their theories abandoned and instruction reduced to only those content areas that are norm-reference-tested. Not unlike the launch of the Sputnik satellite in 1957 and the call-to-math-and-science-arms it stirred in this country, the implementation of No Child Left Behind (2002)—which generously considered art a “core subject”—has unintentionally made the study of the arts a victim of the current political movement. While this may seem historically inconsequential—the teaching of art has gained and lost popularity throughout history—the ramifications vis-à-vis student achievement are significant since fine arts can improve higher-order, concrete, and abstract thinking, the very skills students need for success in school (Gallatt, 2007).

According to Petress (2005), of all the arts, music is the most important because it has proven beneficial to students in four major categories: success in school, success in society, success in developing intelligence, and success in life. Despite its merits, music has taken the biggest cuts due to the high costs associated with music education (sheet music, instrument purchase and repair). More affluent schools manage to maintain music programs, but music education is vital to the physical, emotional, intellectual, social, and spiritual growth of all students, regardless of economic background. Its virtues include:

· Self-discipline, dedication, and goal-setting

· Hard work, practice, and improvement

· Self-confidence and humility

· Teamwork

Gardiner’s (1983) theory of multiple intelligences provides more support for utilizing music to fully educate students. When teachers address all learning styles—including music—students develop their weaker modalities while nurturing their stronger ones. This allows all students to be more versatile learners in various settings (Mixon, 2004).

While the so-called “Mozart Effect” debate rages on, most scholars agree that music motivates students to learn (Eady & Wilson, 2004). It provides an “emotional hook” that can engage students in learning rudimentary facts (McIntire, 2007). Raymond & Broderick (2007) claim that even the most reticent of students will enthusiastically participate in classroom activities when given the opportunity through the arts, allowing them to dig deeper into the curriculum, and providing richer content without sacrificing teacher accountability. Even rap music, which has unified an entire generation of disparate cultures, can be used in the classroom to educate, its “driving beat” mixed with educational lyrics adding interest to otherwise lackluster lessons (Eady & Wilson, 2004).

Music helps students learn more, more effectively in core subjects, as well as contribute to the attainment of learning goals (Eady & Wilson, 2004). Therefore, music should be woven into the tapestry of the curriculum. Since music and literacy go hand-in-hand—literacy, vocabulary, and memorization skills are naturally developed through melody, rhythm, and rhyme (McIntire, 2007)—reading instruction should be fused with music in order to enhance its effectiveness (Eady & Wilson, 2004). If teaching the whole student is our goal, then music is an important medium that teachers and educators should utilize to maximize student achievement, motivation, and involvement.

preachin' to the choir

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;

I come to bury conventional wisdom, not to praise it.

The evil that men do lives after them;

The good oft interred with their bones.

Politicians have used policy to punishing effects on our profession. Our autonomy—and indeed our integrity—as teachers and members of the professional class is threatened daily. The press opines about the need for “accountability.” Republicans rant about the need for “choice.” The public is pummeled with negative stories about dysfunctional districts and trashy teachers. We’re in an all-out PR war, and our students’ academic lives are on the line.

While politicians clamor to take credit for the latest educational craze, we teachers are in the ditches—day in, day out—diligently disciplining and didactically directing. We know what works with kids because we work with kids! How can anyone who hasn’t spent more than a few hours in a classroom know what is best for students? Don’t you find that insulting? Have you ever spent a few hours in the state Capital building or Congress then decided you knew exactly how to legislate? It’s ludicrous! We need to stand up for ourselves! We need to demand the respect we’re due.

Our profession has been marginalized by state-sponsored, mandatory reading programs and high-stakes, standardized testing. These are clumsy tools at best. They aren’t the precision instruments needed to address the disparate needs of 21^st century American school children. Non-standard English speakers and English language learners need more finessed, more finely tuned teaching—practices that reading programs like Open Court don’t provide.

Take the teaching of reading comprehension skills for example. To teach Main Idea, the 5^th Grade Teacher’s Edition simply states, “Have students locate the main idea of the paragraph and its supporting details.” That’s it. No instruction on how to find the main idea or activities teaching what a main idea is, just find it. A careful look at the 4^th grade T.E.’s reaps the same result. How about 3^rd grade? Still no explicit instruction. 2^nd grade? Nope. Well, surely then the first grade teacher’s edition would have at least one activity teaching this abstract concept in a concrete way… Nonewhatsoever.

Yet we expect someone who is new to this country—someone who has never spoken the language or read it fluently—to pick out the main idea of a literally foreign text when he/she has never been taught how to do it?! That’s insanity. Oh, and by the way, here’s this standardized reading test—only in English, mind you—that we expect you to be successful at, or we’re going to send in the “program improvement” team with their clip boards and bow ties to go snooping through your teacher’s lesson plan book! Outrageous.

We must work smarter than that. We mustn’t fall prey to the one-size-fits-all approach. There are no silver bullets, no panaceas—only good teaching and good resources. We must have both in order to be successful. We must supplement our current reading programs with venerated practices that are professional and practicable, like explicit comprehension skills instruction. We must teach students at their instructional reading level, not at their frustration level, two to three grades above their comprehension level, like in the Open Court series. This is the “soft bigotry of high expectations.”

Our core texts—math, social studies, science, and health—are also too difficult, so we must replace them as well. They are all written at grade level, yet how many of our students in urban schools—the ELL’s, et al—read at grade level? These students are just as deserving of science and social studies instruction as more affluent students. They need textbooks that are not only aligned to their grade-level standards, but more importantly, written at their own individual reading level. So while your top—or at grade level—students read the harder text, the lower students still have access to the same content, but with easier vocabulary. It can be done… with a little ingenuity… and a lot of cash.

This reminds me of a bumper sticker I used to see occasionally: It will be a great day when our schools have all the money they need, and the army has to have a bake sale to buy a bomber. The money issue is a problem, but perhaps it’s an opportunity for local publishing businesses to get involved in education. To wit: perhaps smaller, local companies could step in to meet each state’s needs instead of huge, national text book companies (McGraw-Hill, Houghton-Mifflin, etc) that make a uniform, grade-level text that they can sell in any state. This could address the educational problems each state faces on a more local level. Just another way we could better serve the needs of our students in this country. Thank you.

vilify the fry

The nascent movement to ‘vilify the fry’ may have begun with Cultural Politics and Education (Apple, 1996). Recently, French fries have been an enemy to both our health and waistlines due to their preparation in trans fat. A few short years ago, we changed their anti-American image by renaming them “Freedom Fries.” But a decade ago, cheap French fries began wreaking havoc on education with far more serious effects.

This didn’t happen in the United States—it happened in Asia—but with W.T.O. trade policies like NAFTA, a similar educational crisis is currently affecting California: how do we educate the ever-growing immigrant population? This has had national, political ramifications. Immigration and national defense are arguably the two most important issues to both democrat and republican voters in this upcoming election year. So what do French fries have to do with immigration? I’ll get to that. Suffice to say, the immigration problem we face in 2007 is analogous to the problem of cheap French fries in the Asian country where those potatoes were grown.

When a multi-national, fast-food giant was offered huge tax breaks to move their potato farming and French fry production to rural areas of this Asian country, thousands of indigenous people were forced from their homes—land on which generations of their kin had lived, long before banks and mortgages and deeds existed. Naturally, the people migrated from their rural environment into and around the cities.

The influx of families created a burden on the city’s schools, and they began to over-crowd. Unfortunately, the government would not build new schools without a “legitimate” need based on “official” statistics. The displaced families were considered “illegitimate”—and therefore weren’t counted in “official” statistics—because of their “immigrant” status. Moreover, babies born to these families weren’t counted as new births unless they were born in a hospital—facilities that weren’t readily available in the slums and “shanty towns” where many moved.

While the “Value Meal” was heralded in America for its abundance of cheap food options—including fries—unbeknownst to most Americans, it was causing an educational crisis in Asia. Since the fast-food company was offered sweeping tax-breaks on the land, no new revenue was coming into government coffers. This–and the unfair counting of its citizens—accounted for the dearth of new schools. Even if there were a “legitimate” need for new schools, there was no money to fund their construction.

We have a similar educational problem in California. After Clinton signed NAFTA in 1994, huge companies (like the auto and textile industries) moved their domestic production facilities south of the border. Many of these factories were built in rural areas, and indigenous people were forced to relocate. Some moved into the surrounding cities, but many moved to the Border States like Texas, Arizona, and California. They moved into urban areas where local school systems—already over-crowded and under-funded—have struggled to address their needs ever since.

The English Language Learner—or ELL—student generally requires more resources to educate; resources many inner-city schools lack. Since Proposition 13, school funding has been tied to property tax. Downtown schools, surrounded by apartments and low-income housing, don’t have the local tax base that more affluent, suburban districts have. Therefore, ELL’s and inner-city children get a “separate but unequal” education.

Standardized (English only) testing only exacerbates this problem. And with federal educational funds tied to these tests, our education system stands at a crossroads. Do we professionals let top-down policies such as NCLB destroy what we know are best teaching practices? We know high-stakes testing doesn’t lead to more effective teaching or a better education—if anything it leads to higher dropout rates. But maybe that’s the point: as long as we stay enamored with cheap French fries, we’ll always need someone to run the drive-through window.

letter to the stephanie miller show

hi,
why does your show promote that empty vessel, maureen dowd? her deranged diatribes have damaged dems for the past 15 years, yet i hear her pieces read frequently on the s.m. show. please. stop.

as glenn greenwald and bob somerby have ably pointed out: this woman is clearly not well. it's a wonder the n.y. times still employs her. her recent comments about the "dominatrix" (hillary) could have come from that mccain supporter. her taking a shot at your man, "obambi" is just another illustration of her historically vile treatment of dem. hopefuls (see also: gore, 2000 & kerry, 2004).

unfortunately, the m.s.m. read from one script--a script created by the likes of dowd, matthews, et al-- in which liberal men are wishy-washy pussies and liberal women feminist "bitches." (conversely, conservative men are "real" men--see: chris matthews' crushing on "manly" fred thompson.) i expect this brainless narrative from right-wing radio, but not from the n.y. times. "liberals" like maureen dowd (and frank rich, another of your buddies) have put cowards like bush/cheney in the white house and our bravest in iraq with these inane caricatures.

their constant derision of democrats begs the questions: with "liberals" like these, who needs conservatives? and when was the last time you saw a conservative columnist like william kristol or robert novak treat their own kind so... well, unkind? i hope you recognize the damage done to progressive politics by liberal-on-liberal attacks. we do the other side's dirty work for them. how smart is that? (insert hillary laugh here. real bright...if we like to lose.)

i like your show and listen daily, but i want to win in 2008. in order to do so we must not prop up people like dowd and rich. they are fatuous, fops--part of a millionaire press corp "serving" a(n increasingly dwindling) middle class nation. real issues are anathema to these people. they've got great health care, thank you..."diamonds or pearls?" more importantly, we progressives must not do our opponents' work for them. (insert howard dean hurrah here) we've already got enough work trying to win back the white house in '08.

your official "humorless, stick-up-the-butt-liberal" 5th grade teacher from long beach, ca
mr. c.

p.s. no, my shift key is not broken. i just don't like to yell. it's uncivil.


the stephanie miller show airs weekday mornings from 6-9 on ktlk 1150 am.

veterinarian's day

today, when we stood to say the pledge in my class, i asked my students why we had a holiday on monday. one of my students excitedly raised her hand. since she was an 'excel' student last year i expected the correct answer...

"yesterday was veterinarian's day!" she exclaimed.

while no one in the class even cracked a smile, i stifled my giggle long enough to explain that it was veteran's day--a day where we honor the service of our men and women in uniform who fight to protect our constitution and our freedoms.

later on i realized that this student might have been trying to be funny. last year her class may have laughed at her "mistake," but this year, i don't think anyone in my class knew what she was talking about!

d.i.a.b.

if you didn't already notice, take the poll at the top of this page on what i should dress up as for the halloween parade at school. fun! (i know: i should go as mr. garcia...!!! maybe next year...) since you already know what i look like in a DEV-O radiation suit, here's a picture of my colleague from stevenson, (and member of the whittier masters cohort) mr. r. and me dressed as the d. in a box guys from the SNL skit. (warning: adult language)

shout out to ms. velez for the fun halloween party friday night. thanks for letting us share our "gifts" with everyone!

4 electric seconds

not really related to teaching (although i did bring in my drums this past week to share with my students), i just realized i hadn't posted a video from 4 electric seconds. at the end of 2005, operator! went on a long-term hiatus due to many reasons, not the least of which was that the lead singer and lead guitarist were having a baby. i had just joined the thingz (after being unceremoniously kicked out of sexytime explosion), and was looking to play in another band with a more "modern" sound. that's when 4ES began. here's a song called "lawrence, kansas," named after the hometown of the band we copied in this song. (bonus points if you know the name of the band!) video courtesy of c.s.

his heart

today, an amazing, inspiring "teaching moment" occurred in my classroom! no, it wasn't when my principal observed me for 45 minutes. nor was it during my algebra "review" (from 4th grade). and sadly, it wasn't during one of my favorite writing lessons (figurative language).

it was when i shared a song by the old 97's that related to our open court unit 1 theme: cooperation and competition. here are the song's lyrics:

Alone So Far

I watch, as it stops for a girl,
A moment, elaborate and weak.
I am easy in her midst,
Why elaborate, when there's no need to?

But I do, all night,
My words ring like money off a bar.
But she's here, asleep now,
One can only go alone so far.

One can only go alone so far.

I dream of a deep dark grave,
Seven feet below Saint Augustine.
And she's so easy in her breathing,
Why fall in love, when there's no need to?

But we do all night,
Sleep like spoons, forget whom we are.
But she's here, and she's wound down now.
One can only go alone so far.

One can only go alone so far.

after i played the song on my guitar, i talked about how it related to geese that fly in a V formation--they can fly farther, cooperating in a group than they can flying alone. one can only go alone so far.

since we've been studying pronouns, i asked what the rather ambiguous "it" was that "stops" in the first line of the song. i told them i thought "it" could be a car, a bus, a train, maybe time. one of my students raised his hand and set me straight:

i think "it" is his heart.

my heart stopped too, when i heard that!

just to recap: today a "teaching moment" occurred when a 10 year-old taught me what a song lyric i showed him could mean!

same as it ever was...

thanks to the wonders of online advertising, the new york times' paid subscription service is now a thing of the past. (thank you pop-up ads!) today, one of the only reasons to read the paper--paul krugman--wrote an excellent op-ed about the historic failures of the conservative movement. here's one of my favorite parts:

KRUGMAN (10/8/07): People claim to be shocked by the Bush administration’s general incompetence. But disinterest in good government has long been a principle of modern conservatism. In “The Conscience of a Conservative,” published in 1960, Barry Goldwater wrote that “I have little interest in streamlining government or making it more efficient, for I mean to reduce its size.”

this is incompetence through self-fulfilling prophecy. to wit: conservatives don't believe government works, therefore it doesn't work. (see FEMA under bush versus clinton. it's true: "heckuvajob brownie" probably knew more than james lee witt about arabian horses!)

at the end of his piece, krugman gets big props for referencing one of the great "american rock bands," the talking heads:

KRUGMAN (10/8/07): Now, as they survey the wreckage of their cause, conservatives may ask themselves: “Well, how did we get here?” They may tell themselves: “This is not my beautiful Right.” They may ask themselves: “My God, what have we done?”

But their movement is the same as it ever was. And Mr. Bush is movement conservatism’s true, loyal heir.

come on: everybody who's seen the video--sing and karate chop your arm at the same time!

same as it every was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...

anniversary pt. II

today is the 1 year anniversary of my first blogpost!

...and el cumpleanos de mi padre tambien.

...yard duty and mi padre...

that's cool with me...

tambien.

anniversary

today is the anniversary of my birthday.

...and jimmy carter's, too!

...me and jimmy carter...

that's cool with me.