What In Tarnation?!?!?

Awhile ago I was invited to be an author at EdBlogger Praxis. I finally got around to putting up my first post, you can find it here. The group blog take a look at educational uses for blogs and content management systems. Naturally, most of the folks there are using blogs with much older students. In my entry, I explain my initial goals of using a CMS on my class website.

I was quite flattered that Albert would invite me to be an author, and I was a little astonished at my Author description:

Christopher Wright
Pioneer Edblogger is author of Mr. Wright’s Third Grade Class

Never considered myself a pioneer.
____

Here is one for cool link of the month. I found this via webel (-) net. It is probably the cleverest parody of the Matrix. So, if you ever wondered what it would be like to play ping pong in the Matrix, it would probably go something like this…
____

Smiles everyone…smiles…Welcome to 1978! Let’s buy fantasies from Mr. Rourke! Let’s activate the Wonder Twins Power every Saturday morning! Let’s ease on down the road with Michael Jackson, Diana Ross, and The Wiz. Let’s try not to turn our Batman Underoos into Aquaman Underoos, over night!

I have seen just about all 10 hours of “I Love the 70’s” on VH1. I really enjoyed the “I Love the 80’s” (more so than the 70’s since I can remember the 80’s) so I was looking forward to this. I would like to state for the record that I am thankful that I am a child of the 80’s rather than the 70’s.

Bring on “I Love the 80’s Redux!”
____

One of the entries that has been getting the most hits from search engines is The Essential 55, my review of the excellent book by Disney’s Teacher of the Year, Ron Clark. Recently I received a comment on that entry from someone claiming to be Ron Clark. I didn’t get my hopes up to much because if I were to believe everything I would thing that George W. actually posted a comment here at WIT?!?!? To confirm Ron’s identity, I e-mailed him and I reviewed a reply back. I will just say that I am 99.9985759854% sure that the commenter is who he claims to be, in which case, that is dang cool!

A special thanks to Mr. Clark for stopping by and taking the time to comment.

Class dismissed!

Got two sets of Friday Fives for you:

Friday Five L,a: “School Maze”

1. Are you going to school this year?
Well yes, I am. I am a third grade teacher. Folks would be unhappy if I didn’t show up.

2. If yes, where are you going (high school, college, etc.)? If no, when did you graduate?
Right now I am going to Wyman Elementary School. I graduated from Sullivan High School in 1996 and I then moved onto East Central College and graduated with an Associate degree in 1998. Finally, I graduated from Southwest Baptist University in December of 2000.

3. What are/were your favorite school subjects?
I always enjoyed going to music class and reading and history classes, I have fond memories of.

4. What are/were your least favorite school subjects?
Spelling and math. I despised both.

5. Have you ever had a favorite teacher? Why was he/she a favorite?
I have fond memories of all my teachers, but I would have to say that my favorite was my fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Buxton. There was always something interesting going on in here class. Some activities that I remember, Name that person or place, the person who correctly identified the most pictures got $1.00, and I also loved our current events time, when students would bring articles from the newspaper and share them with the class. Mrs. Buxton would pin the news stories on the the current events board and the class would discuss them. I remember that someone found a small article about a dead body that was found in the trunk of a car in longterm parting at Lambert Airport in St. Louis. We followed that story for a couple of months. It was quite exciting.

Friday Five L, b: “A Little More Clarity, Please”

These questions are from Bryan from Clarity Amidst Chaos, personally constructed for me.

1. What’s the most frustrating experience you’ve had as an educator?
One is not jumping out at me over all the other frustrating expereinces, but there is a common theme to all the frustrating expereinces that are coming to mind: parents. There are two types of frustrating parents that I have encountered, so far: 1) Overprotective, taking up all the child’s struggles, even when they shouldn’t and 2) Parents who don’t give a rat’s patootie about anything. Though the first one is more in-your-face-call-at-all-hours-of-the-night type, the second variety is by far the most frustrating.

Oh, and the standardized test that third grade takes every year are frustrating as well because, quite frankly, they aren’t developmentally appropriate for most third graders.

I think that about covers it.

2. Why is the public school classroom a vital location for the presence of technology?

Several reasons:

1. Motivation, motivation, and motivation. The likelihood that kids are going to learn something when they are not interested is pretty low. One of the challenges of teaching is making everything, even adverbs, as exciting as their GameBoy. Not an easy task. Now imagine, in the case with my class and the Palm handheld computers, teaching kids about adverbs on “GameBoys!” We have the spark of motivation. My struggle right now is getting to the point where we can do that. I’m still teaching them how to use the “GameBoy.” Last year when I used the Palms for about a month after test with my class I made a few observations:

As I have been preaching here for the past couple weeks motivation is key, to point: a) Attendance is up. In fact, I have had to force some kids to home when they were sick. b) Behavior issue are down. I have integrated use of the handhelds into the classroom discipline policy. Not being resposible, you can’t use the handhelds. c) I have not heard one compliant about about writing the previously discussed essay. (Writing is one thing that kids will complain about the loudest, in my experience at least.)

2. The earlier kids learn basic technology skills, the farther they can go with them and the more proficient they can become with them. Our society is becoming increasingly run by technology. I say let’s give all students the knowledge and tools that are becoming a major influence in our lives.

3. In higher grades, technology can improve communication between teacher and student, but for me, technology improves communication between teacher and parent. I have recently implemented MovableType on my class website allowing parents and students to leave me notes and comments. E-mail has be a wonderful tool. No longer do I have to worry if a message got a note home and delivered it to mom and dad.

4. On a bit of a more practical point, our district has just finished writing its technology plan which is required by the State of Missouri. In it, the document outlines technology objective for each grade. Currently, we do not have the equipment to meet these objectives on the elementary level.

3. Using only five different adjectives that end in ‘y,’ describe your relationship with Pressed and Michael.
Before I begin my answer, a little refresher. (In class, we are just talking about sentences, subject and predicate, in English right now.) Adjectives describe nouns. They answer the questions what, which, and who. (I feel like I am doing a Mad Lib here.)

1.

(Ugh. This is hard.)

2. funny
3. silly (at times)
4. close (y) (Yup, I just made up a new word!)

(Well crud, I am coming up short on this one, so I will randomly pick a word…)

5. salty

4. What’s the most valuable thing you’ve learned from your mother?
My mother is the person who lead me to Christ in my bedroom as a child. So the best that that she and my father have given me is a firm understanding and support in the aspects of my spiritual life. Giving the gift of life… I like that.

Secondary to that, she has been an excellent example of what a teacher is. I haven’t ever really seen her teach a class but I see all the work that she invests into the lives of her students at home. I can only hope to emulate that.

5. What is best thing your church is doing right these days?
Well I have to say, I think my church is on the verge of some very exciting times. I think God is showing us a door to take our relationships to the next level, we just have to take that step, make that sacrifice to join Him. To that end our pastor’s sermons have been more personal, more intamate of late. Stressing relationship, genuine Christianity, not simply religion. There are going to be all kinds of opportunities in the coming year for people to respond through, relationships with other people, through ministry opportunities, throught study of the Bible, through prayer, and whatever else, God might have in store for us. From my perspective, it appears that God is moving the pieces into place for something God-sized to happen. Two very tangible things that I think are going to set a standard for more in the future is our first adult mission trip that will be happening in September, unfortunately I can’t go, but you can bet that I will be praying for them as they go to minister. The youth group has gotten some new blood from the seventh graders who are promoting up and they seem excited to be there. I’m looking forward to see what is going that happen in the coming months.

Whew, I’m tired. New Blog of the Month coming soon!

Class dismissed!

Have you ever had one of those days when unexpected things keep happening? I have had one of those days… going on the whole week now.

For your reading comfort the unexpected events in chronological order:

Monday
I decided to get the Palm handhelds out with the kids for the first time this year. Our objective was to learn the Grafitti (handwriting recognition on Palms) symbols and other Palm basics. I pass out all the Palms and I go over basic care instructions, how we hold it, how to remove the stylus, no touching the screen with yucky finger (or any fingers at all), etc. After that we go through the Grafitti tutorial on the Palm, there are about four students who continually complained that their handheld was not accepting their letters. I suggested that they just needed to practice more; they persisted so I decided that I would placate them and take a look. After close inspection, I discovered that four of the Palms magically obtained Graffiti 2 over the summer. I have no idea how they got them, I didn’t think Graffiti would run on the m130 model. I don’t know anything about Graffiti 2 other than it uses different symbols than Graffiti, and I don’t know how to use 2. Not sure how it all happened or how to correct it, I guess I will be teaching two different sets of Graffiti symbols.

Tuesday
We planned last year that we would be purchasing another set of Palms for a fourth grade class but because of budget problems that has not been possible so that fourth grade teacher has been stuck in limbo concerning the program. Tuesday afternoon, that fourth grade teacher strolled over to my side of the trailer and told me that he wanted to make a presentation at the PTO meeting to try and get money for the Palms and he wanted to know if I could help throw something together. I “threw” a PowerPoint presentation together about the program in about an hour, I went to the meeting and the presentation received rave reviews. The PTO voted to give us $5,000 (despite most of the parents were Kindergarten parents and their children would not see direct results from the money immediately) for the Palms and other technology needs.

Wednesday
Surprise IEP meeting! “You have plenty of time after school, right?” Too bad I had to get my car in the shop because the steering unexpectedly went out giving me the feeling that I was driving on ice about 50% of the time. Driving back to Sullivan on the Interstate was quite frightening.

Thursday
This morning my kids kept saying that we had four computers. Normally there are three computers that they use and one that sits behind my desk (the new one of course!) “Of course we have four; we always have had four computers!” I said. Almost all the students said something like that, which I thought was kinda odd. It wasn’t until I actually looked at the computers that I realized that there was a fourth student computer that appeared out of nowhere. Its origins are still being investigated. We also had two older desktop computers donated to the school today, quite unexpectedly.

Friday
We will see…

Class dismissed!

Don’t have time to make a real post so here is a quiz and a comic.

Quiz found via Clarity Amidst Chaos. Results should come as no surprise…

Threat rating: zero. Excellent work - you
demonstrate all the qualities of patriotism
that will make America even greater under Bush.
USA no.1!!!

What threat to the Bush administration are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

This comic (one of the best comics ever created) and link found via blogs4God and Ian.

The comic, better than anything, sums up my reason for blogging.

I have some stories to share with you but I also have a PowerPoint to make for math class tomorrow which at this second it more important. A real post to follow… soon I hope.

Class dismissed!

Most things have a beginning, a starting point. Blogs aren’t an exception to that. Recently I have been facinated how and when several of my favorite blogs started. I never considered making a post about it until today. So join with me as we take a look at a few of my favorite blogs climbing out of the primordial ooze, taking their first steps. (Listed in chronological order with a section of the first post.)

webel (-) net
February 8, 2002

welcome to the new webL. we’ll see how this works … but i think a glimpse into my mind can only be accomplished through little glimpses into little parts of my mind. like the medulla oblongata. compared to the cerebrum, that’s most definately a little part of my mind… [more]

asisaid with Tim Butler
February 21, 2002
Hiya!

My friend Ciaran Hamilton gave me this nice script, waddya think?

What in Tarnation?!?!?
March 5, 2002
It Has Begun

This is the first entry into my new blog. Now some people may ask, “Well Mr. Wright, what is a blog?” and that would be a good question. Good thing Mr. Wright is here to tell you huh? A blog can best be described as an online journal. However, it can be more than that… [more]

Time to Believe
March 15, 2002
My First Entry

This is is my first entry into the Blogging world. I plan to post my thoughts on a variety of issues. Please check back often and comment on any of my entries… [more]

Heal Your Church Web Site
May 01, 2002
For Immediate Release:

Rockville, MD, May 11, 2002 - Tired and frustrated with church and para-church websites that look like visual vestiges from the dark ages, Dean Peters, contributing author to “Son of Web Pages That Suck”, posts his own virtual 95 Thesis to the door of the Internet at http://www.HealYourChurchWebsite.org…. [more]

IdeaJoy
May 19, 2002

So I’ve been on the net for a while. (Early 90’s, pre web) And every once in while I like to experiment with faith and Tech. I was part of an early mail list with IVCF Canada, posted the started the second IVCF home page in Canada in 95, and I build the GUI Jesus back in 96. But it’s been six years since I mixed my faith with my passion for tech in public. So here I am playing catch up with those blogging kids… [more]

Avoiding Evil
May 24, 2002
My First

It’s time for my first entry into the blog. You would not believe the trouble I have been through just to get to this point. After many hours of sweating and screaming my friend came in and fixed my problem in about two seconds. *sigh*

Anyway I hope to complete some of the other things on my site soon so that it will be officially finished and ready to be released into the world for all to see! Ok so it’s a little dream I have, humor me.

Pressed

ireneQ
June 15, 2002
Thinking About My Webpage

I just signed up for this and I’m wondering how it will all turn out. My eyes hurt from staring at the PC screen since 2pm. I’ve been trying to figure out HTML! Thank God for Meg and her link to htmlgoodies.com. Printed out loads of stuff to read later coz my eyes hurt…. [more]

Where The West Begins
June 20, 2002
Installed!

Well I have successfully installed Moveable Type 2.11 on my Windows 2k box. I can’t wait to move it over to my solaris box. The solaris box is fixing to get overhauled with Solaris 9 thought, so I guess I’ll wait till then.

Tuesday Morning
August 7, 2002
My First Entry

Wow, OK, so this is new to me and I think I will just take this time to introduce myself, how does that sound? My name is Tony, IM 17 years old, and i live in a small town in Pennsylvania.

Future Hope
August 19, 2002
Back in the Swing

Well I am all moved in my room at Dallas Baptist U! Things are going great so far, and it is so good seeing everyone. Once again, from the moment I arrived, I was blown away by the presence of Christ on this campus. God never ceases to amaze me. I can’t wait to see what He has in store for me this year. Right now, I am going through SWAT (Student Welcome and Transition) leader training, and the new students will arrive Wednesday. I can’t wait to serve them and see how God changes their lives like He did mine through DBU. It is so sad how we get out of the habit of constantly serving others. To refresh our minds, please share a story with me below of how you have had a chance to serve someone this year. If you haven’t had that chance, pray about how God might use you to serve others in upcoming months.

Out of My Mind
August 26, 2002
Welcome

Welcome to my new blog! The name of my blog is “Out of My Mind”, as you can see. It is based on 2 Corinthians 5:13 which states:”If we are out of our mind, it is for the sake of God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you.” Many people think we as born-again believers are “out of our mind”, but as Proverbs 1:7 states “the fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge.” … [more]

Clarity amidst Chaos
September 30, 2002
in the beginning…

What a day…got a crash course on HTML by putting together this page. No doubt, if I were in college, I’d be guilty of code plagiarism. I’m not trying to steal others’ content, just their functionality. Isn’t that all Microsoft did? Maybe I’m the next Bill Gates — if only this total lack of computer skills wouldn’t keep getting in the way… [more]

The Living Room
November 27, 2002
The Living Room Lives!

After months - years even - of dreaming, prayer, conversation and writing this new community last night took a large step towards coming into being… [more]

Random ideas and commentary on life and ministry
October 10, 2002

Test.

Citizen of the State
January 20, 2003
Happy Birthday JD!

Ok, it’s late but it is here. I promised to make you a blog for your birthday and here it is finally.

Vertically Challenged
February 23, 2003
My First Entry

Welcome to my weblog. I have always loved to journal on paper, but I figured I would like to try blogging. This site will be my outlet of thoughts, opinions and expressions about life and education. Soon, I will have some information about myself and the purpose of my blog, but I’ll write that over Spring Break (March 1-9)… [more]

emerging minister
March 29, 2003
Blog? You know, they make an ointment for that.

So this is my blog. For those of you who know me and are new to this whole idea, a “blog” is short for a “weblog” which is basically an online journal. And now you know. So why on earth would I, a relatively private kind of person, decide to post random thoughts on the ole’ superhighway for all the world to see? Well, I’m not sure yet but I feel like it’s something I need to do… perhaps my struggle and strive will help someone else. Perhaps my wrestling with things will allow truth to show its face to someone I don’t even know. Perhaps, someone will connect with something and offer me something I need… a Godsend perhaps… we’ll see… [more]

Sophoristically Speaking
June 23, 2003
Devolutionization

Well, I suppose this is my first post on my first blog. I really don’t know how this all works, but it sounds like it could be cool…and fun. Maybe someday I can look back a year or two and see how I am mentally devolving… [more]

The Brog Blog
July 22, 2003
My First Time…

the first blog.

what a moment. Amazingly, absolutely nothing is on my mind right now… [more]

How fun to go back and look at the beginning whe you post your first entry and it is live out on the web and no one knew about it.

It is actually can be difficult to find the first entry for a blog. Overtime, databases become corrupted, blogs switch domains, sites switch blogging software platforms, and some blogs aren’t set up to search for a entry chronologically. What ever the case, if I don’t have your first entry posted or I didn’t get the very first one and you would like to include it in this list, e-mail me at wit (at) fidmail (doht) com and I would be glad to post it along with these “first” entries.

Class dismissed!

1. When was the last time you laughed?
Today. I laugh all the time when I am at work. With teachers, with students, whoever is available. The kids haven’t quite caught onto when I am kidding and when I am not so many times they will half laugh until I smile real big. One of my favorites:

Student: Can I go to the bathroom? (Or do something else.)

Me: I don’t know, got five bucks?

Student: (slight chuckle but very cautious) Noooo…

Me: Sorry, can’t help you.

Stundent: (even more tentative laugh with a slightly confused look on his or her face) Uh, well okay.

Me: Oh alright, but only cause I like you!

Student: You were kidding right?

Me: Yes.

Student: Good.

Me: (with arched eyebrow) Maybe.

2. Who was the last person you had an argument with?
I don’t get in arguments very often. I did disagree with a fellow teacher about something today, but we didn’t argue.

3. Who was the last person you emailed?
Two teachers, one of the teacher I am team teaching with, the other is the Title 1 Math teacher. I gave them my schedule in math for the next couple of weeks.

4. When was the last time you bathed?
I don’t bathe. I just don’t like the idea of sitting in your own filth. I do shower every morning. On weekdays, it is at 6:09 am sharp. Weekends, considerably later.

5. What was the last thing you ate?
A stale, leftover biscut that was leftover from breakfast at school. I only ate half of it.
_____

You’re Doc Brown from Back to the Future. So if
You’re Doc Brown, can you answer me one
question that’s always driven me nuts? Is Doc
Brown a stoner or is it just you?

Which 80’s Movie Character Are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

Also from the Thinklings: What are your top five sitcoms?

Here is my list:

1. Seinfeld (I know so predictable)

2. Newsradio (Dave Foley and Phil Hartman, so funny)

3. Dilbert (Just as funny as the comic strip and I couldn’t get enough of the guy who couldn’t control the volume of his voice)

4. Simpsons (Of course)

5. MASH

What are your top five sitcoms and answers to the friday five, tell me in the comments.

Class dismissed!

The story Fortunately by Remy Charlip is fun book to use with kids and it has several educational applications (predicting outcomes, cause and effect, patterns, etc.) Today I am going to use the story as a template for my entry.

School started for Christopher four days ago.

Fortunately, the two days of school went well.

Unfortunately, the third day the air conditioning in the school building stopped working, making the temperature in the building unbearable.

Fortunately, Christopher’s room was out in the trailer where the A/C was uneffected.

Unfortunately, the skies opened up and dropped huge amounts of rain upon the school.

Fortunately, it didn’t rain until after school got out.

Unfortunately, Christopher had to wade through lake Wyman to get to his car.

Fortunately, the fourth day went according to plan, except…

unfortunately, the bells and intercom are not working in the trailer and as a result, one student missed her bus.

Fortunately, the principal was able to take her to the day care she attented after school.

Unfortunately, one of Christopher’s other students was lost and could not be found on any bus or at the daycare that she was supposed to be at, though one bus driver swore that she got off his bus at the daycare.

Fortunately, she was found (she rode the wrong bus to her house, no one was there and she went to the house next door.)

Unfortunately, the skies opened up and dropped huge amounts of rain upon the school for the second day in a row.

Fortunately, it didn’t rain until after school got out.

Unfortunately, Christopher had to wade through lake Wyman to get to his car.

The end.
___

I have nearly completed my new classroom website. I moved hosts for this site, and I highly recommend BlogHosts. The front page of the website uses MovableType for announcements and news. I am using Gallery for the picture gallery (both of which BlogHosts installed for me for free). There are a few things that are puzzeling me. Maybe, just maybe, my techo superfriends can give me some advise. In the picture gallery I have tried to put some navigational links at the bottom of the page using these directions. However, sometimes the links display other times the PHP spits out some horrible error messages, I don’t know how to fix it. Arg! Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

Class dismissed!

Let’s take a look at what is going on in my blogosphere:

asisaid has a A Visitor’s Guide to Driving in St. Louis, Missouri. I laughed out loud.

Avoiding Evil is back to school.

Instant Gratification. Bene Diction shares a method to be IMed whenever someone is visiting your blog. I have implemented this and the results have been interesting. I even signed up with AIM to get the service. By the way, my AIM name is oobleckblocked.

Clarity Amidst Chaos helped me waste some time I didn’t have by linking to a compendium of cross-overs and spin-offs Most interesting to me was the lists of TV programs that exist in the same “reality,” all of these shows in the group are related somehow. My favorite list:

AFTERMASH
Ally
Ally McBeal
The Andy Griffith Show
The Beat
Becker
Beverly Hills Buntz
The Bob Newhart Show
Boston Public
Buddies
Can’t Hurry Love
Caroline In The City
Cheers
Chicago Hope
Civil Wars
Coach
Cop Rock
COPS
Cosby
The Danny Thomas Show
The Dick Van Dyke Show
The Drew Carey Show
Early Edition
Ellen
Everybody Loves Raymond
The Famous Teddy Z
Frasier
Friends
The Geena Davis Show
Gideon’s Crossing
Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.
Grace Under Fire
High Society
Hill Street Blues
Home Improvement
Homicide: Life On The Street
Hope And Gloria
I Dream Of Jeannie
I Love Lucy
Ink
It’s Gary Shandling’s Show
The Joey Bishop Show
The John Larroquette Show
The King Of Queens
L.A. Law
Law And Order
Law And Order: Criminal Intent
Law And Order: Special Victims Unit
The Lone Gunmen
Love And War
Mad About You
Make Room For Daddy
Make Room For Granddaddy
Martial Law
M*A*S*H
Mayberry R.F.D.
Millennium
Murphy Brown
N.Y.P.D. Blue
The Nanny
New York Undercover
Newhart
Nick And Hillary
Norm/The Norm Show
Oz
Picket Fences
The Practice
Private Secretary
Public Morals
St. Elsewhere
Seinfeld
The Single Guy
Sons Of Thunder
Soul Man
Strange Luck
Tattingers
These Friends Of Mine
The Tortellis
Trapper John, M.D.
Walker, Texas Ranger
The White Shadow
Wings
The X-Files

IdeaJoy teaches me the meaning of the word “slag.”

Joy Unspeakable has me singing Blue’s Clues songs. The voices won’t stop!

Mark Riddle has some ways to get under your convervative evangelical christian church’s skin.

God less America! from Simple Green.

Brog Blog tell us about a college class about “How to be Gay.” Huh? He has a funny list of proposed courses. (Aug. 18, 2003 entry)

kevin is complaining about the heat. (Not really.)

Michael recently tried a new food, frog legs. I was there.

TV Tattle has the latest skinny on all kinds of TV news. One new study is the first to show a clear link between TV-watching and obesity, well duh!

Anne has started student teaching. Go and wish her well.

Lance has an entertianing link: Twenty Questions anyone? It is kind of spooky, it got about half of my objects correct.

The LoneAggie got a computer virus!

While I have been compling this entry I have recieved 25 unique hits to various parts of my blog. Gotta love that immediate gratification.

Class dismissed!