“Authentic Assessment for English Language Learners: Practical Approaches for Teachers”
“Making Content Comprehensible for English Learners: The SIOP Model (3rd Edition)”
“99 Ideas and Activities for Teaching English Learners with the SIOP Model”
“How the Soldier Repairs the Gramophone”
“Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel”
“Letters from a Stoic (Penguin Classics)”
3 of these are textbooks for my next Grad Class. And 3 are recommended reads.
I found Blurb, while sifting through Flickr tools. I was unsure about creating a book with them, because I didn’t know how the photo quality would turn out. I had my hang-ups. I wanted to feel and smell the weight of the paper. I wanted to inspect the printing quality. I wanted to see if the colors blazed like a moment in time. I wanted to eat it, firsthand. But, no.
I made 2 of the Standard Landscape books, which are 10×8 inches. They are 40-80 pages. The downloadable Blurb software is cake. I found it completely intuitive, simple, and easy to use. Everything is pre-customized. So, all you really need to do is pick a layout and drag-and-drop your photos. At the time, I thought some of the layouts could have been better, or there could have been more choices. Given a 10×8 page, some of the photo layouts didn’t make sense. The photos would have been too small or awkwardly chopped, IMO. Though, I think Blurb has added more choices with 2 or 3 software updates, since last year.
My impression of the finished books is a 4.5/5.
However, I’d like to redo the books. I want to make one large all encompassing book that spans the entire year in Korea. My books only covered about 5 months time. Blurb can make a book up to 440 pages, and I want to push that. I would also change the book size. I want to use the 13×11 book to showcase the photos better. These photos are more than memories; They’re art! The only problem with that is that I didn’t take high resolution photos. Most times, I used 1600×1200 pixels, and that wont cut it. Push those digital cameras to their highest settings, folks. Lastly, for the cover, I’d use the imagewrap. This wasn’t an available option at the time. I’m no fan of dust jackets. They slide, bend, and tear. I’d prefer a durable hard cover, like a bulky Calculus textbook.
Having this book would make it easier for me to get rid of the thousands of images I have saved. I don’t need to sift through all of them when I can quickly remember the moments with a single photo. I made these books for Mom, but over these months I’ve spent more time with them. To her, they’re probably just photos. To me, they’re memories of something I’ve been through and thought was beautiful.
There have been many occasions when I’d be reading something, and I came across this word. My logic could never make sense out of it. So, finally, I looked it up.
The word sic may be used either to show that an uncommon or archaic usage is reported faithfully: for instance, quoting the U.S. Constitution:
The House of Representatives shall chuse [sic] their Speaker…
or to highlight an error, sometimes for the purpose of ridicule or irony, as in these examples:
Warehouse has been around for 30 years and has 263 stores, suggesting a large fan base. The chain sums up its appeal thus: “styley [sic], confident, sexy, glamorous, edgy, clean and individual, with it’s [sic] finger on the fashion pulse.”
It is also sometimes used for comic effect:
The Daily Mail was the first newspaper [sic] …
The More You Know!
While reading, I came across this phrase, “Waste Not, Want Not.” I know I’ve heard it before, but the meaning didn’t seem clear. If we don’t waste something, … we won’t want it? I laid in bed thinking about it and looked it up this morning.
If we don’t waste what we have, we’ll still have it in the future and will not lack (want) it.
This definition makes it more comprehendable. ‘To lack’ something makes more sense than ‘to want’. They should change it to “Waste Not, Lack Not.” But, I suppose it doesn’t roll off the tongue as well.
I have some more thoughts on the wastefulness of food, but I’ll save that for later.
Kurt Vonnegut, whose dark comic talent and urgent moral vision in novels like “Slaughterhouse-Five,” “Cat’s Cradle” and “God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater” caught the temper of his times and the imagination of a generation, died Wednesday night in Manhattan. He was 84 and had homes in Manhattan and in Sagaponack on Long Island.
Mr. Vonnegut wrote plays, essays and short fiction. But it was his novels that became classics of the American counterculture, making him a literary idol, particularly to students in the 1960s and ’70s. Dog-eared paperback copies of his books could be found in the back pockets of blue jeans and in dorm rooms on campuses throughout the United States.
