Comets win the 2009 Spirit Bowl! Congratulations to Todd, Tim, and the team! Photo credit: Jim Kelly
There are no school announcements for this week.
See yesterday’s post for your assignments.
Need something else to do? You know where to look.
Best wishes for your big day, David!
Behold, the The Average Color of the Universe. Click through for an explanation.
Tomorrow is the Spirit Bowl. All students need to come to school in the morning. Those who are not playing in the tournament will be working on a variety of projects here on campus.
Humanities: Find a book or story from when you were small. Make a Vonnegut-style story graph for the story or book. Your graph can be made with pen(cil) and paper, or on the computer. Keep it simple. Bring the graph and story to class on Monday.
Humanities: Do you owe me an email from yesterday?
Humanities: Is your Middle Ages project on schedule?
Math: Today was a catch up day for concepts. There will be a quiz on Monday. Take this time to do extra problems and test your understanding. Use old homework assignment and the problems on your online textbook. If you are set, you can go ahead do the Practice or Enrichment for 3-1.
Problem solving: The ball was dropped on this assignment this week. Have the assignment completed and ready to discuss on Monday. If you do not remember what this refers to, check the post for November 2.
Science: We discussed yeast and fermentation. We struggled to find a question to test. We decided to test the relationship between sugar concentration and the carbon dioxide produced by yeast. To prepare for our experiment, e-mail me a complete list of materials you think we need to conduct our experiment. This is due Friday.
Español: Escriban un horario de una semana en español.
Media Literacy: Call to Action 5 is due Wednesday, November 18.
That’s it.
Carwai has another math/science update on her blog.
This assignment (due on Wednesday, November 18) is from Lisa A. Please see or email her with questions.
Create an ad collage. You can cut out magazine ads, use internet ads or do something on your laptop. Be creative!
For all Lego fans: What terms do you use to describe the different pieces?
Which of the three stories that we’ve read so far from “Some of the Kinder Planets” is your favorite? Why? Send me a quick email with your answers.
Humanities: Make a Vonnegut-style story graph for any of the stories or books that we have read in class this year. Your graph can be made with pen(cil) and paper, or on the computer. Keep it simple. Here is a list of literature we have read so far: Skellig, In Ned’s Head, “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings”, “The Night of the Pomegranate”, “Tashkent”, and “Strangers on the Shore”.
Humanities: Take some time to look at the “Strangers on the Shore” post that I made earlier today. Click through on the many links that it contains.
Humanities: Optional: Create an xkcd-like narrative chart of any book, story, or movie.
Math: We are wrapping up Chapter 2 and practicing multiplying and dividing integers. Quiz 3 is ready so those who want to take it tomorrow may and those who would like extra time to review may take the quiz on Monday. The homework is to complete the odd problems on Practice 2-6 and 2-8.
Español: Terminen de hacer página 56 ejercicios 30 y 31.
Update: Arts: Those of you who are now with Carrie need to do two things tonight: (a) Jen has posted some reflection questions. Send her an email me with your answers. (b) Sketch some ideas for your bas relief project.
We’ll see you in the morning.
Regarding today’s story “Strangers on the Shore” from Tim Wynne-Jones’s Some of the Kinder Planets: Acker Bilk is not a fictional character and he does play a song called “Strangers on the Shore.” And here is a video of Dizzy Gillespie on The Muppet Show. He plays his trumpet at the 1:39 mark.
Some of the other names that appeared in the story with links if available: Lester Lanin, Nat King Cole (video here), archy and mehitable (purposely not capitalized, more here); Scheherazade; Saint Mechtilde of Hackeborn; Uz; Nahor; Pildash (briefly mentioned in this article); Ashmolean; Smithsonian; and Rance Mulliniks.
You’ll also need these “Movie Narrative Charts” for tonight’s homework. The large version is here.
You’ll need this post (reblogged from tcsnmy7) for tonight’s homework.
Kurt Vonnegut was an American writer whose work you will likely discover in the coming years. Before he became a full-time writer he studied science and engineering and worked at General Electric (GE).
Above is a graph he made of the story “Cinderella”. It comes from series of similar graphs that he invented for stories. More can be found here. You can read also read an explanation for the “Cinderella” graph on the same page.
Take a look at Rosana’s Español NMY blog. She’s just posted images from Día de los Muertos.
As you go about completing homework assignments, posting to your blog, and working on projects, don’t forget to pay attention to detail. If the documents and objects you share are sloppy, incomplete, misspelled, unorganized, etc., your viewers will likely interpret such as a signal that you don’t care much about your work. Furthermore, if you are not turning in your assignments or if they are incomplete, you are forgetting the NMY Constitution and Habits of Mind that we (including you) have spent so much time creating and discussing.
Speaking of completing your homework, Carwai and I are still waiting to receive emails from many of you. Make changes to the your self-evaluation document to reflect our conversation during your conference. Then send us a copy.
Humanities: Are you on schedule with your Middle Ages project? We had limited time in class today, so make sure that you spend some time at home catching up.
Humanities: Optional: Make a Google Map (click “My Maps”, then choose “Create new map”) with the city locations from the Some of the Kinder Planets story “Taskent” that I read to you this morning. Here is the list of cities: Zagreb, Ibadan, Bilbao, Uppsala, Singapore, Tunapuna, Taskent, Sofia, Anchorage, Reykjavík, Kowloon, Rangoon, and Dar es Salaam.
Math: We are reviewing and working on one of the toughest skills you will have to get in math, subtracting integers. You have a choice of homework assignments. If you are still figuring out how to subtract integers, work on Skills Practice 2-5. If you are feeling confident, you can work on Practice 2-5 or do the “Sock Holder” graphing sheet.
Science: Check out the video resources on the Math/Science Tumblr.
Español: Hagan un dibujo de la clase usando el vocabulario que aprendieron hoy en clase.
Media Literacy: Call to Action 4 is due tomorrow.
Have a great game this afternoon!
I know that science and math are Carwai’s domain, but I’m going to share this with you anyway because I like math and I also like jokes. Wikipedia has an article devoted to mathematical jokes. Many of them will not make sense to you until you have studied more math, but you should appreciate some of them, like this one:
A physicist, a biologist and a mathematician are sitting in a street café watching people entering and leaving the house on the other side of the street. First they see two people entering the house. Time passes. After a while they notice three people leaving the house. The physicist says, “The measurement wasn’t accurate.” The biologist says, “They must have reproduced.” The mathematician says, “If one more person enters the house then it will be empty.”
If you like that, see the article for more. There’s another math joke you might like (in equation form) on this post by Jason Kottke (where I first read of the Wikipedia article).
In addition to the Organization Workshops, there will be no Open Studio this Wednesday, November 4, and on Wednesday, November 18. You will spend that time working with Lauren and Lisa on your Media Literacy projects.
