pinkeyerobot

Read to the Kids!

2008-05-17T01:51:06Z

Regarding the importance of reading to children from an early age (MTCer's see comments here), an idea has occurred to me from time to time for a family literacy program. The idea is to establish an evening program where poor, at-risk families ar...

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Creole or Not Creole

2008-05-06T06:20:20Z

A crash course on Ebonics, or AAVE, should be required reading for everyone in Mississippi Teacher Corps -- not so we can understand what our students say, but why. Looking at it from a linguistic perspective is a lot more interesting and compass...

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David and Goliath

2008-05-06T03:16:06Z

The killing continues in Palestine. My friend is there.

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New Rules

2008-04-27T22:24:11Z

I am starting to do a fair bit of thinking and planning for next year. Now that I understand my school and the students better, it is time to rewrite my classroom rules. Originally, I began with some vague, pretty-sounding sentiments about “respe...

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I Am That Crazy Bicyclist with a Camera

2008-04-27T03:45:28Z

All of these photos were taken today, on my ride to Rosedale, Skene, and other locales around Bolivar County, Miss. Today's roadkill count: 2 armadillos 2 possums 5 baby possums 1 raccoon 1 turtle 1 or 2 dozen assorted mice, snakes, etc. I [hear...

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Best and Worst Sports in the World

2008-04-27T02:26:32Z

And now for a random opinion... The best sports are exciting and beautiful because they involve constant action and movement. These games involve tremendous skill and athletic prowess, but never for their own sake. The essence of the game is move...

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Deconstructing My Misery

2008-04-13T01:13:04Z

My mental health has been the defining issue of my Mississippi Teacher Corps experience. I first began this effort by recapitulating my feelings about the Teacher Corps program, because the prospect of writing retrospectively about my own two yea...

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Black and White

2008-03-27T02:23:57Z

It has been so hard to write anything lately. To paraphrase another Teacher Corps friend, it takes hope to write. So true. But it takes a precise, certain kind of hope, to me, like a belief in the meaning of your own words. There have been plenty...

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Almost Worse Than Nothing

2008-03-02T05:31:21Z

Over dinner this evening with a couple first-years on their way back from Oxford, where we each ordered huge, bloody steaks and whiskey, and where my view of whatever college basketball game happened to be showing on TV was obstructed by the thre...

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Tipping Drunks for Directions

2008-02-01T04:23:33Z

Two figures collide at speed and strange angles, the arms and legs in random directions and pieces falling off. Two thousand, she says, and writes it on a scrap of paper salvaged from the bottoms of pockets. The woman shouting sex and something i...

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