books for all children: videogames

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Wednesday, September 25, 2013

BEAN DOG & NUGGET: Charise Mericle Harper Cooks Up Another Great Book Idea

This is an excerpt from an excellent blog entry by Charise Mericle Harper.

The other day I was at my son’s book fair, talking with his teacher. A few of my books were included in the event, and she picked one up and flipped through it. All of a sudden she asked, “Where do you get your ideas?” I’m pretty good at answering this question at school talks, but on the spot, I was speechless. I ended up smiling uncomfortably, shrugging my shoulders and saying, “I don’t know,” and then I quickly changed the subject.

On stage and in front of a group, I’m fine with the spotlight, but in a social situation, the last thing I’m comfortable talking about is me. Later that day, I started feeling guilty about how I’d responded. I should have made more of an effort to answer her, because her question was a good one. In fact, it was the exact same question I always want to ask other authors and illustrators. It’s why I’m always excited to meet them. I want to know: How do you do that thing that you do? Where do you get your ideas? And how do you get those ideas to swirl together perfectly so you can use them?

Read the full text of: BEAN DOG & NUGGET: Charise Mericle Harper Cooks Up Another Great Book Idea
Using simple text and cartoon-style illustrations, Charise Mericle Harper introduces young readers to a new graphic novel series, Bean Dog and Nugget.These two engaging characters capture young kids’ actions, reactions, conversations, imagination, and humor with spot-on accuracy. Kids will want to follow Bean Dog and Nugget and their adventures in each and every book in the series.
In The Ball, Bean Dog and Nugget lose Bean Dog’s shiny new ball in a bush. They dream up elaborate and silly ways to get it back while they argue about who is actually going to go and get it. Enter Superdog and Ninja Nugget for a hilarious ending that kids will love and relate to.

CHARISE MERICLE HARPER has written and illustrated numerous children’s books, including Just Grace; Wedgieman: A Hero Is Born; Wedgieman to the Rescue; The Power of Cute; Gigi in the Big City; Milo’s Special Words; Good Night, Leo; Pink Me Up; When Randolph Turned Rotten; Fashion Kitty; and Fashion Kitty Versus the Fashion Queen. She lives in Mamaroneck, New York, with her husband and their two children. Charise loves creating art and stories, petting her cat, drinking coffee, and eating pie.

The Juice Box Bully: Empowering Kids to Stand Up For Others … plus other books and resources

“Every child deserves the opportunity to have a successful early learning experience, which is the foundation for becoming a lifelong learner,” writes Bob Sornson, PhD, author of The Juice Box Bully: Empowering Kids to Stand Up For Others. “My work with the Early Learning Foundation is all about helping parents and schools be more effective building the skills and behaviors that help kids be successful.”

Juice Box Bully is part of my effort to teach kids to stand up and speak up for themselves and others, build healthy classroom and school cultures, and make the world a better place! Only by building safe and connected cultures will we get rid of the bullying behaviors that harm children. Punishing bullies is not enough. We must teach our children a better way.

Have you ever seen a bully in action and done nothing about it? In Juice Box Bully, the kids at Pete’s new school get involved, instead of being bystanders. When Pete begins to behave badly, his classmates teach him about “The Promise”. Will Pete decide to shed his bullying habits and make “The Promise”?
Bullying behaviour comes in many shapes and sizes, and being bullied in childhood can have lifelong effects, according to author Dr Sabina Dosani in Bullying (52 Brilliant Ideas) to Keep Your Child safe and Happy. Recent UK research indicates that 1 in 4 primary school children and 1 in 10 secondary school children are bullied at least once a term. Bullying makes children lonely, unhappy and frightened. Tackling bullying and its side-effects can be a very delicate business, and each case is unique. Often parents don’t know anything is wrong until events overtake them, or they can’t think of the best way to help their child survive the experience. Being armed with the right information about bullying, recognising the symptoms to look out for, and knowing effective ways of breaking the cycle of abuse can be crucial factors in ensuring your child deals with their tormentors in a calm, positive and proactive way. In Bullying Dr Sabina Dosani has put together 52 brilliant ideas to enable parents to help their children survive being bullied and become stronger and more confident people as a result. Including advice on identifying different types of bully, clever tips for not reacting to taunts, self-defence ideas for increased confidence and methods to take the wind out of a bully’s sails, Bullying will help you to help your child find their own empowering way to take control of the situation and rid themselves of the fear that being bullied can bring. In Bullying Dr. Sabina Dosani has put together 52 brilliant ideas to enable parents to help their children survive being bullied and become stronger and more confident people as a result.

In Tease Monster: A Book About Teasing Vs. Bullying (Building Relationships), when One-of-a-Kind”is laughed at by Purple for being weird and Green playfully calls One a klutz after tripping on the stairs, is the Tease Monster to blame? With words of wisdom from Mom about the Tease Monster, One discovers that teasing is part of life. And not all teasing is the same. One learns that laughing at someone (mean teasing)has a hurtful bite, but laughing with someone is alright when it’s not done out of spite. This the newest book in the Building Relationships series by Julia Cook.

Author Julia Cook has a phenomenal gift of writing books for children! Her books teach important life skills and are written through a child’s view of the world,” wrote Erin E. Bowden, M.S., Elementary School Counselor.
As an Elementary School Counselor, I have incorporated many of Julia’s books into my curriculum and must say Tease Monster is a powerful relationship-building tool. Children will quickly learn the power of words, how people hear things in different ways, and the importance of laughing with someone not at them. Tease Monster should certainly find its way onto your bookshelf if you’re a parent, school counselor, teacher, social worker, psychologist, or pediatrician.
*****
Social issues: About one fourth of all students from elementary age through high school are the victims of bullying and harassment while on school property because of their race, ethnicity, gender, disability, religion or sexual orientation. Unfortunately the primary reason for bullying is due to something that may set themselves apart from the norm.
According to recent statistics, ‘gay and lesbian teens are two to three times as more likely to commit teen suicide than other youths.’ The Bullying Statistics website continues:
About 30 percent of all completed suicides have been related to sexual identity crisis. Students who also fall into the gay, bisexual, lesbian or transgendered identity groups report being five times as more likely to miss school because they feel unsafe after being bullied due to their sexual orientation. About 28 percent out of those groups feel forced to drop out of school altogether. Although more and more schools are working to crack down on problems with bullying, teens are still continuing to bully each other due to sexual orientation and other factors.

In a … survey about gay bullying statistics, teens reported that the number two reason they are bullied is because of their actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender expression. The number one reason reported was because of appearance. Teens are at a pivotal point in their young adult lives when they are trying to find out who they are and who they are about to become as adults. This is why being teased, bullied and harassed is something that could negatively affect a person’s self-esteem and view of themselves for the rest of their life.
In fact, about 9 out of 10 LGBT teens have reported being bullied at school within the past year because of their sexual orientation, according to the most recent gay bullying statistics. Out of those numbers, almost half have reported being physically harassed followed by another quarter who reported actually being physically assaulted. Unfortunately most teens who experience bullying of any kind are reluctant to share their experience or report the incident to a teacher or trusted adult. Even more unfortunate are the gay statistics that report a lack of response among those teachers and school administration. According to a recent statistic, out of the students that did report a harassment or bullying situation because of their sexuality, about one third of the school staff didn’t do anything to resolve the issue.

Here are some other numbers:

About 42 percent of kids have been bullied while online with one in four being verbally attacked more than once.
About 35 percent of kids have been threatened online.
About 58 percent of kids and teens have reported that something mean has been said about them or to them online.
Other bullying statistics show that about 77 percent of students have admitted to being the victim of one type of bullying or another.
The American Justice Department bullying statistics show that one out of ever 4 kids will be bullied sometime throughout their adolescence.
46 percent of males followed by 26 percent of females have admitted to being victims in physical fights as reported in one report of bullying statistics by the Bureau of Justice School.

Other bullying facts:

As these bullying statistics indicate, bullying is just getting worse in American schools. Many studies have shown that increasing domestic violence at home are leading to an increase in bullying online and at school.
Researchers note that one way to help begin to lower these bullying statistics is to tell an adult when it is happening.
According to the i-Safe American survey of students bullying statistics, about 58 percent of kids admit to never telling an adult when they’ve been the victim of a bullying attack.
Another way to stay safe from bullies is to inform the school if the attacks are taking place on school property or have something to do with the school.
Ignore messages sent by cyber bullies.

See also: Bullying 101: The Facts About Bullying, by E.M. Lemus. Are you tired of sitting idly by while bullying becomes more and more frequent in the lives of our young people? The statistics around bullying are staggering. This book will provide information that you need to stop being a bystander and become a key player in helping to end the bully cycle. Learn about the different types of bullying, how to identify it and the laws that currently surround this epidemic by becoming a part of the revolution that says enough is enough.
As an added bonus, the last chapter will give you specific information regarding your state’s laws and what actions they are taking, if any, to combat this issue.

Wednesday, August 21, 2013

Creative Writing Lesson Plan

“Perhaps then, someday in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer. ” —Rainer Maria Riike, Letters To A Young Poet.

Welcome to Summer 2013 Creative Writing!

NOTE: YOU WILL SEE DOZENS OF ENTRIES ON THIS SITE ABOUT LITERATURE FOR YOUNG PEOPLE. ONLY THOSE WITH THE CATEGORY “Creative Writing Summer 2013″ ARE REQUIRED FOR THIS CLASS. THE REST ARE RECOMMENDED READING.

This video shows, as one commenter said, how “poetry (like all art) is subjective… I may like Disturbed, you may like Lady Ga Ga, he may like Jack Johnson, she may like Bethoven. None of it is wrong. It’s art. An expression that can not be measured except by how it moves you. (or doesn’t move you).”
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Be sure to review the syllabus for this class. It can be found by CLICKING HERE or by using this link: http://youngpeoplespavilion.com/summer-2013-creative-writing-syllabus/
A few important reminders:

* Check this website regularly for class updates and material. If you have a question such as: “I missed class, can you tell me what we did and what is due?” … this website is the spot to find your answer.

Recommended Reading: Letters to a Young Poet, by
Rainer Maria Rilke

* Click on the “Creative Writing Summer 2013″ category below this post, and all class lesson plans (posted as of that date) will come up.

* This site will also be used for updates and announcements.
* Each class will include a 10 point “What I have learned in this class” assessment.
* All writing that will be graded must be submitted to me as a Microsoft Word Document. We will have time in class for you to transfer work from your flash drives.
* We have chosen certain texts that exemplify the craft of creative writing. If at any time a student/parent objects to any material used, I would be more than happy to accommodate by working together with all parties to choose an alternate text.
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In class today:
Class overview and syllabus review
Introductions
What is Poetry?
VIDEO: “O Captain! My Captain!” by Walt Whitman (See: Summer 2013 Creative Writing Videos)

Assessments:
1) What I have learned in this class (10 points) Due by end of class period 6/10/13.
2) There will be a quiz on Literary and Poetry Terminology (25 points). It will be short answer and multiple choice. Given in class Wednesday, 6/12/2013.
3) FIRST WRITING ASSIGNMENT: Write your own poem: (50 points). Due Friday, 6/14, 2013. (See: Summer 2013 Creative Writing Assignments)
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What is poetry?
SOURCE: http://www.poetry.org/whatis.htm
Poetry (ancient Greek: ποιεω (poieo) = I create) is an art form in which human language is used for its aesthetic qualities in addition to, or instead of, its notional and semantic content. It consists largely of oral or literary works in which language is used in a manner that is felt by its user and audience to differ from ordinary prose.

It may use condensed or compressed form to convey emotion or ideas to the reader’s or listener’s mind or ear; it may also use devices such as assonance and repetition to achieve musical or incantatory effects. Poems frequently rely for their effect on imagery, word association, and the musical qualities of the language used. The interactive layering of all these effects to generate meaning is what marks poetry.
Because of its nature of emphasising linguistic form rather than using language purely for its content, poetry is notoriously difficult to translate from one language into another: a possible exception to this might be the Hebrew Psalms, where the beauty is found more in the balance of ideas than in specific vocabulary. In most poetry, it is the connotations and the “baggage” that words carry (the weight of words) that are most important. These shades and nuances of meaning can be difficult to interpret and can cause different readers to “hear” a particular piece of poetry differently. While there are reasonable interpretations, there can never be a definitive interpretation.

Click in this link http://www.poetry.org/whatis.htm to read more, including

Nature of poetry

Sound in poetry

Poetry and form

Poetry and rhetoric

History of poetry

VIDEO: “Literary Devices” (See: Summer 2013 Creative Writing Videos)
TERMS:
1) figurative language
2) simile
3) metaphor
4) personification
5) hyperbole
6) alliteration
7) onomatopoeia
8) assonance
9) consonance
DEFINITIONS
1) communicates ideas beyond the ordinary, literal meaning of words
2) compares unrelated nouns, usually using the words “like” or “as”
3) an implied comparison that does not use the words like or as
4) giving human characteristics to inanimate objects, ideas, or animals
5) an exaggeration for the sake of emphasis, not to be taken literally
6) repetition of the initial letter or sound in two or more words in a line of verse
7) a word that represents or imitates natural sounds
8) the similarity or repetition of a vowel sound in two or more words
9) the repetition of final consonant sounds within a line of verse
HERE ARE A FEW EXAMPLES:
1)

Alright, the sky misses the sun at night.
Hear the mellow wedding bells. – Edgar Allen Poe
Out of reach, I pull out with a screech.
I move fast like a cheetah on the Serengeti.
Her head was spinning from all the new information.
The toast jumped out of the toaster.
I’m so hungry I could eat a horse.
The Sea lashed out in anger at the ships, unwilling to tolerate another battle.
The Redcoats are coming!
I’ve told you a million times to clean your room!

2)
A Red, Red Rose
O My Luve’s like a red, red rose,
That’s newly sprung in June;
O My Luve’s like the melodie
That’s sweetly played in tune.
As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in luve am I;
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear
While the sands o’ life shall run.
And fare thee weel, my only luve,
And fare thee weel, awhile!
And I will come again, my luve
Tho’ it ware ten thousand mile!

Robert Burns
1759-1796
Here are examples of similie poems by Denise Rodgers:
Link: http://examples.yourdictionary.com/examples-of-simile-poems.html
3) One of the most prominent examples of a metaphor in English literature is the All the world’s a stage monologue from As You Like It:

All the world’s a stage,

And all the men and women merely players;

They have their exits and their entrances; — William Shakespeare, As You Like It, 2/7^[1]

This quote is a metaphor because the world is not literally a stage. By figuratively asserting that the world is a stage, Shakespeare uses the points of comparison between the world and a stage to convey an understanding about the mechanics of the world and the lives of the people within it.

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ThinkWave.com will be used for grading.

Saturday, August 17, 2013

Creative Writing Lesson Plan

Nice job yesterday. I really enjoyed meeting all of you and was impressed by the way you exhibited seriousness about this class and about your writing. Keep up that attitude and we will have a very fruitful summer session.

Here are some materials for our Tuesday meeting:

Recommended Reading: Six Centuries Of English Poetry: Tennyson To Chaucer (1892) by James Baldwin

“Ain’t I a Woman?” is the name given to a speech, delivered extemporaneously, by Sojourner Truth, (1797–1883), born into slavery in New York State. Some time after gaining her freedom in 1827, she became a well known anti-slavery speaker. Her speech was delivered at the Women’s Convention in Akron, Ohio, on May 29, 1851, and was not originally known by any title. It was briefly reported in two contemporary newspapers, and a transcript of the speech was published in the Anti-Slavery Bugle on June 21, 1853.

Here is the text of the speech. I use the speech in this class because it has great examples of several of the literary devices we discuss. (See: Summer 2013 Creative Writing Videos)
The speech received wider publicity in 1863 during the American Civil War when Frances Dana Barker Gage published a different version, one which became known as Ain’t I a Woman? because of its oft-repeated question. This later version was the one recorded in most history books.
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VIDEO: Similes and Metaphors in Pop Music (See: Summer 2013 Creative Writing Videos).
We will also discuss the video: Pat Pattison on The Inspiration Behind Creative Writing: Poetry (See: Summer 2013 Creative Writing Videos). In it he refers to greatly inspired by Leonard Bernstein. Bernstein was an American composer, conductor, author, music lecturer, and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim. According to The New York Times, he was “one of the most prodigiously talented and successful musicians in American history.” He is quite possibly the conductor whose name is best known to the public in general, especially the American public.

Pattison refers to Bernstein’s Harvard lectures:

ON a November evening in 1973, in the final moments of the sixth and last of his Norton Lectures at Harvard University, Leonard Bernstein offered what he described as a personal credo: a summation of his beliefs about music as he looked into the final quarter of the 20th century.
He was, by then, nearing the end of his tenure as the university’s Charles Eliot Norton Professor of Poetry, an interdisciplinary chair despite its title. And in the weeks leading up to that evening, he had delivered nearly 13 hours of lectures, liberally illustrated with musical examples at the piano and on projected slides as well as in a handful of luminous videotaped performances with the Boston Symphony conducted by Bernstein.
He had drawn analogies between music and linguistics, and he had traced the increasing complexity of harmonic language from Bach and Mozart to Schoenberg and Stravinsky. Now, tying up the strands of his argument, he offered what in retrospect seems a prescient prediction.
Read the full New York Times article here.

Literary and Poetry Terminology
Here is a review of our terms and definitions from yesterday (Monday, 6/10/13):
TERMS:
1) figurative language
2) simile
3) metaphor
4) personification
5) hyperbole
6) alliteration
7) onomatopoeia
8) assonance
9) consonance

DEFINITIONS
1) communicates ideas beyond the ordinary, literal meaning of words
2) compares unrelated nouns, usually using the words “like” or “as”
3) an implied comparison that does not use the words like or as
4) giving human characteristics to inanimate objects, ideas, or animals
5) an exaggeration for the sake of emphasis, not to be taken literally
6) repetition of the initial letter or sound in two or more words in a line of verse
7) a word that represents or imitates natural sounds
8) the similarity or repetition of a vowel sound in two or more words
9) the repetition of final consonant sounds within a line of verse

Also, yesterday I opened class by reading the poem Annabel Lee by Edgar Allan Poe
Link: http://poestories.com/read/annabellee
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Meet Kioni “Popcorn” Marshall, (See: Summer 2013 Creative Writing Videos) an extraordinary 12-year-old poet from the Bronx. Despite her age, Kioni has earned the respect and admiration of the NYC poetry community by developing her own unique voice and bravely exploring mature themes like alienation, abandonment, loneliness, and abuse. Follow Kioni’s emotional journey as she prepares for her first featured performance at New York’s famed Nuyorican Poets Cafe.

Setting and Mythology: Creative Writing Lesson Plan

Recommended Reading: The Adventure Time Encyclopaedia: Inhabitants, Lore, Spells, and Ancient Crypt Warnings of the Land of Ooo Circa 19.56 B.G.E. – 501 A.G.E.

What is Adventure Time and why does a cartoon matter in Creative Writing? How can we use it to stimulate our own work?

First, let’s look at its concept and creation:

According to series creator Pendleton Ward, the show’s style was influenced by his time at California Institute of the Arts and his work as a storyboard artist on The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack. He tries to include “beautiful” moments like those in Hayao Miyazaki’s film My Neighbor Totoro, as well as elements of subversive humor. The show began as a single stand-alone animated short which ran for seven minutes. Ward created the short almost entirely by himself, and wrapped up production for the short in the spring of 2006. It aired in January 2007 and again as part of Frederator Studios’ Random! Cartoons on December 7, 2008. After its release, the short video became a viral hit on the internet.Frederator Studios then pitched an Adventure Time series to Nicktoons Network, but the network passed on it twice. The studio then approached Cartoon Network. The network said they would be willing to produce the series if Ward could prove that the series could be expanded into a series while maintaining elements from the original short.

WARNING!
Written by Lord of Evil Himself to amuse and confound the citizenry of the Nightosphere, Adventure Time Encyclopaedia is perhaps the most dangerous book in history.
Although seemingly a guidebook to the Land of Ooo and its post-apocalyptic inhabitants, it is in fact an amusing nightmare of literary pitfalls, bombastic brain-boggles and ancient texts designed to drive the reader mad.
Complete with secret lore and wizard spells, fun places you should visit and places where you will probably die, whom to marry and whom not to marry, how to make friends and how to destroy your enemies–this volume includes hand-written marginalia by Finn, Jake, and Marceline.
Arguably the greatest encyclopedia ever written since the beginning of the cosmos, it is also an indispensable companion to humans and demons who know what time it is. Adventure Time!

Ward quickly retooled the concept of the pilot; he wanted a potential series to be “fully realized”, rather than possess the “pre-school vibe” that the original pilot had. One of the major changes from the pilot to the series was the emphasis placed on the background art. Dan “Ghostshrimp” James, an artist, was tasked with fleshing out the background; reportedly, he was told to make the series look like it took “place in a ‘Ghostshrimp World’”. He designed major locations, such as Finn and Jake’s home, the Candy Kingdom, and the Ice Kingdom.Ward, with help from Pat McHale and Adam Muto, turned in a rough storyboard that featured Finn and an “oblivious” Princess Bubblegum going on a spaghetti-supper date. However, the network was not happy with this story, and asked for another. Ward then created an early storyboard for the episode, “The Enchiridion”, which was his attempt to emulate the style of the original short. Cartoon Network approved the first season in September 2008, and “The Enchiridion” became the first episode to enter into production.

Setting and Mythology:

The show is set in a fictional continent called the “Land of Ooo”, in a post-apocalyptic future about a thousand years after the “Great Mushroom War”. According to Ward, the show takes place “after the bombs have fallen and magic has come back into the world”. Before the series was fully developed, Ward’s original intention was for the Land of Ooo to simply be “magical”. After “Business Time” aired, in which an iceberg containing reanimated business men floats to the surface of a lake, the show suddenly became post-apocalyptic, and Ward notes that the production crew “just ran with it.” Ward later described the setting as “candyland on the surface and dark underneath”. Ward stated that he has never intended for the Mushroom War and the post-apocalyptic elements to be “hit over the head in the show”. In fact, he limited it to “cars buried underground in the background [and elements that do not] raise any eyebrows.” Ward has acknowledged that the post-apocalyptic elements of the series were influenced by the 1979 film Mad Max. Kenny called the way the elements are worked into the plot “very fill-in-the-blanks”, and DiMaggio noted that “it’s been obvious the Land of Ooo has some issues”.

The series also has a mythology, or an overarching plot and backstory that is expanded upon in various episodes. This backstory largely involves the Mushroom War, the origin of the series’ principal antagonist the Lich, and the backstory of several of the series principal and recurring characters, such as the Ice King, Marceline, and Princess Bubblegum. Ward has admitted that the details behind the Mushroom War and the series’ dark mythology form “a story worthy telling”, but that he feels that the show will “save it and continue to dance around how heavy the back-history of Ooo is.”

The show has received positive reviews from critics and has developed a cult following among teenagers and adults; Adventure Time has a passionate audience of both children and adults “who are drawn to the show’s silly humor, imaginative stories, and richly populated world.” Television critic Robert Lloyd, in an article for the LA Times, said that the series was a good companion piece “to the network’s [then] currently airing Chowder and The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack.” He complimented the setting and compared the two previously mentioned, noting that each take “place in a fantastical land peopled with strange, somewhat disturbing characters and has at its center a young male person or person-like thing making his way in that world with the help of unusual, not always reliable, mentors.”[2] He went on to write that the show is “not unlike CN’s earlier Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends, about a boy and his imaginary friend, though darker and stranger and even less connected to the world as we know it. Lloyd also compared it to “the sort of cartoons they made when cartoons themselves were young and delighted in bringing all things to rubbery life.”

Mike LeChevallier of Slate magazine awarded the third and fourth seasons of the show four stars out of five. In a review of the third season, LeChevallier wrote that the series “scores relatively high marks for storytelling, artwork, music, voice acting, and realization with its neatly wrapped, 11-minute packages of multicolored awesomeness.” He further complimented the show because he felt that “it scarcely appears to be trying too hard to attract attention, yet it does just that”. He did note that “the short-form format leaves some emotional substance to be desired”, although he noted this was inevitable for a series with such short episodes. In a review of season four LeChevallier positively complimented the show for “growing up” with its characters, and that “the show’s dialogue is among the best of any current animated series.” He concluded that the series possesses “strikingly few faults”.

The A.V. Club reviewer Zack Handlen summed Adventure Time up as “a terrific show, and it fits beautifully in that gray area between kid and adult entertainment in a way that manages to satisfy both a desire for sophisticated (i.e., weird) writing and plain old silliness.” He concluded that the show was “basically what would happen if you asked a bunch of 12-year-olds to make a cartoon, only it’s the best possible version of that, like if all the 12-year-olds were super geniuses and some of them were Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and the Marx Brothers.” Robert Mclaughlin of Den of Geek wrote that Adventure Time “is the first cartoon in a long time that is pure imagination”. He heavily complimented the show for “its non-reliance on continually referencing pop culture [...] and the general outlook is positive and fun.” Eric Kohn of IndieWire said that the show “represents the progress of [cartoon] medium” in the current decade. Kohn also enjoyed the way the show not only revels in “random, frequently adorable and effusive” aspects, but also “toys with an incredibly sad subtext”. Entertainment Weekly named Adventure Time #20 on their The 25 Greatest Animated Series Ever list. Later, in 2013, Entertainment Weekly reviewer Darren Franich awarded the series an “A” and called it “a hybrid sci-fi/fantasy/horror/musical/fairy tale, with echoes of Calvin and Hobbes, Hayao Miyazaki, Final Fantasy, Richard Linklater, Where the Wild Things Are, and the music video you made with your high school garage band.” Franich praised the series’ “consistently inventive” plotlines and its “vivid landscape”, as well as its continued maturation.
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And we will continue our discussion of literary devices including motifs, found in Titanic:
In Titanic the constant images of the ship sailing on the ocean are visual motifs. But these images themselves fall into two categories:

See this link for more info.

Because there are two categories of ship shots there would in fact be two motifs.

When the ship is shown in detail a particular idea is being presented. This idea is all about how great Titanic is and what an incredible achievement she is. These shots all present Titanic as a masterpiece, “the largest moving object ever built by the hand of man.” They also present the social structure of the ship because many of the details shown are those that apply to the luxury of the first class areas of the ship.
When the ship is shown in extreme long shot the idea being explored is completely different. The ocean dwarfs the ship and so the motif means that even though Titanic is so great, she is still insignificant when compared to the ocean. It is these shots that provide the visual dramatic irony of the film. We know how this film will end because it is an historical fact that the Titanic sank, but the characters in the film are unaware of the tragedy that is sliding towards them.

Four Twitter ideas for teaching concise writing, a FREE Ebook and other resources

Here are some activities that I will use in my 10th and 11th grade creative writing class this summer for TRIO/Upward Bound.

The strategies teach concise writing and are based on Twitter. However, the ideas can easily be adapted for other platforms including Facebook status updates or text messages.

SOURCE: Less Is More: Using Social Media to Inspire Concise Writing
1) Personal Writing: Students write a series of Twitter-esque personal “essays” (140 characters maximum, including spaces and punctuation). Topic ideas include the school year, life lessons, relationships and personal goals. Each one can be stand-alone, or each post can be part of a series. They might do this, for example, for personal writing or in the context of developing college essay ideas. They then develop one or more selected posts into a longer piece. Afterward, debrief: How did starting off by writing brief expressions of their ideas contribute to their writing process?

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2) Authentic Writing: Taking a page from Andy Selsberg, students find ways to contribute meaningfully and authentically to the world of the Web. Ideas include, as Mr. Selsberg suggests, writing descriptions to “sell” an item of used clothing on eBay, commenting on a YouTube video or contributing a product review on a site like Amazon, as well as participating in our daily Student Opinion discussions. Establish guidelines for good Web citizenship. Have students read each other’s posts and provide helpful feedback. How was this activity different from writing academic essays that only the teacher reads?

3) Poetry: Students read the Twitter poems by Billy Collins, Claudia Rankine, Elizabeth Alexander and Robert Pinsky. They then write their own original “Twitter poems” or rewrite a classic poem or one of their own poems in 140 characters or fewer. They can also look further into the history and impact of brief poems, like Ezra Pound’s “In a Station of the Metro” and William Carlos Williams’s “So Much Depends.”

4) Creative Writing: Students write pieces inspired by so-called Twitter novels and cellphone novels, either by writing the equivalent of an original story or novella 140 characters at a time, or by “crowd-sourcing” the work, by having each student contribute a line, in turn, to a class novel.
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