Week 15 Review

For this weeks review I watched the video on the announcement page.  This video is a song "Fly to Paradise."  I picked this because first off it talks about paradise and there is nothing I wouldn't do to fly to my own personal paradise right now (aka the beach of course!).  Second off I love music. I was in the band for over 10 years and found a love for instruments and the different ways they can be produced.  Music is awesome because you can always find different songs for the mood you are in.  I had never heard this song before, but I really enjoyed it.  The vocals were awesome, and I love the way it was produced with the making of the pretty voice but also adding in a nice background beat to bring it all together.

Fly to Paradise by Eric Whitacre's Virtual Choir

(Source: Youtube) 

Famous last words - Week 15

This is the last week for this class so I though I would reflect on my work from the semester.  I definitely could have done better in the class, but I was too distracted by my other classes.  I am taking 18 hours this semester so it was hard to balance everything plus work.  I also was very busy with my major and research and that took a lot of my time.  None of this acts as excuses but as I talk it out I realize how much I had on my plate.  I still am pulling A's in both of my online classes so I see it as a success.  I also I am very proud to look back at all the work I put into this class.  I wish that I would have spent more time and gotten more creative with my blog.  I also would have liked to add more stories to my portfolio.

    

(Photo Source) 

Tech Tip- Google Timer

For my last tech tip I thought I would check out the Google timer.  I never realized that google actually had a timer until I saw checked out this tech tip.  This Google Timer would be useful in many ways. I could have used it for my learning challenge with the Comodoro Resource Learning Challenge, or to time project presentations for class.

(Photo Source) 

Learning Challenge: Pomodoro Challenge

This week for my learning challenge I watched the video about the pomodoro technique.  This was a pretty interesting technique to watch since I'm the biggest procrastinator that I know.  I hate that I procrastinate things because it sometimes never makes me feel accomplished, or I have to rush through something and then I don't get a good grade.  I tend to beat myself up after I wait so long to get an assignment done.   I tried this out with one of my assignments and it really sorta worked.  I only tool a 3-5 minute break but that really was all the time  I needed. I feel like if I took a longer break I would have gotten distracted.  After my break I was ready to get back to my work and finish it.  I think that this method works well with me because the worst part of an assignment is getting it started.  But if I know that I am going to get a break within 25 min that might motivate met o go ahead and just start.

(Tomato Timer) 

Growth Mindset- You are Capable

For this last Growth Mindset assignment I decided to talk about how capable you are.  With finals and big life decisions college can be very stressful.  This stress sometimes causes us to think that we can't do it, or that thing get to hard.  Well I'm here to tell you that you can do it!  The more you tell yourself you can do it, you will succeed.  I truly believe that we can do anything we set our minds to.

(Photo Source) 

SO next time you find yourself stress and felling down your confidence remember everyone goes through hard times and you just gotta find a way to fight through it.  

Storytelling Week 12: Ashley's Regret

Author's Note: This week's storybook post was inspired by one of the many tales of The Twenty Jatakas Tales.  I focused my story off of the different stories in reading A named “The Golden Feathers.” This story is about a family who is very poor and the father set out to find riches to return with.  While he was finding fortune to bring back to his family he was turned into a goose with golden feathers.  He went back to his house and gave his family one feather telling them to sell it and that he would be back.  Before he retuned one time the mother decided that they should take all the feathers in case he never returned.  When this happened all the feathers turned white and were worthless.  This is a good lesson about learning that you have enough and to not be greedy.  The mother also learns that it isn’t smart to take advantage of the help being received.  Read my story about Kate and Ashley.  Here Ashley learns how important it is to not take advantage of people when they offer to help. 

 Ashley's Regret 

Kate Maxwell has always been one of the smartest girls in school.  Not only was she smart but also she was extremely nice and loved helping people. Ashley on the other hand struggled with school but was extremely popular.  Kate and Ashley lived on the same street so they saw a lot of each other out of school as well as in school.  

They weren't much of friends expect maybe a wave here or there or a “Hello” while passing.  One day during school Kate found Ashley crying in the girls bathroom.  Kate being the nice person she asked her what was wrong.  Ashley explained to her that she was failing her algebra class, and that if she did fail she wouldn’t be able to cheer on the squad.  Kate knew that very upsetting to Ashley since she was cheer caption and all.  Kate offered to help Ashley in her math class every day after school.  

Every day Kate would walk down to Ashley’s house with her algebra homework.  At first Ashley was very interested in learning what Kate was trying to teach her.  She took notes and was very organized with all the information Kate was giving her.  It didn't take long for Ashley’s grades to start to rise.  Once this happened Ashley figured out that since she took her homework over to Kate’s house every day she could trick Kate into doing the problems for her.  Kate thought she was helping Ashley but really she was just doing the problems for Ashley.  Ashley started to take advantage of Kate and found sneaky ways to get Kate to do the problem for her as a demonstration for that type of math problem.  Ashley would make comments like “I just don’t understand” with the most confused and sad look on her face.  This would make Kate feel bad for so she would tell her not to worry and show her how to do the problem.  Ashley stopped taking notes and worked more on her sad puppy dogface instead of learning how to do the problems. 

Ashley’s final grade for algebra all depended on her final test for the class.  Since Ashley was making good grades on all her homework, she didn’t even stop to think that she would be on her own for the test.  The test day came and when Ashley received her test on her desk she quickly realized that she didn't know how to do any of the problems because she was having Kate do them all for her.  Ashley ended up failing the test and the class, resulting in her not being able to be a cheerleader anymore.  Ashley regretted not paying more attention to Kate while she was helping her, but has learned to never take advantage of help that was being offered. 

(Photo Source) 

 Bibliography: The Golden Feathers tale in the book The Twenty Jataka Tales by Noor InayatRetold by Noor Inayat.  
 

Storytelling, Week 3- 'Princess Isabella

Princess Isabella 

In a kingdom tucked away in the highest mountains lived a little princess named Isabella.  Princess Isabella lived with her parents, the King and Queen, on the tallest mountain overlooking the kingdom.  Isabella and her parents were the only ones that lived in the tallest mountain, alongside the trees and animals.  Her parents moved her away from the village when she was born, because they had heard story after story about princesses being harmed or taken, and they didn’t want to take a chance of that happening. 

((The Castle looking over the Village, Photo Source)

As Isabella grew older and older she grew lonelier and lonelier..

Isabella loved her parents, but those were the only real people that she ever came in contact with, unless it was time for the doctor to make his monthly trip to give the princess her check-up.  Not only was Isabella isolated from the village; her parents gave her certain boundaries, and she could only travel so far away from the castle.  Isabella loved to be outdoors climbing trees, feeling the grass between her toes, and smelling all the beautiful flowers, but she always wondered what went beyond her limit.  Isabella was never sure what would happen to her if she were to go past her boundaries. Her parents always just told her that there was nothing special about going any farther, and that it would be a waste of time for her.    

The closest thing to a best friend Isabella were her dolls and the animals that roamed the castle and the castle yard.  Every day she would take time to visit all of her animal friends.  The first stop of the day was the caterpillars and ladybugs.  She would always bring them a piece of lettuce for them to eat, and they would always compliment how beautiful they were.  Next she would visit her pet pigs and horses.  One of her favorite things to do was comb and braid her horses’ hair, and they loved her so much for that, they would tell her stories of what was beyond her boundaries of the kingdom. The pigs were one of her favorite animals because they would tell her funny jokes and she would roll around in the mud with them (even though her mother hated that).  Lastly she would bring carrots to all the bunnies and they would cuddle with her with their oh so soft fur.  The only animal she wasn’t allowed to be friends with were the birds.  Her father, the King, told her that they are evil and will trick you into danger.   She listened to her father and never listened to the birds until one day a yellow bird told the princess that he would take her beyond her boundaries and have her back before sun was down. 

 Because Isabella was lonely and dreamed of the land beyond her limits, she quickly agreed and ran off with the bird for an adventure.  The bird was showing her all sorts of new things she had never seen before.  She got to see a pond and talked to the fish about what it is like to swim she smelled new flowers and climbed new trees.  It was starting to get dark and the princess suggested that they head back to the castle, but the bird insisted on eating some berries before they headed back.  The bird told Isabella that he must fly to get the berries and that he would be back shortly. She was to wait for him in that exact spot.  As she waited, she started to hear the bush leaves crumble, so out of curiosity she looked in the bush to see what was making the noise.  As she pulled back the leaves she saw a little squirrel that told her that the bird was only planning on killing her with poisoned berries, and that she must follow him back to the castle.  Isabella was surprised to hear this because she had such a nice day with the bird she couldn't believe that he was evil.

The sun was almost down, and she remembered what her father said about the birds being evil, so she decided to follow the squirrel back home.  The squirrel rushed the princess back so that the bird couldn't stop them before she reached the castle.  Once they reached the front step of the castle Isabella thanked the trustworthy squirrel and told him to come back and that they could be friends. 

After the princess's adventure with the bird she realized that there is evil in the world, and understood why her parents brought her to the kingdom.  She became content with all of her animal friends and never wished to leave her boundaries again.      

Author Note:

This story is based off PDE Ramayna part C.  In my story the animals help Isabella, and even save her life.  There isn't much about my story that relates to PDE Ramayna and none of the characters are the same and the story line does not fit the theme of Ramayna.  One of the only resemblance is that some of the animals in Ramayana were helpful. A squirrel helped Rama and his army of monkeys and bears who were building a bridge.  The squirrel brought tiny pebbles and grains of sand to add to the bridge. I always find it fun when you can bring an animal to life with communication, and this is why I chose to create my story around helpful and evil animals. This is a similarity between my story and the Ramayana.  Jatayu and Sampati, the monkeys, the bears, were all animals who communicated.  The purpose of this story is to show and learn from Princess Isabella that rules are sometimes made for our safety, and that we should respect them even if we don't understand them. Princess Sita learned a terrible lesson when she stepped outside of the circle boundary that Lakshmana drew around her. Both Princess Sita and Isabella learn how important it is to follow rules. Learning to follow rules is an important lesson for a young child; this lesson is something that is carried throughout life, and once you learn this lesson life can get a little more organized. The image I chose is to represent the castle that Isabella and her family lived in looking over the village.  I picked this because I thought it offered a good setting to picture when reading about Isabella and her adventure.   

Bibliography:

 The source from this story, “Princess Isabella” is Public Domain Edition: Ramayana Part C.