Week 6 Review

Creativity = Hard work link

I realized this week that creativity includes a lot of hard work. I think when people think about creativity, they think of it as something that comes naturally to people and that it is something that requires no effort. This may be true in some cases but true creativity requires a lot of hard work. I don't necessarily believe that it's something that you are born with and that you can't improve it. I used to believe that I wasn't a creative person, but I think that anyone can become creative if they put their mind to it.

Week 6: Famous Last Words

This week, I was able to do both readings along with an additional one. I liked the additional reading that I did because it was of nursery rhymes which are typically very light and easy to read. I am also pretty happy about how my portfolio is coming along. I am proud of my writing and surprised at the same time with the things that I have been able to accomplish so far. I never thought about myself as a creative person but I think I am becoming better at this with more and more practice. Reading a lot of stories also helps a lot with this creative process and this class has introduced me to a lot of material that I probably would of never experienced if I did not take this class.

I also had fun reading other people's portfolios and their storybooks. Many people are really creative and they are great writers. It's really fun to see how other people can take the same story that you read and create a whole different scenario. Each person's point of view is really interesting and fun.

This week, I was also able to include some of the growth mindset concepts that I have learned in this class in an essay that I had to write about. This essay was about the grade inflation and the meaning behind grading. I was glad to be able to integrate the two classes and use what I learned in this class for another class even though the two subjects are completely different.

I think little by little I am becoming a better writer and learning more and more rules especially with dialogue. It's really cool that I'm also learning about studying habits and tips on becoming a more efficient student while having fun all at the same time. Sometimes writing is tedious when it is too forced but since this class gives so much freedom, writing is really therapeutic.

Writing online source

Growth Mindset Challenge: Growth Beyond School

Recently I challenged myself to do something that I would of previously ignored. I changed my cabin air filter and engine air filter. I ignored doing this for my car because I tend to think that I won't be able to do anything that is car related since I know nothing about it. Usually, I just take my car to the dealer and they take care of everything. However, this time I challenged myself to learn more about simple fixes for my car and I found out that some things are a lot simpler than they seem! Changing a cabin air filter is extremely easy and doing it yourself is a lot cheaper. Don't be afraid to learn.

Change a Filter youtube

Week 6 Reading Diary Extra: Nursery Rhymes

The Nursery Rhyme Book, by Andrew Lang

Babes in the Wood was a very sad story with the children losing their lives. I think I would like to write a happy ending for those children and include a long journey of the lost kids trying to find their home. They could encounter a lot of obstacles but eventually find their parents and return to those who really love them. I think it would be creative have the animals of the forrest help them along their journey or they could encounter many mystical creatures that could help them. There of course would have to be a villain in the story to make things more interesting. I like the believe that good wins over evil so I would make sure that the villain would not win.

While also reading over these nursery's, I got the idea to possibly write my story in poem form. I could also maybe use a rhyming scheme. My biggest challenge would be telling a story with this format since I am not really good at writing poems. However, I think it would be a really fun and new way to tell a story. It would be hard writing a long story in this format however. This might be a good challenge for me and my next story.

I also liked the paradoxes. I particularly likes the one that gave a lot of "what if" situations. I think humans ask this question a lot. For my next story, I might use a what if situation and create a whole story then have that person wake up from a dream.

What is the World was Apple Pie? By L Leslie Brooke

Week 6 Storytelling: How the Moon and the Sun Came to Be

Long ago there once was a brother and a sister who were very close siblings. Their father had passed away due to a terrible accident and just a couple years after, their mother became very sick with an incredibly rare disease. Before she passed, their mother gave each of her children a small gem that glowed very brightly.

“If in life you come across a very troubled time where there is no escape, swallow this small gem and you will be set free,” said the mother weakly. She placed each gem into separate lockets and hung them by a string around her son and daughter’s necks. Shortly after, their mother passed.

Since then, the brother took care of his younger sister and they both continued to live in a small house near the river.

One morning, the two siblings went out to the market together to get some fresh vegetables and meat. Upon their arrival back home, they noticed something strange about their house as several of their windows were shattered and their yard torn apart.

“Something or someone has destroyed our home! We should get help,” whimpered the little sister in fear.

“It will be okay. We must check the damage,” replied the brother.

Just then, a whole herd of lions dashed out of the house and rushed towards the brother and sister.

“Give me your precious gems or we shall devour you!” yelled the leader of the lion pack.

The brother hurriedly took his sister’s hand and they darted off as fast as they could. The brother knew that they would never be able to escape the lions so he quickly convinced his sister to climb a tree.

They both climbed up a tree and stood on one of the branches when they were far enough from the ground.

The lions however, cleverly began to use their claws to cut down the tree.

The sister looked at her brother with troublesome eyes and asked what they should do.

“The lions will never leave until they have our gems. We must swallow them like mother told us before she passed,” said brother.

They both swallowed their gems and as the gem resided in their stomachs, the gem began to glow brighter and brighter.

In that moment, the brother transformed into the sun while the sister transformed into the moon and they were able to forever escape the vicious lions.

That is how the sun and moon came into existence.

The Moon and the Sun flickr

Author's Note: My reading for this week contained many stories that explained how things in nature became to be. Even though of course these reasons aren't scientifically correct, many of these stories were easy and entertaining ways to explain something that many people had no idea why something was the way it was. I was particularly interested in "Why the Sun Shines More Brightly than the Moon" because it reminded me of a story my mother used to read to me when I was a kid. With this reading and the childhood story combined, I was inspired to write my own version of how the sun and the moon came to be. In the original story, the children cry to the heavens and a rope falls down that they climb into the sky. I changed that transformation with the gems that their mother had given them which was more inspired by the folktale by Dean Fansler. I wanted to write a story like this because it is a silly way of explaining something that is normally a bit complicated.

 You can read the original Korean folktale here.

Bibliography: "Why the Sun Shines More Brightly than the Moon" by Dean Fansler (1921) Web Source

Week 6: Google Timer Tech Tip

I like the Google Timer because it's right there on your computer screen whenever and wherever you need it. A tip is to keep it up as a separate window then work on what you are doing so that you can keep track or the pace you are on. When there is a timer running, you are probably more likely to stay on task. I also like to time my breaks because it's hard to realize how much time as gone by. With the timer, I can go back to work at exactly the time I set it on and not lose track of time.

Since I spend a lot of time on the computer, this timer would be very helpful to use and I'm sure it could be helpful to others as well.

During my breaks on the computer, I often find myself watching Netflix. I'll tell myself I am only going to watch 10 minutes of something then I end up watching the whole episode. The timer could help me keep track of when my 10 minutes is up.

Time Management flickr

Week 6 Reading Diary Continued: Filipino Popular Tales

Filipino Popular Tales by Dean Fansler

The Greedy Crow - The topic of greed keeps appearing in my readings. Most of the time, a character has a small portion of something but wants something better and bigger and ends up losing everything in order to get more. It's better to have something than absolutely nothing. I think a lot of people are tempted by greed and often times their actions are controlled by greed.

Why the Sun Shines more Brightly than the Moon -  I like the stories that explain why things became to be the way they are. Even though it's a made up story, it's interesting and amusing. There are a lot of unexplainable things in the world so I might want to write my own story about how the sun and the moon came to be. Maybe I can talk about the stars as well. This story could be very whimsical and imaginary.

The Sun wikimedia

Why the Cow's Skin is Loose on the Neck is also an example of how things are the way they are. I also enjoyed The Lost Necklace which explains why chicken peck at the ground. Maybe I can tell a story that explains why cows or flamingos stand while sleeping or why sharks continue to swim when they sleep. I could maybe also try and explain the seasons changing or maybe why there are earthquakes or other natural disasters. Why the Ocean is Salty was pretty clever to explain how salt got into the ocean. I could put a twist on this original story or come up with a new one like the ones I listed above. Some other ideas like this would be a story about why the wind exists or any other characteristic of an animal.

Week 6 Learning Challenge: Reading - Love it or Hate It?

For me, I have always loved reading as a kid. Getting AR points was never a hassle and I often went beyond the expected goal. Most kids didn't like rainy days because that means recess was spent inside. I didn't really mind however because if I had a good book to read, I would read through recess. Of course reading wasn't my life. I loved other things too like playing outside and playing games with my friends but reading never was tedious to me. As long as it was something I enjoyed reading. As I grew up, reading for fun happened less and less and reading a textbook for school happened more and more. This is when I started to be pushed away from reading. Reading because boring and dreadful. After reading a textbook, I didn't want to read a normal book. It wasn't until a couple summers ago that I read a book just for fun and now I make it a goal to read a book at least a few times a year. It doesn't sound like much of a challenge but when you get so caught up with school, work, friends, and family, you often push your books over to the side of your shelf and allow it to collect dust.

I also never really understood kids who hated to read. There's a different world in book and stories that you could never imagine. Maybe those kids haven't found the right types of books that they like to read but if I were teaching reading, I would encourage kids to read with someone. I always enjoyed reading to someone or having someone read to me.

These are some insightful blogs written by a reading teacher, Pernille Ripp.

Love to Read Again link

Week 6 Reading Diary: Filipino Popular Tales

Filipino Popular Tales by Dean Fansler

I liked this particular sentence in The Three Friends: The Monkey, the Dog, and the Carabao. "...he did not dare attack all three of them at once, for in union there is strength." I really like this because it reminded me of "united we stand, divided we fall". This is an important reminder for how powerful teamwork can be. There are many things that cannot be done alone. With a whole army of people, many things can be accomplished such as building the massive Colosseum. I might want to write a story that is based off of teamwork.

Carabao link

I did not expect the ending to go that way at all for The Clever Wife and Husband. I actually don't really like the ending because I wanted there to be justice. The husband and wife stole from the doctor who was always generous to them. They played tricks on them to get more money. At the end, when the doctor finds out they are both alive, he is very happy for the mere fact that they are not dead and invites them to live with them. The doctor liked them so much that he didn't care that they stole from him. It was unconditional. 

The Poor Man and His Three Sons gave me the idea to possibly write about a father and his children. The children respected and listened to their dad so they received great wealth in their life. Maybe I will do the opposite where the kids do not listen to their parents and run into misfortune. I think it is important to respect your elders, especially your parents. 

Week 5 Review

Success is Inspiration link

I think we often take someone else's success as personal failure but we should really be happy for other people's success. Their success should inspire us to do more instead of letting it bring us down. We often measure ourselves by other people's successes which is something I try to avoid. So this week, this meme really stood out to me.

Week 5: Famous Last Words

This week it was a bit harder than other weeks to write a creative story. I felt like I had writer's block for a little bit and I don't think I produced my best story. I still think it's exciting to write something down so that you can go back and edit the piece later. I had to read through several different stories from different units to be able to come up with a story so this week it took me a bit longer to do the assignments. I was still able to read both units of my chosen reading and I also did an extra reading that was outside of the India or Middle-East readings which I had fun doing. For the next reading, I might choose a bigger overlying theme of the whole unit instead choosing just one story to focus on. I might want to consider mashing a lot of different ideas and characters together just to be able to add more variety to my story and I can get really imaginative with my storytelling.

As far as other classes go, midterms are just around the corner and that uneasiness feeling is starting to creep back up on me. I really hope that this semester will be better since I am trying new ways to become a better student especially with the growth mindset assignments. Even though you try these new tricks, it's often hard to keep up with them and practice them until they become a habit. Hopefully, I will be able to see good results at the end of the semester. My biggest challenge is still going to be procrastination and time management. It's really hard to prioritize what needs to be done because often the most important things are by no means the most fun things. It's hard to keep up with school work over the weekend since there are so many distractions. Next week, I will try to finish most of my work before the weekend so that the weekend can be spent having fun and relaxing.

Just Do It flickr

Tech Tip: Quotemaker

For this week, I made a quote for my tech tip assignment.

It was incredibly easy and I will probably use this in the future. I used pinstamatic to generate a simple layout with the quote but there are many other sites as well.

I really like this quote and wanted to share it with others. It's good to remind yourself that it's never too late.

It's never too late: quote by Eric Roth

Growth Mindset Challenge: Tell a Friend

This week I challenged myself to tell a friend about growth mindset. It's amazing to see how many people have never heard of this but then can relate to it so well. I shared the basic idea and the videos that I learned in this class. I also found a picture with some tips on how to train yourself with the idea of growth mindset. I think it's important that we can share our knowledge with other people to help them grow.

Growth Mindset flickr

Learning Challenges: Empathy Meme

This week I decided to learn more about empathy. I initially ignored this while learning about H.E.A.R.T. I'm not exactly sure why. A part of me felt that I was already empathetic enough and I think another part of me was because I didn't really want to think about emotions.

However, this week I thought it would be a good idea to explore empathy and see what it's all about.

I came across these meme that I really liked.

Empathy link

I think the quote speaks for itself.

Week 5 Reading: English Fairy Tales

I began to read English Fairy Tales by Joseph Jacobs. I have read all of Aesop's Fables by Joseph Jacobs so I knew that I would enjoy the English Fairy Tales too. I wasn't familiar with a lot of the stories as I thought I would have. I picked out just a few fun ones below.

The Old Woman and Her Pig was a fun story to read because it led to one thing to another to another to another. The old woman had to go through so much just to get one little thing done. Sometimes I feel like this about life. Most things seem like it might be an easy, straightforward process but then once you actually get to doing it, there are all these obstacles and unexpected forks in the road that come up. I would say this happens all the time in college, especially during a time when we are trying to figure out who we exactly are. Students change their majors multiple times and decide on different careers. This is a normal but tedious process. It's a life-long journey and it often takes a million steps to fully circle round and get to the place we wanted to be in the first place.

The Old Woman and Her Pig by John D. Batten source

Mouse and Mouser ended up not turning out so well for the mouse since the cat ate the mouse. I liked to format of the story though and I might consider using this type of writing that is very "sing-songy". It's just very easy to read along to.

Thoughts about Comments

I like the kinds of comments where you can tell that the reader was really engaged in the story. It's really helpful when they tell me about the things that they liked about my story as well as when they ask me questions that were unclear from my writing. It is also very useful when people catch my grammatically mistakes because no matter how many times I re-read my writing, I always seem to miss something. I really appreciate it when readers give me suggestions too. Many people have really great ideas about how my story could be improved. The best comments always contain positive criticism. I also believe positive reinforcement is helpful too. 

I think I have done a decent job of making comments so far but I think I could work on being more detailed and giving more suggestions. I usually just write about what I liked about the story but don't really give pointers on how a writer could improve the story. It might be helpful to make comments as I am reading the story instead of reading the whole story and writing up a comment at the very end.

Storytelling Week 5: The Great Mind

There once was a woman who was known as The Great Mind because she was so academically knowledgeable. You could ask her anything that was written in any book and she could tell you word for word the literature or solve any mathematical problem.  People from all over the world came to ask her questions and learn from her. The President of the United States even commissioned her to a full laboratory to make advances in technology and science. You name it. She could solve everything.

In the year 3000 she was able to develop holographic projections by just a single thought in the brain.  Then just two years after, she found the cure for 500 different types of cancers and was continuing to develop more and more.

There was nothing that she was without. People gave her everything from money to jewelry to animals and other riches for all of her contributions. Many people loved her and there was not a person on the planet that didn’t know who she was.

One night, she was to work with a group of sailors to discover a way to re-purpose the oceans as they had become so contaminated by human life. Her main goal was to make the water sustainable again for all fish and to also create a city underneath for humans to live as the earth was becoming more and more populated.

During this first night out, the sea raged as a powerful storm was unexpectedly coming and the sailors tried their best to keep the boat afloat, but the waters were too violent and the ship would not uphold.

Sea Storm by Willem Younger Wikimedia

The Great Mind was so furious, she yelled, “You have been seafarers your whole life. How is it that you cannot do your one and only job correctly?”

The captain of the ship immediately called, “Mayday! Mayday! The S. Sherman is sinking. Please send help immediately!”

“We will send help right away!” said the rescuers through a speaker that was cutting out.

The Great Mind thought how stupid the sailors were as they weren’t able to navigate a ship well enough to fight a storm and even more irritated for not planning accordingly to avoid such a disaster. She annoyingly ran to the opposite side of the ship to obtain a life jacket.

At this very moment, the ship split into two and all the passengers were forced to jump straight into the water and fend for their lives without time to grab life jackets or to even think. 

All of the sailors immediately turned to their backs to float upon the water as they could hear the helicopters from a near distance but the Great Mind began to gulp down lumps of water as she started to drown.

The Great Mind had learned so many things in life but she had never learned how to swim and she was full of regret from looking down upon the other sailors.

  

Author's Note: This story is based off of Two Losses in which a scholar looks down upon a sailor because of his grammar. In the end, the sailor makes a remark back at the scholar for not knowing how to swim when the ship begins to sink. The scholar immediately regrets what he said and ends up drowning. I didn't deviate too much from the original story except for adding more details and a small backstory to the scholar who is known as The Great Mind. I really liked the original story and its irony was perfect. I wanted to show how important the simple things are in life. The Great Mind was very intellectual but lacked on some of the essentials that often keep you out of trouble in life. Those who are very smart often belittle others too. This story basically gives arrogance a slap in the face and I think it is important to realize how humbling life is.

Bibliography: "Two Losses" by Marjory Wardrop (1894) Web Source

Week 5 Reading Diary Continued: Georgian Folktales

Georgian Folktales by Marjory Wardrop

I noticed that a lot of the stories include friendship. However, there is usually one friend who is stronger than the other. Sometimes, the less strong friend is wiser and can survive from making smarter decisions and other times, the weaker friend dies. It reminded me of survival of the fittest. In the end of The Grasshopper and the Ant,  the moral was that "help is only valuable when it is given in time." I think this is really true. A lot of people tend to put off giving help only until it is absolute necessary but at that time, it might be too late. It's so important to give help at the time someone would need it most. I am thinking about a story where someone needs helps but a friend chooses not to help because they are so busy with their own life and then in the end realizes that their help is now too late.

Two Losses is a very ironic and funny story! I think sometimes with those who focus a lot of academics forget to learn about the knowledge that you need outside of books and exams. Some of the most intelligent people don't know how to do basic things like change a tire or some other handiwork that may come very useful in life. Sometimes, the "common sense" stuff is more useful than knowing how to solve a math problem or knowing chemical reactions. I think it would be fun to follow this outline and include irony in one of my stories. It would be very ironic if a person who solved cancer ended up dying because of something really simple in life.

Loss at Sea link

Week 5 Reading Diary: Georgian Folk Tales

Georgian Folk Tales, by Marjory Wardrop.

The Master and the Pupil - Greed almost got the best of the peasant and the little boy. If the little boy had just gone to live with his father, he would have not been put in such danger but he kept chasing the money. It was a miracle to have escaped the devil but then he kept tricking people into giving them more and more money.  My parents used to tell me that you want to live a life where you control money and not a life in which money controls you. I think people often become consumed by wealth that it actually ends up hurting them more than pleasing them. You might actually end up worse off than before even if you have a lot of money. I may consider making this the main point of one of my story tellings and include a story with a person who wins the lottery. In the end, he may lose so much more than what he initially gained.

A Peasant who becomes Greedy link

Fate- This was a fun story to read and I knew from the beginning that the prince would not be able to cheat fate. Sometimes you can't change fate no matter how hard you try to. What is suppose to happen usually happens.

The Priest's Youngest Son -  Karma is an interesting topic that mostly everyone can relate to. If you do good things, then good will return to you and if you do someone wrong, then it is likely that you will be wronged too. It would be fun to write a good story about karma maybe with a modern day setting. I like to believe that good always wins in the end.

Week 4: Review

Here's my favorite meme from this week's announcements! This is another growth mindset challenge and I think I should pursue this more often. I tend to play things on the safe side and continue to do things that are comfortable for me. However, it's extremely important to take risks in your life or you will become complacent and never really grow.

Take Risks! link

Week 4: Famous Last Words

This week I am glad that Laura suggested I use dialogue in editing one of my stories. I think it really made my story better and I am more comfortable with using the format for dialogue now. It still confuses me sometimes so I plan on practicing it throughout the semester to make me a better writer. I found it difficult to keep my story under 1000 words because I wanted to keep writing and add more details to it. I guess, this allows me to only keep what is absolutely necessary and it get rids of any “fluff”.

I also had time to do both portions of my reading and an extra reading with Russian Fairy Tales, which ended up being one of the most bizarre and dark readings that I have done so far this semester. I typically strive for stories with good morals or happy endings but now I might consider adding mystery or horror to my writing. Although, I don’t really like horror stories, it may shape me into a well rounded writer. It’s just something I’ll think about as I read new stories for the next week.

I like doing the extra credit growth mindset and learning challenge assignments because it helps me discover more about how I can improve my learning abilities. This helps me in my other classes too and whatever I learn here I can apply to my other classes. So that’s really helpful for the big picture. So far, I have been working on time management but it’s a harder process than I had hoped for.  Procrastination also goes hand in hand with time management since you can’t manage your time well if you are always procrastinating. So the goal is to continue working hard and prioritizing what needs to be done. I need to remind myself to have fun sometimes too though because I don’t think I work efficiently when I am stressed out all of the time.

Growth Mindset flickr

Learning Challenge: Time Management Video + Tech Tip Blogger Youtube

This week, I found a good video on youtube about time management. I like the suggestions that this video makes because the first step is to realize what you spend a lot of your time on and then find a way to make your time most efficient. This could include making a list and physically writing out what needs to be done throughout the day so you can prioritize your tasks. I think you are more likely to get something accomplished if you have it written down somewhere. It also feels really good to cross something off of your list. Here's the video if you'd like to watch it too!

Time Management 

Here is also a tech tip on how to upload youtube videos right to a blog post.

Growth Mindset: Growing My Writing Style

This week I tried the Dear Diary writing style. I got this idea from another student and I had a lot of fun writing it. It reminded me of writing in my diary as a kid and it made writing really easy. I also used more dialogue in revising one of my stories. I had avoided doing this before because I found it difficult to think about the right format of using quotations and punctuations in dialogue but I pushed myself to learn more about it and practice it. I'm glad I was able to do that this week because it helped me with my growth mindset and helped me become a better writer. 

Growing by Writing Wikipedia

Week 4 Reading Diary Extra: Russian Folktales

I was drawn to fairy tales again this week so for an extra reading I decided to read about RussianFolktales by W.R.S Ralston.

The first story I read was nothing like I would of expected it to be. I thought the folktales would be fun and appropriate for children but The DeadMother was a bit morbid. I actually don’t really understand what this story was about. The mother dies and the baby is unhappy all the time except for during a part of the night. One day they catch the figure of the dead mother and then the baby dies at the end. I’m not sure what the story was suppose to get at but it left me with a very strange, confused, and slightly chilled feeling. Maybe one of my storytelling could be a mystery or horror type story.

Russian Fairy Tales link

The Metamorphosis of the Dnieper, the Volga, and the Dvina interestingly described the characteristics of the sea but I really liked the beginning of the story which talked about orphans and how hard it was to survive. It reminded me of Oliver Twist and gave me the idea of storytelling which includes children surviving on their own. 

I was curious to read a little more so I read The Witch Girl which was also an interesting story and reminded my of the plague story in the Bible.

I am noticing that a lot of the Russian folktales are like horror stories. This unit would be good in inspiring scary story telling. A lot of them are pretty dark. Maybe I can use one of the stories and use it to create a happy ending.