Position Paper Responce

For my position paper respoce I decided to do it on Mitch Hilers presentation on the jail system. I personally think that the numbers and percents are amazing. The fact that jusy by sending inmates to a camp just to embarrase them doesn't sound like the best idea at first. But then when I saw some of the stuff that happened to them like wearing pink shirts and being videotaped while working it helped show me that humiliation can be one of the worst forms of punishment. You just have to image thats it is you in the person's shoes who is at the camp. What feelings would it create? I wouldn't feel to great. I mean in all honesty the pink shirts wouldn't be that bad but being videotaped in just demeaning and a punishment on its own. This presentation really made me think about prison systems and their affects because up till this point the thought never really crossed my mind. But now looking at the facts of this camp it really made me realize that if people want to screw up their lives for whatever reason then fine, because if they do then the punishment is going to be brutal and not in a painfull type of way either; they just need to be ready for a few years of complete humiliation which actaully is a pretty painful and brutal type of punishment.

Remember the Small Moments

I have always been a person who remembers the small moments. To me the small moments are what make me who I am; they are the things you want to remember the most in life because usually they can bring you the most joy. Big moments in life are great but you will always remember them. What happens twenty years from now when you look back at your life and can’t remember so many of these moments that made you so happy? Chances are you will never remember them because it was such a small thing that it wouldn’t really matter if it’s remembered or not. Well guess what, it does matter. One example I have of a small moment was over this past summer when a bunch of my friends and I took a trip up to a house in Frisco that one of our youth group leaders Chad took us to. It was one of the greatest weeks of my life and I will always remember it; especially one of the small moments we had there. Three of the nights we were there we decided to watch all three of the Lord of the Rings movies. Now you know how all three of the movies are like 3 hours long? Well we figured out how to get some joy and enthusiasm into the movie. Evan Lanning and I noticed while watching the first movie that the time in the movie was almost at the 22 seconds of 22 minutes of the second hour or 2:22:22. When this time came he and I both just stood up and started cheering just for 1 second. We celebrated as much as we could in that one second of time and you know what; it was so much fun and was a big thing that made the trip better for me. So the next night we were watching the second movie and when it got to 2:22:22 about half of us got up and started cheering. There were only seven of us there including Chad so only like one more person got up and cheered with Evan and me. The next night we were all watching the third movie. The time got to 2:22:22 and this time every single one of us got up and started cheering except this time we went a few extra seconds. I don’t know why this moment made me so happy but it did and it is a moment that I will remember for the rest of my life. So many people are so worried about all of the deadlines in life and about making them or else they will fail or something. But what happens when you make the first deadline? You will only have another. This is just the way life works. It is just about meeting deadline after deadline after deadline and you know what, they never stop. There will always be someone relying on you for something or trying to make sure that you don’t make any mistakes. Because of all of this people tend to forget about small things. So much is going on that people don’t even pay attention to the small things in life anymore. This is why I remember the small things. This is why I always keep an eye out for the smallest thing that’ll bring me joy. When the ability to recognize and get joy in the small things is lost then much more is lost than just this. The kid spirit is gone and this is very hard to get back. This is why I think everyone needs to pay attention to the small things in life; why people need to be more observant and not so up tight and busy. This is why I believe so many people have lost there ability to see straight. See threw the eyes of the child they once were.

Looking for Angels

In Rise Against’s song “The Good Left Undone” there is a lot of meaning in their lyrics but most people cant differ what it all means because to them it is just another song. What I mean by this is that most people listen to music just to find something they think sounds good, or something with a good beat. When I listen to music I really like to pay attention to lyrics and try to understand why they are what they are because most of the time you can find really good meaning in them. This is one of the reasons why I do so many PLN responses on lyrics and such. Anyway there is one part of the lyrics in this song that has a lot of meaning to it. The lyrics go “All because of you, I believe in angels. Not the kind with wings, No, not the kind with halos. The kind that bring you home, when home becomes a strange place. Ill follow your voice, all you have to do is shout it out!” When you hear these lyrics at first you don’t get much of an impression but when you look at them it really is explaining something. It is saying what people see angels as, spirits with wings and halos. The thing is though; this isn’t what angels are, it’s just what people believe they are. Like it says, angels are people that bring you home when home becomes a strange place. This is saying that anybody can be an angel but we just don’t realize it. Anyone that is willing to help you when you are feeling down or you’re hurt or anything. Those people are angels. I’m not saying that I don’t believe in angels and heaven and all that. I know that all of that is real but this song is talking about the angels that you see everyday but don’t realize it. All your friends and family, those are the real angels. You can always depend on them and they will let you down every once in a while but that is a part of life! We all get hurt and wish stuff didn’t happen but it is all a part of living! What I’m trying to get at here is that everyone has angels looking over them and keeping them safe whether they realize it or not; whether spiritual or living. So next time someone starts to think that there is nobody looking down on him or her, they just doesn’t realize who the angels are.

Survival Skills for Life

In the article “Educational Leadership” by Tony Wagner the topic of how students are learning and preparing for the 21st century is brought up and threw all of the research done, it seems like Tony Wagner is for this preparation. The biggest reason that makes me believe this are the paragraphs on the 7 survival skills. “Critical Thinking and Problem solving”, “Collaboration and Leadership”, “Agility and Adaptability”, “Initiative and Entrepreneurialism”, “Effective Oral and Written Communication”, “Accessing and Analyzing Information”, and “Curiosity and Imagination”. The author expands on all of these topics and is able to explain how they will help us in the world. To me though the biggest of the survival skills is Curiosity and Imagination because no matter what your job is or where you go to school, Curiosity and Imagination will help you. Curiosity helps you answer questions; while Imagination just helps with everything and makes you be more creative.
Also in this article the author expands on the idea of before students are taught these skills, first we need to redefine excellent instruction. I think what he means by this is that we can’t always just go to class sit down, take notes and get ready for a test. It’s ok to do that every once in a while but what really needs to happen is students need to get more involved with their learning. We need more energy in assignments as in move around a little, maybe make the learning interactive instead of taking notes all day. Also if we could work in teams that way if we get stuck, we can get help from a partner. These are some thoughts about Tony Wagner’s article “Educational Leadership”.

Inspiration in Many Forms

Earlier this week I saw a video. It is called the “Don’t Quit Poem” and it was a video that completely changed my outlook on my decisions. So I decided to do my PLN response on it and share how it changed my life. The author of this poem is actually unknown. But anyway when I saw this video it really just made me think about all the times in my life that I started something and then just left it and never took it back up. A lot of times I have given up in Parkour but that is a different story. But anyway not only did this make me think about the times I’ve given up but also everything I haven’t given up in, everything I have and for how thankful I am to have all of it. This video inspired me to not give up anymore until absolutely necessary which won’t happen much. If I can stick by this then life will be harder at times but the overall outcome will be amazing. I may have given up on many things but I have made it threw more. Now that I have talked about how this made me think, the question is; how would this affect kids and students if you were to show this video in schools? This question really makes me think because I know it would affect some people but there are also a lot of kids who think that they are to cool, don’t need to try any harder and even some kids who have already given up in lots of things and even life. These are the kids that I think need to see this video.
Also as long as I am on the subject, there is another video I have seen and I’m going to go into religious stuff here but the video is a skit about Jesus helping you threw everything no matter how hard it gets. I saw the skit in person and I was speechless after it. It made me think more than I ever had before. The skit involves the song “Everything” by Lifehouse. I personally think that everyone needs to see this video especially those kids that say they have given up in life and that kind of thing. It helped me and I know that it will help them weather it makes them think a little or a lot. . Both the videos I have talked about so far might not make people think the way I did but it will make them think and start discussions. The video about Jesus wouldn’t be allowed in school though so kids would have to see it somewhere else. The point I have been trying to get throughout this response is that little things can inspire us everyday weather a little video or skit or something like meeting your hero. We all have choices in life and some choose to give up on them and others keep going till there is nothing left or till they have accomplished whatever necessary.

Don't Live Life Behind Closed Doors

For my PLN response this week I decided to do it over the song “Behind Closed Doors” by Rise Against. The lyrics to this song really made me think. It just keeps talking about not staying behind closed doors but there is a bigger meaning to it. What it is really talking about is making change. We can’t all just sit around and hope something will happen. If you want something to happen then you need to get up and do something about it; for instance activism. It is a duty, not a choice. Only through activism can we this country by the people, and for the people. So really what that means is that at times we just need to cast away our apathy which is mainly what I was saying before. Really what this means is that we need emotion and enthusiasm in order to make a difference. I personally think that this statement is completely true. Think about it. A real world example would be Presidents. Whenever they are giving a speech or trying to make a difference they have emotion in there voice. They try to emphasize things in there speech to attract people’s attention and make us think about what they just said.

Also if you pay attention to the lyrics of the song its saying that we aren’t obligated to stay alive and be here but, we still are here because every single one of us serves a purpose on this earth. Some of us serve bigger purposes than others but we are all still equal. This song talks about how even though we get knocked down in life, we can all still get back up and make things right. We don’t just after one failure say that we’re done. No. We get back up and keep trying till we get it or till our life’s are back in order. This is what I think that this song is about. Casting aside our apathy and mistakes so that, we don’t live our lives Behind Closed Doors.

Skype, The Savior of the Tipping Point?

For my PLN Response I did a response to Mr. Fisch's article "H1N1, Skype, and a Possible Tipping Point" What this article talks about is how some students are you Skype to stay up to date with there assignments and class work while they are home sick. When I read this article it made me think mainly about myself because when I was sick I went to check what I missed on that day. But then I read the article again and started thinking deeper. When I was sick I just went onto the school website and checked the little bit of work I missed and that was the end of it. These kids have been out for days or possibly even a week or so with stuff like swine flu or different flu’s like it. These kids had tons of work to make up so instead of checking the school website they go to Skype to try to talk to there teachers about the work they missed. When I thought about it, this seemed like a lot more affective method of getting to your teacher than going on the website. Think about it; what if your teacher hasn’t updated there page yet or doesn’t have all of the work they did in class on it. Then what? With Skype you can easily just send a message or even IM your teacher to find the work. So this might just save you from a zero or something.

Later in the article, Mr. Fisch talks about how if H1N1 gets any worse and if the outbreak could cause a lot more absences in schools, if people will start posting instructions on the Internet on what to do and how to stay healthy. This kind of goes back to Skype. When you think about it Skype and other social networks would be great places to post these instructions. Almost every teenager these days either has a Myspace or a Facebook, so what better way to get people to know what to do? This could be something that could save us from the tipping point of this epidemic. And I’m sure that people would read it because nobody wants to get sick. Posting something like a way to avoid getting H1N1 or any sickness on a social network would get the attention of kids a lot faster than Yahoo or on the News. These are my thoughts on Mr. Fisch's article "H1N1, Skype, and a Possible Tipping Point."