Rants, Raves, and Rhetoric v4

Tag: play

  • Town & Gown Hamlet

    Of any play, this is the one I know the best. In 7th grade, we were supposed to do this play. Not an abridged version, but the whole thing. I was only Barnardo, and even memorizing that stressed me to the breaking point. Thankfully, I was able to transfers schools and get out of it. At…

  • xmllint

    This Linux tool is my new best friend. We get thousands of XML files from our clients for loading user, class, and enrollment information. Some of these clients customize our software or write their own software for generating the XML. This means we frequently get oddities in the files which cause problems. Thankfully I am…

  • TED Talk: Taryn Simon

    My favorite quote from Taryn is, “Photography threatens fantasy.” Disney uses intricate interior design, photography, and video to construct fantasy. Advertisements, magazines, weddings, and portraits are about showing others the ideal instead of the reality. Have you seen the Dove Evolution video? (This one has music and singing by a Baha’i musician Devon Gundry.) What about…

  • TED Talk: Is Play More Than Fun?

    In the Q&A, Stuart Brown, co-author of Play: How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul, rejects the idea play is a rehersal for adulthood. Stopping an animal from playing doesn’t prevent the animal from being a successful predator. REM sleep provides the rehearsal needed for learning. Play is the next…

  • Wii Must Have It!

    Have you gotten your Wii Elbow yet? How about the Wii Knot? I got to play normanee‘s this weekend. Must… get… Wii….

  • Videogames in the Classroom?

    Yes!! Videogames in the Classroom? – Newsweek Education – MSNBC.com: Where parents see hours wasted in front of a screen, these scientists see potential. An FAS study released this week, titled “Harnessing the power of video games for learning,” reports that best-selling games are built in surprisingly pedagogical ways. Players improve at their own pace.…

  • Dragons

    This series is my LOTR (the books I have read over and over). From 7th grade through 11th grade I read them at least once a year, usually twice. I replaced my first copy with another as the covers were nearly destroyed. So, now I know how the fanatics feel (not true, . I so…

  • Origins of Brazilian Soccer Scorer Names

    The link is for the article at Slate. A good teaser paragraph. How Brazilian soccer players get their names. By Nick Schulz: Brazil’s affinity for nicknames might stem from the country’s historically high illiteracy rate. As such, shortened spoken names are typically used more often than longer birth names. In Brazilian society, the use of…

  • On Siege

    Who wants to starve out the enemy? Break down his defenses! Mmmmm… a 300 pounder! Watching this show on siege engines reminds me of two favorite things from my life. The first, and best was the week my aunt and uncle let us come stay for a week in England. By far, that was my…