Month: April 2020

Plus to Pandemic

Daughter dances with teacher and classmates through digital learning

There are a few perks to having this pandemic where my whole family, all 6 of us, are suck in one house all together, all day long, everyday. One is seeing how my children learn.

I am a teacher myself but it’s amazing to see a kindergarten teacher and music teacher teaching kids through a computer together. These are moments I would never get to experience in a normal day, but now I get a small glimpse into their day. It’s nice.

These are times that we will never forget. They will always has a place in our mind, the good and the bad. I want to remember these small little perks of being stuck at home during this pandemic.

Somethings never change…

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.denofgeek.com/movies/frozen-2-ending-explained/%3famp

I have watch Frozen and Frozen 2 so many times since school closed… At least I like these movies, I just heard the song at the beginning that says, “somethings never change…,” and they are right. Here link. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nVW9QOIeqQg

I hate change, but to love the fact I have six people living in my house. I have a four month old who keeps choking herself with her fingers. I have a five year old who spills everything, trips over everything, and wear the weirdest clothing combinations. I have a 13 year old who thinks he is going on 25 and always knows more than everyone. My nephew who just stares at me, we are in this together and a husband who is worse than the three kids put together.

Man I love my life! (Really I do, it’s crazy, but what’s life without an adventure every step of the way.)

What day is it?

After reading this article: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2020/04/14/us/coronavirus-time-what-day-is-it.amp.html

I really like this article because it brings up the point of change. Change is hard for me. I love routine and the patterns of daily life. Unusual for a creative person, but I am unusual anyway.

Most times, you have a crisis or experience trauma and your life changes, but it’s expected because something happened to you that caused change. For most of us today, our life changed, but things seem normal, look normal, so our brain are confused. I know I am more tired now, than I have ever been. And I am doing less than ever… It really doesn’t make any sense.

I hope I can get a bit more energy to be able to survive this mess. But by the time I adjust to this new normal, another normal will be right around the corner. Change…

The Power of a Sketchnote

Sketchnote about the Elements of Art

I love Sketchnotes. I have my students make them all the time. They are pretty much taking notes, but in a more creative, lasting way. I created the one above while listening to an Edmentum tutorial. Since my school has transitioned to digital learning, I have started using this software. It was very easy to create. The company has pre-made course for you to choose from. I was thinking there would not be any art courses, but there was and they even had students creating art. Due to equity, I had to take the creating activities out, but they could be added in later. I did the first tutorial myself and than completed the mastery test. I got a 100%. (I know I’m the teacher…)

Creating the sketchnote was helpful because it reviewed a lot of vocabulary that I use, but not in the detail or direct language of the tutorial. Edmentum has the ability to read all the I information to you. I basically, listened and drew with pencil, erasing as needed. There are quick questions in the tutorial that I stopped to answer and than continued on with my listening, writing, and drawing. When the tutorial was over I took the test and than added color to my Sketchnote.

The color is the best part because as I add color to what I drew before, I revisit the information and remember what was said in the tutorial. This really makes the information stick in your brain. You hear it first. You draw and write second etching the information in your brain. You add color third, solidifying the information to memory. You go over the information three times in one activity. It’s a great way to get information and really digest it your own creative way.

I have created Sketchnotes for many things, presentations, movies, articles, books, meetings, lectures. You name it, you can create a Sketchnote. I am going to hang this Sketchnote in my classroom with the others I will make in the upcoming weeks with Edmentum. Try to make some of your own!

Turn, Turn, Turn!

www.youtube.com/watch

I was reading an article on Drudge, the only news I read. I remember this song from Forest Gump. I like it. It reminds me of new beginnings, Spring, happiness, with sprinkles of sadness, but ultimately joy. I can’t always be happy, but I can always be filled with joy.

And in this time of worldwide lockdown. I am pleased to spend more time with my four month old baby. I did not get this much time with my two older children. This is my last baby, so its wonderful to enjoy seeing so much of her precious and short first year. She is a cutie pie!

I am also creating art. Something you would think would be easy for an art teacher, but I teach for a living. Creating art is something I haven’t been able to really fit in until now.

Here is my most recent piece. It is for the 2020 School for Art Leaders sponsored by the National Art Education Association. I was a member of the first class in 2015. Each year we create artwork to go to members of the next class of art leaders.

Anthony Fauci sets stage for mandatory — lucrative! — vaccine – Washington Times

“Vaccines are miracles,” said Pedro Alonso, the director for the Institute for Global Health of Barcelona, and another stakeholder in the “Decade of Vaccines” program. Yes. And for certain folk, certain insider folk, vaccines are also great economic and political investments.
— Read on m.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/apr/8/anthony-fauci-sets-stage-mandatory-vaccine/

This article really bothers me. I believe in vaccines. My husband does not. We have argued so much about this topic. Your parents tell you to marry someone with the same religion, well don’t forget to discuss vaccines too. We have come to an agreement…for now. My husband doesn’t like vaccines because of information like what is written in this article. I do think vaccines save many, many lives, BUT when they are politically used as money makers for the already super rich there is a problem.

I am a leader and I have read the books. Leaders capitalize on crisis and are taught to turn all disasters, big and small, into a platform to further their skills, their agenda, what they want and believe is right. I am a leader and I do this all the time, BUT there is a point when I draw the line.

Just because we can, doesn’t mean we should. Just because I can, doesn’t mean I should. Just because there are millions to made off of the death of others, doesn’t mean the money should be made. And if it is made, it should go back to the ones who suffered! Not to people who are already rich!

I forget the name of the book, but it was about leadership and it scared me. I could not believe the words I was reading. I could not believe that people do this everyday, all the time like nothing. This concept has been around since the beginning of time. The few suffer for the needs of the many, or so we think… I read two chapters in this book I forget the name of, where there were issues in the system. Innocent people were going to die and the higher ups were told and did nothing. They needed a crisis, they needed people to suffer to fuel their agenda, their ego, their pockets. So, they waited and people died. Then and, only then, did they make changes. They claimed the credit and got what they wanted, but people died. Innocent, naive people died.

I am a leader and I have worked hard to learn the game, play the game, and use the game to my advantage, to use my influence over others to support my own agenda. I pray to God that I never allow others to suffer and die to get what I want. I hope that my agenda, my goals never, ever lead to the death of another. I beg God to give me the strength to set aside my ambition, humbling me enough to let my beliefs go when others will pay the ultimate price.

With all that being said, have people in our world leadership waited for this pandemic to come? Did leaders know and said nothing, did nothing? Is this pandemic really as bad as they say? Will a vaccine save us all?

Or is it all bullshit and my husband is right…