time to write

I’m sitting here at work thinking about my commitment to writing. I love to write! So what’s the real problem? It’s that right this moment, I’m doing all the things that I don’t have time to do in the school year. I’m working on reports, I’m fixing bar codes and spine labels, I’m trying to decide if I can effectively organize all that stuff that I just dropped in a drawer all school year. In addition, I may have over extended myself just a tad. (Don’t laugh!) I’m conference chair for a state organization, and I’m on two state-level committees. mmmmm I’ve written about this seriously disturbing condition before. In my mind, I’m some librarian wonder-woman. In my mind, I can accomplish anything – only to be smacked in the face with my very real surroundings.

So writing takes a back seat again. Well, maybe not today. Maybe today, I’ll spend a few minutes writing. Then when I get back to the bar codes and spine labels, maybe I’ll think of a little something to write about tomorrow.

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56 days of summer – 35

Today, my goal is to complete the MS for this math book, then let it sit until Monday for another round of editing. I’d also love to finish with my vehicles and get the BB paper cleaned up out of the guest room! I can do mess for a short period, but there comes a point that it wears on my nerves.

Cheryl Ristow posted a video this morning of a teacher decorating his room. It is not all practical, but I do love his enthusiasm. I have done some impractical things in my room (even knowing they were impractical) because I loved the way they looked and HOPE really does spring eternal donchano. I didn’t do themes in my classrooms – well, I did, but the theme was Math. 😉 I’m doing my second one in the library now and I love how the theme can tie things together. I love the filming theme he uses. Got to add that to my Pinterest board!

 

 

Barb Kibler shared a Buzzfeed Link – 35 Money Saving DYIs for the Classroom from 2013. I realize this kind of teacher craftiness is not everyone’s cup of tea, but I’ve tried many of these things. I cannot tell you how many stacking boxes and cans (metal and plastic) I’ve repurposed over the years. Sometimes what I ended up making was NOT less expensive because of covering it (or, yes, even the mistakes I made), but I just couldn’t find something to fit a purpose. I would recommend finding boxes from a source other than the Post Office. Those are clearly marked that they are for USPS use only. But once you start collecting boxes, they multiply quickly.

 

paint chip calendar

56 days of summer – 26

Yesterday, I hit the halfway mark in my manuscript. Today is also dedicated to writing. Wondering if 3/4 is too much for which to hope. I’m am seriously disliking fractions found in the real world at the moment 😉 Writing math problems makes for a pretty boring report.

I did sneak in a few other things. Still looking for some books to fill out series. Still cutting out letters. I am about to move on to modes of transportation!

 

2nd grade math book

Last weekend, I mentioned to my husband that I was ready to pick up some freelance writing again and that I needed to call some of the publishers for whom I’d previously worked. Before I could make those calls, I got one from an old contact with  a 2nd grade math book they needed written. Very nice.

BUT I hate starting a project. I have to get my mind wrapped around the requirements, then I have to get it wrapped around the content. I’m fine after I get both those things done, but until then . . . *bleh* Today’s been spent wrapping my brain. Hopefully, by the time I wake up tomorrow, I’ll be ready to start writing. *fingers crossed*

inklewriter

Thanks for Richard Byrne for the heads up on Inkel Writer. I’ve been looking  at ways that students can publish online and this one seems to  fit the bill.

Collaboration and writing – too cool!

HT to Paul Hamilton for this one.

Storybird provides the medium for writing with art provided. The part I really liked – besides the writing was the collaboration possibilities. Woozers! Wonderful potential there. Take the tour, and you’ll see what I mean.

My most referenced book

I absolutely abhor the fact that the book I pick up most often is the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association. Why don’t I have this stuff memorized by now!?!

A Cog in the Cheating Wheel

The Shadow Scholar – written by Ed Dante, a shadowy name.This guy makes $66,000 to write student papers. Maybe I’m in the wrong field. What was rather ironic through the essay was that he could point out the inadequacies and lack of ethics in his clients, but didn’t mention his participation in the cheating process as cheating. He is providing a service. He is working.

You’ve never heard of me, but there’s a good chance that you’ve read some of my work. I’m a hired gun, a doctor of everything, an academic mercenary. My customers are your students. I promise you that. Somebody in your classroom uses a service that you can’t detect, that you can’t defend against, that you may not even know exists.

He does ask this and it’s a very good question:

Do you ever wonder how a student who struggles to formulate complete sentences in conversation manages to produce marginally competent research? How does that student get by you?

So how do they? Has education become such a big-business that we can let an utterly under-qualified student make it from admissions to graduation with no one noticing?

Appalling.

HT

HG Wells writing competition demands handwriting, no science fiction; no one applies – Boing Boing

HG Wells writing competition demands handwriting, no science fiction; no one applies – Boing Boing.

Handwritten manuscripts?

No Science Fiction?

Please. No wonder they got no entries.

I handwrite as few things as possible anymore. I broke my wrist about ten years ago and I lost some legibility. NOT that I would be doing things differently today without that event, but it did push me to drastically doing more on the computer.

That idea of creative writing being linked to writing by hand is a bunch of bunk. I write because you think. I think because I write. Writing on the computer is still writing.

And then there is the no science fiction. uhhhhh a contest in honor of H. G. Wells with no sci-fi entries? That’s just wrong.

Getting the Not-Quite-Right Stuff From I Write Like – ArtsBeat Blog – NYTimes.com

Getting the Not-Quite-Right Stuff From I Write Like – ArtsBeat Blog – NYTimes.com.

This is great! The author puts passages from various famous authors in and gets some nearly hilarious results. Like I mentioned in my first post on this, my writing is incredibly multi-faceted OR this little analyzer is just a spin of the roulette wheel.