Oh what a beautiful MORNIN .. oh what a beautiful DAYYY!
Hmm … think we’ll meet him naked at the do… Damn sorry didn’t know you were listening … our fault our fault. Hehehe
*Sigh* Just took my medicine. It’s late. 8 am. We were up earlier and foolin around with V. We were both reading from Encyclopedia Britannica … and we’d be going along and say … listen to this, listen to this! I swear nobody ever read the encyclopedia with us … we were pretty happy.
When we were young, we used to have certain rooms we were responsible for cleaning between siblings and myself … I had the kitchen several days a week, but mostly I had the dining room every day. We didn’t get a long with our siblings so we each had to stay in our own room … that way my brother had the whole living room by himself with the TV. BUT, we eventually got the Encyclopedia’s in our room. So, we’d lay on the floor between the table legs and go cover to cover pausing on whatever interested us. Think this has a pretty big impact on my interest in research … will be trying that out in just a little bit.
V. just passed by long enough to say you know … MW. He sure is a tough taskmaster! We don’t have to go back to work until Wednesday so am pretty happy. Good time to work. But, our sweetie called last night … I had the days confused … he was driving back with the guys last night . Today, when he picks up his gear, he will be able to stop at our place! WooooHOOOOO!!!! He sounded pretty tired … we only talked for 1 min and a half. They had just stopped by a convenience store. Soooo happy my sweetie bun is almost here. I’m a little worried because I just burned one of my massaging fingers. Maybe if I blow on it??
We had a dream this morning. We were getting to preview a new mall that was more open like the way the encyclopedia is organized you just walked from one thing to another with no effort. No doors just high open wide walled in frames. Later in the dream my youngest son joined me. But, we’d come up to a new university in this building which was architecturally sweeping. It was next door to where my Grandmother lives, so I seemed to be considering it. Then there were some things walking around, testing, eating, washroom hehehe. But, we were anxious toward the end, because we’d put down our “purse” camera bag with electronics and wasn’t sure if someone took it or we just couldn’t remember where we put it.
So, I guess you can tell what’s on our mind … AND, you should know never to read about education before taking nap!
We had a last couple of days that were so-so. The nice part was treating ourselves out to dinner last night … we tried an Italian place just round the corner that was on an off-track street, but seemed popular. Hehehe, we now know where the people of our town hang out. The place is very deceivingly large and they are still building. The prices were reasonable, the drink big, service very good, food great, and dessert woooHOOOO had this tasty rum cake that was so big had to take some of it home. The owner even held the door open for us when we left. Nice. The seater person must have saw stress when I first walked in and saw how crowded it was, but she led us to a smaller quiet smoking part with only a few tables being used. Pswhoo. Everything was timed well so I could relax and just space out. Very cool.
Maybe we can go back sometime with sweetie, but I wouldn’t mind going alone again either.
Hmm, maybe coffee reheated brb
Ahhh
Sister turned out to be ok when I got in yesterday … after she had mistreated us. Hmpf! She was asking me first thing how I thought the report turned out. I thought Pshwoo I’m back on the team … felt kicked off for a bit, which was leaving me feel real put out, because I’d done everything but cover pages and sponsors. I really would like a print out though because you know how I am about reading things over and over.
I know … but I’m just that way … think they call it OCD. Hmm, maybe we should turn on some AC here this morning. SWEETIE SWEETIE SIGNED ON
YAYYYYYY!!!! He’s coming over maybe later this afternoon … pizza too! I haven’t heard too much but, got in on a few stories. Seems some of the guys were jumping on his bed. Wow! I never knew … heheheh He says he caught more fish than the others, at least musky I think he said. And, he said he caught the biggest, but not the record. This is very important fishy figurin. He says average amount of flies and mosquitoes and it was best in the middle of the lake. Not too much more news to tell you … He knows if he draws out the stories he gets a longer back rub! YAYYYYYY!!!! Ok, ok … trying not to be just a little over excited.
BUT, just before we left him we drifted back to this story we read about earlier on AOL news …
Yes, for the curious that is an upside down light bulb in his p**p shoot. Umm, the guy is a prisoner and claims he doesn’t know how it got there. I’d think … that’s the kind of thing you would know about? He umm, claimed it “hurt.” V says, “Not a bright idea.” Hehehe
Ok, ok … so we’re just fooling around here a little. We’re going to need concentrating, but we’re still a little too giddy …
Hmm, anything else news worthy? Had pretty good staff training and Thinking Groups this week.
For the staff training, we brought in the client surveys we’d be working on … I thought they’d be a little more excited then they were, but had to let that go. They were being too competitive and one was defensive saying, “I don’t remember anyone in my group saying that.” But she had to acknowledge that she’s only here 3 days a week and sometimes others take over. Kind of disappointed really. They read, but more from their own guarded interests. I don’t think they like the new surveys either, but we’ll have to let that one unfold at its own speed. Sr. was pretty defensive about them being better. Even our friend said, they were almost the same, only longer and more confusing. *Sigh* Hard to be the leader. You want to do it all by yourself, except when your blaming others for messing up. Then its “their” fault.
Right before Thinking Group I was opening my email and found an ad for super savings on CDs for the client’s computers. At least, that’s how we figure it. We like to give them something nice on our birthday … and Sister is against sweets. Rightfully so. We’re an oversized crew. SOOOOO, we ordered most of these. The sale was
50% off, PLUS an additional 10% for Britannica members. I went a little nutsy. I get so incredibly excited about knowledge.
The first CD is the big one … I understand its actually 6 CDs … we went that way, because the clients are using older computers without DVDs
It has …
• New! Homework Helpdesk, provides guidance for research papers, oral presentations, and more.
• New! Daily Content, snapshots of news, biographies, and events from the past served up each day.
• New! Bonus Transparent Language CD: Learn 10 languages for travel, school, business or personal enjoyment: Spanish, French, German, Italian, Brazilian Portuguese, Latin, Russian, Dutch, Polish, and Swedish.
• Three easy-to-use encyclopedias: the entire 32-volume Encyclopædia Britannica, Britannica Student Encyclopedia, and Britannica Elementary Encyclopedia.
• Britannica BrainStormer™. Visual browser makes research easier and more fun through associations you didn't even know existed.
• Rich multimedia: Thousands of images, audio and video clips
• Britannica Classics: Expand your knowledge with Britannica's most notable and credible sources, from Sigmund Freud to Albert Einstein
• Timelines: Tour through history with exciting timelines that show people, events, and discoveries of the past.
• 166,000 online links to magazine articles and high-quality Web sites.
• Merriam-Webster's© Dictionary & Thesaurus. Simply double-click on any word and get instant access to over 550,000 definitions, synonyms, and antonyms.
• Year-in-Review: Get information on recent historical events from over 9,000 articles.
• Atlas: Explore the globe and learn more about different countries, people, cultures, economies, and national statistics with over 2,500 interactive maps and links to articles.
• Free membership to Britannica Advantage, which includes downloadable updates for a year and a free 90-day subscription to Britannica's online premium service (www.britannica.com).
Hehehe … we’re a walking billboard … but, did you read? All this INCLUDING 3 sets of encyclopedia’s
the entire 32-volume Encyclopædia Britannica, Britannica Student Encyclopedia, and Britannica Elementary Encyclopedia.
That part came out to $22.45 … there is no way that kinda deal can be beat! I know most of the clients can’t read, but its got sooo many pictures and sound clips and little movies. Thought shoot … something we need to expand on.
Last time I’d ordered all those books for work, I got a handful on history and philosophy … we had in mind that we teach them how to think more broadly past themselves. BUT, by the same token … figure out how to relate their world to the world around them. I figured I should try it out yesterday during the Thinking Group. I just pulled one of the history books (for juniors) from the shelve. When I got to the group I set up the experience and then read two paragraphs. I then broke it down … I said you have a King from one country, England, and they are fighting a 100 year war against a King in France, because they both want the same land. I then tried to put it in perspective all the time that goes into a hundred years. Then off the cuff, we thought of Independence day and the wars … and after giving them colored pencils and paper, we asked them to draw people on either side of the paper, and then we asked them to draw what they thought was worth fighting about … they needed time to think it out, but in the end almost all complied. They suggested fighting over a tree, drugs, money, a donut, a bed, a woman, etc. Then for the last part, we had them turn the page and had them draw what they would give up for it. Donut was easy … give the other person money. One girl was fighting over water. But, then decided that was too hard, so she talked about her and a sister fighting when they were younger over a phone. We were trying to get across the idea of compromise. Each party would give up something to get what they wanted. It was a great session. It was helped along by putting it more in their perspective … We needed to use examples of people they knew … like if their friend owned the White Sox and they wanted to own the team … what would such and such friend like in return. In this case it turned out he could by the team for shopping! Hehehe it was a good thinking exercise.
Anyway, I hope to turn the Britannica series into goals they might be happy to consider. One of my clients this year got the first goal in “culture.” We bought him a book from Mexico written in Spanish and English and made it a goal to read a couple a story a week. He’s been proud of that book all year. We’ve also done a couple goals in the sciences area … One of the higher clients has to think through a present form of 12 questions over a month about any given science series. They’ve covered a lot. This year we expanded it to cover safety, because this individual has a disability that requires him to use a walker and he was getting lazy and not going out the door as he was supposed to for fire drills. We had a lower level client who we turned on to a big colorful science book. His trouble was that he had trouble concentrating and sitting down for any length of time. Since, he enjoyed looking at the pictures of the science book so much, we had the DSP work on increasing the allowance of his reading time by about a minute every two weeks. It was great … at first very frustrating, because the timer would ring at 5 minutes and it was time to put the book away, or if he got up to wander and then come back, he might find he’d wasted the time he was allowed to read the book. We went from him not concentrating 1.5 minutes to being able to concentrate for about 34 minutes. It was a good goal.
There will be 14 CD sets in all, which is way over enough to cover the eight client computers that can handle them. And, they will work for the half computers that are not able to be signed onto the Internet.
I’m pretty excited to be getting them … they should be here in about a week and that will be about the time we’re establishing new client goals. We’ll have to test them out. I’m hoping that they are the type that don’t need the CD in the machine to run, but most likely not. That will mean the two computer rooms will have to share. The first two groups will be able to learn to do it independently, but I see no reason the 2nd and 3rd groups couldn’t figure it out as well, especially if there staff took an interest in reading things for them. Like with that client who could concentrate up to 34 minutes … he had gotten extra attention from the staff in another goal so that he could bring the things that interested him to her and she would read paragraphs for him. You always have to hope for the best and that a staff will show enough motivation to excite the students. I think when they get in, we are going to need having a computer session with the staff to orientate them to the material and teach them how to spread excitement.
My mother-in-law said something wise to me at one point. She said … that if you want to maintain relationship to people at the formal dinner table and beyond, you should always take an interest in the news, or what is going on with the world. She suggested one of the news magazines, US World Report. She was very sure it was important to hold up your end of the conversation. I think it should be the same with the clients. I want them to be interested in what goes on beyond the boy they like. The one thing I learned from Cognitive is … well, actually there’s more, but in general if people don’t use their cognitive functions they loose ability to do so down the line. Because neural connections not used or strengthened die out. Important then to think!
I think we’re pretty much wrapping up our morning edition. Should be one more entry toward the end of the day.
We’re about here … let me think now … anything else?? Work … um hmm, Dr. M. got him, friends been there. Oh … one thing there … Deb is going to have surgery on her arm due to nerve damage on Thurs. Please remember her in your prayers!!!
Nothing on the boys. Kitties ?? All good. Ohhh as far as the animals … they’ve been spell-bound with the computer ever since we signed on to the Britannica. They were very curious when V. looked up blogging. I sure hope they don’t think they are getting their own blog! After our friend signed on they refused to leave …
Yeeks, I’ve been shhhh’d!
HMPF! Who would of known they were going to take such an interest in learning! WooooHHH gives me the goose bumps!
Ok, ok … think we’re covered. Next, has to be school and for that dear friends, we are starting another post … Because from here to the end of the day, there will be quite some journey, we hope. Be taking care … and know we’re just over here -- *winking at Jodi!*
posted by Ann Marie @ 7/01/2006 11:06:00 AM
Comments: 1
