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content and are asked to indicate whether they know the answer, know some of the answer, or don't know the answer. Faculty can use these reports to gauge how confident students feel in their understanding of course material at the |
beginning or end of a course, before exams or papers, or even as graduating seniors or alumni. Kristin Bonnie's report relates how her students completed a short knowledge survey (6-12 questions) online (via Google forms) on the material covered in |
class that week. Rather than providing the answer to each question, students indicated their confidence in their ability to answer the question correctly (I know; I think I know; I don't know). Students received a small amount of credit for |
completing the knowledge survey. She used the information to review material that students seemed to struggle with. In addition, a subset of these questions appeared on their exam – the knowledge survey therefore served as a review sheet.Wirth notes that |
the surveys need not take much class time and can be administered via paper or the web. The surveys can be significant for clarifying course objectives, structure, and design. For students, knowledge surveys achieve several purposes: they help make clear |
course objectives and expectations, are useful as study guides, can serve as a formative assessment tool, and, perhaps most critically, aid in their development of self-assessment and metacognitive skills. For instructors, the surveys help them assess learning gains, instructional practices, |
Free the Cans! Working Together to Reduce Waste In a blog about how people share, it’s worth the occasional reference to the bizarre ways that people DON’T SHARE. Is it |
safe to say we live in a society that places great value on independence, private property, personal space, and privacy? Even sometimes extreme value? Is that why people at an |
8-unit apartment building in Oakland, CA have separate caged stalls for eight separate trash cans? I know it’s not nice to stare, but I walked by these incarcerated cans and |
could not help myself. I returned with my camera, so that I could share my question with the world: Why can’t people share trash cans or a single dumpster? Or, |
at the very least, why can’t the cans share driveway space? The Zero Waste Movement has come to the Bay Area and it calls for a new use for these |
eight cages. Here are my suggestions: - Turn two of those cages into compost bins. Fill one with grass, leaves, and vegetable scraps, let it decompose for six months, then |
start filling the second bin in the meantime. - Put in a green can, which is what Oakland uses to collect milk cartons, pizza boxes, yard trimmings, and all food |
to send it to the municipal composting facility. If your city doesn’t do this yet, tell them it’s a great idea and they could be as cool and cutting edge |
as Oakland. - Put in one or two recycling cans for glass, plastic, cardboard, paper, aluminum, etc. - Put out a FREE STUFF box for unwanted clothing and household items. |
The neighbors could sort through it each week, and later put it out on the curb for passers-by to explore. Take what’s left to Goodwill or a comparable donation spot. |
- Put in a few small bins for various items that can be recycled, such asbatteries and electronics, which can then be taken to an electronics recycling center every month |
or two. Styrofoam can be brought to a local packaging store or ceramics business that accepts used packaging material. Or, if you accumulate a bunch of plastic bags,take them to |
a store or to some other place that accepts used ones. - Put in ONE trash can. By the time you compost, recycle, re-use, redistribute, and take a few other |
measures to reduce your waste, you’ll have almost no trash each week. - Install a bicycle rack or locked bicycle cage. - With the leftover space, put in a container |
Excerpts for Thames : The Biography The River as Fact It has a length of 215 miles, and is navigable for 191 miles. It is the longest river in England but not in Britain, where the Severn is longer by approximately 5 miles. Nevertheless it must be the shortest river in the world to acquire such a famous history. The Amazon and the Mississippi |
cover almost 4,000 miles, and the Yangtze almost 3,500 miles; but none of them has arrested the attention of the world in the manner of the Thames. It runs along the borders of nine English counties, thus reaffirming its identity as a boundary and as a defence. It divides Wiltshire from Gloucestershire, and Oxfordshire from Berkshire; as it pursues its way it divides Surrey |
from Middlesex (or Greater London as it is inelegantly known) and Kent from Essex. It is also a border of Buckinghamshire. It guarded these once tribal lands in the distant past, and will preserve them into the imaginable future. There are 134 bridges along the length of the Thames, and forty-four locks above Teddington. There are approximately twenty major tributaries still flowing into the |
main river, while others such as the Fleet have now disappeared under the ground. Its "basin," the area from which it derives its water from rain and other natural forces, covers an area of some 5,264 square miles. And then there are the springs, many of them in the woods or close to the streams beside the Thames. There is one in the wood |
below Sinodun Hills in Oxfordshire, for example, which has been described as an "everlasting spring" always fresh and always renewed. The average flow of the river at Teddington, chosen because it marks the place where the tidal and non-tidal waters touch, has been calculated at 1,145 millions of gallons (5,205 millions of litres) each day or approximately 2,000 cubic feet (56.6 cubic metres) per |
second. The current moves at a velocity between 1Ú2 and 23Ú4 miles per hour. The main thrust of the river flow is known to hydrologists as the "thalweg"; it does not move in a straight and forward line but, mingling with the inner flow and the variegated flow of the surface and bottom waters, takes the form of a spiral or helix. More than |
95 per cent of the river's energy is lost in turbulence and friction. The direction of the flow of the Thames is therefore quixotic. It might be assumed that it would move eastwards, but it defies any simple prediction. It flows north-west above Henley and at Teddington, west above Abingdon, south from Cookham and north above Marlow and Kingston. This has to do with |
the variegated curves of the river. It does not meander like the Euphrates, where according to Herodotus the voyager came upon the same village three times on three separate days, but it is circuitous. It specialises in loops. It will take the riparian traveller two or three times as long to cover the same distance as a companion on the high road. So the |
Thames teaches you to take time, and to view the world from a different vantage. The average "fall" or decline of the river from its beginning to its end is approximately 17 to 21 inches (432 to 533 mm) per mile. It follows gravity, and seeks out perpetually the simplest way to the sea. It falls some 600 feet (183 m) from source to |
sea, with a relatively precipitous decline of 300 feet (91.5 m) in the first 9 miles; it falls 100 (30.4 m) more in the next 11 miles, with a lower average for the rest of its course. Yet averages may not be so important. They mask the changeability and idiosyncrasy of the Thames. The mean width of the river is given as 1,000 feet |
(305 m), and a mean depth of 30 feet (9 m); but the width varies from 1 or 2 feet (0.3 to 0.6 m) at Trewsbury to 51Ú2 miles at the Nore. The tide, in the words of Tennyson, is that which "moving seems asleep, too full for sound and foam." On its flood inward it can promise benefit or danger; on its ebb |
seaward it suggests separation or adventure. It is one general movement but it comprises a thousand different streams and eddies; there are opposing streams, and high water is not necessarily the same thing as high tide. The water will sometimes begin to fall before the tide is over. The average speed of the tide lies between 1 and 3 knots (1.15 and 3.45 miles |
per hour), but at times of very high flow it can reach 7 knots (8 miles per hour). At London Bridge the flood tide runs for almost six hours, while the ebb tide endures for six hours and thirty minutes. The tides are much higher now than at other times in the history of the Thames. There can now be a difference of some |
24 feet (7.3 m) between high and low tides, although the average rise in the area of London Bridge is between 15 and 22 feet (4.5 and 6.7 m). In the period of the Roman occupation, it was a little over 3 feet (0.9 m). The high tide, in other words, has risen greatly over a period of two thousand years. The reason is |
simple. The south-east of England is sinking slowly into the water at the rate of approximately 12 inches (305 mm) per century. In 4000 BC the land beside the Thames was 46 feet (14 m) higher than it is now, and in 3000 BC it was some 31 feet (9.4 m) higher. When this is combined with the water issuing from the dissolution of |
the polar ice-caps, the tides moving up the lower reaches of the Thames are increasing at a rate of 2 feet (0.6 m) per century. That is why the recently erected Thames Barrier will not provide protection enough, and another barrier is being proposed. The tide of course changes in relation to the alignment of earth, moon and sun. Every two weeks the high |
"spring" tides reach their maximum two days after a full moon, while the low "neap" tides occur at the time of the half-moon. The highest tides occur at the times of equinox; this is the period of maximum danger for those who live and work by the river. The spring tides of late autumn and early spring are also hazardous. It is no wonder |
that the earliest people by the Thames venerated and propitiated the river. The general riverscape of the Thames is varied without being in any sense spectacular, the paraphernalia of life ancient and modern clustering around its banks. It is in large part now a domesticated river, having been tamed and controlled by many generations. It is in that sense a piece of artifice, with |
some of its landscape deliberately planned to blend with the course of the water. It would be possible to write the history of the Thames as a history of a work of art. It is a work still in slow progress. The Thames has taken the same course for ten thousand years, after it had been nudged southward by the glaciation of the last |
ice age. The British and Roman earthworks by the Sinodun Hills still border the river, as they did two thousand years before. Given the destructive power of the moving waters, this is a remarkable fact. Its level has varied over the millennia--there is a sudden and unexpected rise at the time of the Anglo-Saxon settlement, for example--and the discovery of submerged forests testifies to |
incidents of overwhelming flood. Its appearance has of course also altered, having only recently taken the form of a relatively deep and narrow channel, but its persistence and identity through time are an aspect of its power. Yet of course every stretch has its own character and atmosphere, and every zone has its own history. Out of oppositions comes energy, out of contrasts beauty. |
There is the overwhelming difference of water within it, varying from the pure freshwater of the source through the brackish zone of estuarial water to the salty water in proximity to the sea. Given the eddies of the current, in fact, there is rather more salt by the Essex shore than by the Kentish shore. There are manifest differences between the riverine landscapes of |
Lechlade and of Battersea, of Henley and of Gravesend; the upriver calm is in marked contrast to the turbulence of the long stretches known as River of London and then London River. After New Bridge the river becomes wider and deeper, in anticipation of its change. The rural landscape itself changes from flat to wooded in rapid succession, and there is a great alteration |
in the nature of the river from the cultivated fields of Dorchester to the thick woods of Cliveden. From Godstow the river becomes a place of recreation, breezy and jaunty with the skiffs and the punts, the sports in Port Meadow and the picnic parties on the banks by Binsey. But then by some change of light it becomes dark green, surrounded by vegetation |
like a jungle river; and then the traveller begins to see the dwellings of Oxford, and the river changes again. Oxford is a pivotal point. From there you can look upward and consider the quiet source; or you can look downstream and contemplate the coming immensity of London. In the reaches before Lechlade the water makes its way through isolated pastures; at Wapping and |
Rotherhithe the dwellings seem to drop into it, as if overwhelmed by numbers. The elements of rusticity and urbanity are nourished equally by the Thames. That is why parts of the river induce calm and forgetfulness, and others provoke anxiety and despair. It is the river of dreams, but it is also the river of suicide. It has been called liquid history because within |
itself it dissolves and carries all epochs and generations. They ebb and flow like water. The River as Metaphor The river runs through the language, and we speak of its influence in every conceivable context. It is employed to characterise life and death, time and destiny; it is used as a metaphor for continuity and dissolution, for intimacy and transitoriness, for art and history, |
for poetry itself. In The Principles of Psychology (1890) William James first coined the phrase "stream of consciousness" in which "every definite image of the mind is steeped . . . in the free water that flows around it." Thus "it flows" like the river itself. Yet the river is also a token of the unconscious, with its suggestion of depth and invisible life. |
The river is a symbol of eternity, in its unending cycle of movement and change. It is one of the few such symbols that can readily be understood, or appreciated, and in the continuing stream the mind or soul can begin to contemplate its own possible immortality. In the poetry of John Denham's "Cooper's Hill" (1642), the Thames is a metaphor for human life. |
How slight its beginning, how confident its continuing course, how ineluctable its destination within the great ocean: Hasting to pay his tribute to the sea, Like mortal life to meet eternity. The poetry of the Thames has always emphasised its affiliations with human purpose and with human realities. So the personality of the river changes in the course of its journey from the purity |
of its origins to the broad reaches of the commercial world. The river in its infancy is undefiled, innocent and clear. By the time it is closely pent in by the city, it has become dank and foul, defiled by greed and speculation. In this regress it is the paradigm of human life and of human history. Yet the river has one great advantage |
over its metaphoric companions. It returns to its source, and its corruption can be reversed. That is why baptism was once instinctively associated with the river. The Thames has been an emblem of redemption and of renewal, of the hope of escaping from time itself. When Wordsworth observed the river at low tide, with the vista of the "mighty heart" of London "lying still," |
he used the imagery of human circulation. It is the image of the river as blood, pulsing through the veins and arteries of its terrain, without which the life of London would seize up. Sir Walter Raleigh, contemplating the Thames from the walk by his cell in the Tower, remarked that the "blood which disperseth itself by the branches or veins through all the |
body, may be resembled to these waters which are carried by brooks and rivers overall the earth." He wrote his History of the World (1610) from his prison cell, and was deeply imbued with the current of the Thames as a model of human destiny. It has been used as the symbol for the unfolding of events in time, and carries the burden of |
past events upon its back. For Raleigh the freight of time grew ever more complex and wearisome as it proceeded from its source; human life had become darker and deeper, less pure and more susceptible to the tides of affairs. There was one difference Raleigh noticed in his history, when he declared that "for this tide of man's life, after it once turneth and |
declineth, ever runneth with a perpetual ebb and falling stream, but never floweth again." The Thames has also been understood as a mirror of morality. The bending rushes and the yielding willows afford lessons in humility and forbearance; the humble weeds along its banks have been praised for their lowliness and absence of ostentation. And who has ventured upon the river without learning the |
value of patience, of endurance, and of vigilance? John Denham makes the Thames the subject of native discourse in a further sense: Though deep, yet clear; though gentle, yet not dull; Strong without rage; without o'erflowing, full. This suggests that the river represents an English measure, an aesthetic harmony to be sought or wished for, but in the same breath Denham seems to be |
adverting to some emblem of Englishness itself. The Thames is a metaphor for the country through which it runs. It is modest and moderate, calm and resourceful; it is powerful without being fierce. It is not flamboyantly impressive. It is large without being too vast. It eschews extremes. It weaves its own course without artificial diversions or interventions. It is useful for all manner |
of purposes. It is a practical river. When Robert Menzies, an erstwhile Australian prime minister, was taken to Runnymede he was moved to comment upon the "secret springs" of the "slow English character." This identification of the land with the people, the characteristics of the earth and water with the temperament of their inhabitants, remains a poignant one. There is an inward and intimate |
Teach your child the importance of good sportsmanship.Not too long ago, my 10-year-old daughter's indoor soccer team finished their game and lined up to do the traditional end-of-game walk with the other team. If your own child has ever played in a team sport, you likely have seen this walk |
a hundred times before. Win or lose, each member of the team is expected to essentially tell the other players they did well and good game. This is a classic way to end a game on a positive note and to exhibit good sportsmanship, win or lose. The opposing team |
in this case, however, had a unique way of showing their good sportsmanship. They all licked their hands before holding them out for our own girls to "low-five" as they walked down the line. Our girls saw this, and they refused to touch the other girls' slimy, slobbery, germ-ridden hands. |
You may be wondering if our girls' team beat this other team. The truth is that they beat the other team pretty harshly, but there is no score that would justify the level of poor sportsmanship that the other team exhibited. As a parent, I can only hope the parents |
or coach on the other team reprimanded their girls for this unsportsmanlike behavior. This is not the kind of behavior any parent would be proud to see in their own child. However, this is just one of many ways unsportsmanlike behavior is exhibited. From tears on the field to pushing, |
shoving, "trash talking" and more, there are many different behaviors that are associated with poor sportsmanship. The fact is that good sportsmanship is a quality that can play a role in your child's ability to react to other situations throughout life. Competition may occur on the field, but it also |
plays a part in the college admission process, a run for a place on the school board, the job application process and so much more. Teaching your child how to be a good sport now can help him or her to handle wins and losses throughout life with grace. So |
how can you help your child build a healthy "win-or-lose" attitude? A Positive Parental Role Model No parent takes pride in seeing other players, either from their child's own team or on the opposing team, be better than their own child. Parents simply want their child to be the best. |
However, somewhere between the desire to see your kid to aim for the stars and the truth of reality is the fact that there always will be someone or some team that is better. As a parent, you can talk negatively about these better players or better teams, or you |
can talk positively about them. You can use these interactions with better competition to point out areas where your own child can improve and to teach your child to respect those with skills and talents that are worthy of respect. This is a great opportunity to teach your child to |
turn lemons into lemonade. You Win Some, You Lose Some Very few children really are the best at what they do. There is always someone who either is better now or who is working hard to be better in the near future. A team that was on top this season |
may not be the top team the next season. While you want your child to work hard and strive to win, it is unrealistic to expect a child or his or her team to win all of the time. Children will inevitably be disappointed after a loss. This is understandable |
and justified, especially if he or she has been working hard and did his or her personal best. As a parent, your response to a loss is every bit as important as your response to a win. The fact is that an entire team can play their best, and they |
may simply be out-matched. Teaching kids that losses do happen, even when they try their hardest, can help them to cope with their defeat. Show them that you are proud of their performance and effort at each game rather than letting the tally mark under the "W" column dictate this. |
A Lesson Learned The fact is that a child or a team simply will not improve very quickly when they are blowing out the competition on a regular basis. To be the best, you have to play the best. You have to be challenged by the best, and sometimes this |
means a loss will occur. Within each game, whether a win or loss, lies an opportunity for growth, development and improvement. After each game, regardless of the outcome, talk to your child about what he or she did well and what he or she thinks could have been done better. |
Rather than tell your child what you think, ask your child his or her personal opinion on the matter and what the coach said. Then, remind your child that these are areas that he or she can work on for the next game. Nobody likes to lose, but challenge and |
loss are the motivators that make us all better. Whether on the field, in the workplace or any number of other environments, challenge and loss are vital to developing that ever-important trait that true winners in life have. That trait is perseverance.Content by Kim Daugherty . |
View Sample Pages Provides a detailed curricular calendar that's tied to a developmental continuum and the standards so you'll know not only what you should be teaching, but what your |
students are ready to embrace and what you can reasonably expect of them as successful readers and writers. Additionally, you'll find monthly units of study that integrate reading and writing |
so both work together to provide maximum support for your students. The units are organized around four essential components, process, genre, strategy, and conventions, so you're reassured you're addressing everything |
your students need to know about reading and writing. What's more you'll find ready-to-use lessons that offer exemplary teaching and continuous assessment, and a flexible framework that shows you how |
to frame a year of teaching, a unit, and a lesson—and you can easily adapt all to fit the unique needs and interests of your own students. 240 pages + |
Groundhogs, as a species, have a large range in size. There are the medium-sized rodents I grew up with, averaging around 4 kg, and groundhogs—like a certain Phil—that are probably |
more like 14 kg. This is the likely source of my earlier confusion, as that's a huge discrepancy in size. Evidently, it's all in the diet, much like humans. Where |
I grew up, in rural Northern Minnesota, we called the groundhog a woodchuck; I thought that the groundhog was some fat cat, East Coast, liberal rodent. As it would turn |
out, they are actually one in the same creature—Marmota monax, a member of the squirrel family. Woodchucks spend a lot of their time in burrows. It is their safe haven |
from their many predators, and they are quick to flee to it at the first sign of danger. They will sometimes emit a loud whistle on their way to alert |
others in the area that something is awry. Groundhogs enjoy raiding our gardens and digging up sod, thereby destroying what we've spent countless hours toiling upon. Look for groundhog signs. |
You might not even know there is a groundhog around until your garden has been devoured or your tractor damaged by a collapsed groundhog den. Things to look for are |
large nibble marks on your prized veggies, gnaw marks on the bark of young fruit trees, root vegetables pulled up (or their tops trimmed off), groundhog-sized holes (25–30 cm) anywhere |
near your garden, or mounds of dirt near said holes. If you see these signs, take action. Don't wait or it will be too late! If you know it will |
be a problem and do nothing, you can't blame the animal. Set groundhog traps. This technique takes some skill as you need to be able to pick a spot in |
the path of the animal, camouflage it, and mask your strong human scent. Setting a spring trap, whether coil or long-spring, is usually just a matter of compressing the springs |
and setting a pin that keeps the jaws open into the pan or trigger. Make sure your trap is anchored securely with a stake. Check your traps often, and dispatch |
the animal quickly and humanely. Shooting them in the head or a hearty whack to the head with club will do the trick. If you can't deal with this, you |
have no business setting traps. Call a professional. Guns kill groundhogs. I have never shot a groundhog. I rarely have had problems with them, and they move so damned fast |
it is difficult to get a shot off. If I had to, I know how I would do it. First, be sure it is legal in your area, and be |
sure to follow gun safety protocols. After that, it's just a matter of learning where your target is going to be comfortable and let their guard down. I would follow |
their tracks back to their den, find a spot downwind to sit with a clear shooting lane, and make sure nothing you shouldn't hit with a bullet is down range. |
Then, I would wait, my sights set on the den, until the groundhog stuck its head up—quick and easy. Demolish the groundhog burrows. If you find a couple holes around |
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