BEST SUB DAY EVER!!!

Today I had the best sub day I've ever had outside of my normal school district. This was my first day subbing outside of my normal school district in nearly ten months and I could not have asked for a better experience. The kids were in their seats listening and ready to work. This led me to wonder why were these students were so great for a substitute while other districts that I have been in are not. Is it because this school has a strong anti-being mean to a substitute policy or because the teacher had earned the respect of their students and her students knew that if they were bad they would lose the respect of their teacher. I could not have asked for a better experience and I look forward to working with this district again.

Was it Really My Worst Subbing Day Ever?

On Thursday my Facebook status was Worst Sub Day Ever. I was left no plans, the ninth grade buddies that were suppose to come had a half day and did not and to top it all off a new student arrived that day. Needless to say I was running around the building like a chicken with my head cut off. Then I realized it was probably my best sub day ever. I proved to myself that even though I was stressed, angry, and frantically running around I was able to maintain my classroom and keep my class running normally. I was blessed that I was in a building I was familiar with and knew the staff and the normal routine. Even though the stressed showed and I am sure my children noticed I kept going and complained every second of it but survived and isn't that what a teacher is suppose to do maintain the classroom and keep learning going even with everything falling apart? And even though my students saw my stress they still said I was their favorite sub, so at least I made an impact on them. However, I learned the most important thing about teaching, TEAMWORK!!!. I could not have done without all the help I recieved that day from the neighboring third grade teacher, a fourth grade teacher, and of course the most important person in the building the secretary. These women helped me and I cannot thank them enough. Without this team I would not have survived. This proved to me their is no I in teacher and this experience has forever taught me that I cannot do it alone.

I've been Inspired to Blog Again

It is that simple. I found inspiration to blog again thanks to the new batch of students that are taking this course this semester. So please look forward to more updates on Currin 480.

Last Mandatory Post

This is my last mandatory post for HST 480 while I'll probably continue I wanted to wrap up my experiences from the class. The most important thing I got was history does not matter unless it is shared. This can be through a museum or in a classroom, or grandmama passing down stories of her past. History must be shown if it is not it does not exist.

I'll never look at a museum the same way again. As our group prepared and designed our project I gained so much more respect for the workers. We dug and dug and dug and still did not dig enough. We found almost everything we could and it still did not seemed enough. Then to top all off I have to analyze everything differently at a museum. I kind of touched on this when I discussed my trip to Milwaukee but I had to judge everything. I had to analyze every little detail and determine what audience they were going for and does the exhibit talk to me.

Also, I want to thank all my classmates. I wouldn't have survived without you. There is no way I could have done everything we did in that class without you.

And finally, thank you Professor Knupfer. As much as I complained about everything it was rewarding. I developed new skills and new ways to analyze everything.

Hopefully, we can still all say hi to each other and hopefully we will work together one day.

Peace,
Brandon

Promotion

It's one of the few times I'll promote anything but here I go. The Mitten Mavens the Lansing Roller Derby League is having a fundraiser at Noodles and Company on May 5th from 4-9pm. By mentioning the Mitten Mavens 25% of the sale will go to the Mitten Mavens. Please support these women as they do what they love.

Heritage or History?

Grace Kelly's Gowns. You decide. I found this on Yahoo News.

London Museum Showcases Grace Kelly's Gowns

What is Worth Preserving?

Today I contacted WILX and WLNS to find video archives for our I-496 project and the response I got was "absolutely not". WILX mentioned how they could go back to 1989-1990 but no further. This led to the discussion what gets preserved and Akikwe one of the many and talented students in our class mentioned on the Library of Congress is going to preserve the Twitter Archives. It was funny she mentioned this because I just found the link on The Drudge Report that linked to a Wired article.

Twitter and the Library of Congress

One More Thing...

about the Milwaukee Public Museum. If the purpose of the museum is to learn. Why does it cost an additional $14 to see the Dead Sea Scrolls. I mean I can understand a little extra for a special exhibit but $14. That additional fee forces the exclusion of many people who cannot afford or does not believe it is worth $14 to see this historical document. I wasn't going to spend $14 on it.

Blogging from Milwaukee

After spending hours upon hours at the State of Michigan Library I made the trek to Milwaukee. I could not believe how much we actually made it through at the library. While some sources had little to no relevance we still needed those to help guide our path. We all still had to take one book home for homework it could have been a lot worse. Their was now way I could ever conceive of getting through all of those volumes on my own.

Now, as I sit here at the Milwaukee Public Museum I just want to say what a great job they have done recreating items. I walk into the rain forest and the floor is simulated to look like the ground in the rain forest. The stone roads through the European villages section. The recreating of the rain forest, homes, businesses, and pretty much everything else was amazing. However, the layout troubled me. One moment I was in the rain forest and the next I was seeing stuff about biochemistry. The continents of the world blended together. They had too much going on. And the captions were another issue. Some were over labeled other exhibits lacked context. I had a hard time trying to understand how everything connected together. Overall, I had a very mixed experience at the Milwaukee Public.

Now I must go and take part in my favorite activity, shopping :)

Boy, Have I Been in a Blogging Mood Today

This will probably be my last post before the Invasion of the State of Michigan Library tomorrow but I just want to say how helpful the librarians at Michigan State University. I come with this off the wall topic on Michigan Statehood (they were taken aback by it, because seriously how many people truly do research Michigan Statehood when they are 21). Even though I caught them off guard they quickly found two great sources and could not have been friendlier. For that I'm thankful. Now I feel even more confident on my final project and I'm definitely going to stick out with the founding of Michigan and the Toledo War.

Final Project

While I'm still undecided on what topic I'll take I'm still fascinated by the Toledo War. I was going through the Ohio Standards and was amazed they didn't mention statehood in their standards. They don't even have a year of state history like Michigan does. This amazes me.

I Think I see the Light

I'll know more tomorrow but I think I finally see the light at the end of the tunnel on the I-496 Project. I feel tomorrow will be a great day when a good chunk of the research team invades the Library of Michigan to hopefully find many of the loose ends that we are looking for.

Why does everything have to happen at the end of the semester?

Everything is coming up at once and it is annoying me. I have to multitask just to keep up with everything. While I feel like we are making progress with the I-496 Project it just seems their is always something more. This is why I have not been able to dedicate my time to the individual project which is taking on so many different directions. I know I'm doing a lesson plan that was originally going to be on the Toledo War but while researching that I would like to compare and contrast Michigan's and Arkansas's admittance into the United States. With that being said I was researching the Democratic Republic of the Congo for another class and I would love to do a lesson plan on the DROC and the United States during the Cold War. With exams coming up in my ISP class (Psyhics) and my English Final Project and my Independent Study I just don't know how I'll get it all done. However in the words of one of my idols Tim Gunn "Make it Work." and that I will.

Rant on the I-496

I am so confused right now and I have no clue what we are doing. I don't know what the other people have posted because I don't have the access. I really don't know what direction the project is going in. I am so confused because this to me has no structure and I work on structure. I feel like some of things I've found were never releavant.

Productivity

Today I went with an amazing group of classmates to the Library of Michigan to research our I-496 Project and boy we got a lot accomplished. I don't know how much of it was related to our GM connection but we found a lot of great resources in the forms of newspaper clippings. While it was a great experience to see many of the old headlines it was also great learning about Michigan. While I only got to see it through Lansing roads and Interstate 496 it was still an experience. I hope we found things that we can use but if not it was still great learning about the area.

General Motors and I-496: The First Post of Many

As you know we are building an exhibit on I-496 and I was placed on the Research Team. Within that team I was given a more specialized topic and that was General Motors (GM) role. Me being an Africanist I really had no background knowledge on General Motors or the automobile industry. The first book I read on the topic was Billy, Alfred, and General Motors written by William Pelfrey. This gave me great insight on not only the growth of GM but also the growth of the automobile industry. The free wheeling style of Billy Durant (who looks like a professor I had at MSU named Barry Stein) and the rigid Alfred Sloan. Both of these men made great strides in the automobile industry with Durant building GM and Sloan saving GM.

Stupid time to ask this question but...

I just drove the entire stretch of I-496 for the first time and guess what it goes a lot farther than the neighborhood we are discussing. A lot of land was used and why are we only focusing on this one neighborhood? I realize it was the largest black community in Lansing at the time but I-496 impacted so many more people. This leads me to a lot of questions about our exhibit. Why are we only including one neighborhood? Did the people in Eaton County get treated differently than in Ingham county? What was destroyed out past this community to build I-496? I know if we included everyone are exhibit would be to huge with too many focal points. However, with a narrow scope of the project I don't feel that we can tell an accurate complete story.

RESOURCE ANNOUNCED

Thank you C-SPAN. They are releasing all of their footage online for free. This is great for historians. It makes digging through all of the political footage you want so much easier. I haven't had to chance to dig but I can't wait. Why wasn't this done over spring break :(

C-SPAN Video Archive
New York Timess Article

Curriculum Again

Who gets to decide history? In Texas it is the State Board of Education who has just passed sweeping legislative changes to its history, economics, and sociology curriculum. This has national impact because Texas is one of the nation's largest textbook buyers and as a result the textbooks are impacted across the nation. Many of the changes promote a more conservative and heritage based of American History. It wants to show that the Founding Fathers did not necessarily want a secular nation. It will also include the Black Panthers and not just Martin Luther King Jr. The conservatives are claiming their adding balance to the liberal education system while the liberals are claiming a rewrite of history.

Who is right? Who should decide what is taught? Below are links to the New York Times Article and the Houston Chronicle article.

New York Times
Houston Chronicle

Stuart Dunnings II

Stuart Dunnings II passed away on Wednesday due to natural causes. He is one of the men interviewed in Matt Miller's article which is assisting us in our I-496 Project. He was the first Lansing's first black lawyer and an important part of the legal community. Below is the link to Christine Rook piece about him from the Lansing State Journal.

Report