Friday, October 23 - Sunday, October 25

HAPPY WEEKEND! You have reached the end of Week 9! The Week 9 Read and Respond assignment (blog commenting) is available now, and the remaining Week 9 assignments are due on Friday or on Saturday or Sunday - please make sure you get started on those assignments soon.

Storybook Week 9 and Week 10. For the Week 9 Storybook assignment this weekend, most of you will be turning in a revision assignment. Then, for Week 10, you will be turning in a new story. Remember that you do not need my comments on your Week 9 revisions before you start writing your new story - so don't let me hold you up! After you finish the Week 9 assignment, please feel free to move straight on to the Week 10 assignment and get to work on your new story. If you can get the Week 10 Storybook assignment turned in by this Monday, you can take a point of Early Bird extra credit for working ahead. (For those of you who are on a slightly different schedule with your Storybook, check the email I sent you with your weekly schedule.)

Storybook Stack. I'm still working my way through the stack of Storybook assignments that people have turned in this week. If you turned in your Week 8 Storybook assignment on time, you should have comments back from me now. If you turned in a late Week 8 assignment, or an early Week 9 or Week 10 assignment, it might still be in the stack. In order to check to make sure your assignment is in the stack, you can see the contents of the stack here. I will do my best to get comments back to any assignment that is turned in before noon on Friday. If you turn in something after noon on Friday, it will go into the stack for Monday.

Spring 2010 enrollment. (repeat announcement) I know that some of you are graduating in December (congratulations!), but for those of you who will be in school next semester, I wanted to give you a chance to reserve a place in one of these online classes for Spring, if you are interested. The online courses all fill up very fast, but if you let me know BY MONDAY, October 26, that you would like to take one of these classes in the Spring, I should be able to reserve a space for you. You can get more information about each of the three classes at MythFolklore.net, where you will find links to the websites for each class: World Literature (lower-division Western Culture Gen. Ed.), Myth-Folklore (upper-division Western Culture Gen. Ed.), and Indian Epics (upper-division Non-Western Culture Gen. Ed.).

Microsoft Updates and Anti-Virus Software. Every semester, I hear from several students who have run into serious problems with viruses on their computers. If you use Windows as your computer operating system, and especially if you use Internet Explorer as your browser, it is EXTREMELY IMPORTANT that you update your Windows operating system with the latest security updates at the WindowsUpdate.microsoft.com website. The OU IT department makes anti-virus software available to you FOR FREE, so you also should make sure that you have anti-virus software installed on your Windows computer. To get the free software, you have to log on to the IT Store at ITStore.ou.edu, and after you log on, you can click on this Symantec Anti-Virus Software link to download and install the software on your computer for free (Symantec EndPoint is available for all versions of Windows: Windows 2000/XP/Vista and Windows 7). For additional help or if you have questions, call IT at 325-HELP. You definitely do not want to run into computer virus problems as the end of the semester draws near!

(image source)

Thursday, October 22

Today is Thursday of WEEK 9 of the class. If you have not turned in your Week 8 Storybook assignment yet, you may turn that in BEFORE NOON today for partial credit. For those of you in Myth-Folklore or World Lit, Thursday morning, until noon, is the grace period if you forgot to do any of the assignments that were due on Wednesday.

Storybook Stack. I've still got quite a few items left in the Storybook stack. If you turned in an assignment over the weekend, you should have comments back from me now. If you turned something in on Monday or Tuesday or Wednesday, your assignment is probably still in the stack, waiting for me to get to it. If you want to check to make sure your assignment is in the stack, you can see the contents of the stack here.

Extra Credit. As you strategize about getting the points you need to finish up the class, remember that extra credit points go straight into your total and can help you either to make up for missed work or to finish the class early. There are some extra credit assignments available each week (like the "Famous Last Words" post), and there are some extra credit assignments you can do in advance (like the "Technology Tips," which you can do now for Week 9, Week 10 and so on - there's no need to wait), plus there are the Grammar Quiz extra credit points which are available now and which will continue to be available for the rest of the semester.

October 22: Doris Lessing. Today, October 22, is the birthday of the great British author, Doris Lessing, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2007. You can read more about Doris Lessing's life and career in this Wikipedia article. Last summer I read Lessing's novel Shikasta, which is one of the greatest science fiction novels I have ever read - if you are a science fiction fan, or interested in political literature (like Orwell's 1984, for example), it's a book I recommend most highly! Here's a recent photo of Lessing when she learned she had won the Nobel Prize. Happy birthday, Doris Lessing!

Wednesday, October 21

Today is Wednesday of WEEK 9 of the class. If you have not turned in your Week 8 Storybook assignment yet, you may still do that for partial credit. Wednesday morning, until noon, is the grace period if you forgot to do any of the assignments that were due on Tuesday.

Storybook Stack. There are still quite a few Storybook assignments in the stack and I am making my way through them in the order that they were turned in. If you turned something in before 5PM on Sunday, you should have comments back from me already. If you turned something in later on Sunday or on Monday or Tuesday, it is probably still in the stack. If you want to check and make sure your assignment is in the stack, you can see the contents of the stack here.

Finishing the course early. As you can see on the Grading page for this class, you need 320 points to get a C in the class, 360 points to get a B, and 410 points for an A. It's fine with me if you decide to finish up the course with a grade of C or B, instead of going for an A. I know many of you are taking the course for the Gen. Ed. requirement, often on top of a very full course load along with work and other personal commitments. So, just remember that as soon as you get the points you need for the grade you want in the course, you are done! My only request is that when you finish your work for the course, please let me know, so that I can mark your final grade in the Gradebook. If you are interested in finishing up the course ahead of schedule, make sure you start doing the extra credit assignments (including the Grammar Quizzes). Each point brings you that much closer to finish up the course ahead of schedule!

October 21: Jack Kerouac. Today, October 21, marks the death in 1969 of Jack Kerouac, the great American novelist of the "Beat" generation of writers. You can read more about Kerouac's life and career in this Wikipedia article. He is most famous for his novel On the Road, which he wrote in a burst of inspiration during the month of April in 1951. In order to keep pace with his writing style, he taped pieces of paper together in a continuous roll of paper that was 120 feet long which he could then feed into the typewriter without having to stop to put new pages into the typewriter. Just imagine what he could have done with a word processor, eh? The actual roll of paper has been preserved; here is the start of the novel at the top of the roll (click here for a larger view - and you can also see a display of the scroll rolled out):

Tuesday, October 20

Today is Tuesday of WEEK 9 of the class. That means in Indian Epics you are beginning the Mahabharata, while it's Robin Hood or King Arthur in the Mythology-Folklore class, and Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in World Literature. If you have not turned in your Week 8 Storybook assignment yet, you may still do that for partial credit.

Storybook Stack. As usual at the beginning of the week, there are still LOTS of Storybook assignments in the stack. If you turned something in before 6PM on Saturday, you should have comments back from me already. If you turned something in later on Saturday or on Sunday or Monday, it is probably still in the stack waiting for me to get to it. If you want to check and make sure your assignment is in the stack, you can see the contents of the stack here. If you still have not turned in your Week 8 Storybook assignment, you can still do that late for partial credit - and the sooner you can turn that in, the better!

Spring 2010 enrollment. I know that some of you are graduating in December (congratulations!), but for those of you who will be in school next semester, I wanted to give you a chance to reserve a place in one of these online classes for Spring, if you are interested. The online courses all fill up very fast, but if you let me know BY NEXT MONDAY, October 26, that you would like to take one of these classes in the Spring, I should be able to reserve a space for you. You can get more information about each of the three classes at MythFolklore.net, where you will find links to the websites for each class: World Literature (lower-division Western Culture Gen. Ed.), Myth-Folklore (upper-division Western Culture Gen. Ed.), and Indian Epics (upper-division Non-Western Culture Gen. Ed.).

October 20: Birth of the Bab. Today, October 20, is a holiday in the Bahai religious calendar, celebrating the birthday of the Bab, one of the central figures in the Bahai tradition. He was born in Iran in 1819, and took the name "Bab" (meaning "Gate") when he announced his claims to be God's messenger in 1944. His radical religious claims were not accepted by the Muslim clergy of the time, and he was executed in 1850. You can read about his life and religious teachings in this detailed Wikipedia article, where you can also read this detailed article about the Bahai faith. The image below shows the Shrine of the Bab which is located in Haifa, Israel:

Monday, October 19

Today is Monday. Week 8 of the class is now over. Monday morning, until noon, is the grace period if you forgot to do any of the assignments that were due on Friday/Saturday/Sunday. Week 9 will begin tomorrow - and those assignments are available now if you want to get started.

Storybook stack. As always on Monday, I will have a huge bunch of assignments in the Storybook stack that were turned in over the weekend or on Monday morning. The first thing I will do on Monday morning when I get to work is to update the list of items in the Storybook stack. So, after 8 a.m. or so on Monday, you will be able to check the contents of the stack to make sure I received your assignment. I will be reading and reply to the assignments in the order they were turned in.

Grading. With the beginning of Week 9 tomorrow, that means there are a total of seven more weeks of the semester (9-10-11-12-13-14-15), which means 210 points of regular assignments available, plus extra credit (extra credit that is available week by week, plus the Grammar Quiz extra credit options). You may want to start planning now how you want to finish up the class. For a chart that shows you week by week point totals and other information about the grading system, you can consult this Grading Information page. It's fine with me if you want to finish the class with a grade of "B" when you get 360 points or "C" when you get 320 points; for an "A" you need 410 points. So, when you have reached the the points required for the grade you want to take, just let me know. As soon as you get the points you need, you do not need to do any more of the class assignments.

October 19: Yorktown Day. Today, October 19, is the anniversary of George Washington's victory at the Battle of Yorktown (Virginia) in 1781, the last major battle of the Revolutionary War, which ended with the surrender of the British forces commanded by General Cornwallis. If you are a U.S. history buff, you probably also recognize the "Yorktown" as being famous as the name of a U.S. aircraft carrier which fought and was sunk at the Battle of Midway in WWII. The painting below showing Cornwallis's surrender can be seen in the U.S. Capitol rotunda in Washington: