Friday, March. 2 - Sunday, March 4

HAPPY WEEKEND! You have reached the end of Week 7! The Week 7 Read and Respond assignment (blog commenting) is available now, and so is the Week 7 Internet assignment (Storybook commenting), along with the remaining Week 7 assignments that are due on Friday or on Saturday or Sunday - please make sure you get started on those assignments soon. Friday morning, until noon, is the grace period if you forgot to do any of the assignments that were due on Thursday.

Storybook Stack. I'm still working my way through the large stack of Storybook assignments that people have turned in. I've read and replied to all the Week 6 assignments turned in on time, but if you turned in a late Week 6 assignment, or an early assignment for Week 7 or 8, it may still be in the stack. My goal is to get comments back to everyone by the end of the day Friday for assignments turned in before Friday at 8AM. If you want to check to make sure your assignment is in the stack, you can see the contents of the stack here.

New Responding groups. (repeat announcement) The blog responding groups have been shuffled around again this week so you should see one or even two new people in your group. Let me repeat the instructions for that assignment just as a reminder: You need to comment on TWO posts at each blog. Read the ESSAY post and STORYTELLING post. If - and only if - one or both of those posts are missing, choose any two posts in the person's blog you have not read yet.

Week 7 Internet assignment. (repeat announcement) For the Week 7 Internet assignment, you will be reading stories at the Storybooks, since everybody should have a story available now. That means you have more reading to do this time (three stories and, possibly, a couple of Introductions also), so you will have just THREE Storybooks that you comment on. To find out more about how the assignment works this week, see the Internet assignment page.

Weekend Events on Campus. OU's Opera Theatre is presenting Mozart's Don Giovanni; performances are at 8PM on Friday and Saturday, and at 3PM on Sunday (time/location/details). Find out more about this and other events at the Campus Calendar online.

March 3: Hinamatsuri. Saturday, March 3, is the Hinamatsuri holiday in Japan, the "Doll Festival," which is a festival of good luck for young girls. You can read more about the holiday in this Wikipedia article. There are special dolls which are displayed for the festival, often decorated with peach blossoms. This image shows a Hinamatsuri doll displayed at the festival in 2005 in the city of Kounos, near Tokyo:

Thursday, March 1

Today is Thursday of WEEK 7 of the class. If you have not turned in your Week 6 Storybook assignment yet, you may still do that for partial credit; please make sure you get it turned in by noon today at the latest. For those of you in Myth-Folklore, 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'm still working my way through the large stack of Storybook assignments that people have turned in. If you turned in an assignment on Sunday, you should have comments back from me now. If you turned something in on Monday, 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.

New Responding groups. The blog responding groups have been shuffled around again this week so TOMORROW, Friday, that assignment will be available with new people in the groups. Let me repeat the instructions for that assignment just as a reminder: You need to comment on TWO posts at each blog. Read the ESSAY post and STORYTELLING post. If - and only if - one or both of those posts are missing, choose any two posts in the person's blog you have not read yet.

Week 7 Internet assignment. If you did not read yesterday's announcements, please make sure you take a look at that; the instructions for the Internet assignment this week are somewhat different from last week since you will be reading a STORY at the Storybooks you comment on this week.

Thursday Events on Campus. The opening reception for "A Veritable Menagerie" will take place from 5PM-7PM in the Lightwell Gallery of the Art Museum (time/location/details). Find out more about this and other events at the Campus Calendar online.

March 1: Saint David's Day. Today is the feast day of Saint David (Dewi Sant in Welsh), the patron saint of Wales. You can learn more about Saint David and the Saint's David celebrations in this BBC article. Here is a depiction of Saint David in the stained glass windows of the Jesus College Chapel in Oxford, England.

Wednesday, February 29

Today is Wednesday of WEEK 7 of the class. If you have not turned in your Week 6 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. I'm still working my way through the large stack of Storybook assignments that people have turned in. If you turned in an assignment before 9PM on Sunday, you should have comments back from me now. If you turned something in later on Sunday or on Monday or Tuesday, 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.

Week 7 Internet assignment. (repeat announcement) For the Week 7 Internet assignment, which is available now, you will be reading stories at the Storybooks, since everybody should have a story available now. That means you have more reading to do this time (three stories and, possibly, a couple of Introductions also), so you will have just THREE Storybooks that you comment on. You are welcome to do that assignment now; you don't have to wait if a person you are assigned happens not to have published a story yet. To find out more about how the assignment works this week, see the Internet assignment page.

Commenting on Storybooks. (repeat announcement) Every week from now through Week 12 of the semester, you will be commenting on people's writing at their Storybooks. During these weeks as you comment on people's Storybooks, please provide as much detailed, specific feedback as possible. People will be writing and re-writing their Storybook pages all semester long, so specific feedback is really valuable. It's nice to get compliments, but it is also really good to get feedback about what things could be improved. So, do not hesitate to say when something is confusing, or obvious, or repetitious, or if you think something is important is missing. Every semester, students tell me that they wish they had received more detailed feedback on their Storybooks, rather than just generic compliments. So definitely give compliments about things you like, but please also try to provide detailed feedback both about the writing and about the webpage design. Sharing your specific, detailed impressions is an important part of the process of helping everyone to create a great Storybook this semester!

Wednesday Events on Campus. Free cupcakes - come "Decorate a Cupcake" in the first floor lobby of the Union at 11:30 AM (time/location/details). Find out more about this and other events at the Campus Calendar online.

Happy Leap Year Day! As you can imagine, the Wikipedia article about Leap Years is filled with all kinds of fascinating details about this calendar phenomenon, including leap years in folklore. For example, here is a postcard from the 1908 Leap Year based on the folk tradition that in a Leap Year, and only in a Leap Year, women may make a proposal of marriage to men, rather than the usual vice versa.

Tuesday, February 28

Today is Tuesday of WEEK 7 of the class, and I've re-arranged the Quiz area in Desire2Learn so Week 7 is on top. This week's topic is India or Japan in Myth-Folklore. In Indian Epics, you are finishing up Buck's Ramayana. If you have not turned in your Week 6 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 on Friday or Saturday, you should have comments back from me already. If you turned something in on Sunday or on Monday, 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. PLEASE DO CHECK: if something did go wrong with your email, it is important for you to let me know right away.

Week 7 Internet assignment. For the Week 7 Internet assignment, which is available now, you will be reading stories at the Storybooks, since everybody should have a story available now. That means you have more reading to do this time (three stories and, possibly, a couple of Introductions also), so you will have just THREE Storybooks that you comment on. You are welcome to do that assignment now; you don't have to wait if a person you are assigned happens not to have published a story yet. To find out more about how the assignment works this week, see the Internet assignment page.

Tuesday Events on Campus. There will be a free noon concert by the Bill Neill Voice Studio in the Fred Jones Museum of Art's Sandy Bell Gallery (time/location/details). Find out more about this and other events at the Campus Calendar online.

February 28: John Tenniel. Today, February 28, marks the birthday in the year 1820 of the great English illustrator, John Tenniel, who is most famous for his illustrations to Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland. You can read about Tenniel's life and career in this Wikipedia article. You can see many of his illustrations to the Alice books in the Wonderland unit for the Myth-Folklore class and the Looking-Glass unit for the World Literature class (which is no longer offered, but the course materials are still online). Here, for example, is the illustration of Humpty-Dumpty the egg who sat on the wall ... just before he has hid great fall! Ouch!

Monday, February 27

Today is Monday, and Week 6 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 7 will begin tomorrow - and those assignments are available now if you want to get started.

Grading. Now that we have finished Week 6 of the semester, there have been 180 points of required work. You can consult this chart to get an indication of how you are doing in the class overall: if you have around 165 points (155 points if your Week 6 Storybook has not been graded yet), you are headed for an A; if you have around 145 points (135 points), you are headed for a B; if you have around 125 points (115 points), you are headed for a C; with less than 125, you are in danger of failing the class. There are still 9 weeks left in the semester, which gives you plenty of time to improve your grade if you are not on track for the grade you want. Just make sure you budget time to do more of the assigned work and, if you do miss an assignment, make sure you complete some extra credit points to make up for it.

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 9AM 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 replying to the assignments in the order they were turned in.

Monday Events on Campus. Prof. David Hackett Fischer (Brandeis University) will be giving a public lecture entitled “George Washington’s Gift” at 10:30 AM in the Sharp Concert Hall of Catlett Music Center (time/location/details). Find out more about this and other events at the Campus Calendar online. Fischer's book Washington's Crossing is one of the best American history books I have ever read, so if you have time to attend this event, I would highly recommend it - and I would highly recommend the book, too!