Sunday, September 10

Yep, it really is Sunday of Week 3 already. So, today is the day to finish up Week 3, and you might also want to do some extra credit and/or get started on next week's assignments! You can find all the assignments for this week and next week at the Class Calendar.

Class Procedures and Reminders

Problems with Canvas Gradebook. Canvas added a new feature to the student view of the Gradebook this semester, and I just found out about it this week: "Late" and "Missing" labels. Those labels do not fit the grading system of this class, but unfortunately I cannot turn the labels off. So, please just ignore all those "Late" and "Missing" labels that you see in the Gradebook! I am hoping Canvas will change the feature to allow instructors to turn the labels off. From the Canvas Community discussion, I know I'm not the only teacher who wants to get rid of those new labels, so hopefully they will make that change. Fingers crossed.

Call me Laura. As I mentioned earlier, you really can just call me Laura! I'm not a professor (just an instructor), and being on a first-name basis makes sense to me in an online class like this. So really, please just call me Laura!

Project Stack. You can check the stack to make sure I received your Project assignment; I'll be updating the stack periodically over the weekend, and on Monday I'll start responding to the assignments in the order they were turned in, starting with the assignments turned in on Friday. If you want comments back sooner rather than later, turn your assignment in on Sunday morning or afternoon. If you wait until Sunday evening, it will probably take me until Thursday or Friday to get comments back to you.

Extra Credit. There are lots of extra credit options each week, and the "Famous Last Words" one is a nice one for taking a few minutes to pause and reflect on how the semester is going. Find out more in the extra credit section of this week's assignments.

The following items are for fun and exploration:

Class Twitter. From yesterday's Twitter @OnlineMythIndia, here is a graphic about Madeline L'Engle's novel, A Wrinkle in Time. This was one of my favorite books when I was little; I am so glad she did not give up in her quest to publish that book.

Art at OU. Some of you have been exploring Greek mythology this week, so maybe you will want to go take a look at OU's own Sphinx, a 10-foot-tall sculpture by Fernando Botero.

Storybook Archive. This project is from the Myth-Folklore class: Hero Visa Pending. It's not easy being a clerk in the afterlife, as you will learn from Marcus, secretary to Lord Hades himself.

Free Book Online: Today's free book is Bengal Fairy Tales by F. B. Bradley-Birt. See the Freebookapalooza blog for links and the table of contents. This is another book with illustrations by Abanindranath Tagore:

Story of the Day. Today's story is from Aesop's fables: The Bear and the Bees. This is a great fable about anger management. The illustration is by Milo Winter:

Video: The video for today is The Present. Find out more at Jacob Frey's website. Be sure to watch all the way to the end:

Growth Mindset: Reflecting together with others is a great way to grow and learn! You can find out more at the Growth Mindset blog.

Event on Campus: Bring Grandpa and Grandma to the Sam Noble Museum today; all grandparents enjoy free admission... and today is the last day for Comets, Asteroids, Meteors: Great Balls of Fire! (details). Find out more about this and other events at the Campus Calendar online.

September 10: Alison Bechdel. Today is the birthday of the cartoonist Alison Bechdel. Happy birthday, Alison! She is the author of two graphic novels, Are You My Mother? and Fun Home; the stage musical of Fun Home won a Tony Award in 2015. Bechdel is probably most famous for the Bechdel Test, used to rate movies and other works of fiction for women's presence: are there at least two women who talk to each other about something other than a man? Here's how Doctor Who rates on Bechdel Test ... and soon the show should rate even higher because the Doctor will (finally) be a woman!

Check out the Twitter stream for information and fun stuff during the day, or click here for past announcements.