Tuesday, February 12

Today is Tuesday of Week 5. Here is a link to the Week 5 assignments. I hope you will enjoy the new readings this week: Mideast and India in Myth-Folklore, and a new Ramayana in Indian Epics.

Class Procedures and Reminders

Project Lists. There are now project lists for both classes: Myth-Folklore and Indian Epics, and I'll keep updating those lists, and also the slideshows, as the projects evolve. Congratulations again to everybody for all your good work! It's going to be a great semester of stories, and everybody has gotten so much done in just a few weeks. Soon, starting in Week 6, you'll be reading and leaving comments on other people's projects and getting feedback on your project too. I'll have more information about that next week.

Project Stack. As always at the start of the week, the stack is HUGE. If you turned in something on Friday, you should have comments back from me now, and I'll start working on the weekend assignments today. As always, you can check the stack to make sure I received your email.

The following items are for fun and exploration:

Blog Stream. I shared Alyx's "relax" poster yesterday, so I thought that would be a good reason to share this "tranquility" poster from Andy's blog today (learning how to make these posters is one of the graphics Tech Tips):

Comic Book On Reserve. Today's comic book is The Sons of Rama: Luv and Kush — The Invincible Twins. If you are curious what happened to Rama and Sita after they came back home to Ayodhya, this comic book has one version of that story.

Free Audiobook. In honor of the Henan Puppet Troupe (see below for details), today's free audiobook is about a very famous puppet: Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi.

Featured Storybook. Many traditional legends and fairy tales involve criminal activities, and that calls for a detective: Fairytale Case Files. From light-hearted tales of elves to the brutal baking of a witch in her own oven, Wolfgang Forrester is on the case!

Myth Video. For those of you doing Egypt in Myth-Folklore this week, here's a fun mash-up from Amy Burvall: King Tut ("Walking on the Sun" by Smash Mouth). Checkout more mash-ups at Amy's YouTube channel.

India Video. Any Battlestar Galactica fans out there? (It's one of my favorite shows.) The opening number is based on the ancient Sanskrit Gayatri mantra.

India Item. And here's an ancient proverb to ponder, inspired by the Ramayana: The birth of a golden deer is impossible; nevertheless, Rama longed for the chase.

Writing. As you write, you need both kinds of thinking: logic and imagination. Learn more here: Divergent-Convergent-Lateral Thinking.

Growth Mindset Cats. This cat needs logic and imagination in order to think outside the box.

And here's something from Maurice Sendak to inspire your reading this week: Reading is fun!

Where does creativity come from? Manoush Zomorodi explains how boredom can lead to your most creative ideas:

Event on Campus. The Puppet Troupe of the Henan Opera and Dance Theater will perform at tonight at 6:30PM at the Sam Noble Museum (details).

Find out more about this and other events at the Campus Calendar online.

February 12: Charles Schulz. Today marks the anniversary of the death in the year 2000 of the American cartoonist, Charles Schulz, creator of the famous Peanuts cartoon characters (he was born in 1922). You can read more about Schulz's life and career in this Wikipedia article. My favorite of the Peanuts characters was always Linus! Here is an image showing the whole Peanuts gang:

And here's a video of Schulz drawing:

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