Friday, April 13

HAPPY FRIDAY! You have reached the end of Week 12! Here is a link to the class calendar; after you finish Week 12, you might want to get a head start on Week 13, especially if your goal is to finish the class early.

Class Procedures and Reminders

Success Tip: Laugh. Seek out opportunities that will let you laugh: it's good for you! Really! Find out more here: The Surprising Link Between Laughter And Learning. And, yes, this is why I am believer in LOLCats for learning. :-)

Project Stack. Yesterday I replied to all the assignments that were turned in on Sunday, and I'll get through as much of the stack as I can today. While you are waiting on comments back from me, you can check the stack to make sure I received your email.

The following items are for fun and exploration:

Blog Stream. Speaking of laughter, I really liked these thoughts from Princess Poppy in Jessica's blog post: "if something goes a little wrong, you can go ahead and bring it on."

Myth Item. In honor of Friday the 13th, I thought I would share this infographic about Number Theories: lucky and unlucky numbers.

India Video: And for something upbeat, you can sing along with Shankar Tunker and the people of Mumbai: Hum Loag

Myth Book Online: Today's free book is Celtic Wonder Tales by Ella Young. See the Freebookapalooza blog for links and the table of contents. The illustrations are by the remarkable Maud Gonne:

Proverb of the Day: Today's proverb is from the ancient Indian Hitopadesha: The waters of the ocean cannot be heated by a torch of straw. Find out more at the Proverb Laboratory.

Writing: Here are some inspiring words for the weekend: Go Out and Create Art.

H.E.A.R.T.: And here's a lovely work of art on the OU campus, accompanied by a quote from Shakespeare: Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.

Growth Mindset: Today's growth mindset kittens are learning as they go: Kittens don't worry about making mistakes. You can find out more at the Growth Mindset blog.

Video: And we can all be kittens at heart, if we open our minds: Millennials Show Us What ‘Old’ Looks Like .

Event on Campus: Khaled al-Masri will be speaking about "Lost Selves and Fractured Homelands in Modern Iraqi Fiction" at 12:30PM in Farzaneh 145 (details). Find out more about this and other events at the Campus Calendar online.

April 13: Alfred Mosher Butts. On this day in 1899 Alfred Mosher Butts was born, the man who invented Scrabble in 1938. So, if you have ever enjoyed a good game of Scrabble, think a happy thought for Mr. Butts today. You can read more about Mr. Butts at Wikipedia. I think I'd like to get one of these giant outdoor Scrabble games: doesn't that look like fun?

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