Dec.4 — “Scarlet beads dripped over her collarbone.”
Dec. 5 — “A flighty thing with broken wings.”
Dec. 6 — “Friend request from an ex. Accept?”
Dec. 7 — “Bent out of shape. Reason: unknown.”
Dec. 8 — “The cold, white snow turned crimson.”
Dec. 9 — “Pin pricks on faded map dots.”
Dec. 10 — “First love lost is never found.”
Dec. 11 — “Dark silence stifled her last lullaby.”
Dec. 12 — “His grizzly whiskers clogged the sink.”
Dec. 13 — “Age warped his sterling wedding ring.”
Dec. 14 — “Wanted: Men without self-destructive vices.”
Dec. 15 —…
“We want to put everything in black and white, but I love the gray areas.”
Marilyn Minter challenged the status quo for decades as a painter, photographer, and video artist with her unique blend of grit and glamour. Born in 1948 to a substance-abusing mother and absent father, Minter derived artistic inspiration from her unusual upbringing.
As an undergraduate photography student at the University of Florida, Minter photographed her mother using black and white medium format film for a class assignment. Her professor and peers responded with horror upon learning the subject of these images was Minter’s mother, likening her more to a drag queen than a maternal figure.
Humiliated by her peers’ response, Minter…
Lesson 1: Student teaching and teaching students.
The last week of August was my first week working in a middle school English Language Arts classroom (outside of being a middle school student, of course). My goal for the week was to get a feeling for the flow of instruction throughout the class period.
While I imagine teachers are conducting lessons using some altered practices and procedures this year, I do feel like I now understand the basic structure of how my mentor teacher plans and delivers her lesson over the course of the class period.
The 8th grade class periods I am currently working with are studying…
From Peter Pan to Pocahontas.
Disney has faced many controversies concerning the depictions of Native American characters in their media productions. The portrayal of Native Americans in children’s movies, specifically the Disney films Peter Pan (1953) and Pocahontas (1995) are not only stereotypical but also dehumanizing and often completely inaccurate.
Both Peter Pan and Pocahontas exploit Native American culture and deviate so far from reality that they undermined Native peoples and their unique cultures in the United States. …
Forest wives in Hemingway’s novel ‘For Whom the Bell Tolls’ and Paramount Vantage Pictures’ 2008 film ‘Defiance.’
Since the earliest years of American film, the movie industry has been profiting greatly from the production of war films, experiencing a dramatic rise in popularity after the end of World War II. Feeding off of the patriotic sentimentality of the American people, production companies made films that glorified the American military and created an idealized image of war as a romantic act of self-sacrifice for the well being of the nation. Combining elements of action, romance, and patriotism, this genre appeals to millions of movie-goers and continues to profit today.
Defiance, a 2008 film produced by Paramount Vantage Pictures…
Analyzing ‘Canyon,’ one of the artist’s most famous works.
mirror, taxidermied eagle, cardboard, pillow, paint tube and other materials. Museum of Modern Art, New York.
Upon seeing Rauschenberg’s Canyon for the first time, I recall feeling both confused and revolted. As my fifteen-year-old eyes analyzed the piece, I couldn’t help but question the sanity of the artist. Why would a sound man taxidermy an eagle, fasten the stuffed bird to a pedestal and call it art? Why would he slap black and white paint across a canvas with no apparent intention? And how could he reproduce photographs that weren’t his own without committing copyright violations?
Temporarily loaned to the National Gallery of Art several years ago, Canyon was displayed alongside pieces by Jasper Johns, Claes…
Examining perennialism and progressivism as philosophical approaches to public education.
In Teachers, Schools, and Society, authors David Sadker and Karen Zittleman explore five educational philosophies that have greatly influenced and shaped public schooling policies and practices in the United States: essentialism, perennialism, progressivism, social reconstructionism, and existentialism.
As Sadker and Zittleman explain, “although there are some similarities, there are also profound differences in the way leading educators define the purpose of education, the role of the teacher, the nature of the curriculum and assessment, and the method of instruction,” (pg. 158). …
A free tool that removes reading barriers.
General education teachers in all content areas are responsible for adapting their teaching strategies and content delivery systems to meet the individual needs of all students, especially those with disabilities. This can be particularly challenging when working with students who struggle to read and understand printed materials.
In the past, teachers had to scan books individually by cutting off the spine, scanning the pages and proofing the scanned pages. Processing each book took teachers several hours to complete. Fortunately, the U.S. …
The Eastern European creators of American Color Field Painting.
Several shifts in the intellectual, social and political climate of post World War II America gave way to the rise of Abstract Expressionism. The artistic style gained popularity as a weapon against Totalitarianism, which had plagued Europe during the war, and as a method of art-making that championed individuality and self-expression.
Critics such as Harold Rosenberg and Clement Greenberg explored the motives and meaning of the contemporary American art scene through scholarly writings and critical reviews of gallery exhibitions. …
Junipero Serra’s controversial legacy as founder and father of California’s Catholic mission system.
What is now present-day California once belonged to the Kingdom of Spain during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. This vast area, along with Mexico and parts of the American southwest, were under Spanish rule. Spain sought to control Native American tribes within this region so they could establish and maintain absolute imperial power. Spaniards believed that religions of the Native Americans were derived from the work of Satin and needed to be corrected immediately with Catholicism.
In response, the Spanish government sent a ship carrying Franciscan missionaries to the New World to spread and instruct Catholicism to the…
Polina Rosewood
Educator, art lover & adventure seeker
