I ended up not teaching at all today. My teacher has taken over both Per. 2 and 5, and today he taught Per. 3 and 6. Every few days he jumps in to teach the AP classes, so that was good. The day went pretty slowly though, with me just sitting there the entire time.
Tomorrow I will be teaching the AP kids again.
I sent Dragon Age Origins back to Gamefly today. I probably put about ten to twelve hours into it, and barely scratched the surface. Yet, from what I played, I know its a game that I HAVE to own. I was gunning to get Borderlands, but Dragon Age really blew me away, and I just have to have it as my next game. If I hadnt just bought MUA2, Uncharted 2, and WWE 2010 I would have been more inclined to keep it, but Ive been spending too much on games as it is. Regardless, it is safe to say that Dragon Age is the best RPG on the PS3 that I have played, and that says a lot based on how much I loved Sacred 2.
When you start a game, you create a new character by choosing the race, sex, and class. Then, you will select one of six “background stories” which introduce your character and the game. Which story you can choose depends on what kind of character you created. From there, you are thrust right into the game.
I have a full review partially done and saved as a draft, so I wont get too much into the game here. All Im gonna say is that it is one of the best RPGs on the PS3…it definitely gives Sacred 2 a run for its money. I had it about a week, and have returned it, simply because I know that I have to buy it, and theres no point wasting my Gamefly time on renting it any longer. I will own this game by the end of the year!
I am going for Beatles Rock Band next. I keep meaning to snag it from Gamefly so that Shell and I can give it a run-through, but the past two months have been full of awesome new releases (Uncharted, Borderlands, WWE, Dragon Age), so I kept pushing it back. But now there is nothing else of interest releasing in the near future, so I will go for the Beatles.
Here’s a list of the things I actually accomplished today:
All in all it was a pretty sweet day. I accomplished quite a bit today. Creating the website took a few hours, but Im pretty happy with it so far.
Per. 2
The class went very well today. I had my last observation today as well, and I think the class went very good, and I think the District Supervisor will be happy. I started the class by formally going over the class overview that I had on the board. I then introduced the idea of Manifest Destiny, something I did not do as well yesterday. I had them take notes on it, and then moved on with the activity.
I used the power point with westward expansion, highlighting different points in history where America gained more land. They would color in the new section on their maps, and then I would go to a slide of notes, and they would copy those down as I discussed them. I asked a lot of questions as I went over the material, either so they could guess what I would mention next or to reinforce something I already mentioned. We covered the Louisiana Purchase through the Adams-Onis Treaty.
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The school is closed tomorrow for Veterans Day, so I have some things I hope to accomplish. They are:
We shall see what I actually end up doing. Regardless, Im excited for another nice relaxing day off.
Per. 2
Today went pretty well. I started class by giving them a quiz. I made a fill in the blank quiz on U.S. foreign policy that pretty much comes right out of the packet they have been filling out in class for notes. I also gave them a word bank, so that all the words that would be used were there, and nothing extra. I don’t like the idea of putting extra words in the word bank, or making it that one word could be used more than once. I don’t want to trick them…just check to see if they learned anything.
After the quiz I jumped into the final foreign policy that I didn’t get to cover, which was the Monroe Doctrine. I gave a brief five minute lecture on it, using the map to kind of show them what was going on with it.
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We got back from the travel agent, and the honeymoon is booked. We will be spending ten nights at Walt Disney World, at the Caribbean Beach resort. We threw on the park hopper passes, so we will be able to go to all the parks as often as we want. The parks we will be going to are the four main Disney ones…Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Animal Kingdom (which Im really excited for since I havent been there yet) and MGM, which is now called something like Hollywood Studios or something like that. We decided not to go to any water parks because neither of us is very big on that…we are just as happy chilling in the hotel pool or whatever. We also got a dining plan, which includes one “snack” (like a pretzel or ice cream), one “sit down service” (which will be any of the little fast food restaurants for lunch), and one dinner and dessert at a restaurant for each of us per day, which is sweet.
We didnt book the plane tickets yet. We want to use South Western since it is the only airline that will fly non-stop from Albany to Disney, and South Western also tends to be a little more affordable. My biggest concern with flying is doing as little actual flying as possible and spending as little time in airports waiting as possible, so the direct flight is a big deal to me.
Im pretty excited. I love Disney, and I know we will have a blast. The only other thing is that I want to also swing over to Sea World since I love marine animals/fish so much, but we will play that by year. I wish it was 2010 already!!!
Yesterday Shell and I had our precana. For those of you not familiar with the term, its basically a requirement that the church has on newly-engaged couples. In our case, we had to attend this “workshop” in order to get married at the church. Its basically where a bunch of engaged couples come together and discuss love, marriage, relationships, and all that stuff in terms of spirituality. Some of these things are actually full-on weekend retreats, but ours was only one day, from 8:30am-4:30pm. Needless to say, it was not how I envisioned my Saturday to be, so I was not exactly looking forward to it.
So we get to the location, and the place is pretty packed. I would say there were at least twenty couples with us, crammed into this small room with very uncomfortable seats. The precana was led by an older couple (prob. in their 50s or possible even early 60s). When we came in, they gave us a workbook that we would use for the remainder of the day and a nametag. I already wasnt looking forward to getting in front of all these people and talking about relationships and all this stuff. I didnt think it was going to be a good day.
It turned out not being all that bad.
I was waiting and waiting to get Fairytale Fights in from Gamefly, but they kept pushing the release date further and further back. Eventually it was pushed back so much that Dragon Age was now releasing before it, so I went for it. The PS3, in my opinion, is lacking in the RPG library, so I wanted to see how Dragon Age was. I had heard lots of good things, but for some reason I wasnt following the game closely, so I had no idea what to expect. I didnt know what kind of RPG it was, how leveling and combat was worked, etc. So when I popped the game in last night, I wasnt sure what to expect.
What from the about two hours I have played so far, I am very impressed and pleased with the game. There are six different stories to choose from, and which story quest you will follow for the game is based on the kind of character you create. There are three races (human, elf, dwarf), three classes (warrior, mage, rogue), and each race can be either male or female, so that makes a total of 18 different character combinations. Depending on which of the three you choose, there are either one or two stories to choose from. The stories are actually more like background information for your character, and give a general sense of where your character will go in the game.
For example, last night I made my first character. I didnt know how the game play or combat was, so I wanted to play it safe. Thus, I created a boring male human warrior. This choice unlocked one story for me, in which I was the son of some Lord. That was all well and good. I played for a bit, and got to see how the game play was, and enjoyed it. I saw that I would definitely be able to play as any character I wanted. So this morning I pop it in, and start up a whole new character. This one is a male elf rogue. Upon choosing him, two of the stories were unlocked…I could either be a tribal forest elf, or a slave elf that eventually revolts because some king tries to rape my newfound wife. I decided to go with being a slave elf, since the background reminded me of Braveheart.
Per. 2
It went pretty good today. The students were relatively into the lesson and made for some good discussion, which was good. I was still attacking that packet on foreign policy, but wanted to present it in a way that was different from me just writing on the board. So when I came into school this morning, I spent the first period whipping up a quick power point that they could copy the notes of off, as opposed to me writing on the board.
Normally I would have loved to find some images and maps and such for the material to break it up, but it was difficult to find anything appropriate for them on the Embargo Act, Non-Intercourse Act (which I did have one kid snicker at), and Macon’s Bill #2. There is a really good political cartoon I used for the AP kids on the Embargo Act, but the 11-3’s would not have gotten it.
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I received the disc from Netflix yesterday. When placed in the PS3, the disc allows me to access Netflix streaming video services, which is pretty sweet. I mean, its nothing new, as I could always do it on my laptop. But the quality on the laptop was horrible, where it would sometimes lag, skip, or buffer, and the sound was not the greatest either. I dont know if it was my laptop or what (I assume it was, stupid piece of junk) but when I heard that I would be able to do the same from my PS3, and thus be able to watch these videos on my TV rather than the laptop, I couldnt wait.
The minute I got the disc in the house, I loaded up the PS3 and got ready to check it out. First I had to verify my account, so once I got the Netflix program going on the PS3, it generated a random code that I had to enter on Netflix’s website from my laptop. Once that was done, I was ready to go. What I actually get is two different things. First, my entire queue of instant movies and shows is loaded up on the PS3, and I can choose what I want to watch. Secondly, I am able to browse the “top 100″ instant videos for different categories such as comedy, horror, and tv series.
Per. 2
The class went pretty much the same as yesterday. I didn’t accomplish as much as I wanted to due to class discussions, but this one was a lot more important and involved. I started off by finishing up lecturing about the treaties signed under Washington.
I then moved on to Washington’s Farewell Address. I had taken excerpts from the Address and popped them on a sheet along with some questions, and wanted the kids to break into groups and work on it. However, the text proved to be too challenging, and after three minutes I decided to just go over it as a class. Basically we interpreted the basic ideas of the Address, and then compared Washington’s foreign policy ideas to how today’s foreign policy is conducted. Basically Washington warned against alliances and being involved in the affairs of Europe, which is totally different to how American foreign policy is today.
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Per. 2
The class went pretty much the same as yesterday. I didn’t accomplish as much as I wanted to due to class discussions, but this one was a lot more important and involved. I started off by finishing up lecturing about the treaties signed under Washington.
I then moved on to Washington’s Farewell Address. I had taken excerpts from the Address and popped them on a sheet along with some questions, and wanted the kids to break into groups and work on it. However, the text proved to be too challenging, and after three minutes I decided to just go over it as a class. Basically we interpreted the basic ideas of the Address, and then compared Washington’s foreign policy ideas to how today’s foreign policy is conducted. Basically Washington warned against alliances and being involved in the affairs of Europe, which is totally different to how American foreign policy is today.
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I got an email from Netflix today informing me that the disc for use in the PS3 is shipping today, meaning I’ll get it tomorrow. This is awesome…Ive been waiting to get my hands on this. The disc will allow me to access my Netflix queue from my PS3, so I can then watch any of the instant movies or TV shows on my TV through the PS3.
I used the instant streaming on my laptop a few times, but I wasnt a fan. My laptop isnt the best, so it was kind of lame. Worse off was the sound…it was just horrible. I look forward to being able to plop down on the couch, fire up the PS3, and watch a movie or TV show within minutes.
Per. 2
Class went pretty good today. I had some good discussion going on, and got off topic a little but it was still good discussion, and I was always able to use it to bring it back to what we were talking about, so it worked out good. I started out by guarding the door with flashcards, and making them answer questions about Jefferson and Hamilton’s views and polices before they entered. Only one kid got one wrong and had to go to the end of the line…all the others got it right on their first attempt.
After that, I did a brief review on Monday’s class and then started discussing Washington’s foreign policies. I had created a packet that would help guide their notes about foreign policy. The packet will cover foreign policy from Washington to Monroe, and should take a few days to cover. So my basic plan is to keep them busy writing notes through the packet, and hopefully I will think up some other activities to support the packet.
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I know I always say this, but I feel like I have the need to restate it constantly. I am not a wrestling fan. I havent watched wrestling since 2001 or so. However, I LOVE the WWE series of games. It is such a unique, fun, and interactive fighting game that I find myself constantly getting the most recent version each year. And this year was no exception. I got it in from Gamefly yesterday, and after spending a little under two hours with it, I was sold. I traded in some games to Gamefly and in return kept SvR2010.
The first thing you notice is the training mode. The main menu screen is actually a training mode, where you can do all kinds of moves to your opponent as the game prompts you to do particular ones. This is a great way to quickly get into the action if its your first time, and see what the game has to offer.
Per. 2
Class went pretty good today. I started out by using a video of George Washington which served as a review of what we have been talking about, and as an introduction to Hamilton and Jefferson. I gave them a video quiz along with it, but at the end of the video they were basically lost, and had a lot of missing questions. So I decided to count it as simply a class activity rather than a quiz, and then went over it in class so that they could all get the correct answers written down.
After that I moved on to the introduction of the first political parties under Hamilton and Jefferson. To do this I gave them a blank chart which stated both political parties, and had sections to fill in such as who supported them, where they were located, how they felt about the Constitution, etc. I then basically just discussed it all with them while the Special Education teacher filled out a similar chart on the board for them to go along with. This worked out really well, and I was able to get them to correctly guess which aspect each person would support by dropping hints, which was great.
Since the schools are closed tomorrow for Election Day, I dont have to go in. So Ive been thinking about my plans for tomorrow, and this is what I hope to accomplish:
That is what I hope to accomplish. Who knows what I will do. One thing is for sure though…the leisure activities will take precedent over the school ones!!!
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