DISCOVERY!

Once in a while you come across an exhilarating story based on a new discovery… After teaching World War I and talking about militarism and the build up of new weapons including submarines, the advance in U-boats, their strategic use, their advantages over other crafts, etc. I stumbled upon a SPIEGEL ONLINE article entitled “The Secret of the Pearl Island” where Jim Delgado has made a great discovery while on vacation!

This is a cool story! Finds like this is what makes history such a great subject…! It is like finding Antonio Vivaldi’s music in a hidden drawer in an old school piece of furniture, or discovering a George Washington letter at a garage sale in Philadelphia – you get the idea…

Spiegel

NATIONAL EDUCATION COMPUTING CONFERENCE

San Diego in the summer – what a wonderful vacation spot for those traveling out of state! For us that live in the area, it is always a treat and prices remind us of the cost of living in paradise! This is an amazing place.

We are lucky to be hosting the National Educational Computing Conference this July 5-7

Click on the image above to see the details of the conference.

There will be people from all over the United States coming for the conference and I am sure also a nice vacation. There will be many bi-lingual teachers attending and teachers from other parts of the world that speak Spanish.

I was encouraged to teach a workshop in Spanish about the use of technology in the classroom to teach history. Well, under the encouragement of a professor, I did so and submitted a proposal to the NECC.

It got accepted! So those of us that might be coming to NECC stop by and/or look me up in the program…

......Title: El Uso de Tecnologîa en la Enseñanza de la Historia
......Category: Concurrent
......Status: ACCEPTED

WRITER SEMINAR

It was a very interesting experience –

Having never participated in a writer’s workshop, a bilingual workshop none-the-less, the whole thing proved to be an exiting experience. The leader is a professional writer – and well trained in her craft. She shared some of her pointers…Here are some of them:

Write from the heart…
Be authentic…
Writing is transparent...
Respect your reader...
Mind the details...
Let it cool...
Writing is rewriting...
Don’t think...
Write!

There is also chemistry with the group that is fascinating – a Peruvian, a Mexican, a Puerto Rican and a Bolivian sitting with a Mexican-American creating and fine-tuning our journals. These are great folks – one is an accomplished poet, the rest including me are neophytes but with lots of “ganas”

The use of Spanglish is very interesting…. I have always held the purist opinion that you write in English or Spanish… honoring each language and not mixing the two except in extraordinary circumstances… but not here! I have to laugh…. mixing of the two languages is reminiscent of hearing “pocho-speak” – like our playful Latino College of Education professor who puts on his “pocho” hat and accent and has us in stitches! Even the title of the seminar is called “los bilingual writers” with a mirror image of the “bilingual” in Spanish…take a gander:

Very creative – don’t you think? Am I coming back? You bet – the writing combined with the great interaction with the participants turned the time into an interesting and productive evening…

Well, bueno pues, que nos queda… bye Vato!

If you care to participate contact Irene A. Márquez at (619)384-7144

EDUCATIONAL CONNECTIONS

This is highly recommended... a great teaching moment: