ABC #24: Bright Eyes

When last we heard from The Mighty Andar, he was thrown 20 feet by a giant chicken.

The Art by Committee Challenge this month is to illustrate this random quote from a science fiction novel. I have no idea what novel or anything about the story.

“He is shorter than I remember, and thin. His fur is grayed to white in a fringe around his head, just below his ears. His coat is dull, thinning, and coarse. His eyes, so bright I…”

Regular readers of this blog know that I am trying to piece all of these into a cohesive story. Below are two pages. The second is the one I did to illustrate this challenge. The one above it is one I did about a year and a half ago, to put it in context.

Life Imitates Art?

Here I am with my friend Rich Macik, who happens to be dressed as a giant chicken. This is during the school Halloween parade. Regular readers may recall that the Mighty Andar Recently battled a six foot chicken. This goes to show -- be careful what you visualize, because many times these things come to pass!

The Journey Begins

This graphic shows the Dissertation Sequence for Northcentral University, which I started today. It's broken down into eight three-credit courses. At the end, I will have a Doctor of Education degree (EdD) in Curriculum & Teaching. Wish me luck!

Things I Learned at the Museum of Play

We took Nathan to the Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, NY. As soon as we got through the door, he took off like a rocket to try each fun hands-on learning station. We were there for four hours and I don't know if we saw half of it. Nathan wanted an Iron Man costume for Halloween, so we let him wear it here, since there was a big Superhero section that just opened up.

In addition to the activity centers, they have displayed old toys and games from every era. You can find all kinds of things you forgot you ever had, or remember some friend that had one of those, and you couldn't believe their luck.
Here Nathan is serving Mommy at the restaurant.
Of course, Iron Man can handle a few boulders.

The arcade was really neat. Newer video games were side by side with vintage ones and some reeeeeallly old ones. I found out that Kristan was a Q*bert champ and she showed Nathan the ropes on some other ones.
Another neat feature of the museum is that there are quotes on all the walls of things great thinkers had to say about play, and I was furiously scribbling them down in my notebook. Some of them might help with a research project I'll be working on.

1. "Do not keep children to their studies by compulsion, but by play." -Plato
2. "Play is our brain's favorite way of learning." -Diane Ackerman, American author
3. "It is a happy talent to know how to play." -Ralph Waldo Emerson
4. "Almost all creativity involves purposeful play." - Abraham Maslow, American psychologist
5. "A child loves his play, not because it's easy, but because it's hard." - Benjamin Spock
6. "We all need empty hours in our lives, or we will have no time to create or dream." - Robert Coles, The Overscheduled Child (2001)
7. "Play is training for the unexpected." -Marc Bekoff, American biologist
8. "Play is the only way the highest intellect can unfold." -Joseph Chilton Pierce, American scholar
9. "The opposite of play is not a present reality, or work; it is vacillation; or worse, it is depression." -Brian Sutton-Smith
10. "Play energizes us and enlivens us. It eases our burdens. It renews our natural sense of optimism and opens us up to new possibilities." -Stuart Brown, American psychologist

A Comic History of Iceland

Comix by Kids

Issue #1 of this comic is now in print! Every year, each of my fifth grade students creates their own character and makes a one-page comic strip. Last year, I chose the 24 best strips and had them published through a print-on-demand publishing company called Ka-blam. The comic looks really sharp and I think the kids will be excited to see their work in print.

Kirby's Treehouse

Kirby's Treehouse is a small press comic. I picked up issue #5 at the Small Press Expo and was very impressed. I was even more impressed when I found out the creator Sam Leveille was sixteen years old! I've read issues 2-5 now, and I have to say that the comedic timing and characterizations just get better and better. I can't wait to share these comics with my students. Check out Sam's website here.