Student Blogs

I'm so proud of my students for creating their blogs. I hope they will enjoy reading them in the future. I wish we could have blogged all semester. We read "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" in class today. I had students think of a special place. We brainstormed a list. I'm including the characteristics of Romanticism here in case any students need to review: emphasis on nature, imagination, feelings, ordinary experiences, supernatural, innocence, the past, simpler times, the Orient, Middle Ages. The poets wrote about hermits, children, and ordinary people doing everyday things.

I guess I feel closest to Wordsworth. I, too, turn to my "inward eye" to remember special places. I often think about the Western North Carolina mountains and Lake Glenville, the beach, my front yard. I've learned patience from watching my flowers slowly grow and bloom. I think about how short and precious life is as I watch these same blooms mature and die just a few days later. I recall the innocence of childhood as I talk to my own boys and some of my students. (Most have moved from innocence to experience.)

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

"I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud"


I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed---and gazed---but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

William Wordsworth

Special Places
backyard, treestand, hard-wood bottom, stream in the woods, beach, field, front porch, tropical forest, meadow, Upper Penisula Michigan (mountains, waterfall),river, tree, hammock in woods, outside at night, lake, bed under the falls, waterfall, sunny meadow at bottom of mountains by a lake, sunrise in dessert (horizon is blurred)

Les Fleurs

I took some new pictures this afternoon.

More Blogging Pix

Here are more pictures of my sweet students.

My Home Boyz

Leslie and Tay have kept me straight this semester.

Creating Blogs in English 12

Today in class students created their own blogs. It was an exciting, educational experience. Blog on, my friends!

Le Jardin

Last January I bought several gardening magazines to get ideas. I decided to add more perennials to my flower beds to fill them out and give me something to look at year round. Last year I planted four roses: three climbers and one ground cover. They are doing well. So far, I've added the following: three Italian cypresses, four yellow knock-outs, and two pink muhly (sp?)grasses together; black-eyed susans, doppleganger coneflowers, and coreopsis in the beds and by the street; two orange cannas by the fence; lots of dianthus, foxgloves, snapdragons last fall by the street and in the beds; and hen & chicks in conch shells and pots on the porch. We've added several trellises to support the roses and jasmine. This morning I'm going to build an arbor for the entrance to the patio and plant a rose that my mother gave me next to it.
I've still got some grasses, Russian sage, and coneflowers coming.

Easter Morning

I set up this blog for my classroom; however, my sister-in-law and others have inspired me to blog about my family life, as well. It's Easter morning, and we are sitting on our front porch. I have traveled to many wonderful places, but my front porch is my favorite place in the world. Jackson is reading Nicole's blog post aloud; John is preparing his Sunday school lesson; John David is relaxing in the swing. The birds are singing, and the flowers, blooming. It's perfect. My neighbor across the street is working in his flower bed so I'll have more flora to enjoy! I am surrounded by Rebirth.

I've got to prepare my SS lesson for today. I think it will focus on HOPE. During the middle of the night, we were awakened by the phone ringing twice. As I tried to get back to sleep, I pondered the Resurrection. For me, it means that no matter how dark our days may be, there is hope as long as we live in relationship with God, each other, and nature.

Every morning I walk outside and look at my flowers. Over night slight changes occur. I watch the buds turn into blooms: hope. Each day the temperature becomes a little warmer: hope. I see students receiving letters of acceptance, signing scholarships, and passing the graduation exam: hope. I talk to members of a family who have just lost their husband/daddy and yet they are struggling to smile and survive: hope. I listen to my boys practice the piano and trumpet as they develop a talent that will bring joy to others: hope. I read the blog of a former student who is in the hospital, patiently waiting to have her baby: hope. I see a nation that is facing its greatest crisis in my lifetime and an energetic, intelligent President, who is struggling to find a solution: hope. Basically, I see many people struggling, just as that little bud struggles to bloom. In the midst of the suffering, I see a strength that is developed through hope for a better tomorrow.

My hope is that we realize God lives through us and among us. It is only by sharing his love with others on a daily basis that we make the Resurrection a little more than new Sunday outfits, candy, and Easter egg hunts.