Weekly Photo Challenge: Surprise
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Do you speak in images? Enjoy taking photos to document your experiences or just to express what you notice in the world? Love to share them with others? Welcome to the weekly photo challenge! I post a new challenge each week…check in regularly and join the fun!
Sometimes as I am going about my life I see something that stops me in my tracks and makes me think. I’m having one of those kind of weeks. On Monday I had a meeting to do some planning with colleagues…that happened to take place in the San Diego Natural History Museum. I love meetings there–the grand old building oozes character, and when I walked in the conference room on Monday, I was surprised to see there was a tusk on the floor! I couldn’t resist a shot!
Over the weekend the weather continued to be unseasonably warm (into the 80s on the coast!), so the beach was the best option for a walk. As we walked along I was surprised when I spied this man on a ladder. You can see that he is right along the shoreline, perched on the top, with his big camera lens pointing at the surfers navigating the larger than usual waves. Did he carry the ladder from his car, does he live nearby? Does the ladder make a difference in his photography?
Further down the beach I was surprised by the pop of color from the orange umbrella. It felt like a fall leaf turning in the sea of greens and blues.
Earlier this week I took a photo of the palm tree that graces our school playground. And later in the day came across a new editing app for my phone. It was fun to play with the different effects and lenses. Here is the surprising result.
And this morning on playground duty my eye was drawn to the purple boa on the playground bench. Who wore their boa to school…and who left it on the bench? Will this person be surprised when it is missing?
So what has surprised you this week?
You can post your photo alone or along with some words: commentary, a story, a poem…maybe even a song! I love to study the photographs that others’ take and think about how I can use a technique, an angle, or their inspiration to try something new in my own photography. (I love a great mentor text…or mentor photo, in this case!)
I share my photography and writing on social media. You can find me on Instagram and Twitter using @kd0602. If you share your photos and writing on social media too, please let me know so I can follow and see what you are doing. To help our Weekly Photo community find each other, use the hashtag #surprise for this week and include @nwpianthology in your post.
Be on the lookout for those things and situations that surprise you this week. I can’t wait to see surprises through your lens!
Looking for Signs…
Six weeks into the school year with unseasonably warm temperatures…I find myself looking for signs of fall. Southern California is not known for spectacular fall colors: the changing leaves, colorful gourds, and orange pumpkins decorating doorsteps. Instead, I notice things like the orange and red kelp washed up by hurricane Simon off the coast of Mexico,
the orange beach umbrella near the lifeguard tower,
and the golden sun highlighting the surfer atop the bigger than usual waves.
And I’m starting to see some even more exciting signs of fall…and of the writing community growing in my classroom. Some signs are subtle, like students settling into writing without any urging from us and sticking with the writing for longer and longer periods of time. There’s a willingness to share writing with one another and with the class as a whole…even from our shyer students. And then there’s the risk-taking…trying out new strategies for revision and composition with independence and confidence.
This third grader uses her reflection notebook to write about a tool we use in class to help with revision. It’s clear that she sees the value of revision for improving her writing…knowing writers, even good writers, have to work at improving their craft.
It’s also fun to see students bring their voice to informal, reflective writing. They are writers whenever they put words to a page…like this student describing something learned from reading a Scholastic News magazine,
and the student who began her reflection on a writing and art project with, “It all started when Ms Boyesen read us a book called Flashlight.”
Like the more obvious brilliant crimson leaves, sweet apple cider, and crisp autumn evenings that signal fall, these subtle signs in the classroom represent our growth as a community of learners and writers. We are ready to dig in, to stretch ourselves as learners, and to learn from and with each other throughout the school year.
I have to look carefully for signs of fall in my place…they aren’t easily recognized by those looking for the gorgeous iconic images we see represented in the media. The same is true in my classroom, looking carefully uncovers signs that might be overlooked otherwise. The signs are there and I’m looking forward to the journey with these young writers.
What signs of a developing learning community are you seeing in your place?
Silent Sunday: October 5, 2014
Weekly Photo Challenge: Under
Do you speak in images? Enjoy taking photos to document your experiences or just to express what you notice in the world? Love to share them with others? Welcome to the weekly photo challenge! I post a new challenge each week…check in regularly and join the fun!
The weather is changing around here…finally. The unusually warm and humid weather of August and September has made way for cooler, crisper mornings and evenings. It’s still pretty hot, into the 90’s today, but it is much drier. I’m loving the feelings of fall in the air, but also fearing the risks of fire that this weather brings. Walking under the dry eucalyptus trees at UCSD I found myself thinking about how these trees can be like matchsticks, igniting easily and spreading flames with the help of Santa Ana winds.
I noticed yesterday that the monarch caterpillars are back in the planter box in front of our classroom. Milkweed is a magnet for the beautiful orange and black butterflies and if you look closely under the leaves tiny caterpillars emerge from the eggs the butterflies lay. These guys were tiny yesterday, and today they much bigger and fatter!
My students are always great subjects for photography, I love their facial expressions, the seriousness of their thinking faces, and even the interesting ways they sit. I couldn’t resist this shot of the feet tucked under and crossed as he listened in class.
My cats also make interesting photography subjects. When one of my students gave me this cat toy as a gift last week, Jack (one of my 16 year old cats) couldn’t resist playing with it…trapping the dangling object under his paw. He’s not that much fun to play with these days…he wants to just catch the toy and then hold it rather than tire himself by chasing it around!
Our lawn sprinklers seem to be nothing but trouble lately! Sometimes they leak, sometimes the overspray, watering the sidewalk, and it seems like my husband is aways digging under the grass to repair them.
And while our lawn is suffering from the drought conditions and watering restrictions, mushrooms seem to be thriving. There seems to be an entire village of mushrooms sprouting up not only on our lawn, but throughout the neighborhood. They go from tiny to huge in just a couple of days and I love the texture of the underside of these fungi.
So what do you see when you look under? Under a tree, a table, under the paw of your pet, under the edge of a cliff? What is on the underside of your world?
You can post your photo alone or along with some words: commentary, a story, a poem…maybe even a song! I love to study the photographs that others’ take and think about how I can use a technique, an angle, or their inspiration to try something new in my own photography. (I love a great mentor text…or mentor photo, in this case!)
I share my photography and writing on social media. You can find me on Instagram and Twitter using @kd0602. If you share your photos and writing on social media too, please let me know so I can follow and see what you are doing. To help our Weekly Photo community find each other, use the hashtag #under for this week and include @nwpianthology in your post.
Take a look around and under this week…I can’t wait to see what you find when you look under through your lens!
Beyond Paint by Number: October’s Photo-a-Day Challenge
Oranges, browns, yellows, reds, greens…the colors of fall are legendary. Leaves turn, pumpkins grow, candles flicker, and we can see the sunset as we head for home after the work day. In the midst of all this spectacular and extraordinary display, we live our mostly ordinary lives. So what do we take photos of? How do we challenge ourselves to pay attention to the colors and wonders that only October can bring?
Let’s spend October painting what we see through our lens by paying attention to the extraordinariness of the ordinary. I used the term paint by number to play with that idea of the hum drum ordinary of taking that same uninspiring photo over and over again. To avoid that burnout of boredom, you’ll need to pay close attention to what your photo might be if you move in a bit closer, frame it a little differently, or look under the rock instead of just at it! I’ve come up with a prompt for each of the numbered days of this month to suggest an idea for you to paint through your lens…by taking a photo. With the extraordinary of the ordinary in mind, here are a few of my paintings for inspiration…
These red converse hightops highlight the shift to fall…and notice the hat with a splash of orange sitting on the floor under the chair. (And you might even notice the other kid with the florescent yellow shoes in the distance!)
A walk on some hiking trails last weekend brought the dry and scratchy brush into full view…along with a tiny splash of color provided by the monkey flowers.
I love the warmth and glow of the sun on the cliffs bringing out the oranges and reds that often go unnoticed.
And what do you think of these whimsical pink stripes on the outstretched arms of the reader holding her book just so as her wispy bangs obscure her eyes and brush the side of her face?
Saturday’s amber brew was a perfect match for the locally grown veggies on the pizza…and a great way to view the community outside the window.
Don’t you love all the hues of green this painter made using only the primary colors and a dab or two of white?
And I love the layers of oranges and yellows of this early fall sunset framed by the lifeguard tower. If you look closely, you can see the people along the edge of the surf enjoying the last days of summer.
So let’s go beyond “paint by number” and explore the extraordinariness of the ordinary. Here’s a list of prompts to help you look in some new ways…or create your own prompt and share it with the rest of us!
1. brown
2. dry
3. scratchy
4. wispy
5. orange
6. hollow
7. alive
8. dark
9. growing
10. yellow
11. thumps
12. falling
13. spooky
14. lit
15. red
16. fresh
17. spicy
18. morning
19. crisp
20. setting
21. harvest
22. scary
23. hue
24. flicker
25. outside
26. under
27. golden
28. light
29. stacked
30. delicate
31. glow
Once you go beyond painting by numbers and take that shot, post a photo each day with the hashtag #sdawpphotovoices to Twitter, Instagram, Flicker, Google+ and/or Facebook (the more the better!), so that we can all enjoy the posts. If you are game for some more playfulness, compose a blog post about a photo, a week’s worth of photos, write a photo essay, make a video or slideshow or try a learning walk! You are invited to create a pingback by linking to this url or post your blog address in the comment section. It’s fun for me to see what others are doing with the same prompts I am using!
So push past the ordinary, beyond paint by numbers and discover the extraordinary in your everyday routines. You can post every day, once a week, or even sporadically throughout the month…whatever works in your life. You can play this game by posting your pictures in the order of the prompts or post the one you find on the day you find it. You get to make your own rules! Be sure to share and tag your photos with #sdawpphotovoices so we can find them! So go out and use you lens to start painting! I can’t wait for you to share what you are seeing through your lens!
Silent Sunday: 9/28/14
Fall’s Nighttime Beach
As the season shifts from summer to fall
nighttime begins to stretch, lengthening shadows
and shortening the day
Light plays hide and seek with the sun and clouds
painting with colors only nature knows
The photographer frames the bride in the glow
of the setting sun
and she turns, and smiles washed in the soft warmth of the sinking sun
and the dog frolics, running the gauntlet of kelp
through the rivulets of salty water as the low tide starts to rise again
At the edge of nighttime, light creates silhouettes
shadowy outlines framed by light
a bicyclist
a seagull
As I head for home, the lights come on
darkness is near
Those who play at the beach into the night
build their bonfires
and settle in
to enjoy
fall’s nighttime beach
Weekly Photo Challenge: Found
Do you speak in images? Enjoy taking photos to document your experiences or just to express what you notice in the world? Love to share them with others? Welcome to the weekly photo challenge! I post a new challenge each week…check in regularly and join the fun!
Just this morning one of my students found me just as I was heading out for recess duty… “Do you want to see a really big spider?” How could I resist that invitation? As she led me around the corner from our classroom, this is what we found!
I’m not a big spider fan, but I do appreciate the wonderful striped legs…and couldn’t resist getting close enough for a picture!
I also had my camera (phone) out yesterday at school documenting our student readers at work. There is something just so precious and powerful about finding a first grade reader engaged and hard at work.
I make lots of finds on the beach. This week I’ve been fortunate that low tide (and beautiful, warm weather) has corresponded with the time I have left work, offering me a wonderful opportunity for some beach walks before heading home. Yesterday I heard this urgent high pitched sound and then found these birds, seemingly engaged in quite a conversation (or perhaps a bird argument)!
As I was heading up the stairs toward the parking lot, I found this hat and sunglasses perched on the railing. It was fun to play with some editing tools to create an interesting effect…and a burst of light where the sun played with the water.
Over the weekend, as my husband and I walked we engaged in two favorite beach walking activities…searching for beach glass (not easy to find) and being litterati: finding trash, photographing it, and disposing of it (unfortunately, way too easy!). We did find this beauty of a piece of light green glass…
and this mylar balloon bouncing along the shore. We collected the glass and disposed of the balloon, both making the beach a little bit cleaner and the sea animals a little bit safer.
And sometimes my best photos come from things I find around the house. One of my student’s parents brought these pomegranates for us from their tree. I had tucked them into my refrigerator for my hubby to use in one of his recipes…until I was thinking about fall and realized they would make a great still life photo. I love the way the light comes into my dining room in the afternoon, washing the table in warm light. Here’s my little bit of fall find.
So what will you find that catches your eye…and your lens…this week? Will you stumble over it, be led to it by a student or child, pull it from the refrigerator, or find it on an outing?
You can post your photo alone or along with some words: commentary, a story, a poem…maybe even a song! I love to study the photographs that others’ take and think about how I can use a technique, an angle, or their inspiration to try something new in my own photography. (I love a great mentor text…or mentor photo, in this case!)
I share my photography and writing on social media. You can find me on Instagram and Twitter using @kd0602. If you share your photos and writing on social media too, please let me know so I can follow and see what you are doing. To help our Weekly Photo community find each other, use the hashtag #found for this week and include @nwpianthology in your post.
What have you found lately? I can’t wait to see what you find through your lens!
Developing Endurance
There’s nothing easy about the beginning of school. As exciting as new beginnings are, they are also filled with uncertainty and maybe even a bit of fear of the unknown…on the part of the teacher, but also on the part of students and their parents. Even in a class like mine where two-thirds of our students return each year, it takes some time to get back into the rhythms of learning together as a community.
And then there is the need to shift from the habits of summer…staying up late, sleeping in late, playing and vacationing, visiting with family and friends…back to the routines of the school year. Further complicating the transition, it still feels like summer when school starts here. It has been unseasonably warm (downright miserably hot in our non-air conditioned school), the kind of weather where the beach and the pool sound so much better than the classroom, for both teachers and students!
(This portable air conditioning unit was delivered Tuesday afternoon…the day of the peak highs! It helps, but its range and capacity do not match the size of the classroom! Luckily, we should be near the end of unbearably hot weather.)
There’s also endurance that has to be developed; the ability to sustain focus for the work of school and learning that emerges alongside fluency, confidence, and stamina. As a teacher I see this endurance grow as the school year progresses, especially in the area of writing.
Our writers are already surprising us this year, only weeks into the school year, with their endurance, creativity, and willingness to take risks.
With our returning writers, we see evidence of the layers of mentor texts and writing lessons they experienced last year, and for the third graders, the year before, along with the richness of stories they have read and listened to in their lives. The first graders seem inspired by their older classmates, and are willing to put their emerging writing skills to use as they work through the challenges of transforming their thoughts and ideas into words on a page.
We’ve been writing in all areas of the curriculum…to learn, to think, to remember, to express. We write indoors and outdoors…
and we are working on revising to improve our writing too. (You can take a peek at a collaborative piece of writing we did in honor of International Dot Day on our class blog. (Our students always welcome comments!)
We often think about endurance when it comes to physical tasks…and there are those that definitely require endurance. I’m still working on improving my hiking endurance–increasing my mileage and speed and capacity to hike up steep inclines and setting a pace that allows me to continue to improve over time.
I’ve definitely learned over the years that endurance comes with repeated opportunities to do something that you actually want to do. It takes time and we don’t all progress at the same rate. It helps to notice your strengths and focus attention on areas where you want to grow and improve…and it always seem to help to learn in a community of supportive others who are also learning too. The writers and learners in my class are developing endurance…there’s nothing easy about the beginning of school, but then again, things worth doing are seldom easy!
Thinking Through My Lens 