Education In Cubes - Not Just Child's Play

                                                                           

The nine dice rolled across the table top and the students clustered to look at the outcome.  Excited voices called out the images that landed face up on the special dice of the game Rory’s Story Cubes www.storycubes.com .  Laughter and groans ensued as each player recognized their challenge of incorporating the image into a group story. “once upon a time…” the players began to weave a tale. On the next round I added a challenge make it all on one theme or subject. We tried subjects familiar to their curriculum and it provided a much higher level of gamesmanship. On this particular morning I was trying out Rory’s Story Cubes in a high school Agricultural Mechanics class. I began my test with one cooperative student and soon had a large group clustered around.

                                                                 

Looking for ways to add the curriculum to story cube fun I began challenges to the student players. We did a round using vocabulary words. Students in foreign language played a round telling the story in the language they are learning. Theme telling as recommended on the package was incorporated into curricular support choosing a topic from the lesson plan. The next roll the story must incorporate small engine repair for my agricultural mechanics group. Students returned to me later in the day during a free period with the request to play the game, that to me was the best review, the approval of this group of high school students.

 Simplicity of the game allowed quick understanding of the skill required while also challenging the students to new levels. This was very evident through its popularity within the Special Education setting. The game was used in curriculum support again and was a popular reward for work completion.

Teachable moments occurred when working with younger students. These came from some of the iconic images. A roll of the dice producing a Pyramid image allowed us to look quickly at the computer to see pictures from the pyramids at Giza. With this more in depth look and quick lesson on the early culture in Egypt  the students quickly incorporated the new found knowledge into the game.

                                                         

As a generational counterpoint I played the game with a group of nursing home patients and found it brought out delightful interplay and stimulated memories and conversation. The residents varied backgrounds made for an intellectual story with moments of whimsy. I thought it an excellent game for mental stimulation and recall desired for early stage dementia patients.

American author and humorist Mark Twain played a similar game with his family each evening at his home Nook Farm in Hartford Connecticut. www.marktwainhouse.org  Once the family assembled in their library room he was to invent a tale incorporating all seven items on the fireplace mantel into a new and different tale than any he had told on previous nights.  Click this link to see the Twain House mantel and story items:

www.marktwainhouse.org/admin/assets/images/photo_gallery/1274956228-image-2.jpg  

Rory O’Connor and Anita Murphy of Belfast, Ireland have come up with a flexible game that recreates the skills of the Irish storytellers –The Senachai.  The product Rory’s Story Cubes have garnered more than a half dozen toy/game awards. This list includes the 2011 Best Game Award from the Independent Toy Awards – Toy Shop UK. This award was based on independent retailers experience and recommendations. One student suggested playing in an Irish accent after reading my printout from the Rory's Storycube website.

Since the games inception additions have come to the playing field. There are max sized story cubes and a story cube app for iphones.  An expansion set brings a diverse set of verb cubes to provide more story action to the game.  You can follow all the updates from Rory’s Story Cubes on Facebook, Twitter @storycubes  and on you-tube and again on their website www.storycubes.com  

Other reviews in my blog include

Mike Lockett www.carolynstearnsstoryteller.blogspot.com/2011/05/review-tales-from-hills-by-mike-lockett.html  

Dementia Patient blog: www.carolynstearnsstoryteller.blogspot.com/2011/09/journey-of-thousand-goodbyes.html

making a commercial break

I'm having fun making my own commercials. I use my Flip camera for video and a regular digital camera for still shots. Looking for something fun and catchy and connecting it into one of my projects is the quest. Going viral is the dream! I don't have viral quality material yet, I think it will be like hitting the lottery - right place, right time and just the right combination. I'm just having a good time coming up with creative ways  to get the word out!

Here is an example:

For  Campus Slammer ; inter-collegiate story slams in Connecticut, www.connstorycenter.com

                                                                       

Here is a link to a blog I did that had great stats due mostly to the video I took.

www.carolynstearnsstoryteller.blogspot.com/2011/07/artisan-breads-whats-story-here.html

A still shot - a summer special

       My goal this year is for every storytelling venue I produce or take part in to have  a video. Face Book and Twitter, even blogs get a lot more attention with a video attached.             So.....
LIGHTS - CAMERA - ACTION!                                         

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Journey of a Thousand Goodbyes

          My father passed away last week. He was a captive of Dementia or Alzheimer's for several years and in passing over that journey has ended and another begun. Herman F. Marshall was born July 19, 1929 in Manchester, New Hampshire. His story is our family memory now and I'm reading the things he wrote to save his memories, now they become part of my memories. There is a notebook collection of the people, places and things that were special and everyday in his life.

                I can't say all the things I feel, or process all the emotions yet. I did spend the duration of Hurricane Irene's heavy rains scanning in these old photo and re-establishing a mental image of my Dad from before the time when age and illness waged war on his body.    

                                                                                           
     This may have been a last family photo, Charles Marshall my Dad's father died when Dad was only 18 months old. There was no collection of stories and anecdotes, just a few old photos. I can see from this one how much my Dad adored his older sister Ginny, as he did his whole life!   How my Grandmother managed  raising her two children on her own, well she was strong she had to be.

                                                                                    
      My father was a photographer and one thing I could tell from the box of old family photos I brought home from his house was the interest must have started when he was little. Considering the hard times and single parenting they still managed to get a lot of photos of my Dad as a boy. He had never shared some of these, so there are surprises along the way as I scan my way through the box.                        

                                                                                    
Summers were spent in Rye and Hampton Beach New Hampshire. Someone had a nice pony, this is one of the photos I had never seen but makes me understand more why he was so excited when we got my first pony.Little could he have guessed how much impact that pony would have on the rest of my life.
                                                                                  
                                                                                     

Here he is with his sister after 8th grade graduation. Pretty dapper dresser even then! He was always one for a suit and tie when he was going somewhere. When he worked for the newspaper as a photographer he was always in a suit with a white starched shirt. I finally got him to wear a colored shirt when I was a teen. It was very conservative though.

1945 and 16 year old Herman takes on a growth spurt propelling him to his mature height of 6 feet.

WWII and someone had to help build a highway across Alaska's expanse and off he went just 17 and enlisted with his mothers signature. Another adventure that included chasing a moose down the AlCan highway as they worked on it.

After the army it was photo school in Boston and landing the job at the Hartford Courant as staff photographer. He met my mother there and the rest as they say is history!

We added this photo to an album when they celebrated their 50th Anniversary.

Herman and Jessie Marshall

Look at that I've got my cowboy boots on!

Dad is gone but the memories are fresh and alive. I have scanned the photos and posted the blog to share them with family and friends so the story doesn't end there is always another chapter.  On Sept.27, 2011 I will be one of the speakers at Eastern Connecticut University when the Psychology dept. hosts a program on Alzheimer's Awareness. I want to share  some of my father's journey with the students and community. We need a cure and better treatments, we need understanding, we need to save the memories now!  Alzheimer's is the Journey of 1000 Goodbyes as each skill and memory slip past the shroud and disappear. The parting is slow and long as the bright and vivacious, person we know slowly recedes into a mist of confusion. Like any fog it occasionally lifts for a captured moment and memory. I knew my Dad spent many hours with his memories, they played like a long Saturday picture show from his childhood until the credits rolled.

Keith Munslow NO Token NO Milk

It was a perfect summer day,sunshine, blue sky, breeze and  a Library Summer Reading Program  sponsored by Richmond Library and held in Marlborough Senior Center, Marlborough Connecticut.
Just down the road a little way is the turn we have taken so many times for the 4-H Horse camp at Marlborough, I know the way like I was going home.

  I had been looking forward to this performance by Providence's storyteller /entertainer Keith Munslow www.keithmunslow.com Keith performed at this past spring's Connecticut Storytelling Festival to rave reviews, mine included! www.connstorycenter.org  

                                                                         
  This was a children's program that delighted the parents and grandparents in the room as well. Keith mixed his trio of talents, drawing, music and storytelling to bring the Marlborough audience a great blend of his original material. There were pirates in the room and the school lunch lady, feats of daring on the trampoline and the sadness of having no token to get milk at a school lunch time.

                                                                     

Little did Keith know how the song that day pertained to me!  Everytime he came back to the rythmic No Token No Milk line, I smiled. Around our house its No Cows- No Milk,  Now Cows- No Milk!  After the show I told Keith about our family business is dairy,  at some point when I see him again I will just have to bring some of the world's best chocolate milk - Mountain Dairy Chocolate Milk! www.mountaindairy.com  In the mean time you might catch me humming  No token, No milk!  Get yourself to a performance by Keith Munslow but  let me warn you,  when its over you are going to need some Oreo's and milk!

                                               
    My roots are in agriculture, my heart in storytelling, www.carolynstearnsstoryteller.com  I like bringing you a diverse blog of agriculture, story, horses, cowboys, history and reviews. Follow me here or on Face Book and Twitter to see my most recent post and where I  am travelling and the fun things I bring back to share with you.                                                                                     

1 Author, 3 Horses, Thoroughbreds,Lippitt Morgans and Me

Tonight I was watching the Saratoga Yearling Sales Streaming Live from www.fasigtipton.com  I have, since childhood wanted to see the sales at Saratoga. Those days I wore a thin path through the commercial carpet in the school library to the shelves that held the collection of books by C.W.Anderson. Weekly I walked over to carefully select a favorite that would be my companion for the week.

C.W.Anderson wrote so you felt you were right there, including his writing about the yearling sales. His lessons  embedded in the text are on grooming, handling, health issues, rearing colts and more, all were taught in a simple natural way. His equine art was exquisite and precise, yet warm and soft on the eye, I was in love!

                                                                     

Here are some C.W.Anderson resources:
Author page at : www.equitainment.com.aufactsheet.asp?ID=48

Art For Sale or View: www.encore-editions.com/categories/horse-sketches-c-w-anderson

Buy His Books: www.amazon.com/c.-w.-anderson/eB001HCUBMM


It was the beginning of a new story that continues with a new chapter next weekend. If before I could read I liked horses, once the books were in my hands the love affair began in earnest. I read other authors as well I loved them all. Will James and so many more, if there was a horse or pony on the cover my nose would be buried in it. I read Justin Morgan Had A Horse and that was prophetic.

Christmas Day 1974 a black Morgan mare was in the back yard. She was decorated with icicles and happy eating her hay. I didn't feel the cold or snow and ice I just wanted to stand out there in disbelief that this was MY horse. Cindy was with me from that Christmas Day until 2002, what a gift! A new love affair began with Morgan Horses, which continues today.

I leased a look alike mare to my Cindy for breeding purposes, her name was Ryegate Bridget. She is a Lippitt Morgan ( the old blood lines preserved in this group of Morgans) I was hoping for another black mare and she was bred and the long wait ensued. Wait and wait and wait, she drew out the suspense into the 12th month. I was sleeping in the barn my eye easily checking her through a knot hole on the final night. The foal was coming. I ran and got my children we ran into the barn just in time to sit with her and watch the foal enter the world. I got my filly, but as she dried we realized she was bright pumpkin orange. Her color subdued as she shed the foal coat into a lovely chestnut. I gave her the name Storybook Salute Vermont. A homage to her lineage of Vermont Morgans and to C.W.Anderson and my favorite book Salute!

This spring Salute ( with new owner Dave Godding [CT] calling her Sally) delivered a beauty of a colt, Hail Vermont. The tradition continues.

                                                                         


The Lippitt Morgans will be strutting their stuff and showing their beauty and courage in the ring at the Lippitt Country Show Aug 20-21 in Tunbridge Vermont. I can't wait to get there and sit in the shadow of the Green Mountains watching these magnificent Morgans. www.lippittclub.net  Just sitting here dreaming about next week I had to look back at my videos , join me:

                                                                         
                         

Last Year at the show they introduced a new drill team this is the video I took of that performance - all Lippitt Morgans!

                                                                         
Pinch Me, I think I'm dreaming when I get to be the show announcer and see the beauty and majesty of the Morgan Horse on this historic show grounds where on the perfect day you can hear their ancestors thunder over the Green Mountains and on into greener pastures.
                                                            storyteller -announcer
                                                www.carolynstearnsstoryteller.com

Secret 6 of Boston Supply Guns to Raid

Guns in cases labeled Bibles or Books
 
    That was how guns were shipped from Boston to Kansas in support of the abolitionist movement before the Civil War began.  Six men of the greater Boston area bankrolled the movement to make Kansas a free state ( slave free)  and to provide leader John Brown with the money and supplies needed to bring about his plan to create an uprising and free the slaves.

Saturday I attended a program  in Framingham Ma. about  Julia Ward Howe and the Men of the Secret 6. Julia is most well known for writing the words to the Battle Hymn of the Republic. A first person account of these men and their connection to Julia was performed by storyteller Libby Franck a Framingham resident. There was an impressive amount of history personalized and  brought out in this performance. The execution of her demeanor,costume, language, the dates and correspondences of the time were consistently in the time period and style.
                           
          Fundraiser is not a new thing. The Secret 6 raised much of their funds through spirited talks and  political connections in the Boston area. This group was well spoken, well travelled , successful in business and life pursuits, and inspired to bring about the change so needed.

                                                      

Storyteller Libby Franck as Julia Ward Howe   www.libbyfranck.com

                                                     

WHO WERE THE SECRET 6? Here are their pictures I took these at the performance ( sorry a couple a tad out of focus but I had no others)

                     Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe husband to Julia Ward Howe

Franklin Sanborn and Theodore Parker

                          Thomas "Wentworth" Higganson

                                    (below) Gerrit Smith

                  George Luther Stearns - I wanted to learn more about this Stearns!

Performance sponsored By:

                                                     

                                                                         
Libby Franck      www.libbyfranck.com   for more information on programs of  The Secret 6 and Julia Ward Howe and  other topics.

www.framinghamhistory.org   Come out to their buildings, events and touch the local history they have preserved for you!

Village Smithy

                                                                            anvil

Blacksmith Stories Link:

www.anvilfire.com/21centbs/stories

www.story-lovers.com/listsblacksmithstories.html

Terminology of the Blacksmith:

www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blacksmith

                                                  coal fire  and red hot

    Functional work of the smithy- today most blacksmiths do  not shoe horses, farriers trim horses feet and shape and put on their shoes. ( This big draft horse is sporting toe clips to hold the shoe on in mud and hard trail conditions) The toe clip always reminds me of the rubber fronts on my old Ked's sneakers when I was a kid.

                                                       nose to the grindstone
 Putting your nose to the grindstone is about work ethic, being sharp with calculations and steady at work. Axe and other implement blades were sharpened on the grindstone.

In the foreground of the grindstone picture is an early style toaster. The small rack held slices of bread and was put on the hearth to brown them in front of the flames. With some homemade butter Mmmmmm!

He's  full of hot air - could refer to a hot air balloon, but the blacksmith pulls the handle to the large leather bellows to send air into the coals to heat them up. Waiting around the blacksmith shop for a repair or to have a horse or ox shod would be the perfect time to swap tall tales - full of hot air!

Want to hear some of my blacksmith stories? www.carolynstearnsstoryteller.com