Category: history
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Is the Obama Administration Dooming Us to HyperInflation?
According to today’s English WikiPedia entry, “hyperinflation” in economics is: …inflation that is very high or “out of control”, a condition in which prices increase rapidly as a currency loses its value. Definitions used by the media vary from a cumulative inflation rate over three years approaching 100% to “inflation exceeding 50% a month.” In…
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We’ve come so far, so fast – And we need more digital witnesses in the Oklahoma panhandle!
It’s amazing to realize how dramatically and quickly life has changed in many parts of these United States. Consider the following paragraph from Timothy Egan’s fantastic book, “The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl,” on pages 41-42: In the fall of 1922, Hazel saddled up Pecos…
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Exemplary digital stories by educators in Stilwell, Oklahoma
Last week I helped facilitate a 2.5 day workshop on digital storytelling in Stilwell, Oklahoma, as part of our statewide Celebrate Oklahoma Voices project. Stilwell is located in Adair County, just seven miles from the Arkansas state line in extreme eastern Oklahoma. The following three videos were created by educators in the workshop, and are…
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Hobo Signs, Symbols, and Parodied History
This morning I accompanied my 5 year old daughter, Rachel, on a school field trip to the Orr Family Farm, an “Agri-Tainment” destination in south Oklahoma City. One of the learning highlights for me was seeing this metal sign of “Hobo Signs and Symbols,” posted beside the narrow gauge railway at the farm. The history…
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The Tyranny of Oil, The Danger of Unregulated Markets, Power, and Populism
This week I listened to the hour and a half lecture “The Tyranny of Oil: The World’s Most Powerful Industry, and What We Must Do to Stop It” by Antonia Juhasz, which she shared at the University of Chicago on November 20, 2008. I found this podcast because I’m subscribed to the outstanding University of…
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A Passion for making learning fun, Memories of Growing Up Poor, Coming to Oklahoma in a Covered Wagon, One Room Schoolhouses
We wrapped up another great Celebrate Oklahoma Voices digital storytelling workshop today in Oklahoma City, with 22 more Oklahoma educators completing the 2.5 day workshop and creating their own short digital stories. Here were some of my favorites from our “show and tell” time today at the end of the workshop. Ranee Butler did a…
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Geysers in Rotorua at Te Puia
One of the highlights of my day yesterday in Rotorua, New Zealand, was visiting Te Puia and seeing the mud pools as well as geyser basin. This was an introductory “welcome” video I recorded in the morning from my hotel balcony, overlooking part of the crater lake of Rotorua. I am now COMPLETELY sold on…
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Mountains on the descent into Portland
I’m here for three days in Portland, Oregon, attending and presenting at the 2009 ITSC (Instructional Technologies Strategies Conference.) I’ve updated my blog handouts page with links to my five sessions, two of which are repeats. I absolutely LOVE mountains. As a “flatlander” growing up in Kansas and spending most of my adult life living…
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161 Museums in Oklahoma!
I had a great visit this evening with Jason Schubert, a friend of mine from Lubbock who is the interim-director of the J.M. Davis Arms and Historical Museum in Claremore, Oklahoma. Jason told me about the Oklahoma Museums Association, which lists 161 Oklahoma-based museums on its website. This is an amazing list! I knew we…
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Podcast300: Educator Voices from the eTechOhio 2009 Conference
This podcast includes a series of six interviews I recorded at the eTechOhio 2009 conference in Columbus on February 2, 2009. The episode begins with Gabe Ross, a student at Ohio State University studying video production and part of the documentary film crew at the eTechOhio 2009 conference. Second, Kieli Fergusen of the National Underground…