Reading Notes: Chinese Fairy Book Part A

For this unit, I chose to write over the Monkey King, in the Chinese Fairy Book. I liked the entire first part of this story, but the parts that stuck out to me the most were the Dragon King, and Dragon Queen sections. Throughout this story there are many baboons who are the Ape King's subjects. They show him a lot of ways to get the weapons he needs, so I think I could change the story by making the whole thing just a dream. I would make the Monkey King be a 5 year old boy, named Sam, who was obsessed with apes, weapons, and fairy tales. Throughout his dream, he would be the king, of course, and find the best weapon in the world! His journeys would consist of him having many monkey friends to show him the way and how to become the greatest King in the world. He would ask all of his monkeys to find the best weapon ever, which they did. They found someone very powerful named Drogon, who made the best swords ever, which he was dying to have. So in the dream, Sam would conquer the world with his amazing weapons and rule over everything. He would be a great King that everyone loved and respected. When Sam would wake up, he would feel like he was still the most amazing King ever, and live life everyday like he was a Monkey King!

Bibliography:

This story is part of the The Monkey King unit. Story source: "The Ape Sun Wu Kung" in The Chinese Fairy Book ed. by R. Wilhelm and translated by Frederick H. Martens (1921).

Young King

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Tech Tip: Google Site Page

Hi everyone! I have a new page up on my website! It's all about my sweet, little kitty named Phylix, and her best friend, Oliver! If you're interested, go check it out! This was a new post for my Storybook, and it was actually pretty easy to create. All I had to do was create a new page on my homepage for my website, and start typing! :)

Tech Tip: YouTube Playlist

So for this extra credit assignment, I wanted to write a tip on how to make youtube playlists! I have never been "tech savvy", especially when it comes to anything youtube related. I don't use YouTube a lot, so when I do I just do the simplest tasks like typing in what I want to watch and then exiting out of the page. But I realized I needed to start making playlists for a few videos I have saved and didn't know how. That's why this tech tip was awesome for me to find! Making a playlist is actually the easiest thing to do; now that I know how to do it. Once you are logged into YouTube and find a video you want to add to your playlist, simply click on the "Add to" button near the bottom left of the video screen. If you haven't made a playlist before, it will ask you to create a new playlist. Once you have created a new playlist and have added the videos you want then you will start to see them on your home page! Simple as that.
I have never shared any of my videos publicly, simply because I doubt people would want to watch all the cat videos I play. But, when I do make a playlist of the videos that are interesting enough, I will share it for everyone who wants to watch!

YouTube Meme

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Readin Notes: Aladdin's Lamp part B

The Story of Aladdin is where this part begins. I would connect the two stories by having the old man turn out to be Aladdin and stumbling across this cave in his journeys. He would go through the cave and realize how psychadelic it was. Everything he touched would either help or harm him in a different way so he had to be careful. So after his many adventures through this cave, he would have finally come across a lamp at the end of the cave. He has been through thick and thin trying to get to the end of the cave with the help, and not so much help, from every little creature along the way. Aladdin has finally made it to the end of the cave and has his hands on the lamp. He would be shaking so much from his excitement that his hands accidentally brushed the lamp, causing (you guessed it!) a genie to appear! But it would not be just an ordinary genie. This genie definitely does not want to be let out of his lamp, so when Aladdin let him out he was not very happy. This genie did know, though, that he had a job to fulfil. So once the genie was released and saw who let him out, he states the rules as simply and as quickly as he can. 1.) Be specific. 2.) Do not annoy me. And 3.) There are only three wishes I am allowed to grant. So of course Aladdin would be shocked since he did not know what would be to come from the lamp in the first place. The genie would go back into the lamp until Aladdin knew what his wishes would be. After Aladdin has made his way out of the cave with the lamp, he would think of all the things he could wish for and find the many obstacles he would face trying to get what he wanted.

Aladdin's Genie

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Bibliography:

This story is part of the Arabian Night Unit. Story source: The Arabian Nights' Entertainments by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1898). Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp 2

Reading Notes: The Story of the Fisherman Part A

For Part A of the Arabian Nights Unit, I chose to write over the Story of the Fisherman. I wanted to connect this story to my Part B of Aladdin. So in this part of the story a poor fisherman does what he can to support his family. He always goes out to the lake to try and find food for his poor, starving family to make ends meet. Every time he had thrown his net, he would either get garbage, fish carcasses, or shells! So for my notes, I would probably change one major thing- on the fisherman’s last try of the day he would pull in a treasure chest. This poor old man who is trying to catch fish to bring home to his family, now has caught a giant treasure chest! The only problem is, that he cannot get into the chest. So throughout the journey of getting the chest onto his boat without anyone else seeing, and trying to get it home, he come across many obstacles. I would eventually make it to where he had gotten it home and told his family all about it. Because he does not have a key to open to box, or an axe to chop it open, he would go on a journey to find something to open this chest. Along this journey, he would come across a large cave that seemed very strange to him…

The Poor Fisherman- Pierre Puvis de Chavannes

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Bibliography:

This story is part of the Arabian Nights unit. Story source: The Arabian Nights' Entertainments by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1898). The Story of the Fisherman

Feedback Focus

I think copy and deleting is a more useful tool to me than reading out loud. I have tried reading out loud, and even then I still lose my concentration- so when I can copy and paste a part of a paragraph, then it helps me read the whole thing easier. For me it is way easier reading a story little by little, then reading the story as a whole. I am a little surprised at how much more helpful it is for me to copy and paste than it is to simply read out loud. I use this strategy quite a bit actually; I have always found that I lose focus reading long stories so this strategy helps me a lot. This strategy helps me with any story I read, which is why I like this so much! Using a timer has never been the best way for feedback for me.. it actually makes me feel more pressured, even if I am not under a time constraint. So I don't think I would use this feedback anytime in the future.

Feedback Picture

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Reading Notes: Persian Tales Part B

For the second part of my reading I chose to do another chapter about a wolf so I could combine the two! This story starts out with a wedding, and by the end, the bride has turned into a wolf out of nowhere and tore her husband apart. Then she immediately turns back into her normal self without any idea how it happened or what exactly happened. So to change the story I would have it connect back to my part A of the story. Instead of a girl marrying a man, it would be the goat and the wolf from the beginning of my story. After the wolf had protected his house and managed to calm down the goat, they would have spoken about the miscommunication and the mother goat decided to let the kids have a play date with the wolf’s child. After a few play dates, they would begin going on dates without the children and decide that they have been falling in love! So in a twist of fate, the goat and wolf would fall in love and get married. Once getting married, no one would kill the other (like in the original), but they would live happily ever after like any other cheesy love story. The baby goats would then see the baby wolf as their new sibling and they would become best friends. After spending a couple years together, they would eventually realize that they could not keep up with rebuilding a house every time the wolf would huff, puff, and sneeze their house down. So they would learn what materials to build their house out of, and make sure it didn’t happen to any other unlucky people who built a house next to theirs.

Wolf Sneezing

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Bibliography:

This story is part of the Persian Tales unit. Story source: Persian Tales: The Story of the Wolf-Bride , translated by D.L.R. Lorimer and E.O. Lorimer and illustrated by Hilda Roberts (1919).

Reading Notes: Persian Tales Part A

This week I chose to do my story notes over Persian Tales. Because my boyfriend's family is Persian, I thought it would be interesting to read more into some of their stories! I read most of the story and loved the part of The Goat and the Wolf. This part of the story was very cool to me because it showed how the mother goat's motherly instincts set in once her children had gone missing. I think instead of the wolf overhearing the mother warn her kids about not letting a stranger in, the wolf would just be wandering by at the wrong time. The wolf could be a good guy and end up in the wrong place at the wrong time. Instead of the wolf breaking in and kidnapping the kids, he would try and sell them cookies for a fundraiser for his own child. In the story, only one of the baby goats was able to escape and hide when the wolf kidnapped the others, so I would change it to where all of the kids followed the wolf. While the wolf tried to sell them cookies, the kids would end up following the wolf home to try and buy more cookies because the wolf did not bring enough to their home. When the mother gets back home, she will notice her kids are missing and start an adventure to find them. When she gets to the Wolf's house, she will become extremely worried and try to break into the Wolf's house to fight him to get her kids back. Little will she know that the kids will be out in the wolf's backyard playing with his child and eating cookies! So when the wolf answers and tries to explain where her kids are, she won't believe him and become angry anyways. So while the mother goat tries to get her children back, who are not in any harm, she does everything in her power to get inside the wolf's house while he does everything he can to make sure his home is not destroyed by an overprotective mother.

Wolf and Goat

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Bibliography:
Story source: Persian Tales: The Wolf and the Goat, translated by D.L.R. Lorimer and E.O. Lorimer and illustrated by Hilda Roberts (1919). Link to Story

Story: How Adam and Eve Met

One breezy, hot day in the middle of the desert, there was a boy named Adam who was left all alone with nothing but his name. He knew nothing of what was about to be ahead of him, or even how to handle it. Adam looked around in such confusion because he had no idea where he was or how he had gotten there; all he knew was his name. As he sat and pondered everything that was happening around him, he finally got the urge to go exploring. Little did he know that he was created on purpose; to find his purpose in life, and recreate mankind. Adam was created as simple as simple could get. He had little to no muscles, he was only about 5 feet and 5 inches tall, and he only knew simple English.

Adam wondered around for a few hours, and eventually fell extremely hungry. Not knowing how to cook or catch anything to eat, he started to brainstorm ideas of what to eat and how to catch it. After many trials and errors of cooking things that seemed to be edible, he finally figured out what was good to eat, and what was bad for him.

Adam struggled for many days. He cooked what food he could and picked what fruit was available, but only found enough to keep him somewhat satisfied. Adam realized how lonely he was becoming and still was not truly happy. He needed a companion, and didn’t even know it. Help was needed for harvesting crops and fruits, killing game for meat, making shelter, and simply someone for company. So he decided to start his journey to a new part of this world…

Adam hiked mountains and swam through lakes and stumbled upon a beautiful rainforest which was rich with vegetables, fruits, and fresh water. He decided this was the place to set up camp for a while.

After finding a comfortable place that was shaded and had plenty of food, he decided to walk around and find stuff that could further his journey. Although what he didn’t know was that he was intruding on someone else’s land… Eve had put a lot of thought into her life so far and did not want what she had made to be ruined, so she made plenty of weapons for cases like this. She noticed someone walking through her forest that she had never seen before. For as far as Eve knew, she was the only human on earth. She began shooting arrows towards Adam in hopes it would scare him off her land. Adam had no idea what was shooting towards him, so with fear running through him, he ran in circles terrified of what was happening to him. Because he was not fighting back, and Eve did not feel threatened, she slowly made her way towards this strange human that was running in circles.

After calming him down and realizing he was of no threat, she spoke to him the best she could to understand what he was and where he had been. After the both of these humans felt safe around each other, they began to start this journey of life together. Both of them knew different things to help get them through, which led to the both of them teaching each other everything. They began making shelters together and learning off one another to make their lives better. Eventually the two realized why they were the only ones on earth and how to change that. They figured out life together and made small adjustments little by little to make earth a habitable place to live. 

Adam and Eve

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Author's Note:

This story was based on the original story of Adam and Eve. I based the beginning of the story on how Adam was created, and went from there. Instead of the two already being together, I wanted to change it on how they would have met in real life and what would have actually happened if they realized they were the only two people on earth.

Bibliography:

Louis Ginzberg's Adam and Eve: The Ideal Man

Reading Notes: Adam and Eve, Part A

I chose to write about Adam and Eve’s story of where the Ideal Man was created. When I was younger, my family would take me to church every week, but as I got older and my brother was born, we stopped going as much. Ever since we stopped going, I got more and more into other religions outside of Christianity. So although I would consider myself Agnostic, I like to learn about as much religion as I possibly can! I chose this story because I figured it would be a good spot to pick back up on since I do know a little about the story already. I would want to change a few things to make this story somewhat a little more comical than the original. Instead of Adam knowing where he came from and who created him, I would change into where he would just wake up one day and be the only person in the world. Instead of Adam being pretty much "perfect" and made by the God's, he would be average and quite skinny. He would have to figure out why he was put on this earth and what his purpose was. I would probably make him to be about 18 years of age instead of in his twenties. Eve would not be found yet, so he would be all alone until he found her. As soon as he finds Eve, they would then try to figure out where they were and how to make life begin. The only thing Adam would know in this life is his name, but does not know how to spell, read, or write. Anytime Adam would do something to further himself and make the world a better place, he would receive a faint memory of where he came from. So over time, he would learn all the life skills he needs to become a better person and how to make humanity start from the bottom up. He would learn how to make shelter, what food would be poisonous or healthy, and how to talk to girls…
Once Adam had joined Eve, Adam would find his own hell by living with a girl he just met, instead of dealing with the devil.

Adam and Eve

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Bibliography:

Adam and Eve: The Ideal Man, story by Louis Ginzberg