Canada Is Not That Strange And Other Biases | Wednesday | Period 2

[just-add-starch.livejournal.com]

Once again, Fraser was at the front of the classroom. His arms were crossed and he looked thoughtful as the students filed in.

"Welcome back. I hope you all had a productive weekend even if I feel it was probably slightly stressful," he said, nodding. "We've all made it through though so we can continue on with our lessons."

With that said, Fraser launched into the discussion. "Today, we're going to be talking about monsters under the bed. Or, more specifically, urban legends. If you don't know, an urban legend is a story of obscure origin with little or no supporting evidence. It's typically spread by word of mouth and a lot of the most famous urban legends contain elements of horror. For example, the Bunny Man bridge involves stories about a man dressed in a bunny suit who attacks people with an axe. Now, it seems far fetched but words have power and if someone told you this story and spoke it seriously, you might think twice."

Fraser shuddered to think of that urban legend being true. It was really creepy. "With urban legends, words have extreme power. Most often, urban legends are told from friend to friend, making them more personal. As the story is told, it evolves from person to person, often growing in terror and scope as it does. Why do you think most of the famous urban legends depict terror and horror? Is it because this is more interesting than an urban legend about something peaceful? Are words more powerful when there's fright involved? And how are these stories so believable when there's no evidence? Is it the personal factor? If my wife told me about one of the stories, I would be more inclined to believe her than if someone at the local grocery store told me. Let's discuss."

Library [10-6]

[imonscholarship.livejournal.com]

Dan was spending his shift writing. He thought he had something really good this time. He might even get up the guts to let someone other than his parents look at it this time.

Cultural Appreciation, Week VI [Wednesday, Periods 4 & 5]

[atreideslioness]

"If you're from the United States and I say 'Kansas City,' your first thought probably isn't culture," Ghanima teased as the students arrived. "But that's exactly where we are going today."

"The American Jazz Museum's department of collections & exhibitions specializes in several areas, including the history of the 18th & Vine area, jazz masters, jazz on film, new acquisitions & artifacts for the permanent collections and a variety of changing exhibits tied to the jazz experience and aesthetic. Each of the following spaces has its own unique perspective, and they have a musical festival coming up this weekend, and I've got free tickets, for those of you that wish to attend that performance, but today we're going to learn about jazz music first-hand."

"Jazz is a music genre that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States from a confluence of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th century American popular music. Its West African pedigree is evident in its use of blue notes, improvisation, polyrhythms, syncopation, and the swung note. "

"From its beginnings in the early 20th century jazz has spawned a variety of subgenres: New Orleans Dixieland dating from the early 1910s, big band-style swing from the 1930s and 1940s, bebop from the mid-1940s, a variety of Latin jazz fusions such as Afro-Cuban and Brazilian jazz, free jazz from the 1950s and 1960s, jazz fusion from the 1970s, acid jazz from the 1980s, which added funk and hip-hop influences, and Nujazz in the 1990s. As the music has spread around the world it has drawn on local national and regional musical cultures, its aesthetics being adapted to its varied environments and giving rise to many distinctive styles."

[OCD up!]

Boom-De-Yada Science - Danger Shop, Wednesday, Period 1 [Week 6]

[worsethanaunts.livejournal.com]

The Doctor made everyone wait outside of the Danger Shop today.

"Let's start with the homework. I hope you didn't think I'd forgotten. I'm the Doctor, I never forget anything. Okay, I forget some things. After all, I'm not an elephant. You were supposed to live this week like it was Shark Week. How did you do?"

When that was done, he got on with the subject at hand. "An ocean, for those of you who come from less water-plenty planets, is what covers 71% of the Earth's surface. It's the big watery bits. More accurately, it's the big salty, watery bits. There's really only one ocean, but the humans of this and previous eras split it up into a few for geographic and organisational reasons. How many do we have now? Seven? Five? They'll be split into twelve at some point, but not any time soon. There are hundreds of thousands of types of life in the oceans despite humanity's best efforts to kill lots and lots of things that swim around. And contrary to any major corporations' attempts to convince you otherwise, oil does not belong in large bodies of water. Neither do waste products, pool noodles or dolphins, but try telling them that. They never listen.

But I suppose you want to see what's inside." He patted the Danger Shop door. "I've programmed the Danger Shop to simulate the ocean floor of the Great Barrier Reef. I would've chosen the Mariana Trench, but it's dark down there and there are things living down there that you don't really want to meet. So the reef it is. You can walk or swim but you won't need to worry about water pressure or breathing. It's only a water simulation, but you'll feel like you're breathing air normally and you'll be able to talk and hear each other as if you were on the surface. You probably can't always do something so fancy with a holographic set up like this, but I'm very good at this sort of thing."

He was a show-off, that's what. The Doctor stepped aside, opened the doors and let them go in to an underwater reef with turtles, coral, fish, assorted other sea life and, oh yes, probably a shark or two who'll probably leave you alone unless provoked. You were going to get soaking wet, which the Doctor forgot to mention, but it was only holographic water so it would be gone by the time you left the room.

Ethics [Thursday, October 7th, 2nd period]

[sith_happened]

The Danger Shop had been transformed into a different world when the Ethics class arrived: An incredibly dry, hot one which smelled really bad.

Anakin waved his hand around the room. "Welcome to the embodiment of gluttony," he said, "the palace of a Hutt."

He concentrated on the controls on the far side of the room, and the simulation sprung to life: dozens of beings of all shapes, sizes, and degrees of cleaniless (ranging from 'casual acquaintance with soap' to 'water is eeeeeevil') drinking, eating, and dancing. All activity centered around a slug of a beast laying on a raised dais (not that it really had many other options for range of motion) at the front of the room.

"That," Anakin said, nose wrinkling in disgust as he pointed, "is a Hutt. This particular version is named Jabba, and is one of the most powerful crime lords in the galaxy." Or was, but he wouldn't exactly be mentioned what happened to Jabba with Leia running around Fandom. "Today is an interactive experience for you. Take a good hard look around. See the effects that gluttony can have."

Classic American Film, Thursday, Period 4

[eager-platypus.livejournal.com]

When the students arrived to class this week, they would find the television and DVD player set up next to...a gazelle.

Sometimes, Ziva really hated this place.

Don't ask how she got everything set up in her four-legged state. Only Gibbs would really be able to understand. By now, she was used to running a class as an animal at least once, so there was a note on the VCR that said "Last person in the room, please hit play." She was not, however, prepared when, instead of playing Rabat, the DVD turned out to be 98 Golden Retrievers instead. Hopefully, no one spoke gazelle and was horrified by what Ziva's angry noises translated to. At least the movie was American?