Tech Tip: Canvas Notifications

Canvas notifications has been a great help to me this semester since I just downloaded the new revamped app as well. I also get their notifications on my school email. Getting notifications about when a teacher sends out an email or personal one is very helpful along with grade updates and assignment notifications. Sometimes I'll forget to do an assignment, but I'll be notified and reminded to do it so I don't get a big fat zero.

Tech Tip: Canvas Dashboard

To be honest, when I first started using Canvas I was not its biggest fan. I wish the everything wold just go back to the way things were with Ozone, but as time went by I grew more fond of it. The dashboard in particular is quite neat and nice. I can customize it to my liking, which I do a lot every semester now. I tweak the color of each class to match what I want. I can even change the names of these classes to make it more easy for me.

Reading Notes (Extra Credit): Brothers Grimm (Ashliman) Part A

For this extra credit reading I took it upon myself to read out of the Grimm Brothers Children's and Household Tales. This particular translation was done by Ashliman. The story I took most interest in was the one called "Little Red Cap". This is all too familiar with the story of Little Red Riding Hood. In this rendition almost everything was exact as the story I heard growing up and continue to hear. These are, however, minor detail changes here and there because of course this isn't the American version, instead it is the European one. In both versions the Wolf is the main villain and he is seen as the one who tries to eat Little Red Riding Hood. In my rendition I would turn it around. I know there are multiple versions of this story, even the one that I'm suggesting but this version will be told in my own voice. The Wolf would be the victim instead of the villain and the Little Red Riding Hood would be the antagonist. However, I might have to change the actual character of the Little Red Riding Hood to someone who is more villain like.  

Brothers Grimm by Ashliman, link to online reading

(Little Red Riding Hood & Wolf, Source: Getty Images)

Reading Notes: Grimm (LibriVox) Part B

In the second part of this unit's readings, I thoroughly enjoyed reading about the twelve huntsmen. In this story there lived a prince and his father, the king. The prince was happily married to a bride when he caught news of his fathers illness. He told the bride that when he was named king he would come back to her and left on horseback. When the prince arrived at the palace, the king was near death and his last dying wish was for the prince to marry a handpicked maiden. Not knowing what he was saying, the prince agreed and the father died. The prince, now named king, married to a new queen. The true bride caught news of this and ordered her father to bring her maidens that looked like her and eleven of them. He found them all around and brought them to the true bride to be clothed like a huntsmen. They were then sent away to the king whom accepted them with open arms. The king had a lion, however, and this lion warned the king that these were not men, but instead women. The king put them to the test multiple times including having them walk on peas and look at spinning-wheels. The huntsmen had an ally on their side who was a servant of the king. He informed them of these challenged and thus they all passed. One day the king was informed that his queen would be arriving shortly. This made the true bride faint and fall to the ground. The king went to her and took off her gloves. Then he realized that this was his former bride who he married before his father died. When she woke, he told her that she was the only one he loved and informed the queen that she was no longer needed. In my story I would take it a bit further and have the ex-queen become jealous and exact her revenge of the kingdom in some form or another.

Grimm (LibriVox) by Brothers Grimm, link to online reading

(The King and his Lion, Source: Twelve Huntsmen)

Reading Notes: Grimm (LibriVox) Part A

For this unit I decided that the story "The Frog Prince" was the best suited for me if I decided to retell it in my own words. The story goes that a princess goes out one night with her toy ball and is continuously throwing it into the sky. She throws it higher and higher until suddenly she throws it so high that when it comes down, it bounces into a spring. She cried and weeps and even says that she'd give away all her belongings just to get the ball back. Upon hearing this a frog emerged from the spring and told her that he would get the ball for her if she let him sit next to her, eat off her plate, and sleep on her bed. The arrogant princess she is, said yes, but once the frog retrieved her ball she sprinted back to her castle in joy and forgot about the frog. The next morning the frog appeared at her door, but she freaked out and worried her parents. She told her parents about the night before and they told her that she must respect her promises, so she let the frog hop on her chair and sit next to her. She let him eat off her plate until he was full and once that happened she took him up to her bed to sleep. The same thing happened the next day and the next day. However, on the final day the frog turned into a handsome prince and asked for her hand in marriage. She agreed and they lived happily ever after. This reminds me a lot of the Disney movie "The Princess and the Frog". In my own version I would make the frog's three things to break the witches curse be something more interesting instead of just sitting, eating, and sleeping for three straight days.

Grimm (LibriVox) by Brothers Grimm, link to online reading

(The Princess and the Frog, Source: Richard Crouse)

Tech Tip: Canvas Mobile App

I used to have the older version of the Canvas app on my iPhone, but it lacked a lot of features so I got rid of it. However, they revamped the Canvas app and now I have it re-downloaded. It has so many more features now that it almost mimics the actual Canvas website. It does have some limitations though such as not being able to see class averages on assignments and tests. Another downside it you can't manually input in a "fake" score on one of your assignments just like you can on the actual Canvas, so that you can see what you need to make on the assignment to make a certain grade. Overall it is an amazing new app and I use it almost every day.

Reading Notes (Extra Credit): English Fairy Tales Part A

In this weeks extra credit reading, I decided to go ahead and read the unit on English Fairy Tales. The great thing is that a lot of these stories I grew listening to and reading about, so I have a lot of background knowledge on them. One in particular was "The Story of the Three Little Pigs" and how the wolf tried to blow down all the houses, but couldn't blow the brick house down. In Joseph Jacobs version it goes on a little bit further and tells the tale of how the wolf cunningly tried to get the pig to go outside the house so he could eat them. If i retold this story I would make the pigs the bad guys and the wolf the victim. Another story was "The Old Woman and Her Pig" which mimicked the familiar story of "There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly". It was told as a nursery rhyme. In "Cap o' Rushes", there is a girl who is thrown out of her home for doing something small. She covers herself in mud and other nasty stuff and goes on to find herself a new home. There are three dances that are thrown, but the girl doesn't want to go and instead stays home. Eventually she gets ready for the final dance and ends up meeting her master's son. He finds out her true identity and they live happily ever after. It sounds a lot like a Disney tale to me. 

English Fairy Tales by Joseph Jacobs, link to online reading

(Three Little Pigs, Source: Gathering Books)