Click on link to view Jeff Catano's blog on Rockets!

http://howdorocketsfly.blogspot.com/2010/01/why-rockets.html

Rebekah's Blog

Click here to link to the blog Rebekah created for her post:

http://mcalister4musings-rebekah.blogspot.com/

Leslie's Inquiry

My inquiry project is going to be about video game sounds. I have played video games ever since I was a little girl and it has become my favorite hobby. In more ways then one, video games have been interesting to me. Any chance that I get I like to spend it on playing video games. I love playing video games and have seen the wonderful transformation it has made over time. In my opinion playing the different games mean more to me then just getting to the next level. It works my mind mentally, emotionally, and now with new technology, physically. I am a true "gamer". As I play, I think about how much video games have developed over time. I think about the graphics, video game systems, and the sounds. This is what brought me to my inquiry question. My question for my inquiry project is "How have video game sounds changed from the 80's to now?"

Some specific questions that I exploring at this stage are the way that I am going to present all of these ideas for the presentation at the end. I am also wondering how am I going to use this information to set a purpose for my audience. I know I used this question because I was interested in it but I have yet to find out what I want people to take away after hearing about my project.

At this stage I am also noticing that I have found a lot of research on the different sounds from the 80s to now. This is very helpful. I am also noticing that not only has the sound changed but other things as well. These things include the graphics, video game systems, video games, the memory. This shows how technology has and will continue to evolve. At this stage I am trying to gather all my research and put it down on paper so that even a person who doesn't play video games will be interested in my topic and can understand it.

Some next steps that i will take include putting all my data and research together to make my final presentation. I also am going to figure out what I want my message to be at the end of my inquiry presentation.

I have always thought that people who play video games are judged. I never told anyone that I play video games because of that. Now I have learned that analyzing, learning, playing, video games can be complex and that there is nothing wrong with playing video games even if your a girl. Video games are technology at its best.

One source that I came across is a book by Mark J.P. Wolf called The Video Game Explosion. This book describes how video game systems and video games have changed from the 80s till now. This book was very helpful. Although when I went on this website http://img.flipkart.com/bk_imgs/687/9780313338687.jpg I was able to see parts of the book, I had to go out and buy the book. This book describes how the sound has changed and it helped me out a lot. This was a great source. It was filled with rich insight on the different stages that the sound goes through.

Another website that I went on that gave me even more ideas was http://gadgets.fosfor.se/gaming-now-and-then/. This website gave me ideas about the different games that were made when video games first came out and how they have changed. I forgot about a lot of the titles of video games that I can use to describe the transformation. This website has helped me compare and contrast the video games from the 80s to now not only with sound but with graphics and similarities.

Collective Ideas and Advice in how to write a Children’s Book

My inquiry project involves learning and gathering information on how to write a children’s book. I became interested in gathering more information on this topic when I became a teacher. There are many books that I read-aloud to my students and that I have come across in my classroom library over the last few years in my profession. There are many books that are well written and there are books that I would never read to my students. I always asked myself the question, what if I was to write a children’s book. What would I write about and would it be any good? After these questions kept reappearing in my mind, I decided that I would one-day attempt to write a children’s book, have individuals and my students read it and see what comments or feedback they have. I also feel that there are many well-written books but they have a sense of the past and not the present, especially within the realistic fiction genre. I feel that there are few picture books that depict the stories of children and people today. There are not too many books that depict the feelings, experiences, family life structure and challenges that children go through today. As a teacher, who sometimes experience, hear or witness what students go through then I might be a great children’s author one day.

Some of the questions I have right now within my inquiry process are the following:

o What do children want to read about?
o What exercises can I use to help me in the writing process of writing a book?
o What advice do professional authors have to give to novice writers?
o How would I know if I would be any good as an author?
o What are the top best selling children’s books that are in stores now?

The steps that I have been taking in my inquiry process are exploring the web, taking on exploration activities and asking my students questions.

I have been exploring these three websites:

http://www.writingforchildren.com/G8245/index_03.htm

This website offers a free aptitude test that evaluates your potential to be an author for children’s books. This website is associated with the Institute of Children’s Literature and they use this test to place students in the right class and as a criteria to be accepted into the program. I plan to take this test and see how they evaluate me as a children’s author.

http://writingforchildren.suite101.com/article.cfm/starting_to_write_for_children

This website offers a lot of advice and ideas for authors. It also explains the difficulties and executes myths about authors who write for children. Many other links found at this site will lead me to different categories for becoming an author for children. For example, writing picture books and interviews with famous writers.

http://writingforchildrencenter.com/

This site is a blog that offers many different posts that surround the topic of becoming an author for children. In addition to reading the post found on this blog, I can leave comments and ask questions when needed.

In participating in exploration activities, I have used my imagination to develop thought experiments where I brainstormed and created questions that can lead to a topic for a book that I can write. For example, I developed the following:

What would happen if I held a meeting with the devil and God?
What if I was lost within the walls of my school?
What if my glasses revealed to me people’s lives?

I have also started to interview my students individually and I asked them three questions.
If you can choose one book as the best children’s book ever written it would be…
What makes you pick up a book from the classroom library, public library or from within a store?
If you can tell your favorite author, what his/her next book should be about it would be…

My next steps are the following:

1. To interview at least 15 of my students in total
2. To complete the other two explorations I have chosen to do as a part of my inquiry process. These include collecting objects that represent my childhood, which will help me to think like a child and to help me in developing ideas for books to write. The other, people watching, so I can create unique characters.
3. I also want to interview or email an author and ask them a list of questions on the steps they take in order to prepare themselves in writing a book.
4. Lastly, to take a trip to Barnes and Noble, ask them for a list of their top children booksellers, and start to explore these books and question why they are loved by children.

Therefore, my inquiry is developing and finding out the beginning process one should take in becoming an author for children. I am definitely a novice, so I am trying to inform myself with information on this topic and exploring the possibility of becoming an author. If anyone has any insights, please feel free to share, they are definitely welcomed.

What are the needs of my community?

Ever since we were asked to think about an inquiry project, I immediately began to wonder about starting an after-school program. Realizing that this was probably too big a question ( though it is something I've wanted to explore for years) I narrowed my focus to think about what things I could do to improve my community-the Queens neighborhood in which I live and work. From this narrowing focus, I came up with, I think, a more manageable inquiry question-what needs and services are not being met in my community?

The first reading I did  for this inquiry was to walk around and explore the neighborhood to see what programs and services were there. My exploration showed me that  there wasn't much outside of  private homes, stores, parks and the Long Island Railroad Maintenance Faciltity. I decided to do a broader search than my feet would allow and found that my walking exploration was pretty accurate.  According to this new search, http://www.queensbp.org/content_web/cultural_affairs/cultural_resources.shtml, there were libraries and daycare centers but not much in the way of art or music aside from one African Poetry Theater. There are programs for Autistic children and disabled kids, http://www.ny-companies.com/business-in-queens/community-services-companies/ but no enrichment programs.

The next phase of my inquiry will attempt to determine not only if other programs/services are needed and wanted, but what exactly these programs are. I plan to conduct another survey which will be broader and allow for more extensive responses. I will give the survey to students and adults in my community, and I will conduct inteviews to see if people want more services like art, sports or technology or if there are things I haven't even considered. 

I know that I won't be able to answer all of the queestions that I have, but hopefully this will be just the begining of a more substantial life pursuit.