Masterpiece Classic: Downton Abbey Season 1 [Blu-ray] by Pbs (Direct)
In the custom of the BBC's Upstairs Downstairs and Robert Altman's Gosford Park, for which writer-creator Julian Fellowes bought an Academy Award, the royals, servants, and middle-class relations battle to get along. Sniffs uptight maid Miss O'Brien (Siobhan Finneran), "Gentlemen do not work," however that does not cease Mary (Michelle Dockery) and Edith Crawley (Laura Carmichael) from competing for Matthew's affections. Though it takes awhile to heat up to the tightest-wound characters, most everybody finds their extra susceptible facet prior to the primary season comes to an finish, and a model new small-screen classic is born. An addictive mix of suds and social commentary, ITV's Downton Abbey carrys a microcosm of Edwardian society together under one roof. Lord Robert Crawley (Hugh Bonneville) and his family reside a existence of enjoyment, whereas a fleet of servants, including howeverler Carson (Jim Carter), attend to their each want, but two events conspire to shake factors up: the sinking of the Titanic, which claims Crawley's inheritors, and the return of hellos valet, Bates (Brendan Coyle). Since Crawley and Lady Cora (Elizabeth McGovern) have three daughters, his far-off solicitor cousin, Matthew (Dan Stevens), becomes heir to the property..
Read more Masterpiece Classic: Downton Abbey Season 1 [Blu-ray]
Saturday, 2 June 2012
Masterpiece Classic: Downton Abbey Season 1 [Blu-ray]
Sunday, 5 February 2012
Five Stages Of Reading Development
Learning to read doesn't just happen. It has to be taught through systematic, organized instruction. Reading is a skill which is built upon through stages and is an ongoing process.
If a stage of reading development has not been learned, students will flounder in their reading ability, which also affects their writing skills. It is imperative that teachers make certain students fully understand each stage of the reading/writing process before they move on to the next level.
Jean Chall, world renowned reading expert and psychologist for fifty years, and past professor emeritus at Harvard University cites her five stages of reading development below:
Stage 0:
Pre-reading Stage:
Unsystematic accumulation of understandings about reading between pre-school and kindergarten.
Stage 1:
Initial Reading or Decoding Stage (grades 1-2; Ages 6-7 )
Student's central task is learning arbitrary letters and associating them with corresponding parts of spoken words. Learner acquires knowledge about reading. Phonics.
Stage 2:
Confirmation, Fluency, Ungluing from Print, Automaticity Stage (grades 2-3; Ages 7-8)
Consolidation of what was learned in Stage 1. Requires reading many easy and familiar books for developmental reading. Gradual increase in functional and recreational reading. Common use of the basal readers. Functional reading important - content area texts - here's where we fail in our attempts to prepare our students. Range of possible recreational reading increases.
Stage 3:
Reading for Learning the New Stage: A First Step (Grades 4-8; ages 9-13)
Readers need to bring prior knowledge to their reading. Children acquire facts.
Stage 4:
Multiple Viewpoints Stage: (High School; Ages 14-18)
Should include instruction in reading/study skills, and reading strategies for success.
Stage 5:
Construction & Reconstruction Stage: College; Ages 18 & up)
Adult literacy should stress acquisition of skills useful to the participants and the ability to apply those skills.
These are the stair steps of reading development. They are built upon and climbed, as students grow in their literacy development. Sometimes students get stuck in one of the stages. It's my job as a literacy specialist to "unstick" them so they can move on to the next phase and beyond, empowering them to become enthuiastic readers and writers.
Copyright © 2006 by Pamela Beers. All rights reserved.
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Friday, 3 February 2012
Piano Note Reading for Beginners
Reading piano notes is far easier than many beginning pianists think it is. Ultimately, piano note reading is simply a matter of memorization and repetition. In other words, once you learn the basics, all you have to do is put them into practice, and to do so as many times as it takes to completely internalize your note reading skills.
No doubt, you've seen what's known as the staff -- the system of five lines and four spaces upon which musical notes are organized. In music notation, at the far left of a staff you will always see a clef, which is basically a symbol that indicates how the notes on the staff should be read.
There are many different types of clefs, but fortunately for beginning pianists, the vast majority of piano music deals only with two clefs, the treble clef and the bass clef. The treble clef is usually used to notate the first few octaves to the right of Middle C, while the bass clef is usually used to notate the few octaves to the left of Middle C.
In all staffs, no matter what the clef is, successive lines and spaces represent ascending notes of the scale. For example, in the treble clef, the lowest line represents E. Thus, the space just above the lowest line represents F, the line just above that represents G, the space above that is A, and so on.
In the treble clef, which looks sort of like a backwards "S" with a few extra curly-cues thrown in, and centered on the second line up, the notes are as follows: The five lines, from bottom to top, stand for E G B D and F, while the four spaces stand for F A C and E. All beginning pianists must memorize these very early in the learning process. FACE is an easy acronym to remember, while EGBDF lends itself to a variety of mnemonic phrases, which you can make up yourself. For example, when I took my lessons, I was forced to memorize, "Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge."
Often, when reading music, you will see additional "lines" added above or below the staff. These are merely extensions of the staff, and follow the same succession as notes within the staff. For example, the invisible line one space below the treble clef staff -- a note that you will see very, very often -- stands for middle C as it is one space and one line below the E represented by the first line.
The bass clef, which looks like a backwards "C" with two dots around the second line from the top, has this configuration: The five lines stand for G B D F and A, while the four spaces stand for A C E and G. Again, there are many mnemonic devices to remember these, but it's always best to make up your own.
With many piano songs, especially those for beginners, the left hand plays the notes in the bass clef, while the right hand plays the notes in the treble clef. The two areas meet up at middle C, which is two notes below the lowest line in the treble clef staff, and two notes above the highest line in the bass clef staff.
Beyond this basic memorization of notes represented by lines and spaces, piano note reading also involves some knowledge of what is meant by various symbols. Most commonly you will see the symbols for sharp and flat. The symbol for sharp, which closely resembles the number symbol (#), indicates that the note which it accompanies should be raised one half step. Meanwhile, the flat symbol looks like a lower case "b," and indicates that the accompanying note should be played one half step lower. Also, once you start to learn more keys and scales, you will need to know the natural symbol, which cancels a sharp or flat is dictated by the key. Also, it's important to remember that when you see a sharp, flat, or natural symbol, that symbol remains in effect throughout the measure.
From this point on, things become more complicated. But don't sweat it. Learning how to read piano notes is a baby-step process. Try not to learn everything at once. Instead, focus on one thing at a time, and practice until it comes as easily as breathing. As always, this is the key to learning piano.
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Tuesday, 17 January 2012
Imagination
Hold on to your hat, you are about to take an incredible ride!! If used properly, imagination is one of the greatest tools that you can use. In your imagination, anything is possible and there is absolutely nothing that cannot be imagined. The fantasy book authors, who have spent hours in fantasy places, creating every detail and every aspect, have imagined some of the greatest and wildest places in fiction. All kinds of characters,
people, and creatures have been created to inhabit these fictional places.
Whole kingdoms and whole planets have been invented for you to explore. Movies, plays, books, television shows, media events, stage shows, theme parks, dvds,
audio cassettes, board games, electronic games, puzzles,
toys, and sometimes a combination of several of these have
all been vividly imagined and created in every detail.
When you enter into these kingdoms through the
author's guidance, you also explore them through your
imagination, so that no two experiences are exactly alike.
You can use your imagination for great adventures, great
encounters, fantastic stories, love stories, poetry,
building a special house or special property, designing or
inventing something that has never been done before, or
making something that already exists even better. From
the tiniest piece of intricate machinery, to the most
colossal awesome machine, it was first imagined in someone's
mind. She or he believed in that vision enough to figure out how to make it a reality and then she or he worked diligently
until her or his imagination was taking place in the earthly realm.
Thomas Edison invented the light bulb, and electricity.
Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone. Charles Drew
found a way to preserve and store blood, and he created
the world's first blood bank.
Frederick McKinley Jones invented a way to add sound to
movies, which revolutionized the movie industry; he also
created cooling units for trucks and trains to keep food
cool in transportation. All through their own imagination
and work that went on before them. They imagined something in their minds first and they worked diligently to bring that imagination into the physical realm. They
were not deterred because it didn't work the first or second
or even third time; the whole process, or the end product,
was pictured very clearly in their minds.
Harry Potter was a
character invented and nurtured in one woman's mind, now she
has written several books about him and there have been
several movies created about that one character and all his adventures.
Imagination lets you fly above the trees and soar
out over the water. It allows you to go further than is possible or ever dreamed of before. You can talk with kings and queens, you can go into the past or the
future, you can speak in foreign languages, or you can
invent a language. You can create brand new colors,
you can go to another planet, or down under the water.
Your imagination can be bright, big, dark or
foreboding. Where there is light there is dark, where there is up there is down, male and female, good and evil.
Everything has a dimension and substance in your
imagination. Try it yourself and see
where it takes you. Allow yourself a rich and
active imagination. But don't get stuck in the
fearsome side of your imagination; if you created it in
your mind you can un-create it too, and you can create
good and positive protectors in your mind to take care
of you. You can create a new picture in your mind to
replace a piece of imagination that may have scared you.
You can change the focus and change the outcome all with
a thought. You don't have to settle for the same thing in
your mind all the time; you can change your thoughts
at any time. You can create the life that you imagine,
right now, with your thoughts and actions. Every new
thought can progress you towards your dreams.
The world is wide open for you, my dear. Just imagine
what you can do, where you can go, who you can meet, and
then enjoy the journey.
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Monday, 9 January 2012
Free Reg Cleaner Unconventional Thinking - A Must Read
There are many free registry cleaners (sometimes referred to as free reg cleaner) available on the internet. In an ideal world, you would compare their compatibility with your PC by downloading all of them and try them out one-by-one. But of course, almost no one has that kind of time and patience.
I recently read a review that is quite interesting. The writer said that the best reg cleaner programs are ones that reliably fixes registry programs; BUT EQUALLY IMPORTANT is that it does not cause further problems while doing it.
This might seem trivial and obvious at first. But when you think about it objectively, it actually makes a lot of sense. When evaluating reg cleaner software, often times a lot of people place a lot of emphasize on how many problems a software finds. But when the errors found include broken links, useless files and outdated settings, fixing or deleting these "unnecessary" items might lead to other problems, especially in a system as complex and important as a computer's registry. Often times this is forgotten by users who consider that the best software are the ones that unearths the most "errors".
Both paid and free reg cleaner (free or paid) claim to find a huge number of "errors" to make it look more powerful and credible, when a lot of these "errors" are just trivial items that neither harm nor benefit your PC. When the software's cleaning function is that aggressive, it makes your PC more prone to problems from the scans-detections-corrections.
A more conservative cleaning function that only deals with more definite error-selecting criterions will cause fewer problems. Some free reg cleaner come with a regularly-updated "blacklist". This "blacklist" contains values that are not to be deleted by the software. This is a nice feature to have to ensure that critical items are not to be deleted. In any event, as a safe guard and good practice, always back up your registry before running any scans.
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Sunday, 8 January 2012
Want to Learn to Read Spanish? Here Are Some Great Tips For You
If you want to learn how to read Spanish, then I guess you are looking for some free tips on how to do that easy and fast. I am currently learning Spanish lessons too, so these tips might be useful to you too, they really helped me a lot.
When I first started to learn to read Spanish, I did it the old fashion, from a "teach yourself Spanish" old book I found in my library, but I rapidly got bored of it, it just wasn't working for me.
So I went on and did some research on the internet, to find out how can I learn to read Spanish easy and fast, and if possible, from my home, and with as little money as possible. Turns out, there are a few tips out there, but if I wanted to learn language the serious way, the best way was to buy a "Learn Spanish software". I didn't do that yet, but I am seriously thinking on buying one.
Now, here are some tips I discovered while I was surfing the net, and they worked pretty good for me:
1. You can start to learn how to read Spanish by reading books, if you have any in your home. I had an old Spanish book for kids, with drawings and stuff..(hey... don't laugh at me), and I read it over and over... 'til there were no more words I didn't understand. You wouldn't believe what difficult words were in there..I was thinking "what kind of genius kids are reading this book?". Anyway... the point is...find a book written in Spanish and start reading it.
2. No books? No worry, this next tip I know you can put it in practice. Find any instructions for some electric appliances in your home (TV, DVD player, stuff like this) and go to the Spanish section. Read the instructions in Spanish, and where you don't understand a word, just go to the English section and look up that word. This really is a great way to learn to read Spanish fast.
3. Another tip I found was to watch movies with Spanish translations. All DVDs movies have more than one subtitle, and often the Spanish language is in there too. So, next time you rent a DVD movie, turn on the Spanish subtitle and read the text as you listen to the English words. You will be surprised ho much this will help you learn to read Spanish.
So there you are, some of the best tips you could use to learn to read Spanish. They really work, But if you are serious about learning Spanish, you too should consider buying a learning Spanish program online, there some great ones out there. Just check out the resource box of this article for a great review site on the most popular Learn Spanish Software.
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Tuesday, 3 January 2012
Hairdressing Courses - Learning to Cut Hair With at Home DVD Courses
Oftentimes, hairdressing courses inside the four walls of the classroom and later in the hair salon can take time out of your regular schedule and money out of your strained budget. And yet you have to learn how to cut hair on yourself and on other family members in the comfort and convenience of your own home. Of course, the reason behind this decision is to save on costs on your regular trips to the barbershop and/or hair salon, which can run up to or more for a single hair cut.
Fortunately, there are hairdressing courses contained in DVDs that can be played in the comfort of your own home. As such, you learn how to cut and style hair on your own time and pace and without spending tons of money.
You can purchase these video hairdressing courses from offline shops and online sites. Just tell the salesperson or type in the keywords and you will be directed to the numerous brands and resources.
When choosing from among many resources, you should do your research first. You want value for your money in the form of easy-to-understand, easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions on the basics of haircuts, hair patterns, hair shapes and other information. You should join in Internet forums, read product reviews and ask family and friends who may have tried home courses on their own.
Often, too, it pays to pay for quality instead of purchasing the first cheap DVD you can find. As cliche as it sounds, you do get what you pay for even with hairdressing courses. Well, of course, you may be able to avail of discounts but quality comes first especially as this is hair - a man's and a woman's crowning glory - we are talking about. It simply will not do to butcher beautiful hair even if your guinea pigs, er, family and friends, are willing clients.
The courses may or may not have their own hair cutting tools. Of course, you will pay a higher amount if and when you choose the DVD with the right tools and equipment to start you on your first DIY haircut. You should also check if the tools are of good quality - sharp, clean, and new.
And speaking of tools, you must ensure that the tools include cutting and thinning scissors, cutting combs, razors and clippers. Other accessories may include apron, section clips, water spray bottle and nape brush although these are not as important as the cutting tools.
Once you have chosen the DVD hairdressing courses, you must take the time to listen to them, understand the terms and apply the principles. After all, you will not learn to cut hair like a professional unless and until you take the time and exert the effort to pay your dues.
In conclusion, hairdressing courses can save you plenty of money but only if you are determined to learn all that you can from them. You never know of the time when you can become a hair salon owner, too, and thus earn money from cutting and styling hair!
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