Halloween Mix VII: People Are Strange

As promised, it’s the seventh and final Halloween mix!  Ella Fitzgerald, the Doors, Talking Heads, Snob Scrilla, Flogging Molly, the National, and many others.  Hope you’ve enjoyed these mixes.  Happy Halloween! 1. Bewitched theme (1964)      1:02 The theme to the television sitcom (1964-1972) about a witch named Samantha (Elizabeth Montgomery), her husband Darrin

Stephen Fry vs. Language Pedants

If you’ve not already seen Matt Rogers‘ brilliant kinetic typography video of Stephen Fry‘s critique of linguistic pedantry, then you’ll want to watch it.  And if you have already seen it, then you’ll want to watch it again. Before my fellow teachers raise an objection to Stephen Fry’s injunction that writers be less constrained by

Halloween Mix III: That Old Black Magic

Welcome to the third Halloween Mix!  Some more by artists from previous Halloween mixes (the Clash, Robyn Hitchcock, Squirrel Nut Zippers, They Might Be Giants), plus plenty that appear here for the first time: Laurie Anderson, Cozy Cole, Garbage, Hoodoo Gurus, Rockwell, Spike Jones, Swan Dive, and many more. 1.     This is Halloween Panic! at the

Procrastigrading; or, How to Grade Efficiently

Not That Kind of Doctor‘s delightful post on “The Five Stages of Grading” prompts me to share my own grading method: Procrastigrading.  While the word is a portmanteau of “procrastinating” and “grading,” I do not mean “put off grading indefinitely.”  Instead, give yourself a one-week deadline for each assignment (quizzes, exams, papers, anything), and begin