Minecraft Realm - Stephen's World - Minecraft bank and Minecraft University (in progress)

So, as I promised, here is the realm my friends and I have started to build.

Today I am going to just feature two of my buildings that I have created. The first will be a bank that I did solely in survival mode, then the other is the university, which is still in progress, which was done in creative mode. Since I am the Admin, I sometimes like to use my powers to create nice things. Anyways, I hope you enjoy the view ;)

The outside of the Birk Bank.

Main entrance to Bank de Birk.

Employees only behind the counter.

Almost to the safety deposit box!

The safety deposit box. Ohhh look at all the shiny things :)

Main entrance for the Birk Institute.

Welcome welcome, one and all! 

Birk's regular classroom

Birk's Business classroom

1st floor lecture hall

2nd floor cafe

2nd floor basketball court

The water lecture hall is to the left, and the library (currently in progress) is straight ahead.

There is much to be done in this realm and I will updating this blog with more pics from different players. If you want to feature your creations on my blog, feel free to send me your screenshots, I love looking at new buildings. So for now, keep crafting miners! und Aufwiedersehen!

Minecraft Universe - A sample of a world

Naturally, I play minecraft and have started a game with another person through a LAN connection. We use the Sphax PureBDcraft resource pack. I will post periodically of the progress. This world may be pushed aside because I just bought a minecraft realm which will be soon feature on this blog as well. 

Any other minecrafters out there? Hollah at me! :) 

ESL Activity - Speaking Exercise - Witness to a crime

Hello there educators! Welcome back to the ole blogski. I hope everyone is doing well!

Today I will be posting about an activity that worked pretty well in my ESL class.

Name of the Acivity: Witness to a crime
Student Level: Intermediate-Advanced
# of students: 6-14

Teacher's Part:

1. Explain to the students that they have witnessed a crime.
2. Tell them to read the roles that you give them carefully. Have them memorize their role.
3. Give each student a role.
4. Allow them time to read their roles.
5. Next, tell the students they need to mingle with the other people at a party later that night.
6. As they mingle they should explain their roles to one another. (What they witnessed)
7. Provide a witness information sheet to accompany their questioning. 
8. Follow up the activity with a report of what happened during the crime. I usually have them write a paragraph or two describing what they saw

Student's part:

1. Each student will randomly pick a role and memorize this role.
2. The students will mingle together and try to figure out exactly what happened during the crime.
3. At the end the student will compile their information based on what each witness said.
4. They need to play the role of a detective at the end. They should try to piece all of the information together.

Copy this into a word document then print and cut out:

You were standing near the drug store; you were talking to a friend who had just come back from vacation. You were listening to her tell you all about her time in Mexico. Suddenly, you noticed three people running from the store.



You were talking to a friend about your vacation outside the drug store, suddenly, your friend shouted, "Look!" You noticed three people running from the store; one was carrying a large bag.



You were waiting in the drug store for a prescription, you were angry because you had been waiting for a very long time. Suddenly, a man pushed in front of you and started shouting. It was 3.30pm; you knew because you had been waiting for your prescription since 3pm!



You were behind the counter in the drug store - serving customers. You were hungry and angry because the customers were being so impatient and you had missed lunch. Suddenly, a man ran up to the counter and told you to handover the money.



You were helping your friend behind the counter in the drug store, you actually work in the bakery next door but it was your break and so you decided to visit your friend – now you wish that you hadn't! Suddenly, a man shouted, "Give me the money!" You tried to hide but he saw you! He had blue eyes and was wearing a green shirt and a black sweater with a hat. Your friend gave him $2,000.



You heard a man shouting in the drug store; you were looking for headache tablets. Suddenly, you heard a man shout, "Give me the money!" It was 3.30pm; you were going home to watch Oprah Winfrey, she was doing a special program on violent children.



You were standing near the counter in the drug store, you saw a man wearing a casual pair of black pants and a sloppy sweater. You were surprised because it was the middle of the summer. Suddenly, he shouted, "Give me the money!"



You were holding the door of the drug store open for a woman with a baby. She had a lot of things to carry and so you tried to help her when suddenly two men pushed you; you almost fell! As they ran away, you saw that they were wearing black sweaters.



You were walking into the drug store with your baby. You wanted to buy some diapers. You noticed a man open the door for you, but as you walked through the door two men came out and pushed you out of the way.



You were standing by the mailbox near the drug store trying to mail some letters, when you saw three men running from the store. One had a bag and two were wearing black sweaters, the last man was following them, he was wearing a red shirt.



You were working at the front of the drug store putting cans on the shelves. You were wearing a red shirt and a black pair of pants. Suddenly, you saw two men running from the store with a bag. You ran after them to try to stop them.

You are a police officer. You were standing on the street corner. You suddenly saw three men running toward you; you knew that they were in trouble. You chased them but you only managed to catch the one wearing a red shirt and black pants. When you told him to stop he resisted.



You were watching TV at home; Oprah Winfrey was on - your favorite. It was about 4.15pm when the phone rang, it was the police, they said that John had been arrested for stealing money from the drug store. You couldn't believe it- not your son and not when your favorite program was on!



You own the drug store. The police called you at 5pm to say that they had arrested John. You have no idea what happened but you always thought that he was a problem.

The Witness Information Sheet can be copied from here:

Witness Information Sheet

Witness’ Name:________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Job:__________________________________________________________________________

What they       know:__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Name:________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Job:__________________________________________________________________________

What they       know:__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Name:________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Job:__________________________________________________________________________

What they       know:__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Name:________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Job:__________________________________________________________________________

What they       know:__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Name:________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Job:__________________________________________________________________________

What they       know:__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Name:________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Job:__________________________________________________________________________

What they       know:__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Name:________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Job:__________________________________________________________________________

What they       know:__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Name:________________________________________________________________________

Witness’ Job:__________________________________________________________________________

What they       know:__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Hopefully everything stays formatted the same. Enjoy!

PS- Let me know if you improve on this activity somehow!

PS- I do not own any picture in this post. RAWR.

Post for my future kids? Best kids science books of 2014. Also a tiny earth rant. Where will the future go?

I stumbled across a yahoo article today that had some outstanding science books for kids that I felt will really teach them about this earth.

http://www.nsta.org/publications/ostb/ostb2014.aspx

For all you children bearers out there, go to this link, check out these books. See for yourself how you can influence your little one's life by giving him or her a unique intellectual upbringing.

I am always an advocate for learning as much as possible and experiencing different ideas or cultures. To truly be able to accept the world for how it is and not be so biased, it is essential to get the facts straight and not just a dampened view of them. Science will steer us in the right direction.

Science is the present and the future, so we must embrace in with open arms and open minds. Everything scientific related will not come as a benefit, but we must work through our errors and press on in the name of Science!

Sorry, that was a little rant about the future of our Earth. It's hard to tell where we will be in 50 years. I just hope humanity can come together as one and work together for the greater good with the help of science.

Could you imagine everything that is happening now, 50 years ago?

Another point in thinking: The internet.

The internet has brought everything together and has allowed us to share ideas and information that has ultimately allowed us to gain more knowledge than ever thought possible. Science has taken us in a whole new direction of life. A nuclear fission reactor has just been tested and was successful in creating a positive energy flow, meaning that they are literally extracting energy from nothing (well a reaction, but who's counting). This is a huge leap in scientific progress and can only mean exponential growth in the future.

The big question though: How can we sustain ourselves when the internet is lost? Eventually a huge magnetic wave from space will knock all communication offline and we will be back to the stone ages. When... is the only question.

Keep fueling your brain with new ideas. Push old deteriorating ideas out and pump new fresh ones in.


(More thoughts and ideas coming next post) 

-Keep it classy internet people. 

ESL - Part of Speech Review Game - Stephen Birk

Hello everyone,
but a special hello to all my ESL teachers out there!

Today I will be sharing with you a little Part of Speech Review Game that I put together that works pretty well as a warm up and as a review.


The reason I created this game was because my students were not practicing their parts of speech. I wanted each of my students, at any level, to recognize what part of speech a word is because it plays a role in the syntax(word order/sentence structure) of English. Parts of speech are very useful when teaching how and where words go in English sentences.

Here you can find the links to my old Part of speech review games:

Part of Speech Review Game 1

Part of Speech Review Game 2

If you do not know how to use prezi, I would advise signing up for an account through this link
http://prezi.com/recommend/stephenbirk/
You need to have basic knowledge of prezi to manipulate this game.


Prezi is a very useful tool that doesn't require saving your work to a computer/usb. You can directly upload and work on all of your presentations online, so it's very effective for saving time.

Rules of the Game:

1. Each day everyone will get a chance to look at one word and guess the part of speech. 

-If you guess correctly, you get one point.
-If you guess incorrectly or guess more than once, you get zero points.
-If a classmate shouts out the answer for you or gives you the answer, you get zero points.

2. The whole class is working together but individually at the same time. Each person should study parts of speech individually and be ready to help the out the class by knowing your part. 

3. You take the number of days you have to teach and multiply it by the number of students you have in the class. 

Example:      20 days to teach. 10 students.

                      20 x 10 = 200 points (total maximum points the students could receive)

So I usually aim for about a 75% accuracy rate, because I know some students won't always study their parts of speech and sometimes they will not know the vocabulary so it essential to give them some leniency.

That means, if you choose 75%, you take 0.75 x 200 = 150. So the class needs to get 150 points in 20 days to reach their goal. That's an average of 7.5 points per day.

4. If the class gets X amount of points in Y amount of days, then the class will get a SPECIAL SURPRISE.

You need to determine your amount of points and amount of days for each individual class because it will vary. I usually just tell them they will get a special surprise and depending on how the class acts throughout the session, I will vary my surprises to match their behavior and attitude. I have made rice krispies treats in the past and also given out multiple suckers and raffled large candy. So really you can get creative as you want for the surprise, don't limit yourself to just items, you could take a field trip or something.

Instructions for teachers:

1. You need to make a template, maybe something like the examples I have created in the past. 

2. Each day needs to be filled with the same amount of words as there are students. ex. 14 students = 14 words.

3. Each day you will need to create a different direction in the Prezi. Just like microsoft power point, you go through slides in a particular order, in Prezi you can change the order of each slide, pretty easily. So each day you will have to change the order if you put all your words up first. (I usually make up the words each day so my students don't have a chance to go onto my public Prezi account and look up the words before class ;)

4. Start with different students each day and never go the same way around the room, this seems to keep them actively engaged when they don't have a monotonous cycle. 

5. Enjoy yourself. Create fun words or directly link your words from the vocabulary you are teaching in class. In any case, pick words that are relevant to your students' lives. If you are teaching adults, don't pick baby words (and also vice verse) .

I hope you enjoy and use the game I created. If you modify this game in anyway to make it better, please tell me! I would love to know. 

Additional resources:

http://prezi.com/user/stephenbirk/

This is a link to my public prezi account, there is a lot of different grammar topics that ESL teachers may be able to use for their class. Also feel free to share you ideas with me, I am always looking for new ways to teach my students :)

Experiencing Cultural Diversity in Germersheim, Germany.

In the summer of 2012, I decided to take a summer school course introducing Translation and Interpretation at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Germersheim, Germany. I had just graduated from Ohio State in March of that same year and had no direction with my life. So I thought to myself, why not see the world while I’m searching? And see the world I did.

When I arrived at this little town in Germany, I did not really know what to expect. I had been to Europe before, but every small city or town is quite different with its own respects. I was settled into the quaint town of Germersheim. It was a very beautiful town but rather small as I am used to. Upon arriving there were some problems with my housing situation so I was eventually placed into a nice little apartment quite a ways from the town center. This was no problem since they decided I could rent a bike, granted that I lived the farthest away from the campus. A nice little set-up after all!

The first day at orientation, we did a survey of how many different countries students were from. To my amazement I was the only American there, but there were also; Russians, Greeks, Italians, the English (England), Irish people, Czechs, Polish people, Ukrainians, Spaniards, Sweds, and even a Kenyan. I was no doubt pleasantly surprised I was going to be experiencing so many different cultures in one congregated place.

There were only a few people that spoken English as their native language so it was a great experience trying to use my German to communicate with these people from all over the world. My first realization was that the Italian and Greek cultures are very proud cultures. The Italians and Greeks would first not interact with each other because they felt they were better than the other, but by the end of the trip they seemed to mix quite well together. The Cyrillic speakers were very too the point when I spoke with them. I also noticed that whoever spoke a Cyrillic language seemed to adapt better to the German syntax. Why this was? I am not sure of, but it was noticeable nonetheless. The Spanish speakers were amongst the friendliest out of all the different cultures, I felt like I could talk to any Spaniard anytime because of how open they were. The Swedish man was a researcher, just like I imagined all Swedish people were. All these different people were smashed together and somewhat-assimilated into the German culture together.

Each culture brought a new breath of life to my view of the world. We had several weekends to share our own cultures while learning the traditional and modern German culture. Being able to connect with people that have such different views as you, really brings me joy. The power of communication and language is nothing to scoff at. If we could all learn more about other’s cultures, I believe we could really open up our way of thinking and progress humanity with a more harmonic approach. Cultural diversity is an amazing opportunity to learn something about yourself and someone else.

 Even though I started out going to Germany for translation and interpretation, I ended up getting much more out of it than just that! The world has a lot to offer if you stop to take a look. Noticing the beauty of the dissimilarities can sometimes come as a challenge, but if you take the time to step into another way of thinking, you too, can experience the tremendous multiplicity of ideas aroused from other cultural views.

Taking a step into a foreign land may seem like a big risk sometimes, but the experience, good or bad, you gain from it will forever make an impression on you. Take a walk in someone else’s shoes for a change. Dream another’s dream for a night. Surround yourself in an array of new concepts. Becoming sensitive to cultural diversity can affect one’s entire life. One starts to appreciate how different and similar we all really are. Each day that we become more culturally sensitive, we become more in tune with our fellow brothers and sisters of this world. So let’s keep rockin’ out to that funky beat of omni-cultural acceptance. 

What does "colorless green ideas sleep furiously mean"? The answer unveiled by a linguist from Ohio.

"Colorless green ideas sleep furiously." 

This is a famous sentence composed by Noam Chomsky in 1957. They say the sentence is syntactically correct but semantically incoherent. Well today I will shed a little of my own light onto the sentence. Of course our language has evolved from 1957, so the terms used back then are probably not the same terms we use today. Anyways, here it goes...

Looking at this sentence, we can see that it aligns with a correct syntax for English. Semantically though, we are a little puzzled. I am going to hopefully explain how I can put this sentence into a context that is semantically understandable in English.


I will first start with the synonymous definition for each term:

Colorless = nondiscriminatory by race, raceless, unbiased

Green = Environmentally friendly

Ideas = ideas

Sleep = lie dormant 

Furiously = moving quickly with purpose

So what I propose:

 "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously"
to mean
"Unbiased environmental friendly ideas lie dormant within us, trying to get out."

Can't you see it? We all have this furious idea within us that is just waiting to escape! We can't help it, we need to help save the environment unbiased of destination. Can you see it?

We need to start moving toward an environmentally friendly way to live with this earth, or else we could face serious consequences in the coming days. Certainly our generation will not be so impacted by the shifting of the environment, but generations to come will be greatly influenced by the natural world shift. 

Conclusion: 

I believe that nowadays in English we can use semantic similarities much easier because the language has evolved in the direction of a multiform-semantic use for a word. In other words, we can connect ideas much easier and quicker because we can be more lenient with how we define things and the internet carries new information at hyper speeds. We usually take words and ideas to be much more loosely defined than in the past. The constriction from the formal grammatical English is being lifted and we are seeing a massive shift in the flow of meaning. The syntax of English is not so quick to change though. It some cases there has been a shift but it is not big. I may have to discuss this in another post.

 English is on the rise semantically and evolving quickly, we can't do much but sit back and ride the out the tide. So let's create some new words while we are at it ;-).

For all you creative types out there: urbandictionary.com
-----> Go, Create, Enjoy

It dropped below -15F this winter. So stay warm friends! 

Any comments or questions or ideas? I'd love to hear them, so don't be shy! 

*I do not own any pictures in this post. 

Martin Luther King Jr. Day (ESL Student Integrity and Character Post)

This post is dedicated to Martin Luther King Jr. Without him, the social construction of society could not have evolved as quickly as it did. So hats off to you MLKJ.





Speaking of character, that brings me upon a rather interesting conversation topic. Academic vs. Ethical integrity. I have been a teacher now for about five months but as every teacher knows, there are students who like to cheat on tests and quizzes. I am not saying that I have never written a formula on an arm before or eaten a magical cookie of memory enhancement the morning before an exam, but some students are consistent with their cheating. On one hand, some students are excellent and never dare cheat off another student. While on the other hand, some students cheat at every opportunity possible.

Academic integrity, does it directly correlate to ethical integrity? I have not prodded too deeply into this subject matter yet, but based on my observations I have formulated a guess as to there is a correlation between both forms of integrity. I believe that academic integrity is formed based on ethical integrity. People are usually taught how to behave in general before they are taught how to behave in school. How one person is raised in an ethical sense, I believe, determines to an extent how they will act in an academic setting.

This is just one way to view this behavior. Another side could say that students are cheating because that is what they are used to doing in their home countries and so on. A patterned behavior from a young age could cause a student to try harder to cheat on a test than to actually study for it. I do not see any reason this could not be the case, but I don't believe it to be so.

I think we should look at this cheating from a different perspective. Most students come to study English with goals in mind. They are either looking to move on to a university in the United States, get a job in the United States, or continue studying at a university in their home country. The grading system for the institution I work in is a little weird and a bit strict. Basically students are graded much more harshly than a regular school would. When students are used to passing in their country, they expect to pass in this country. When they don't pass, they get frustrated and could easily resort to cheating.

Why cheat on an exam when you just cheat yourself? Well the system is a bit flawed, as it seems to me. If you can pass a certain level at this school you can gain accessibility to apply to a lot of schools in the United States. Otherwise you have to take an English test for foreigners called TOEFL or ILETS. Students want to pass the levels in this school so they can move on with their lives. They don't mind if they are behind when they arrive at the university, but in the long run this will hurt them. Some of them might fail because they are not ready to tackle some of the language they are going to face.

Integrity is integrity, no matter the form. I hope that students around the world challenge themselves to be academically honest and have ethical integrity. As MLK said, he wishes his kids not be judged by the color of their skin, but the content of their character. On that closing note: Do what's right, aim high, and be fair in whatever you do.


I do not own any of the pictures in this post. 

Random Entry - Random Babble - Random Thoughts

Hey there readers!

I know you all love rambling, so I've decided to do a bit. My life has dissolved itself into whirlwind of ideas that pulsate through my tiny cranium non-stop. As I get up every morning I wonder where I will be in one month, one year, ten years, etc.. This world has become so small in terms of accessibility. We must determine in life where we belong and where we fit in. People get stuck in a cycle that either allows them to advance or keeps them stagnant. But aside from the socioeconomic perspective, one must wonder what keeps people from experiencing new things that are totally far from home? I know one must think about other places in the world if not but for a moment's time.

If you had rolled the one billion sided die a nanosecond earlier or later than you did, you may be someone else in a different country right now. The miracle of life is bizarre and I think we should try to make the most of everything we have and of everything we do. We may face hardships and struggles, but without these, we cannot grow. Challenges make us who we are.

Traveling the globe is the best idea. I cannot think of a better way to experience the true beauty and sometimes ugliness of life. I want to feel the raw emotions of other cultures. I want to be transformed into someone else when I travel. My mind will mold and remold. The traveling bug has bit me hard.

Random song of the moment: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rX4g0sxDCEw

Sooooo-hooo-hoooo!
You're wondering what is next huh?

I'm not sure.

Master the English language. Move on to another.

Get my Master's. Move on to another country.

Master the art of school. Move on and up.



I cannot stop learning. Learn beyond death. #cantstopever

PS- I hate hashtags, but they are sometimes useful.

ESL Verb Tense Review Game

Since I am actively involved in the ESL community, I like to create games for my ESL students.This game involves verb tenses of English. It is somewhat of a dual.


-First you separate the group of students into two teams. I let them pick their own names for their team and they seem to enjoy that.

-Next you ask two people from each team to go up to the board to be the writer. The writer represents the entire team, so competition usually drives students to want to excel.

-The teacher says a base form verb and a verb tense (ex. present perfect, past progressive, etc.)

-Each student writes a sentence with the correct verb and verb tense with all correct grammar. Whichever student can do this the quickest will win their team a point.

-The team is allowed to help the writer but no member from the team should write for the writer.

**

Notes: You can play for as much time as you need, or you can set a point total to win. Have students close all their books and notes during the review game so they will have to use their memory. I find when I let them use their books they are slower to answer and not as creative.

I usually award the winning team candy or some small sweets. Positive reinforcement for every student goes a long way. :)



Source of validity: ESL Instructor / MA TESOL (in progress)

**I do not own this picture.