Oh hey, I got engaged

I’m sure you have all read about it on Ashley’s blog. If not, read Three Promises here.

I am beyond excited and ridiculously in love with this girl.

On to something MUCH more boring and silly. I wrote this paper just a few minutes ago describing  my philosophy on assessment (as in tests in school). Hope you enjoy.

Assessment, at its root, is a form of feedback to the students, teachers, and parents about the level of performance the student has achieved. This definition however can be interpreted and applied in a virtually infinite number of ways. My outlook on assessment may not be a popular one, but it serves its own purpose in the context of my ideally planned classroom.

I have a terrible disdain for the contemporary philosophy regarding assessment. Long, grueling tests are focused on and used to find out what the student does not know. In my own experiences, I have found this to lead to a lower level of confidence in the student. This in turn jumpstarts a tragic cycle of missed opportunity and eventually the student is not performing up to his or her potential.

In my ideal classroom, assessment would be used as a primary tool for the student. Regular informal and formal assessment would join to give the student, at any point in time, a relatively specific idea of how he or she is progressing through the material. With carefully designed assessments (be it formal testing or informal discussion), I will also be able to keep track of students who seem to be struggling or in other cases, excelling.

At all costs, I would like to stay away from the assessment philosophies that some educators have. These philosophies are based around formal pencil and paper, multiple choice tests. While they do provide some useful statistics, it tends not to be much more than that. A student who may be very articulate and informed about a topic might not be able to score as high on a Scantron test as is correctly representative of his knowledge on the subject. In conclusion, a student should be given multiple avenues and opportunities to display (and consequently be proud of) the information that he or she has mastered. This not only leads to higher self efficacy, but it also adds a very strong intrinsic motivation to those who may not have experience that otherwise.

Assessment can either be a necessary evil, or it can be a useful tool. It all depends on the methodology behind its use.

Three Promises

My girlfriend has started a blog. I will admit, I helped her set it up….but I never expected her to blog at such a pace that causes smoke to rise from her Mac keyboard. Let’s do some math:

My blog:

• Started on January 30, 2009. That is 7 months, 21 days. 231 days in total.
• Total number of posts: 52 (including this one)
• 52 / 231 = 4.44 or about 4 and a half days in between blogs. Not a great number. I have been told many times that I need to step it up. Maybe the comparison between Ash’s and my blogs will give me that external motivation.

Three Promises:

• Started on September 11, 2009. 7 days ago.
• Total number of posts: 6 (SIX. THAT’S 6.)
• Sigh. This won’t be good. 6 / 7 = .85 or less than a day in between blogs. Uh. If her blog was Lebron James, mine would be…well…me.

Let’s get a streak going! On to actual content.

As some of you all know, I’m a coffee addict. It’s not uncommon to have a cup or two every morning, plus one every few nights of the week. I really like flavors and roasts that I’ve already tried, but I also thoroughly enjoy trying new caffeinated experiences. Today I decided to try a new drink from Common Grounds called “The Flaming Idiot”. A vanilla latte plus cinnamon. (Some background: I love cinnamon. Seriously. I could put it on just about anything….ESPECIALLY coffee.) I almost immediately shouted out my order. Don’t worry, I was able to restrain myself from embarrassing….myself.

So there I am, in the car, drink in hand. I’m shaking from anticipation….and possible over-caffeination already at this point in the day. <sip>  Well okay….it’s just foam right? The foam’s never that great! Haha! Right? I’m right, right? Of course. <sip> Errr….hehe. <sip> Dammit. Well, I tried. I ended up NOT liking ” The Flaming Idiot”. It was a weird flavor of vanilla and there wasn’t much cinnamon…at least not as much as I require.

This brings me to my main point: chocolate. When have I EVER had a bad chocolate coffee drink? NEVER. Granted, some have been much much better than others, but I have never stopped drinking one midway through. Also? What doesn’t chocolate improve? Breakfast? You bet it does. Lunch? Um, duh. Dinner? Now you’re just asking dumb questions. My favorite chocolate things?

These are just 3 of probably hundreds. Seriously. Last time I make the mistake of picking, haha, vanilla.

Tomorrow, I must tell you about Jennifer’s Body, the new “movie” out today.

These are the cork boards that Ash created for me. Lots of pictures of friends, family, and other cool things.

My desk

My dresser....rockin the pink hat!

It’s not a mansion, but it’s pretty nice for what it costs. I’m VERY happy with it, especially with the new decorations.

New addition to my movie review section. (I need a name! Any ideas? Please share!)

House Bunny starring Anna Faris. In all actuality, I enjoyed the film. It was painful though. Those who have a fear of awkward humor or bad jokes or anything similar should avoid this film. But since it was one of my first movies through Netflix, I felt I had an obligation to watch it all the way through.

The main character is a playboy bunny who ends up being evicted. She then stumbles upon the Zetas, the outcast of the school sororities. She becomes their housemother and leads them to blah blah blah…okay so its mostly a predictable plot line, but there is a couple interesting things at the end.

A few good laughs, a couple of scenes so awkward that I cringed, but overall “cute (if a guy can say that). A good movie for those looking for a somewhat mindless comedy.

2 orders of SMALL popcorn.

I was brutally mistaken. As a precursor to my review, I must say that director Zack Snyder DID illicit an emotional response (which I take it to be his purpose and objective in this movie). My emotional response was disgust.

I’m not one to shy away from all things scary. I like a decently complex horror movie. Slasher scenes don’t bother me much. But something about this movie, the combination of graphic violence and the emotional undertones behind it, really seemed to disturb me.

For those of you who are not familiar with it, Watchmen is about a group of superheroes living in a historically fictional world (1985) where Nixon is on his third term as president and nuclear war is looming. One of the “heroes”, the Comedian, is murdered. (This character is disturbing all by himself. I won’t go deep into the graphic scenes of the movie, but this guy does some terrible things to innocent people.) Rorschach, a twisted character in his own right, sets out on an investigation which leads to the discovery of a plot for world destruction. My knowledge about the last part of the movie is limited, due to the fact that I could not finish it.

Seriously. I always finish movies. I’m done beating the proverbial dead horse, but I will sum up all my thoughts here:

This movie had the potential to be, by my standards, great. It had an interesting plot, an original point of view, and potential for amazing fight scenes. Instead, it was limited to pointlessly gory violence and shallow characters.

I shall now introduce my personal scale of movie ratings: bags of popcorn. The scale reads as such:

KID’S COMBO – Not very intriguing at all. Poor choice in movie.

SMALL – Worth seeing, but not by much.

MEDIUM – Decently entertaining. Worth seeing in theaters.

LARGE – You’ll have a very good time seeing this movie and will talk about it for a good while.

LARGE + REFILL – One of the best movies you will ever see! This one will go down in history.

Needless to say, Watchmen only deserves a KID’S COMBO.

Coming in the mail tomorrow with my NetFlix free trial? Obsessed starring Beyonce and House Bunny with Anna Farris. Stay tuned.

Lot’s of things to cover! It’s been an exciting time since the last update of JtCM.

1. Moved into my first apartment! 4 bedroom, 2 bath right down the street from campus. Nice kitchen, huge living room, and a decent view from the balcony. Had a bit of trouble with the office about which apartment I was going to get, but we managed to compromise. 3 roomates, all really good guys. I might be posting some pictures on my next post.
2. Taking 16 hours of class this semester, including: Marketing, Management, two Teacher’s Education courses, Management Information Systems (computer science applied to business), and a weightlifting class.
3. Went on a “work retreat” during the few days before classes start. It consisted mainly of teamwork building exercises, trust exercises, and free mediocre food. I wasn’t all that happy to be there, except for the fact that we got paid for it. Not bad.
4. I am moving towards eating in more. With a kitchen and a girlfriend who is willing to help, I am trying to cook more meals at home rather than go out. It usually ends up being cheaper and most times is healthier.
5. I am going to Austin City Limits with Ash in October. I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before, but I’m really excited.
6. My birthday is in November. I’ve already started to make a list. I can tell I must be maturing (against my own will of course) by what is on my list…dress shirts and ties, running shoes, golf balls, and an electric toothbrush. Only God can save me now.

As I get back into a regular schedule, I should be able to blog more. As I expected, I’ve had a few periods of writer’s block, and honestly, bouts with apathy. But hopefully I will battle through those and keep it regular.

Week 2 of Junior Year, go.

I took the night off from video games, just for you guys, my readers.

Today was one of the last practices for the YMCA team that I coach along with Flattop. (I apologize that I have not blogged about the boys before. I guess it slipped my mind when it came to blogging time.) We are The Spartans. 12-14 year old boys, we started in June and have worked hard to get better and have fun, and by God, we have.

We supposedly have our biggest game of the season on Saturday. This is the team coached by the man who beat us 4 times last year, handing us our only 4 losses of the season. Coach Ryan and I dislike this man, not for who he is (by the way, he’s possibly the nicest guy involved with the YMCA) but for what he did to us. He ruined our rookie coaching season. He scarred us. For life.

It’s really not that serious, but we really want to win. We’ve blown this game up to massive proportions, telling our kids it will be the biggest test of their basketball careers (or at least their YMCA careers). But the interesting thing is, this team we play, this “huge obstacle” in our way, really isn’t all that intimidating.

In fact, they aren’t very good. They’ve already lost, twice, to a team we beat handily. This actually is related to my main point:

Playing from behind as the underdog gives a party, be it a team or an individual, a certain kind of advantage. A “nothing to lose” mentality can completely switch the balance in situations. This can pertain to sports or school work or a career or even a disease. If nobody expects you to succeed, it gives added motivation to press on and to tell the naysayers, “NAY! NAY I SAY!”

I’ve seen the power of this, I’ve experienced this, I believe in this. Give somebody something to prove, or better yet, somebody to prove wrong, and I wouldn’t bet against them.

Secretly, unknown to my team, I expect to win this game by a healthy margin. I just hope I’m not too over confident.

For your musical pleasure, I will end tonight’s post with a music video. In the recent past, I have immediately turned off the radio at the first sign of a Mariah Carey song. This one is bearable, I guess.

I, Matt Wilson, listened to country. Now this might not be very shocking or newsworthy to many of you, but to some……some are speechless right now. Some just fell back in their chairs and hit the ground. Go help them up.

Some of you also know that I experimented with the music of Brad Paisley for awhile, but that opened up a doorway into many new and more potent forms of country.

It started with Brad, but escalated a few days ago when I started to download Tim McGraw classics. Yesterday, I pulled out my Garth Brooks live concert CD collection. Yes, I have one.

It all culminated last night.

Last night, I programmed The New 93Q into my car radio.

I was nervous as I held the last preset button down, saving 92.9 FM into my dash. I finished the deed, and I continued to listen. It took dedication to my new finding. Darius Rucker, former lead singer to Hootie and the Blowfish (one of my favorite bands), has released a new single “Alright”. It made me sad. He should not do country.

I retreated back to my alternative rock. It was safe and inviting. I jammed to some Taking Back Sunday. It allowed me to regain my courage.

What is this? It seems catchy. Haha! Funny lyrics. I’m gonna have to tell my friends about this….I think I like this song…

And it was done. I had discovered the Beer Gut song.

For right now, I will listen to a song, then retreat back to my other stations. This is still a new and frightening world of clever lyrics and a certain musical element called “melody”. Support me in my journey, and in the future I will have many tales to tell.

Goodnight….y’all.

Wednesday night, I went to the my first Astros game of the summer. Ash was kind enough to treat us to some AWESOME seats.

Ain't she a cutie? Plus she buys good tickets. XD

See that shirt? I bought that for her. This girl had NO Astros gear. None whatsoever! I don’t even watch baseball and I have two shirts.

We had some issues finding parking, mainly because I tend to zone out and enjoy the drive too much. I lose focus on the goal at hand, they call it DADD (Drivers Attention Deficit Disorder). It can be deadly….to your time.

We found parking, which turned out to be super close, much closer than I expected. Awesome job, girl.

For a infrequent visitor, one forgets how huge Minute Maid is….its massive! I am always in awe of man-made buildings and structures. Incredible amounts of time and effort put into one finished project. We truly have one of the most original and THE coolest stadium in the MLB. Retractable roof? Yes please.

I love the lighting of this one.

We got to our seats (1st base side, about 20 rows up), and soaked in the atmosphere. It had been more than a year since I had been to a game. It makes you like baseball. I actually felt like playing? It made no sense to me at all.

Even though we had eaten beforehand, Ash and I needed to fully live the baseball game experience. We both agreed that the 1st inning was the perfect time for a frozen lemonade. My goodness those are good.

Another mandatory aspect of a baseball game is to get something spilled on you. I avoided this, as its happened to me before. Ashley decided it wouldn’t be authentic if she didn’t experience this, so she sat right underneath the gentleman drinking sweet tea. Her skirt and her hair both got splashed. She was not happy, so I switched seats with her. Naturally, it didn’t happen again

Turns out we weren’t the only ones in Minute Maid. We had the privilege to meet up with the lovely Monet and Lindsay. These two are hardcore fans. They make sure to enhance my baseball knowledge with deep sighs and eyerolls. This is how I know I am expanding my baseball horizons.

We also were graced with the presence of many Cardinal fans behind us. One possessing the most annoying voice since the middle judge on So You Think You Can Dance.

Her voice makes me, in all seriousness, cringe and contort my body in odd ways. Much like the torture curse in Harry Potter.

Seriously. She did not know how to heckle. I was embarrassed for her.

The game itself was incredible. Astros were slow with the bats, and when we WERE on base, we seemed hesitant with our cleats. Guess it could be boiled down to smart baserunning, but its also boring baserunning. We tied up the game in the 9th, and eventually overtook them with 2 outs and 2 strikes. Awesome late game heroics. Couldn’t have asked for a better ending. However, I was informed, with great eye rolling and sighing that we did not win because of a walk-off. I’m still learning.

The JumboTron

Days like this tend to force me to daydream. It’s not my choice anymore after a certain point, my mind drifts to pleasant thoughts. This weekend was full of them.

On Saturday, after a morning of flipping a house, I was so very kindly treated to lunch. The lunch was amazing. Oh but the cake. Imagine this with chocolate frosting:

Now I’ve had my share of chocolate cake in my day, and this one ranks really really high.

Ash and I celebrated 18 months together on Saturday as well, so we  finally went on our long-awaited date to House of Pies. This was my first trip. Truthfully, I wasn’t expecting much. And visually, it got what I expected. An older building with faded paint and dirty tile grout. Old seats with rickety tables and sub par restrooms.

My attitude quickly changed. We split an omelet with sausage, onions, peppers, and cheese. It owned IHOP’s steak omelet. Then came the pie. Oh. The pie.

I’ve never been ecstatic about apple pie, but the Dutch Apple that Ash ordered was incredible. In an apple pie, the crust makes or breaks it. This one was flavorful, crumbly, and thick. Awesomeness.

My pie of choice goes by the name of “Bayou Goo”, a House of Pies exclusive. Vanilla custard, chocolate custard, and pecans. Wow. Just, wow. I don’t usually like soft custardy pies, by my instincts did not lead me astray. Incredible.

But what tops the pie came on Sunday. After a long day of work, Ms. B and Ash made these:

http://www.williams-sonoma.com/products/b310/index.cfm

They are always good, but were especially good this time. Like I said, crust is very important. She knows her crust.

I wish every weekend could be a pie weekend, but sadly, not all of them can.

In further news, I wanted to give a shout out to Ms. Flo for her comment on my post a few days ago, “TOGA! TOGA! TOGA!”:

I love your stuff, Matt… just one comment on Toga – you wrote, “Looking forward, I figure life will be pretty similar to high school. Cliques will never go away, popularity is usually determined by money and physical appearance, and good intentions won’t get you far.”

Having walked, sometimes run, through many of my own misperceptions of life I would say life is not at all similar to high school. Cliques don’t really exist much, and when they do, they don’t really matter to anyone. Money helps to lessen some pressures, but learning that money isn’t “all that” is one of life’s most interesting journeys. Good intentions, better yet, doing what you know is right, gets you all the way to the gold medal.

So, from someone who has been through a few more decades, keep-keeping-on, Matt – it only gets better!

You’ll see.

If that’s not wisdom, I don’t know what is. Just go check out the comments.

I’m not bitter or anything.

One of my classes this semester will be Marketing. I started thinking about what I might learn (I’m a nerd. Nerds do this. Can it.) and my mind turned more towards advertising. We all know our culture revolves around it. I bet that we subconsciously react to it more than we think.

This brought me to the thought of television commercials. The one that immediately came to mind was for was Sock’Em Boppers. I hated Sock’Em Boppers. They were dangerous, and they hurt.

They were not as fun as a pillow fight. They had sharp plastic edges that would cut you. But yet, I still have this subconscious urge to buy them. Still. Stupid advertising.

Whataburger, in my mind, has the best advertisements out there. Everytime I hear William Basset’s voice I get hungry.

I remember a commercial especially if it’s funny. The funniest lately have been the Sonic commercials with the two guys bantering back and forth, but the crown goes to Jack in the Box.

If you can get my grandpa to sing this and laugh at it every time, you’ve been successful.

Anybody have any other fun or memorable advertisements?

A quick but important side note. Just marked a year and a half with the girly I’m a pretty lucky guy.