test it please

My third graders have just finished all five brain gym exercises and compressions. There are a few minutes left to work on a motion puzzle. They have been practicing on one with a cardboard track and a ping pong ball with holes in it.The puzzle promotes eye and hand coordination.

 As with all my puzzles I practice them myself first. If I can do it my students will be successful themselves.

Watch Cardboard Track and Ball puzzle on video. Two minutes.

      After hauling this styrofoam tray around in my truck cab, I shared it with my students. I asked what they thought it was made of. Was it metal? No. Was it plastic? No. Was it heavy? No. I rolled the ball down two sides of the tray to plant the idea.  "What do you think?" I ask each. "Can it work? Test it for me, please." And they do.
     Two students have to sit down to do it. Most can tilt the tray with their two hands so that the ball rolls around once. Two passes around seems to be a threshold. So, the next time we meet, I have each tilt the tray so that the ball passes around two times and then as many times as they choose after that. All of them have gotten better at it.
     It is tricky because there are two big holes in the tray and it is easy for the ball to fall to the floor. This tray promotes eye and hand coordination.
     Now that they have acquired the focus needed and the ball is controlled. What else can they make it do? The students are becoming inventors. They try out a hunch. Test it out, trial and error. Sometimes it doesn't work as easy as they thought. Two students came up with ideas I hadn't thought of. I was pleased. Do they have a name in mind for the puzzle they discovered? I listen to their ideas.

Two minute video

 

This next week I will have each try the boards. It is a balance puzzle. And yes, I have been trying it myself. The thing is, if I can plant an idea, of course keeping it safe and do able. What might they come up with--as they master it?

 

Two minute video

 

The students I am assigned to need the brain gym exercises to get the right and left sides of their brains working together. I tell them that the exercises are designed to make the body want to fall over. The brain tries to over ride the fall.

Paul E. Dennison coined the term "brain gym."

 

My class does both Hook Ups and the Cross Crawl.

 

You can see what my students have come up with on my Motion Puzzle blog.

 

"Welcome to Motion Puzzles where students have created, tested, and named their own exercises. Balance is challenged. The left and right side of the brain sends emails back and forth, "NO NO, DO NOT TIP OVER!!"

(courtesy of Teacher Tube, http://teachertube.com/viewVideo.php?video_id=27736, http://teachertube.com/viewVideo.php?video_id=27736; and About.com, http://teachertube.com/viewVideo.php?video_id=27736, accessed Oct 21, 2012)

school skills

O Lord, you are my strength and my shield. You bring me joy in pleasant ways. I sing your praise.

There is a delight when a student thinks for himself and formulates an answer, a guess, a hunch. The thinking through and voicing of her thought. This came Friday morning with my third graders. We had completed our six brain gym exercises, and time remained for a motion puzzle. I held out a large rectangular chunky looking tray to each in the group. What did they suppose was the tray was made of? Was is wood? No. Was it metal? No. One guessed, paper. Was it heavy? They held it with both hands. No, it was light. Then I continued, I had found this Styrofoam packing material left out for the janitor to discard. It had once been around a computer unit. I thought maybe it could be used here in our room. (I brought out the plastic golf ball from my jacket pocket, and placed it in the inside the tray.) I wondered whether you could figure it out. (Taking hold off the tray on both ends with my hands, I tilted the tray so that the ball would roll down one side and across the side closest to me. Just enough to plant the idea. We had been trying various forms of ball rolling back and forth on a cardboard track. See http://motionpuzzles.blogspot.com/2011/10/back-and-forth.html)

Each student took three minutes to try their skill at making the ball run down all four sides of the tray in a circular fashion. In the middle of the tray there were two large preformed holes. Every student experienced the ball falling through the tray to the floor, bouncing under a table to retrieve on hands and knees. It was not as easy as it appeared. Two students chose to sit down instead of standing to complete the two loops. I thanked each for trying this exercise out for me. Some began coming up with names for the puzzle. The joy of the Lord enveloped my heart.

Friday afternoon at BMP I listened to a third grader read. Sounding out words you do not know is WORK and takes much COURAGE. Following the story with my eyes as he read, I could interject the right pronunciation of a word after he tried it himself first. The sentences came together in a halting fashion. Start stop start stop. Instead of gibberish, the story actually meant something and could be understood by both of us. After he finished the chapter we looked at the book illustrations and talked about the silk weaver woman, what an ox looked like, what the wooden cart looked like, and the pointed to the major characters by name. After completing the assignment, the student was delighted and in a pleasant mood. The joy of the Lord snuck into my heart and made my spirit soar.

You make my path straight. You bring me your joy in unexpected ways. How sweet you are. How gentle and kind.

streaming over

At the impulse of your love, at the impulse of your LOVE, at the IMPULSE of your love--it comes. Streaming fowler--rockhill memos--names off the record--the positioning of gertrude woolf lighton--jim edd spencer--subjects geary logan lankes leighton had in common. A sheet filled with ideas, my truck cruising over the late green of north carroll county, toward work in chillicothe. spirit sparking flashes, lines of data, to a writer's glee, your whee, your manner of business, downloading file after file. Thanks Lord. This is what you bring to me.
You heard my cry and flooded my data banks to overflowing. The abundance of mulberry essence, your sense, your timing, your impulse, effortless, soundless music to my mind, all you, sweet you, my God. It comes.

Remember it, as the evidence lays ready to the right of the keyboard. Recall the goodness,the magnitude of him, who leads you into MORE. Delectable, always tending to your needs. Thank you Lord. Pull me back to your name, your genuine attention, your assurance, your fullness, your poetry, your symphony of good coded in my mitochondria.

you restore missing files from the hard drive, files buried within other files, you help me extract and consolidate: geary, spencer, memos, holly street, lighton. with clear air you release organization, thank you, thank jesus, thank you father, transfer complete, blessed be your magnificent power, your blessed interface, your pronouced exactitude,
 

 

"Delight in Me," you whisper close. On this cool day in September, yard blessed with new green shoots, leaves chanting your praise, windows open to refresh the house, cats napping and listening to the rustle breeze, I delight, Oh Lord, I remember, Oh God, I smile. Fingers tapping, pauses choosing, yes, to your credit, you are worthy of word and song.

 



twelve by twelve

Double click on images below.

Majestic by Karl Marxhausen

hand-pulled linoleum impression

signed edition 4 of 10,

image size: 12" h x 12" w

sheet size: 18" h x 18"

monogram in left corner

$200

Order yours at

anburkholder@earthlink.net

Burkholder Project

719 P Street

Lincoln, Nebraska

dark from foltz



It was the Lloyd Foltz print exhibit at the American Legacy Gallery in Kansas City, Missouri that took me in to THE DARK. While at the opening I had author Barbara Thompson sign my copy of the above pictured book. You can order the book HERE. It was the use of darkness in Foltz's block prints that later helped me envision Glade 1. Double click on next closeups.

I was halfway through my first linocut reduction,

when the idea of light cascading from the sky took hold.

Cuts were made on a varnished birch panel

twelve inches square.

Two such prints are in the August exhibit.

It is the darkest dark that I love.

Double click on image. 

Glade 1 by Karl Marxhausen

hand-pulled woodcut on white sulphite paper

image size: 12" h x 12" w

sheet size: 18" h x 18" w

signed edition 2 of 10

unframed

monogram in left corner

$200

Among The Mulberries by Karl Marxhausen

hand-pulled woodcut on white sulphite paper

image size: 12" h x 12" w

sheet size: 18" h x 18" w

signed edition 2 of 10

unframed

monogram in left corner

$200

 

Order yours at

anburkholder@earthlink.net

Burkholder Project

719 P Street

Lincoln, Nebraska

paintings

Double click on image to see details

Untitled #1 (Shadow)

plein air acrylic on cradled panel

12" h x 12.25" w
Signature lower left

$450

Untitled #2 (Mulberry Beach)

plein air acrylic on canvas

9" h x 12" w x 3/4" d

Signature lower right

$450

Untitled #3 (Waterway)

plein air on canvas panel

9" h x 12" w

Signature lower right

$450

Untitled #4 (East)

plein air on cradled panel

16" h x 20"w x 1.5" d

Signature right hand side

$450

Untitled #5 (Greens) by Karl Marxhausen

plein air acrylic on cradled panel

11" h x 14" w
Signature lower right

$450

Self Portrait by Karl Marxhausen
acrylic on watercolor paper
12" h x 9"w
Signature lower left
$450

CONTACT Lisa Holmquist or Anne Burkholder for purchase
Phone: 402-477-3305
(Please call only during gallery hours)
Tuesday - Friday: 10am - 4pm
Saturday: 10am - 2pm
(9am - 3pm during Farmers Market)
Monday by appointment
EMAIL anburkholder@earthlink.net
Burkholder Project
719 P Street
Lincoln, NE 68508

his answer

Shouts of joy resound in my tent. He did it.

The Lord has done mighty acts. He answered me.

Thus, pens song writer and poet David, son of Jesse.

The day the dragon wind howled in my ears,

surrounded by juicy mulberries,

just west of the Floyd Levee, off blacktop B,

this is the information I came home with.

 My dream was to capture

the branches going up up up above my head,

 yeah, imagine this, on a horizontal canvas.
Double click on image to enlarge.
(15"h x 24"w on stretched canvas)

The dream took shape

when I rendered an abstract on square paper.

(18 x 18 inches)

It was during the workouts

 in the water and

 the sauna heat,

the waiting, the pausing,

the resting of the mind,

that He brought it to me.

The square graphite came next.

(12 x 12 inches)

There are too many

changes that He granted,

praise to His name, His majestic name.

So grateful this image came to be.

The desire of my heart,

placed within by His intention

bestowed by His affection.

Harder still would be 

the converting

of graphite swiggles

 into solid black shapes.

Inked linoleum block
 (twelve inches square)
Double click on images to see enlarged.

Trial proof

Woodcuts and paintings
Now on display
lower level of Burkholder Project
Lincoln, Nebraska
August 3-28