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The Garden for the Elk and the Ass Bibliography:  This story is part of the Tales of a Parrot unit. Story source: The Tooti Nameh or Tales of a Parrot, by Ziya'al-Din Nakhshabi (1801). Once there was an elk and an ass eating in a garden together. The ass suddenly felt the urge to sing. He exclaimed to the elk, I want to sing, this garden is giving us its great fruit and it is a beautiful night. I have a wonderful feeling and due to the circumstances we are in, I feel like it would be pleasant to sing! The elk replied to him and said, "No. I understand you feel good and I share those feelings as well. I agree that is is a beautiful night and I too am joyous for the food we have eaten. But If you were to sing now it would awaken the gardener and we would be captured and made prisoners like if a man were to steal fruit from a garden. Your voice is loud and unsettling and if you were to sing our night would absolutely be ruined, you have to be aware of your situation....

The Parrot There once was a couple named Miemun and Khojisteh, they were virtually inseparable. They loved each other very very much. They ate together, went everywhere together, they sat together, they were attached at the hip. This couple owned two birds, both birds were wise and could communicate with the couple. One was a parrot and the other a Sharuk. One day Miemun had to go off on a great journey of which he would not return for many days. When he left he left Khojisteh and the two birds behind. When Miemun was gone a prince came to town and started to fall in love with Khojisteh. Even though she knew it would be wrong to show interest to this man she couldn't help but fall for him as well. The prince asked her out and she accepted. She was torn between going or not, she knew it was wrong but she also wanted to go very bad, she decided she would ask Sharuk. She asked the bird if it would be ok for her to leave and go on a date with the prince and Sharuk said absol...

Billy Vessels Authors Note: This was my own rendition on the first reading of Aladdin and the Magic Lamp. There once was a football player named Al. He had just graduated high school and was being recruited by all of the top schools. He finally found himself at the University of Oklahoma playing Wide Reciever. Although Al was a great High School player, he started to not perform well at the collegiate level. He started dropping passes, he couldn't keep up with his routes, and worst of all there were two other wide receivers who were outperforming him. He started to get frustrated and that frustration just further debilitated his talent. He was at the point of giving up one day after a bad practice when a man approached him. This man claimed that he was an assistant equipment manager for OU and he had been watching Al Practice. He said "Al I know of a special protein powder that OU is developing through their research department, apparently its the closest thing to ...

The Genie This story is part of the Arabian Nights unit. Story source: The Arabian Nights' Entertainments by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1898). There was once a boy named Aladdin whose father was a famed tailor. His father just passed away and Aladdin did not take up that practice. Aladdin spent his days roaming the streets and causing mischief. One day a man came to him claiming that he was Aladdin's uncle. Aladdin took him home and his "uncle" ate at the table with Aladdin and his mother. Then he took Aladdin out on the town and bought him nice clothes and showed him a great time. This man claimed to love his deceased father, but he had been out of the country for 40+ years. Aladdin believed him and decided that his story heald validity. Aladins uncle then took him on a journey up the mountain. Aladdin grew tired of the journey and asked to stop and turn back, his uncle grew angry and forced him to push forward. Aladdin wanted to stop but th...

Scheherazade This story is part of the Arabian Nights unit. Story source: The Arabian Nights' Entertainments by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1898). Scheherazade - A sultan had a wife whom he loved more than anything in the world, but she betrayed him to the highest degree so he had her killed by the grand-vizir. So from that day forth, the sultan swore women were the root of all evil. He would then marry one every day and have her slain by the grand-vizir the next day, he would repeat this practice every day.  One day the grand-vizir's daughter came to him and requested to be the next girl to marry the sultan. The grand-vizir wept and asked her why she would wish death upon herself, she promised him that she had developed a plan to stop the sultan's madness. Scheherazade asked her sister to sleep in her chamber with the sultan that night. She asked her sister to ask herself to tell a story that night before sleep, apparently, it was all part of th...

Hole in Roof Authors Note: This is a retelling of the  Followers of Jesus  Story from the perspective of an onlooker. I didn't know much about this Jesus Guy everyone was so crazy about. I am just a regular Shepard. I tend to my flock, come into town to get a meal, maybe buy some garb, nothing exciting. But today was a different day from the moment I left my home. I could see the commotion in town from far away, crowds were gathered all around. I couldn't make the connection to what they were so concerned about until I got closer. That's when I first heard the name, Jesus. I had heard of him before on my previous visits to town, some teacher or holy man or something, I wasn't too sure. I never concerned myself with any of that anyway. I thought though if this celebrity were in town I might as well try to see what all of the commotion. I heard a few people say "I heard he's coming to this house!" so I thought I would go try and get a good spot ...

Gospel Book of Otto III For this reading, I will be taking note on the Gospel of Mark. John was a baptist who practiced in the wilderness, he wore the skin of beasts and only ate bugs and honey. Jesus came to John and was baptized by him. When he was being baptised the heavens opened up and the Lord showed his grace to John. John was put into prison shortly after this. After this Jesus began his journey gaining followers. He went to the land of Capernaum where he met a sick man. He was preaching the gospel when a man broke through the roof and was lowered down to him because there was no room to get in from the door. Jesus blessed him and forgave him of his sins. The man then took up the bed he came in on and walked out. The surrounding people were amazed. Jesus also ate and drank with sinners. He said He had not come to lead the righteous to heaven but the sinners away from sin. Jesus gained 12 followers throughout his journey and they were to be called his disciples. One o...

Feedback This week we are learning about giving constructive feedback to our peers. The two articles I read on this were very informative and really shed a light on the faults of just telling someone "good job." The first article I read was  The Trouble with “Amazing”: Giving Praise that Matters  and this article really showed me how detrimental generic praise can be. When you are giving someone lame feedback on something that could be improved you are allowing their work to be subpar. There is laziness that is associated with the majority of feedback in today's world and the majority comes from not trying to hurt someone's feelings. Another article I read just reiterated this point.  Five Reasons to Stop Saying "Good Job!"  is an article that gives alternative ways to give feedback without saying good job. I think that this is a really great way to get individuals to take constructive criticism better and it allows the populations to work to improv...

The Cowardly Lion Link The topic I have chosen to conduct research on is the Wizard of Oz Stories. I am very interested in this saga of books and how it differs from the films. As of right now, my understanding is that this story is similar to The Chronicles of Narnia in the way that different travelers take a journey to this separate world and watch it change over time. From Professor Gibbs email in response to my favored story topics, I have chosen a chunk of stories that seem very interesting. I have chosen the Third Chunk of stories to dive into and that chunk contains these stories; 12. The Search for the Wicked Witch 13. The Rescue 14. The Winged Monkeys 15. The Discovery of Oz, the Terrible 16. The Magic Art of the Great Humbug.  Wizard Of Oz Stories I have chosen this chunk due to my familiarity with some of the stories, as well as my unfamiliarity with other story aspects. For instance, the wicked witch is a character who I know and understand, but when it...

Plane in Storm Bibliography: Noah's Ark is the story of how God asked a man named Noah to build an ark because he planned on flooding the earth. On this ark was Noah, his family, and a pair of every animal in existence.  Link Authors Note: I took the story of Noah's Ark and adapted it to a story of the future and God ridding the world of Technology. The year is 56,994 and the world is consumed with technology. People don't interact face to face any longer. The last time people had a need to conversate face to face was in the late 36th century. There was a movie released many many years ago that closely represents the state of the population today, I think it was called Wall-E. My name is Noah and I am one of the last of the unplugged. The unplugged is a group of individuals who would just rather not divulge in the technology of today's world. We are often accused of being a secret cult with plans to overthrow technology but we simply just enjoy life better wi...

Noah's Ark Link God gave Noah a book called the Torah which bestowed knowledge unto him on how to share the word of god after the flood. When the flood came the sinners tried to board the ark, but Noah would not let them even after they said they would turn to god. He asked why didn't you turn before? Why now? they tried to take the boat by storm but they were unable. The rains were boiling hot and they scorched their skin. Unclean animals outnumbered the clean animals and after the flood, they had balanced out back into pure species. One male and female of each species. The flood lasted a whole year. After the flood, Noah stayed in the ark until he was commanded by god to leave. But when it came time for him to leave, Noah was afraid to leave, He was scared that a flood would come again. God swore that he would never flood the earth again. Noah and his sons were appointed to be rulers of the earth. God presented a rainbow in the clouds as a promise that even id ma...

Self Criticism Link With this post, I am discussing my thoughts on the two articles I read over discussing feedback and how it can have a positive or negative effect on one's self and their work. The first article I read was titled  Silence the Critical Voices in Your Head . One idea that this article promoted was the practice of enforcing positive thoughts from yourself. They called it "5 positive voices for every one negative voice." This simply means looking for five different positive outcomes form a negative situation. This practice would seem to make light of a negative situation as well as give helpful feedback from a negative outcome. I would like to start using this practice to see how it affects me in the future with my mistakes. The other article I read was titled  Why Rejection Hurts So Much and What to Do About It.  This article shines a light on self-criticism and really places most of the rejection blame on our own blame. This article shows how...

  Link One topic that I am very interested in possibly creating a storybook about is the "Gods and Goddesses of Olympus." These stories have captivated my attention for years and I am excited to finally get the chance to actually contribute to this storytelling conversation. When I think of ideas that I could write about my mind automatically darts to telling stories about "The Big Three" as in Zeus, Hades, and Poseidon. I grew up very interested in stories like these and I am very eager for the opportunity to continue my understanding of Greek mythology. Link Another topic that I found very interesting was the Land of Oz stories. Up until recently, I had only heard of the classic movie "The Wizard of Oz" and I was unaware that there was an entire book series that the movie came from. As I understand it these books were written quite a long time ago and there are 14 books that were written about the Land of Oz. This topic sounds very interesting t...