national anthem before music event at high school

faces turned to the flag, standing, and some with hand on heart

Seeing the many families loyally in support of the outdoor marching band season finale here in the school gymnasium, I began to imagine all the statistical facts reported in the news headlines and in feature stories by investigative reports, documentary film makers, and so on.

Among the 300-400 people gathered this evening, we can imagine such things as:
-jobless rates (and those under-employed; those working without benefits)
-single parent households
-people dependent on social services for food, heat, health, transportation
-debt loads vs net assets/worth
-per centage of un-insured (and under-insured) for health care
-fraction of the adult population who smoke (a generation ago almost 40%, now 20%)
-number of people with serious health threats
-public health problems: flu, obesity, lack of fresh food (not refined or highly processed)
-educational attainment levels (those completing 2 years of college; four; advanced degrees)
-income stratifications
-abuse: substance abuse and addictions (including gambling), DV, TV-video gaming
-personal development difficulties: adjustment, self-esteem, lack of (wide) perspective
-learning difficulties (emotional, physical, mental)
-generational preoccupations: each season of life has distractions and worries

fall scenes - field corn & bare fields

high school contest to decorate classroom doors - Hallowe'en

around October 28 the judges went round the halls of the school to award top rank to best decorated doors: this one is far better than most (in fact it appeared that fewer than 1/2 the rooms participated), but not the top place. On the Friday (10/30, last day of school before the actual day, Oct. 31) a number of students and a few teachers also dressed in costume or parts of costume in keeping with the halloween theme. I was not at this school on the Friday, but at a different high school instead.

traditions of marching band (high school days)

After a week of summer practice the 150 musicians, band leaders (drum majors) and flags (only one male this year) perform at the football game half-time (15') interval during the fall when the game is hosted locally. When the team is away, the band there will do the halftime show. As the sun sets earlier week by week, for the final performance in middle October they have decided to end with a "light show" in which small lights attached to uniforms and shoes accompany the moving formations under cover of darkness. Somehow the sound seems all the bigger when this eerie twilight surrounds the marching band.

Two scenes from the Friday, September 11 game in 2009.

see also a short thumbnail movie from the Monday night rehearsal

death and dying - stone grave markers

The stone cutter across the street from the burial ground must have supplied most of the markers, since the ones from many of the active years of burial are the same granite source material. Some of the early 20c stones are very large indeed; solid, no-veneer. As in life, so also in death the addresses are neatly arranged.
[East central Saginaw, Michigan (USA)]

Compare also the much smaller graveyard that was once beyond the city of Kalamazoo, but now finds itself at the exit ramp to the interstate highway there at the edge of the city.

Flags and feelings

Commemorating public safety workers directly affected by rescue and later recovery from 2001 terrorist attacks of September 21. Pictured here is an oversize US flag on the end of the ladder truck at the front of the town fire station in rural middle Michigan, looking east at the intersection of Main Street.

Seeing this prominent public display got me starting to think about all the things the flag can stand for - individual memories, shared experience, layers of historical resonance, abstract national-ness (essence symbolized); as well as the meanings contained by critics of the US present or past actions and way of handling things. Some of these feelings and ideas may be similar in scale or degree for other flags and other peoples, while other elements may be particular to the US experience as an immigrant society of relatively few generations since its foundation.

Another flag display, this time on a private house, got me thinking more about the flag & ways that people use it to stand for one or more expressions.

Here's a first look at a list of possible connected meanings, http://www.flickr.com/photos/gpwitteveen/3985554820/

--see also 2014 video clips from the remembrance ceremonies

--see also 2016, the July 4 display:

Avenue of Flags - set of cemetery festooned with U.S. flags
[at Memorial Day and again at Independence Day the hundreds of flags are placed]

http://miserybay.usanethosting.com/indylite/archives/3460 =article
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lywSMljkiTU =slideshow of scenes

see also https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/flag-desecration-laws

Waiting for 'flu shots 2009

Annual "healthy families" county-wide health fair. With official figures for unemployment in Michigan at 15% and underemployment also high, the chance to receive a few health services and lots of free information was very attractive this Saturday morning (8:30-noon): vision & hearing tested, blood tests (sugar, cholesterol, pressure), online self-test for risk of heart disease and so on.

elementary school classroom (management)

Managing the minute to minute flow of student interest, questions, reference points

1. Reference: weekdays in which students go to special teacher outside the classroom (art, music, physical education, library).


2. Selecting one student at random: flat wooden sticks with student name written.


3. Behavior codes: students warned about own behavior (green >yellow >red). Students are meant to record this at end of day in parent communication folders.


4. Day & Date: hand-written at top-right of whiteboard (like orienting one's work papers by recording one's name at top-right).


5. Schedule for day (sequence of activities to aid in transitioning and retrospect).


6. Delegating responsibility/status (day's helper: distribute or collect papers, select order of dismissal).


7. Attendance (self-serve): students move own name magnet to the lunch heading: hot, cold, pizza, milk only.


8. Pencil, please: jar of loaner pencils scavanged (likely also set for "self-serve" will be paper: scrap, drawing, lined)


9. Numbers in daily life: calendar, weather, time (yesterday was..., tomorrow will be...), number of instructional days [or days left in the school year]


10& 11. Discretionary time: wide selection of levels and topics and series for reading (or listening) in 10-30 minute times






Not pictured:


a. Tangible rewards - letter O's given to students to collect (trial month, giving out 10 per day; then 5 per day). Gathered in public view. Traded for prizes.


b. Workflow - student "mailboxes" for accumulated daily work produced that students (self-serve) dutifully carry home at end of day.


c. Timeflow - morning meeting to do routines of calendar, weather, day's schedule; end of day "afternoon meeting" as recap & reminder moment.