Just in time for Semester Exams

An Android app (perhaps available for iPhones as well)... StudyUp! Create quizzes, flashcards, and other study devises and review on your Metro trip into Nora this week!

Sligo Street Band in concert last night

Great tool for the ADDers among us!

I've been using Evernote for the past few months, and I must admit that I've become quite addicted to it. This tool runs as a website in your browser, or as an application on your computer, or as an app on your Android (and probably iPhone) smartphone. What's great about it? From any of those three places you can add a note and have it synced to the other two. From your phone you can save pictures, websites, and audio notes to yourself as well, and have these show up on your computer, or any computer that has a web browser. I've found it a great application for collecting the random bits of information that I'd like to follow up on later, as well as creating my "to-do" list for the day/week/month. It's well worth a look, and pretty low risk, as it's free!

Yearbook Tips: Book Design & Layout

Great Time at Prom!

Despite the late hour, well past my bedtime on a Friday night, I thoroughly enjoyed watching our kids have a great time at the prom. It's easy to get so caught up in the day to day academic struggles that we lose sight of the other parts of adolescent education that are equally, and sometimes more, important for adult success. Balancing work (or school), family, and a social life are tough enough, but throw in the stress of discovering your identity, personality, and life's work, and it's amazing they get out of bed at all! There was a wonderful article, Cherish the Good in Your Teen, in the Washington Post last week, in which a mom (Tracy Grant) does a great job of putting things in perspective as she struggles with raising a teenager. I had a long talk with a mom concerned with her son's academic struggles as he works his way through his first serious love interest. He's actually doing it very well, and in 16 months he's going to have to do it on his own, but we as parents (and teachers) are often so anxious that our children avoid pain and suffering (and poor grades) that they never learn to be resilient, to work through problems on their own, and to ask for help when they need to.

A Prom helps put all this in perspective. The joy of spinning wildly around the dance floor with youthful abandon is just as important to kids today as it was to us 35 years ago. We've just forgotten. And how well do we as adults balance work, family, and a social life? Do you even have a social life? If so, you're doing better than I am! So if you want to see what having a social life looks like, here are some more photos from the prom.