Healthier America?

Hello!

               So today I’m doing another blog that shows one argument, with the opposing argument being shown in Countrywoman’s blog, found here: http://everythingcountseventually.blogspot.com/.

               As most people age 6 to 18 probably noticed when they started school a month or so ago, school lunches have been given a makeover. On December 13, 2010, President Obama signed legislation making healthier meals an option for schools, with the bonus of the school being reimbursed six cents per healthy meal served. In Iowa schools this was made the only option as of the 2012-13 school year. It’s changed the content of the meals, as well as portion size.

               Overall, this is not a bad idea. It ensures that students get at least one healthy meal a day, but it’s not the end-all solution. Changing how a kid eats at school isn’t going to change his or her lifestyle, especially students that already have certain habits engrained into them, like middle and high schoolers. If you go home and eat fourteen buckets of chicken after school, having smaller portions with more whole grains in them isn’t going to stop you from helping KFC meet their daily quotas.

               It’s also not just the kids that would have to change their habits for obesity rates to lower much. Parents are the ones who buy the groceries, so if they shop for unhealthy foods, then the kids can’t really help that. It also helps to develop the bad habits that will keep them shopping for bad foods even when they’re shopping for themselves.

               So although the new legislation for healthy foods is a great start, it won’t change much in my opinion. Many kids that it affects have the habit of eating unhealthily already engrained into their everyday lives. So I believe that more steps need to be taken if we really want to call America a healthy place.

               Thanks for reading!

Matt Finley

The Tyranny of Seating Charts

Hello!

                In this post I’m going to discuss the pros and cons of a seating chart in high school classes. Now as I student I have to hate seating charts, it’s sort of a rule. But like most things, I’ve attempted to understand both sides of this argument, and hope it shows in this post.

                Seating charts are a useful tool for teachers. They allow them to see who’s absent easier, among other nefarious purposes that I haven’t caught on to yet. But the biggest reason I see teachers institute seating charts is to keep friends from sitting next to each other and babbling for an entire hour. This both increases the amount of actual learning and work done, as well as lowering the amount of inane chatter occurring. This is good for teachers because they look better as teachers, don’t have to deal with parents calling them to ask why their kid is getting an F, and don’t have to chow down on Tylenol like it’s candy.

                The counter argument to this is almost always, “but I work better when I when I’m with my friends.” And this may be true when it comes to group projects, in general it is not. Although there are always exceptions, you do not take quality notes when you’re talking about how so-and-so looks today, or what you did last night.

                But seating charts are not always good. I see the purpose of them in all classes, but I think they should be relaxed in certain cases. Foreign Language classes are one example. I had a teacher last year in Spanish 2 who had a rule that we had to sit in our seats during her lectures, but could move wherever we wanted afterwards, to work on the nights’ assignment. The “catch” was that we had to talk in Spanish to our friends whenever we could move around. I would say that I learned better in that class than any other course I took last year.  Language Arts classes are similar, especially If you’re doing a writing assignment. In my opinion it’s much easier to write great material if you have someone to bounce ideas and phrases off of.

                Finally, beyond purely academic reasons, seating charts could be more relaxed because school should be a social place. Regardless of what some teachers may say, we are here to socialize. Almost everyone has met a homeschooled kid who just doesn’t understand many of the nuances of functioning society, and ends up looking dumb when he’s at the mall, movie theater, or with other kids. This is because he hasn’t grown up surrounded by 1,000 people five days a week. So allowing us to socialize helps us to develop those important social graces we use later in life.

                Seating charts are good for teachers because they get more work out of us and don’t have to deal with us screaming in their ears for seven hours a day. But I believe that they could be more relaxed because in some types of classes students benefit from working with one another. Another reason is because seating charts help to restrict our socialization, which prevents the development of social skills that will be useful in the future. But in the end, students don’t get the decision. Perhaps this post could persuade certain Language Arts teachers to end seating charts in certain labs, though.

Thanks for reading!

Matt Finley

My Quest to Juggle

Hello!

               In this post, I’m going to be blogging about my procrastination of blogging (among other things) on my blog. I wish I could have included more uses of the word “blog” in that sentence, but if I had it would have been completely incomprehensible. Sorry.

               On the topic of procrastination, I have recently undertaken the epic quest of learning to juggle. Although juggling and procrastination don’t seem to go hand-in-hand, they really do in my case. It was a Sunday night a week or so ago, and I had to start working on my homework, because being a teenager I had already put it off until Sunday night. But instead of doing my homework, I got distracted by the vast amount of pointless information on the internet. For example, juggling! (Not really, juggling is a very practical skill that I believe everyone should develop at some point in their lives.) So it was then, at 11:30, that I realized I should probably stop trying to juggle – and failing miserably – and start on my homework. The bad part about it was, I wasn’t really trying to put off my homework. I believe that it’s just so ingrained into many of us, especially teenagers, that we do it without noticing.

               Although everyone says that procrastinating is a terrible, terrible thing that will cause you to fail in school and end up digging ditches or flipping burgers for a living, I believe that procrastination in healthy doses can be a good thing. Let’s face it, some of us work a lot better with that deadline hanging above us like a headsman’s’ axe. That sense of urgency helps us to produce good quality work that we couldn’t reproduce if we had to. I’m not saying it works for everyone, but some people are made for procrastination.

               But yes, there is a thing as “bad” procrastination. Putting off that project that should take you 20+ hours on until the night before, for example. Or waiting until 2 in the morning before you even look at your homework. Even these things won’t be completely world-ending if you do them once or twice. But those who do it every night would really suffer in terms of grades and sleep. But I guess someone has to dig ditches and flip burgers.

Thanks for reading!

Matt Finley

Book Review: The Gunslinger: The Dark Tower I" by Stephen King

Hello!

               In this post I’m going to be reviewing the book The Gunslinger: The Dark Tower I by Stephen King. This book is one of King’s older novels, and was recommended to me by my brother a while back. I actually read it a few months ago, but re-read part of it yesterday because I’m on the fourth book in the series now, and needed a refresher on a particular piece of the backstory.

               The setting of The Gunslinger is a scene straight from an old western, complete with deserted towns and epic quick-drawing gunfights. The “gunslinger” mentioned in the title goes by the name Roland. Gunslingers in The Dark Tower series are a mixture of sheriffs, noblemen, and outlaws.  Roland is portrayed as your standard bandana-and-jeans-wearing cowboy, never without his trusty pair of revolvers. He’s also a man on a mission – chasing down a man who has somehow wronged him.

               Although Roland is a pretty solid main character, I think that a few more characters could have been a bit more fleshed out. The man who Roland is following, for example, as well as a person who he meets along the way. Although they’re left without much in the way of a background to make them seem more mysterious, to me it made it seem like the story was unfinished. King also had the same problem with some key parts of the plot. Although it leaves room for continuation in the next books of the series, it seems like it could have been done better.

               Another negative I saw in this book was the ending. I won’t spoil it for you, but I’ve never been a real fan of King’s endings. As a suspense writer his books are great in the beginning and middle, but he doesn’t really know how to end them because he wants to keep you “on edge.” One final thing that bugged me in The Gunslinger was the repetition. If I had seen “And the man in black fled across the desert” ONE MORE TIME, I probably would have shredded the book and never read anything again, ever.

               So although Roland’s level of awesome pistol-toting badassery comes close to outweighing many things I saw in the book as flaws, it doesn’t quite make it. There were too many plot holes and similar things for me to truly enjoy the book as a whole. I would give it a 4.5/10, with Roland earning 3 of those points for the book.

Thanks for reading!

Matt Finley

"We don't need no thought control!"

Hello!

This post is going to be the trial run of a new series with me and my BFFL who goes by the name of Countrywoman. Every week or so, we’re going to pick a topic and write posts with differing opinions on the topic. Here’s her blog: http://everythingcountseventually.blogspot.com.

Most schools in America are run on the traditional system. This means that students go to school for nine months of the year, and then get a three month vacation during late spring and early summer. Although this system has worked for us, and continues to work for us, it was designed in a different time period. We got out for summer vacation to help around the farm, which is where many people lived at that time. Now even in the land of corn and cows known as Iowa, I only know a few people that live, or even help out on a farm during the months of summer vacation.

These long summer vacations are not just outdated, but also bad for many students. I personally came back to school a few weeks ago. The first few days of school were terrible, frantically trying to remember facts that I had memorized better than the back of my hand last year. I’m sure it’s also bad for teachers, who have to re-teach material taught in the previous years.

In order to counter this scrambling for lost knowledge at the beginning of the school years, many districts around the country are switching to the year-round system. Lots of people get defensive just by looking at the name. I mean, who wants to go to school year-round? But it’s not like that.

Year-round school is a system where you have to go to school for 180 days, the same amount as traditional school. The major difference is the change in the length of vacations. The way that most schools do it is by cutting summer vacation into a smaller piece, like one month instead of three. They would then take these extra two months and split them up between spring break, Thanksgiving break, and Christmas vacation. Many schools around the nation are already successful with this system, so it does work.

In my opinion, applying the year-round school system would greatly benefit both students and staff. It both updates an outdated system as well as prevents the loss of knowledge that most students would agree happens over summer break.

Thanks for reading!

Matt Finley

Kilt guide for Americans

Hello!

               Today I’m going to explain how I wear one of the oldest fashion statements in the world: the kilt. Now I’m a fan of the kilt because I am of Scottish descent. There are several ways to wear this staple of traditional Scottish attire, and I’m going to explain only one of them.

The way I wear a kilt is a more “traditional” way. For this you need the following:

1.      A kilt (obviously.).

2.      Knee socks and ‘flashings,’ or colorful ribbons in colors that match your kilt.

3.      A white dress shirt.

4.      Black or brown dress shoes.

5.      (Optional) A tartan scarf, which is a sash that goes from one shoulder to hip in the same color as your kilt.

Now to actually put on all of these items! You start with the kilt itself. The top of the kilt should fit exactly where the top of your jeans would go, on your waistline. Then you put on the socks like normal knee socks. The flashings usually have little elastic bands that you can clip around the socks close to your knee. Then you fold the top of the sock down to cover the white elastic, but not the colorful part of the flashing. The shirt gets tucked into the kilt, like a normal dress shirt, and the shoes are put on your feet. Like normal shoes. Surprises, right? The sash is a bit harder. To start, you should find the middle of it and put this part on your shoulder. You can hold this in place with a safety pin. Then you can either tie the ends of it together on the opposite hip or you can tuck them into a belt.

There are several things that you probably shouldn’t or should do while wearing a kilt.

1.      Don’t river dance unless you can actually do it.

2.      When asked if you have anything on under the kilt, please don’t say “Why don’t you come over here and find out.”

3.      Gentlemen, you have to sit like ladies.

4.      Windy or cold days are pretty uncomfortable while wearing a kilt.

5.      Be prepared for some manner of ridicule, and be prepared to laugh at your own expense.

6.      Just because you wear a kilt doesn’t make you 100%  Scottish all the time.

Anyways, I hope this guide helped teach you how to wear kilts if you’re an American!

Thanks for reading!

Matt Finley

Movie Review: The Dark Knight Rises

Hello!

               Today I’m going to be reviewing “The Dark Knight Rises,” which is the third film in the batman trilogy directed by Christopher Nolan. To reveal a bit of my bias right off the bat (Pun intended), I love the movie. I’ve seen it 5 times in the theater and bought a sweatshirt with the main villain on it. I would even go so far to say that it’s one of my favorite movies of all time. Now on to the review!

               In the previews for TDKR very little was actually shown about it except for the fact that it’s a new Batman movie and a few shots of the main villain, a masked man named Bane. So going into the theater for the first time, I didn’t really know what to expect. But, as always, Christopher Nolan managed to forge a masterpiece of cinematography. The camerawork in this movie is amazing, shot from the best place to make every scene seem perfect in the context of the movie. I also have to admit that I’m a little obsessed with Bane. In my opinion, he’s the best character in the movie, even if he’s an evil mastermind. But all the characters in Nolan’s newest work are played by actors perfect for their roles. Christian Bale as Batman, and Anne Hathaway as Catwoman? I doubt a better cast could be picked by anyone.

               But this movie isn’t all positives. One thing that Christopher Nolan could have done better is put a few less references to his previous films into TDKR. To understand some scenes in this movie you have to have seen the first or second movie first. Another negative was the length of the movie. A lot of unnecessary content stretched this movie to 2 hours and 44 minutes of runtime. I’m not saying that some fluff is bad, but there is a limit. And a final negative in Nolan’s final installment in the Batman trilogy is the too-dark feel of it. It’s filled with dark humor and bad endings for some of the characters. It’s different from the previous movies, but I didn’t find it too unappealing.

               So “The Dark Knight Rises” had its ups and downs. There were a few bad things about it, but far more good things. I loved the acting, the camerawork, and the storyline. Bane is by far my favorite character, but all of them were excellent. If I could see it again, I would. On a scale of 1 to 10, I’d give TDKR a solid 8.5.

               Thanks for reading!

Matt Finley