I am a tradition with the 4th graders in the Lawton area. They are bussed to the Professional Developement Center for a program with “The String Man”. One friends grandaughter was in a group today so she gave me the heads up early this morning. I found her and she was delighted with the attention that she knew “The String Man”.
It was raining cats and dogs at the beginning of the day and one school cancelled. The others were glad they didn’t because it settled down and was just a gray day by the time they got there. No problems with the weather except that some of the kids were still damp from walking to school.
It is always a good time. The students were exceptionally well behaved and got excited but then settled down right away to learn the next one. They brought book orders and Jane Herring from Sadler Book and Office Supply was there to fill the orders.
Lawton Area Reading Council put this on as well as some other programs for other grade levels. I look forward to doing this as a fun time and also as a service to Lawton. I give them a special price to help out. I will be there again tomorrow.
Dave
I recieved the nicest booklet from Grand Prarie Elementary School in Frankfort, IL where they go string crazy once a year. They are a K - 2 school of 800 kids and they sell several thousand strings very quickly. They order them from www.StringFigureStore.com.
Mrs Delaney, the Physical Education Teacher helped move this project alson. Mrs. Issert, an aid learned string figures on the internet and with Chicago weather in the winter they had lots of time for her to teach the kids. Mrs. Szudy’s class where Mrs. Issert is aid made up a booklet called “Doing the String Thing!” and sent me a copy. WOW.
It has pictures of each child in class doing a string figure. The thing that I love is that almost every page about a child had the name of someone they taught or who taught them. What a connectional experience.
The introduction talks about the educational benifits of cooperation, coordination, sequencing and the verbal skills used while teaching others. It is spiral bound and quite a treasure.
Susan Wright, librarian, and I have been on some committees years ago. She moved to the school in Norman and wanted to have me come. It was good to see her. I arrived at the school at 8:00 to be ready for the 8:30 group of preschoolers. What shining faces. We did some gross moter skills, letters, shapes and nursery rhymes.
The day was filled with groups and signing books. She had sent home notes and allowed parents to have a personalized note put in the books. That is always intersting to see how people spell names and trying to decipher handwrighting.
They fixed a very nice luncheon for me and invited teachers to bring their brown bags and join us. A wonderful calico bean dish, strawberry dessert and brownies and some fixings to go along with it.
After I left the school, I went into Oklahoma City to Garman Studio to set up filming of my next video. I want one that has some of the newer figures that I am using in String Ministries, inc. Anyone else who wants to learn them can also get the video and just ignore the Gospel messages.
I am having St. Charles Bororomeo Catholic school bring their 8th graders to help as an audience. We will be using 3 cameras and try to do most of it in one afternoon. I may have to come back for some close-ups.
Drove home in a raging thunderstorm. Oklahoma can have them sometimes. I almost pulled over and waited it out but decided to go on slowly and carefully.
Dave
Kala Gulik is a new librarian this year and Jayne is mentoring her. So Jayne suggested that I come in for the principals challange day. Kala had a nice snack set up for me in case I did not have breakfast. She also had the library arranged so I could work in there. I do so love to do my programs in the library. Better accustics and just a nicer setting than the cafeteria.
Having never been at this school, no one had any idea what they were getting into. What fun we had. The teachers had as much, or more fun than the kids. Each group did their best and were very receptive. We sold books there and that only took about two minuts at the end of each session.
The school was having hamburgers for lunch with all the fixings so we ate there. We only had 30 minutes since we had to be done early so the kids could watch the principal drive a race car around the track. Boy were they wired.
I left books for sales on Wednesday and Thursday and Kala said she would send the remainders to me. I knew better and was right. She emailed that they were gone by 9:00 and then needed more. They are taking orders and we will send them in a couple of days.
Drove to OKC after school and met with a friend that I know from some meetings that I attend there. She had shown her son some of the figures and he really is getting into it. He is in 7th grade and wanted to meet me so we met in a restaurant for dinner and strings. Leon is a whiz at learning new ones and picks them up just like that. It was also a good time.
I am so blessed to have meaningful events happening every day. It really is about the journey not the destination. Life is so good.
Dave
Went to Tulsa on Sunday night and was ready to get to the school on Monday morning early. All went well and I was set up in plenty of time at the school. I did not have to set up books to sell since the principal decided that if I were selling them, the school should get a percentage. I explained that this is how I keep my fees low as an author. (If you check out other author visits they are much more.)
Any way, it was a nice relaxing day with out the hassel of book sales and Jayne Selman the librarian had the library cleared out so I could be in there. We had a nice long lunch break and went out for Mexican food. That was nice to get away also. I had been to her school about 5 years ago so she knew what to expect.
After school I had orders from friends to go see “Slumdog Millionair” and so I did . I really enjoyed it. I never go to the movies and it was nice. It was at a “Dollar” movie theater so it was only $1.50. I am a cheep date.
Ate at a nice restaurant. Had a rack of ribs and sides. What a nice day.
Dave
I was the keynote speaker Friday night at the North Texas Book Festival dinner. It was a fun time for the 125 attendees. Celebrating the self publishers among us was the order of the day. We came back at 9:00 Saturday morning for a day long exhibit of the various authors and their works. The public was invited to come in and meet the authors and get their autographed copies of their works.
There were also workshops during the day. I did one on strings of course. There were a lot of grandparents bringing their grandkids in to meet the authors. I had a lot of fun showing them things and working with the elders. “Oh, I don’t remember how to do Jacobs’ Ladder” and then I would give them a string and they would make it or only need a little help to remember. “I haven’t done that in 60 years”.
What a good time even though my feet and legs were very tired from standing on the concrete all day. They had doughnuts for us in the am and Pizza at noon. They took good care of the authors. I did meet a couple of publishers or printers that might like to do a compilation of my three books into one. We will see.
I came home around 7 pm and wanted to crash but decided to write the weekend up on the blog. I am ready to let down now.
Dave
Pecan Creek is in an affluent section of Denton. The students were prepared to buy books and extra strings. Business was hopping. Strings were the thing of the day and everyone was doing them.
One first grader…that is not usually “with it” in the classroom came back from the program and wrote a story on a white board about the strings. Here is his story.
“You git a string.” “You ty a not” “TaDa, you have a bow.” He drew pictures for each episode in his story and it was wonderful. Focused and on target. His teacher came in with a tear in her eye to show us his work. Strings do reach some kids where nothing else works.
Billie Lowrie, the ESL teacher made sure that the teacher took that story in to the principal. I have a picture of the boy and his story. He really made the hit of the day.
Dave
I bought a ticket to Germany for January 27 through March 3, 2010. I will be traveling in a wider part of Germany, especially Eastern Germany and maybe Austria and Italy. More about it later but I needed to get the time set aside and get the tickets.
I have also signed up for a trip to India leaving November 29 and returning December 11, 2009. I might try to piggyback a side trip to a pastor in Southeastern India who has invited me. This will be a VIM (Volunteer in Mission) group that are going to central India. We will be primarily at a girls school.
Sometimes, going with a group for the first time to an area is a good way to scout out things. Since what I do is so hard to communicate, it is good to give people a preview so they can say, “i want you to come back and we will go here, and here, and here.
I am also exploring Chad in Africa. The missionary there suggested that I might like to go to Rwanda with a side trip to Chad to get the most out of my money. We will see about that one.
In a couple of weeks I an meeting a missionary home on leave from Southern Mexico. We will talk about the possibility of my coming to his area for a while.
Some of these will work out and some will not, but I need to be planning and open to opertunities. I am also working on a new evangelistic video. That will be completed in this spring.
Dave
I have collected some monies for the school in Pakistan and sent them on. (www.StringMinistries.org Pakistani School) I also stopped at the bookstore here in Lawton and found some posters that were wordless or few common words to send along with some maps. The school is going to be in Urdu not English as these students need the basics in math and science and reading and do not need to spend their time learning broken English.
Pastor Rauf Swan is the administrator for now and I am listed as the founder. the name is String Primary School. We do not have a posted curriculum and things are rather loose at the moment. But they are moving forward where there has been nothing. Sometimes something is better than nothing. Posters are all over the town for signing up. There are 20 kids registered so far.
We are working on getting some curriculum materials from the man who started the schools in Northern Pakistan. Can’t think of his name. He wrote “Three Cups of Tea”. A good read for anyone interested.
Dave
Spent the night in the area and was at the school the next morning early. This school is attached to the church and so a few of the people had been there the night before. Since this was Good Friday the school was having a short day.
I met with three groups of kids. K, 1 - 2, 3 - and 4, 5. Had about 90 in each group sitting on the floor in the music room. They were excited about the program and anticipating Easter parties in their rooms. Lots of energy. We had a good day and added to their fun. I hung around until the end of school in case some parents wanted to buy some things that I had. Some of the parents appreciated the service. I forget that they really are looking for good things for their children and I am not just hawking stuff.
Dave