There are many political websites and tools. Each candidate has their own site, mailing list, and blogs. Supporters and dissenters have candidate and issues blogs.

Every presidential candidate has a Wikipedia entry. Here are a few:

• Barack Obama
• Hillary Clinton
• John McCain, and
• Sam Brownback

Since wikis are editable by anybody (including anonymous edits) this technology may open the door to a new way for negative campaigning. Wikis make it easy to publish and disseminate misinformation. In fact the Sam Brownback entry contains the following disclaimer – “This article or section contains information about one or more candidates in an upcoming or ongoing election. Content may change dramatically as the election approaches and unfolds.” It is interesting that the other candidates’ listings I referenced, don’t carry this disclaimer. It is also important and good to note that the Wikipedia volunteers are good at monitoring edits to Wikipedia pages.

Certainly, there are many sites that provide political misinformation. The concern about Wikipedia is that since it is considered an encyclopedia, it may have more potential to mislead.

The other concern about Wikipedia political entries I have is who writes them. Are candidate entries campaign fluff, legitimate biographical information, or both?

I believe that volunteers or friends of a candidate’s campaign initially write the entries. This is just a gut feeling.

It will be interesting to see how Wikipedia and other wikis influence politics.

 

Fractions are part of every day life. When you share a sandwich or a pizza with a friend or friends, you are using fractions. The price of items are fractions. For example, if an item cost $1.59, it is the same as saying the item cost one dollar and 59/100 cents. Fractions represent parts or portions of a whole. A fraction consists of two numbers, a numerator and a denominator. The numerator is the top number and the denominator is the bottom number. For example, with the fraction 5/9, 5 is the numerator and 9 is the denominator. The denominator 9 represents how many pieces form the whole and the numerator represents how many parts of the whole we have. Here are some examples. 1. I completed 9 of the 13 tasks on my to do list. In other words, I've completed 9/13 of my tasks. How much is unfinished? 5/13. 2. A pizza is cut into 6 slices. How much does each slice represent in relation to the whole? 1/6. 3. There are 50 states in the United States. There were thirteen original colonies. Using a fraction, how many of the fifty states were not the thirteen original colonies? 37/50

One part of teaching the GED (high school equivalency diploma) is mathematics. When I am asked to teach this course, I'm always asked to teach the mathematics section. I find this ironic because I am far from being a math genius. I am just curious. I decided to tutor a student for the GED. I thought this would be a great way to reaquaint myself with mathematics and remove my fear of math. I'm also curious as to what all those symbols mean. The "Thinking Mathematically" posts will discuss basic concepts of math. My goal is to present these topics with simple, real world examples.

There are a variety of candidates seeking the presidency. A host of Democrats and Republicans have announced their intentions, and soon Greens, Libertarians, and other third party candidates will make their announcements. However, regardless of party or ideology, what qualities does one need to be president? Certainly one must be a good communicator. However, I believe the most important quality is to be a great thinker. This may seem obvious, but how many past candidates do you remember as being "a great thinker?" Part of the problem is our culture. I don't believe most Americans want to hear long speeches that truly detail a candidate's policies and strategies. I question how many people read all the information on a candidate's website? I don't want to sound negative, but when I talk with people, they support a candidate based on one or two issues or based on their party affiliation. Apathy plays a large part. However, it is important to be informed. With all the forms of communication available, tv, radio, satellite radio, press, and Internet, there is no reason to not be informed. What are some other qualities? Honesty, the ability to listen to more than one viewpoint, the ability to compromise, and the ability to stand firm regardless of public opinion. It will be interesting to see what qualities this election's candidates display.

I have a strong interest in mobile computing. I enjoy writing from coffee shops, especially Starbucks. I like MP3 books, reading books on a pda, and am finding uses taking pictures with my cell phone and posting them online. Online technology is quite useful. Yesterday, while driving, I got lost. Yahoo maps resolved that issue. My pda is the source for these entries. I'm fascinated that I can post entries from anywhere. I'll explore different uses of, and different technologies for mobile computing. Please share your ideas with me.

Spent the morning in a coffee shop making notes for a GED class I am teaching this Sunday morning. Have a few days off from my day job managing a technology startup. The topic for the class - fractions. Reading an interesting book "The Number Devil" by Hans Magnus Enzensberger. This is a children's story that teaches math. It is about a boy who dreams every night about a friendly character called the Number Devil who teaches the boy about different math concepts. Each night's dream explains a new concept. Some of the topics are: infinite numbers, Fibonacci series, and prime numbers. The book also includes beautiful illustrations by Rotraut Suzanne Berner. ISBN number is 0-8050-6299-8.

I have an idea for using Google Earth in my ESL classes. It is an updated version of "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego".

I thought I would use Google Earth to display different parts of the countries of my students to create a game. Clues could act as a catalyst to generate conversation and students would learn about these different countries. This could expand to all the countries and cities of the world.

I'd be interested in learning about other educational uses of Google Earth.

Welcome! This is a space about random thoughts; it is a space to allow me to write about whatever interests me and to share photos. Most of the entries and photos will be done via a mobile phone so they will be short and right to the point. What can you expect? Short blurbs about politics, music and other topics. There will also be many interesting photos.