A writer's Random ramblings
Have you recently purchased or received an DSLR camera? Looking to try out new kinds of lenses but on a budget? Look no farther than Amazon.com and the Neewer Wide Angle and Telephoto Lens Kit! This 3-in-1 system of telephoto, macro, and wide angle lenses can help your DSLR of 49 through 58 millimeter standard lens diameters take more kinds of shots. As described on Amazon, (https://www.amazon.com/Neewer-Telephoto-Adapters-Microfiber-Cleaning/dp/B01DNRR7R0/ref=sr_1_30s=photo&ie=UTF8&qid=1487269465&sr=1-30&refinements=p_89%3ANeewer) the kit includes 3 lenses, 3 adapter rings, a cleaning cloth, and all lens caps necessary. Upon opening the box, it will look as if 2 lens caps are missing, but keep in mind that the Macro lens detaches from the Wide Angle. I received this kit as a gift to extend the artistic range of a Pentax K-50 DSLR. To attach any of the Neewer lenses to my camera, the 52-58 mm adapter ring must always stay attached to the stock 18-55 mm lens. This keeps the process of changing lenses from stock to any other quick and simple when all of the lenses are handy. Simply twist the desired lens into the ring and begin shooting, unless close range macrophotography is in order, then twist the Macro lens apart from the wide angle. Both the telephoto lens and wide angle lens do what their names imply. The photographer can use either of these with any settings desired on the K-50. The telephoto allows a 5’6” person to stand at ground level, great for those who are afraid of heights, and shoot upwards. I tried this theory to take the photo below. I could then see the formations of the ice much better once I added the image to my computer as opposed to standing in the yard looking up. That day, I also took several shots of ice on various objects across the yard without leaving the front step. My wide angle lens, also good for landscape or cityscape images, here let me place more ice-encrusted bushes at the center of a shot or capture better images of my husband’s 1989 Mercury Grand Marquis with its icicles than the stock 18-55 mm lens would allow, as shown below. The macro lens identifies as the renegade of the Neewer set, requiring the K-50 set to “C” on the front, left-hand dial to function. This lens requires the photographer to stand at close range to the subject. Doing so adds more detail to the image produced. Such images would lend themselves well to fine art prints or later study of subjects including the arts themselves, science, and technology. Snow day images from the macro lens show well how ice encrusts the leaves of a bush and icicles run down from it, as in the example here. For these reasons, the Neewer Wide Angle Telephoto Lens Kit gives budget minded photographers a wonderful entry to wide angle, telephoto, and macro forms of the art. The kit comes at a price making three high quality lenses much less expensive than one from the camera manufacturer. The included adapter rings allow the photographer to move the lenses between cameras as he or she upgrades between different models, adding to the value. Thus, photography need not be an expensive hobby as one learns its forms.
Should schools continue offering technology education? Yes, but with a twist. To create technologically literate and responsible citizens, incorporate technological skills into every area of education. Society can achieve this goal more easily than one might think.
First, teach paper skills for all disciplines in school in the elementary years. Make sure children know how to speak, write, and spell in their country’s first language by third grade. Teach them both manuscript and cursive, but allow for creativity in combining the two as long as others can read the style. During these years, have children learn to manipulate numbers in math. Let them explore the arts the old-fashioned way by drawing, painting, and building simple ceramic objects. By third grade, most children can begin to write down musical notes or pick up a second language as writing skills increase. Late elementary and middle school years provide enough exploration time in school to add technology training. In simplest terms, begin with having children take notes on paper. They can label computer keyboards, musical ones, and calculators on the worksheets. Once they show mastery of key locations, move them to actual keyboard devices. As students’ typing and spelling abilities improve, allow them onto computers with a list of approved programs and sites to hone their skills. One could begin musical notation on Finale or learn languages and other subjects on Khan Academy. They can also begin to study basic coding and web design for inclusion in other subjects, for example, a future National History Day assignment or higher math project. Middle school language classes need to add note taking methods to their lessons. Before high school and college, students must learn to read and think critically, both online and off. Teach them to take notes from books and articles, physical and virtual, in the writing of research papers. Make sure they know how to properly cite each source in a variety of ways. Each academic discipline will have its own methods, making knowledge of multiple ways important in college and career. At this point, those planning on continuing music studies need to learn theory and transposition skills on and off the computer. In all areas, from music to languages, computer science to math, teachers must let students know what applications and websites may be used for learning purposes. Only by knowing what sites the teachers trust can students start to learn discernment for reliable source material. After all, children learn best with adult guidance. Let’s start showing them how their technology can play well with old school education and bring society together. In the Age of the Budget Shortfall, many wonder why all of our educational programs need to stay. Often, the pundits say to cut the arts. They question what these disciplines teach our children. After all, don’t the arts make better hobbies than job fields when school should be preparing students to enter the workforce? Not necessarily, as studies continue to prove that the arts help our children learn critical thinking, a skill all colleges and employers seek at some level.
Therefore, especially since not everyone can afford lessons for his or her child, schools need to keep these programs. Some places may institute free after school lessons run by volunteers. If those volunteers do not come forward from the community, then who teaches them? Schools, of course, need to have at least basic levels of arts instruction. Beginning studies in the subjects of music, visual art, dance, theater, and creative writing ultimately help our children gain the skills they need to pass the exams many will take to finish high school and go on to higher education. Schools can integrate the discipline of writing both creatively and to convey information as soon as children acquire the motor skills to put pencil to paper. All kinds of writing can augment the curriculum in a student’s studies of any language. Younger children write poems and simple paragraphs about pictures they see or draw. They can then work their way up into learning to write formal papers, articles, and traditional poetry. Teachers could mix the forms of writing in any class. As the pupils get higher in school, they can also learn literary criticism skills to apply to literature. From there, they can apply the skills to history and other social studies and language classes to see how written matter fits the society that generated it. As the students study poetry, make sure they know traditional forms such as those found in songs they enjoy so they see basic rhythm and rhyme. These rhythm studies lead naturally into music. As students learn a rhyme, they can clap out its rhythm and learn from there to tap on basic instruments in time with a reading. More advanced students can learn syncopation and how to subdivide notes to fit lyrics. When the class progresses to high and low pitch in music, a teacher can demonstrate how that fits with basic physics principles or discuss how different animals hear different frequencies of sound. The intervals between various notes on the scale also provide simple application of fractions for those seeking practical math. Studies in musical composition and appreciation can reappear as lessons in how societies use sound as expression to tie music and history or sociology together. Music and movement combine to create dance. Music, dance, the written word, and visual arts presented as a whole equals theater as each art inspires the other. This brings us to visual arts. In this discipline, people learn to see everything around them as a basis for art. This seeking of the elemental leads to critical thinking skills when the artist must explain to someone else why that piece works the way it does. Learning to appreciate art in this way also helps those in other disciplines perform critical thinking. Compositional skills in visual arts act as the puzzles behind it to activate the mind. The history and criticism of painting, sculpture, photography, ceramics, and related arts crosses over into social studies and the learning of other cultures through their languages. This helps students see and understand how societies function. Art fits into science by way of discussions on how people made various pigments and tools over the millennia. Science also falls into art when people watch the effects of various lighting situations on a piece. Math visits art when artists need to enlarge or reduce the size of a project of a display space. Computer art, using pixels to create works, uses math in figuring out how best to place the pixels for the desired effect. Music teachers who oversee marching bands could even use the math of art in representing each player in a field show with a pixel. Dance and theater people may use the same theory in setting up the stage for performances, representing them on a computer screen. For these reasons, schools need to keep the arts alive. Reducing them to something parents bring children to only after school and on weekends would eliminate many students from trying. Well-rounded citizens of any society need the arts to understand their world better. Writing, music, visual arts, theater and dance deserve everyone’s attention, especially among our youth. |
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