Ideal Exercise Class

My doctor recently told me I needed to start exercising. With the way my life is right now, walking on the treadmill is the least objectionable and more convenient way for me to exercise at the moment. But the instructions got me thinking. I prefer Dancercise to actually exercise, so I came up with a program list of what I would like to see in a 1-2 hour class.

Warm Up:

Stretching

Ballet moves

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8A6c7bkzmQ8

Broadway: choose 1-2

Dancing Queen (Mama Mia)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUcyDpt2QCQ

Voulez Vous (Mama Mia)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDtanFQPPmI

One (A Chorus Line)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSQGP9QvnU4

Time Warp (Rocky Horror Picture Show)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ho0FsLwbcM8

Hand Jive (Grease)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACOAt-dxcr8

Spanish Panic (Once Upon a Mattress)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-Hmx5K6LcM

Jigs/Country Dances:

anything similar to River Dancing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8gvxSpjRZI

Pride & Prejudice dances from the Meryton Assembly and the Netherfield Ball

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqHYRzYReHc

Ballroom:

Tango

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qY0_zp58ow

Waltz

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCch-zPc_BY

Modern(?):

Cha Cha Slide

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JXHa5mM8b0

Electric Slide

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoCZsFGVsy4

Cotton Eye Joe

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwajvDYd728

Macarena

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1im74-XgYA

Cool Down:

More ballet moves

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ydRw6cbuQQ

I’m considering putting all these links into a playlist on my YouTube channel and actually using it as an exercise class.

Updated (6/25/15): I went ahead and created the playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmTWkK2jsWo2LcJW797rusA6E8iCEhOv5

© Cori Large January 1, 2015

YA Lit class project, pt. 2

This is part 2 of the reading did for my Young Adult literature class:

v  Title #13: Hatchet

• a. Author: Gary Paulsen
• b. Recommended Audience:      *****
• c. Reading Recommendation:     Adolescent Boys
• d. Curriculum Connections:         Character building, survival training
• e. Review: Brian is lost in the wilderness when the small aircraft he is riding in crashes. He much learn to survive using the hatchet his mom gave him.
• Evaluation: All the survival techniques he uses are real, accurately portrayed, and appropriate for the circumstances.

v  Title #14: Entwined

• Author: Heather Dixon
• Recommended Audience: High school girls
• Reading Recommendation:         ****
• Curriculum Connections: Family, trust, death, and obedience
• Review: After their mother dies, twelve young princesses reluctantly begin their year of mourning whilst their absentee father goes off to war. The girls live for dancing, something that is now verboten. They find a hidden place within the palace where they are allowed to dance in secret, but what price will this freedom come at?
• Evaluation: The girls must learn the hard way about being so trusting, and even though he may not show it, their father loves them no matter what.

v  Title #15: Sister Mischief

• Author: Laura Goode
• Recommended Audience: High school, LGBT teens, hip-hop lovers
• Reading Recommendation:         ***
• Curriculum Connections: LGBT, music theory, music appreciation and interpretation
• Review: This book is about four friends who are trying to start a positive hip-hop club where straights and gays can come together in peace and safety to discuss the genre in their conservative, majority White town.
• Evaluation: I personally did not care for the language, sex, and mild drug use in this book. However, this book is very positive towards gays and the gay youth may appreciate it.

v  Title #16: The Book of Mordred

• Author: Vivian Vande Velde
• Recommended Audience:           *****
• Reading Recommendation:         Middle school and up
• Curriculum Connections: British medieval history; Arthurian legends
• Review: This book tells the history of Mordred from the points of view of three different women. It brings in some of the well-known theories regarding Arthur, Merlin, Camelot, and what happened to them all.
• Evaluation: I’ve always been a fan of the Arthurian legends and the theories on what happened to the main characters. This would be a good addition to an Arthurian-love collection.

v  Title #17:      Race Across Alaska

• Author: Libby Riddles and Tim Jones
• Recommended Audience: High school
• Reading Recommendation: ****
• Curriculum Connections: Ambition, Training for an endurance race
• Review:                This book is about the story of the first woman to win the Iditarod.
• Evaluation: This book is inspiring and the format teaches as well as entertains.

v  Title #18: The Canterbury Papers

• Author: Judith Koll Healey
• Recommended Audience: High School
• Reading Recommendation: **
• Curriculum Connections: General Reading, Historical figures of France and England
• Review:                A lesser French royal is called upon by Eleanor of Aquitaine to retrieve letter she had written to the Archbishop of Canterbury. These letters could bring down her son from the English throne is discovered.
• Evaluation: This book was really difficult to get into. I didn’t really enjoy it.

v  Title #19: Magic or Madness

• Author: Justine Larbaletier
• Recommended Audience: Middle School and up
• Reading Recommendation: *****
• Curriculum Connections: General reading
• Review:                A young girl and her mother are on the run from her wicked witch of a grandmother. When she ends up in her grandmother’s care, she escapes but some transports herself far away. There she must decide whether or not to go back to her grandmother or risk her life in the care of her bad-vibe-giving grandfather.
• Evaluation: This book left so many questions unanswered. I hope there is a sequel that will answer my questions.

v  Title #20: Zazoo

• Author: Richard Mosher
• Recommended Audience: Immigrant and adopted kids
• Reading Recommendation: **
• Curriculum Connections: World War II, Vietnam War, Adoption, Hatred, Antisemetism
• Review:                This is a story about a Vietnamese orphan who was adopted by a Frenchman and brought up in France. She befriends a strange boy who asks questions about another citizen. She does her own investigation and discovers the truth about her adopted parent and the village she was raised in.
• Evaluation: The book was hard to get into and on more than one occasion I wanted to put the book down because I was bored.

v  Title #21: Speaking from Among the Bones

• Author: Alan Bradley
• Recommended Audience: High School
• Reading Recommendation: ****
• Curriculum Connections: General reading, Great for Mystery Lovers
• Review:                Flavia de Luce is a mini Sherlock Holmes and had aided the police on several occasions when they don’t know in which direction to go in. When the church organist is found dead in the tomb of the church’s namesake saint, the questions begin to pile up quickly.
• Evaluation: I was hooked from the first chapter. I will definitely be looking up the author’s other books.

v  Title #22: First People: an Illustrated History of American Indians

• Author: David C. King
• Recommended Audience: Middle School & High School
• Reading Recommendation: *****
• Curriculum Connections: American History, Native American History
• Review: This book is very interesting. It goes over the history and theories surrounding all the Native American tribes and what the descendents are up to now.
• Evaluation: This book would be good for research as well as general reading. There are lots of illustrations to facilitate understanding.

v  Title #23: Frozen Secrets: Antarctica Revealed

• Author: Sally M. Walker
• Recommended Audience: Late Elementary and Middle School
• Reading Recommendation: *****
• Curriculum Connections: Geography, Earth Science, International Relations
• Review:                This book is about the history and evolution of Antarctica, and all the scientific research that is going on down there. Despite looking like a picture book, this book would be great as a research source or for general nonfiction reading.
• Evaluation: This was a VERY educational book. What is going on down on Antarctica is proof of what happens when everyone comes together and work toward the greater good.

v  Title #24: The Beekeeper’s Apprentice

• Author: Laurie R. King
• Recommended Audience: Middle School and up
• Reading Recommendation: ****
• Curriculum Connections: General Reading, Using a well-known literary character in a different setting with a different author
• Review:                This story is written from the point of view of a fifteen year old girl who becomes friends with Sherlock Holmes after he’s retired from being a Consulting Detective, and he wasn’t fictional but really did live around the turn of the last century.
• Evaluation: This book is an interesting concept. The story is dense and not a quick read.