Uh-Oh! Proof Miley Cyrus may just be growing up...a bit too fast?

Okay. I wasn't sure I wanted to post this because parents and some kids want to think of Miley Cyrus and have visions of the wholesome Hannah Montana...but I just came across it yesterday and it's a bit racy for Ms. Cyrus but then again, hasn't she slowly been losing her good-girl image and searching for an older audience?

I also hate to say I think the song is kind of catchy and as a concept video I think it's kind of cool with the bird wings...what do you think?

Check out my mini-collection on bullying!

I just finished my final project for the Materials for Tweens class I took this semester. Feel free to check out the website I created here.

The Boys of Baraka/ PBS POV Documentary

Synopsis:

Devon, Montrey, Richard, and Romesh are just at that age — 12 and 13 years old — when boys start to become men. But in their hometown of Baltimore, one of the country’s most poverty-stricken cities for inner-city residents, African-American boys have a very high chance of being incarcerated or killed before they reach adulthood. The boys are offered an amazing opportunity in the form of the Baraka school, a project founded to break the cycle of violence through an innovative education program that literally removed young boys from low-performing public schools and unstable home environments. They travel with their classmates to rural Kenya in East Africa, where a teacher-student ratio of one to five, a strict disciplinary program and a comprehensive curriculum form the core of their new educational program.

I called Baltimore my home for 4 years back in the late 1990s. I was always aware of the overwhelming poverty and crime but as a lot of people say, the city has "charm." What I wasn't aware of was that a few blocks away from me lived boys that were slowly losing their chances to do something productive with their lives. Most of them were destined to end up in prison, homeless, on drugs, or killed. This is where the Baraka School stepped in to help some of these boys see that there is hope for the future. I seriously can't describe in words how powerful this documentary is. You get to see these boys get handpicked from some of the most violent and poor schools to attend the Baraka School in Africa where they learn how to deal with their anger and emotions. They get to receive an education without all the distractions of street violence, gangs, domestic violence, and drugs. You can tell that they are excited and scared to go and they have very difficult times adjusting. They go from living in a frightening concrete jungle to living on the plains of Africa; a chance that not a lot of people get especially boys like these. Watch them struggle and fail and pick themselves up and succeed...in the last half of the documentary watch with great pain when all that is given to them is suddenly taken away. Heartbreaking.

The Library Card by Jerry Spinelli

Newbery Award-winning author, Jerry Spinelli's book contains four stories about a mysterious, small blue library card that magically appears in the lives of the kids and changes them forever.

Meet Mongoose and his best friend, Weasel. They are social misfits who go around town and vandalize and steal things. One day the library card appears and although they try to throw it out it keeps coming back. Slowly Mongoose realizes its powers and discovers the power and fun of learning things through books, but that power is lost to Weasel and their friendship begins to change in ways neither of them see coming.

Meet Brenda who must endure the Great TV Turn-Off, a plan implemented by her parents to shut the television off for a week. It's the worst possible thing to ever happen to Brenda. She's obsessed with all the tv shows and doesn't think she'll survive! Then the blue library card appears and she starts to see life in all kinds of new ways. Can you believe she doesn't know her favorite color because the tv had shut her brain off.

Meet Sonseray who lives in a car with his dad. His mom left them when he was young and he's angry at the world and wants to forget and remember his mother all at the same time. He has no need for libraries but he knows that on a scorching summer day he can go into a library and cool off. Enter the library card. Soon Sonseray finds a book that he recalls his mother reading to him. Soon he is able to remember and forgive.

Meet April Mendez who, after discovering the library card, takes a crazy ride on a hijacked bookmobile where she meets a sad and angry girl who starts off being an enemy and by the end of the ride becomes a friend.

These are all great and easy to read stories about how a bit of knowledge can change a kids life. i recommend it for kids 8 and older.