Buffy's Whale Of A Halloween!

Buffy's first costume:

Her costume last year . . .

and this year . . .



And no she's not a shark, she's an Orca Whale.

I know Buffy . . . I know . . .

Mo Money Mo Problems by The Notorious B.I.G. (feat. Mase & Puff Daddy)

Yes, Mase’s rapping skills were suspect, yes, Puff Daddy comes across as a shameless
self-promoter but man this song was fun.



“Mo Money Mo Problems” was the second single off the Notorious B.I.G.’s second and final album Life After Death. Released posthumously after his murder, this song was a huge success topping the Billboard charts for two weeks and saturating MTV and radio stations.

This song comes from a quote from Notorious B.I.G. stating that with more money came more problems in life. And while this song warns of this adage the many of the lyrics and the sample feel more like celebration then a warning.

The sample which comes from 1980 Diana Ross hit “I’m Coming Out,” which features the greatest (and one of the only) trombone solos in popular music history.



Let’s not talk about that jacket she’s wearing . . .

This song really could not have been more perfect for a rap song sample and Puff Daddy arranged it so well that people hardly cared about the skill or the content of the raps in this song. I know I didn’t when I was listening to this song as a teenager.

Listening to this song, the beat is infectious but the variation of the rapping styles comes across very clearly, illustrating how great the Notorious B.I.G. was a rap artist. Mace just barely gets through his verse. I could deal with his monotone and unaffected delivery if he rhythms of his rap were so monotonous. Every phrase has the same cadence and his lack of momentum and energy juxtaposed over the sample is pretty painful.

Puffy does bring it with his verse. There’s variations in the phrase lengths, he sues alliteration and check out how he flows when he starts “team much stronger than yours . . . “ (2:40). He works through the beat placing accents against the what you expect before landing back down later in the verse.

Then Biggie comes in and blows both Mase and Puffy away. From the initial spell-out of his name, his superior skills are immediately clear. There is a rhythmic energy and punctuation with every syllable he says. His words are by-far the most meaningful illustrating the theme of the song and the struggles that come with wealth. What’s interesting is that it doesn’t really come across as bragging so much as an honest expression of insecurities.

Puff Daddy makes a great choice to clear the top layer of the instrumentals to let Biggie rap over the base line. It not only provides a great moment of space in the song but really highlights what Biggie is doing with his verse and how he uses his rhymes to create momentum in the song.

"Mo Money Mo Problems," while not coming across as the deepest song is a fascinating reflection about the life and times of the Notorious B.I.G.  This song is a party song but on another layer, it's a statement about the flaws and the misconceptions of having lots of wealth.  I can't help but wonder if it's these problems that led to the death of Biggie, one greatest rappers of all time.  With every positive thing in life, there's a potential for something bad to happen.  Like this song the good feelings can't last forever and eventually with have to deal with out lives.

Unfortunately for the Notorious B.I.G. when the party stopped so did his life.

Year 2: Week 8 - The Medicated Child

One of the most touching things a student can do is to give you an unsolicited, genuine and host apology.

I’ll never forget the day at my old school when after a music class one of my students came up and apologized for his behavior in class. After pointing out the things he felt he could do better he told me that he was off his medication. I suspected this after teaching him and dealing with his outbursts during class, but now that he told me it all came together.

I had worked with this student all year and had seen the ups and down in relation to the medication he was taking for his ADHD. And it absolutely broke my heart watching him struggle through class and trying to keep it together and not being able to.

When I tell people I’m a teacher one of the common things people ask me about is this idea that we are over-medicating our children. Often this discussion includes some statistics from some article or news show and about the possible harm that these drugs may cause. What is interesting to me is that most people who talk to me about this are coming from the viewpoint that children are indeed over-medicated, and if parents simply did a better job then we wouldn’t have as many issues with kids with ADD or ADHD as there was when they were kids.

First off, kids have always had attention issues; it wasn’t labeled until the past twenty or so years. The treatment for these children who we would now diagnose as having attention disorders was akin to torture for them. I know this for a fact because one of my closest friends grew up with ADHD in the 1960s and being sent of the class and punished because your senses are hyper-sensitive to stimulus really is torture.

When I teach a student and it seems clear to me that they could benefit from some level of medication for their attention disorders I don’t think this because I want to stop them from talking and blurting out in class. Well, would you open a door for a person in a wheelchair so they could get into a building? Of course you would.

I view a child with an attention disorder the same way. If there is a way that they can manage the stimulus and their impulses with the help of medication so that they can be happier and more successful it would be cruel to not provide those resources for that child.

I’ve never met a parent who didn’t hesitate and struggle with the idea of putting their child on medication. However, I’m sure that there are parents as well as doctors who are responsible for over-medicating and wrongfully medicating children.  However I’ve never encountered this in my life and no amount of statistics can outweigh the look in the eyes of students struggling to manage the barrage of outside stimulus and their own impulses.

Our society does have a lot of questions to ask about the issue of medicating children with all kinds of disorders, but we can't let this discussion hinder the positive uses of these medications.  This isn't about making children better students, it's about allowing them to live better lives.

When Will My Life Begin (from Tangled)

E-mail from one of my 8th grade students:

Hi Mr. Tang,
Here is your daily and friendly reminder to stop reading this email and go watch Tangled.It will be a great family activity for you, your wife, and buffy! So put down the camera (filming buffy again?) and GO WATCH TANGLED!or else Megan and I will sing more princess songs on wednesday.
Look forward to tomorrows email!!!  

~Kate (and Megan in spirit)

I was totally skeptical and regretting telling my students that I would watch this film, but Mandy Moore lends her voice to one of the most endearing Disney' Princesses.  I love how right after she gets out of the tower she is "at war with herself."



Ah, SO cute, but what I really have to highlight is the opening song.



I love how optimistic music is tied with the monotony of her life.

If you have ever liked Disney animated films in the past, this is a great and beautiful film to experience.

Somewhere Out There (from An American Tail)

Towards the beginning of my freshmen year of college I told my mom that I had a cold. She then proceeded to call me every day, multiple times a day checking up on me. I remember getting really annoyed at my mom and slightly frustrated. I felt like I was an adult and that she didn’t need to worry about me.

Then one time she called worrying about something that I felt was irrational and I got frustrated with her and told her that I didn’t need her to worry about me and she responded “Of course I worry about you, it’s my job.”

Your mom worrying about you is one of the greatest blessing you will ever have your life. Whether you realize it or not, the knowledge that she is out there thinking about you and loving you is what gives connects you to your mom and the world knowing that you are never alone.

“Somewhere Out There” from the 1986, Spielberg produced film is about this feeling.


An American Tail - Somewhere Out There from kojihoon on Vimeo.

During a time when Disney’s animated features were mediocre, Spielberg took a shot at created an animated feature and the result was an immigration story that spoke to the hopes and struggles of the immigrant experience of the 1880s.

The film follows the Mousekewitzes, a family of Russian Jews who immigrate to American. During the journey, the son Fievel becomes separated from the family.  The film follows the families' struggle to find each other while surviving in a new country.

“Somewhere Out There” is a duet between Fievel and his sister Tanya, in which they sing about their hopes of finding each other. It features the “somewhere” motif, the leaping melodic shape on that word also featured in “Somewhere Over The Rainbow,” which expresses a longing before the melody gently descendes.

One of the strengths of this film is that the voice actors for the kids songs like, well, kids and this is also true for the singing of ‘Somewhere Out There.” Yeah, it’s a little rough but it's cute and feels more real then singing it with perfect technique and clarity.

Fievel is lost in New York City. Think about that for a second. That would be scary today as an adult, now imagine that as a kid in the 1880s. But he’s hopeful because as the song reminds him, “someone’s thinking of me and loving me tonight.”

When things are going fine, you may not think you need to be reminded your mom is out there worrying about you.  But when you have a moment in your life when you feel lost and lonely knowing that your mom is out there really makes the worlds seem not as scary.  As Fievel sings “it helps to think we’re sleeping underneath the same big sky.

Nagging phone calls and e-mails are more than worth enduring to be reminded of how much your mom cares about you. Don’t try to argue that she’s being silly or irrational and don’t give her some sarcastic remark, she’s not trying to make your life harder or more inconvenient, she just cares.

So next time your mom calls you and expresses concern about something going on in your life, just say “thank you for thinking of me” and ensure her that you’ll be careful no matter how irrational her worry may be.

She’s just doing her job.

Year 2: Week 7 - Taking It Personally

The relationship between a teacher and a student has changed throughout history and varies quite a bit depending on the school and the level of teaching.  There’s the traditional idea of the teacher as an authority figure.  Then there’s the more fluid idea of a teacher who does not so much instruct but guides students through learning experiences.

Most teachers are somewhere in-between.  What comes along with this relationship is that things students do affect teachers’ feelings.  When a student starts talking when I’m instructing is it a personal sign of disrespect?  Is this something that I should feel offended about?  Well, probably not but feigning a level of offense does help students understand the consequences of their behavior.  The things is, I can’t take things students do in class personally because I’d probably just go insane if I did.

Children and teens (and many adults) do not fully understand the consequences of their actions.  Do you get offended at a seven year-old who makes a racist joke when they honestly don’t know the implication of what they said?  Not really, a serious conversation needs to happen but you taking it personally doesn’t really help the situation.

I tell my kids that people who don’t know you can’t really hurt your feelings.  If someone makes fun of you who has never met you, they aren’t reacting to who you are as a human being, they are just throwing a random comment at you that is not based in any meaningful interactions.  On the contrary if someone who has known you for all your life insults you they are speaking from the experience of knowing you personally and that can hurt.

My students don’t know me.  I mean they do, but “Mr. Tang” isn’t a full human being in their minds.  It’s why whenever one of my students sees me out side of school they are shocked to learn that I exist outside of the school building.

I guess I’m pondering this topic because sometimes it’s hard to separate the way students behave with my own personal feelings.  The reality is that sometimes negative student behavior is in fact based in a lack of respect for the teacher.

Thinking back to my first couple years of teaching I can see clearly times when students acted out in class because they didn’t respect me.  While that rarely seems to happen now, I can’t help but wonder when a student behaves in a way that is disrespectful to me how much is this about who I am as a person. 

This week has had some amazing and positive interactions with students and some pretty rough ones.  Is it crazy to take the positive ones as personal success and brush off the negative ones as things that shouldn’t affect my feelings?

I wish I could but I don’t think that the way things should be.  Because you can’t take positive things as personal victories and not take all the feelings that go along with negative situations. 

At the end of the day I guess what’s important to remembers is that the song is not about the teachers.  If things go really well in class, yeah the teachers deserves some credit but it’s the students who made it happen and when things go bad in class, the teacher probably contributed to that situation a bit but no one forced the kids to act like jerks, they chose that path themselves. 

When you invest time and energy into other people, in my case 196 students, you can’t help but become emotionally involved.  Because it’s that emotional connection that makes you care enough to do all the work to make that students have a positive experience in your class.  Like most things in life, I guess it's just a balancing act in which you have to make sure you wear enough armor that the stabs that you have to bear from your students don't damage the heart that you have to teach with every day. 

Alicia Silverstone & Aerosmith

Remember Aerosmith's classic album Get A Grip?

Remember Alicia Silverstone?



Ah, remember Alicia Silverstone AND Liv Tyler skipping out of private school?



Oh and the hope that Vitual Reality simulators could make these videos come true?



Man if you were a middle school-aged boy when these songs came out, you never forgot these videos.