More on the Babelfish
Monday, May 31st 1999
Ignore that new logo until we actually buy Lab6, which could be as early as next week. So then, ever been to Lucent's website? Try out their speech synthesis program, especially the French version, which sounds very realistic if you ask me. Now would somebody please combine everything into one device?
And is anybody interested in the KHS statistics for June? You should be. They are, after all, very interesting. You need Excel 97, of course.
Finally for today, November 22nd 2000 will be the thousandth day of Adam's Lynz. Get ready to celebrate the first millennium! If you can't wait that long, October 1st 1999 is apparently unofficial DOK day. Perhaps we'll organise some kind of competition.
Page Updated: Languages and the FAQ
Inside Information on Supplies!
Sunday, May 30th 1999
Wahoo! It didn't take much to find the following quote, made by a supply teacher, on the ethics and effort put into supply teaching. We knew it already from experimental evidence, but to see the proof is great:
"Responsibilities are interesting ....... there's none ...... you just walk in & child-mind ..... its up to you how much effort you put in ....... a prof. puts in lots & gets the kids really enthused, while a noff just sits back & lets the set-work get covered ..... if you want to take home some marking the regular staff'll be bowled over ....... some-one else will set work (head of department, if the reg hasn't set work themselves) and really you ought to expect this as there's precious little time in the curriculum for non-course lessons"
A 'noff', eh? That's a new term! Would those non-course lessons be RPSE and PE? Of course, this supply teacher has never had any experience of a lesson where he can simply sit back and do nothing - at least some effort is required to keep us under control.
More exams and perhaps even aliens
Thursday, May 27th 1999
English Literature, Spanish and Geography - all things of the past. In real life, too. While searching through that massive black folder I've carried to every lesson in Years 10&11, I found an enormous amount of stuff that had been used to the amusement of the masses throughout school. I'm in the process of scanning all these bits of paper, but they'll appear in the yearbook in a few weeks time, or perhaps sooner, depending on how sunny it is. For now, try to be (even if only a bit) slightly amused by a quote from the back of a sponsored day leaflet:
"Money is the root of all evil, so GIVE GENEROUSLY!"
That huge counter number reminds me of a target we set a few months ago for the 'previous' site. 2000 hits for 2000. I think we'll surpass that one, eh? We could conceivably go for 20,000 hits for 2000, but that would be pushing it.
New Yearbook Page (in progress): The Vault
Revision
Monday, May 24th 1999
Retrospective good luck to everybody who did their English Literature exam today (which at the last count was everybody).
One of the problems with the school intranet page is that it turns off every day at 6:00pm, and another problem is that only about 3 people know how to get to it from outside school, and two of them are Lewis. So I've put the revision section of the Economics page up, with a view to putting the rest up. I'll add A-level stuff as soon as I know any. If anybody would like to put some good work up, send it along. One thing, though - NO COURSEWORK. It's either illegal or immoral to offer that kind of help to other students. Make sure whatever work you're submitting has a mark for it, otherwise there's not much point. Also include whatever question it is you're answering. Things that work well are English essays rather than Maths questions - who wants to revise from a page of numbers? I suppose if it's a big Maths question, then you could submit it.
If this sounds a bit like schoolsucks.com, then ya' right. But the thing about schoolsucks is that most of the papers are useless and irrelevant to our school. And there's no quality control at all.
New Pages: Library Rules and the whole revision section
Like The New Adz?
Saturday, May 22nd 1999
Look at that! A thousand hits! It seems like only a month ago that I was announcing the 500th hit. In fact, it was only 22 days ago. Does this mean the readership doubled in a month? Well yes, it probably does, what with our ingenious "scrawl it on the back of everybody" "advertising" "campaign".
EULA Relaxed, Gun Law Tightened
Thursday, May 20th 1999
Dead Magazine is now freely avaiLable - the password protection has been removed. The same goes for the credits page. Also, you can now access the Yearbook without first going through the EULA, although you must still read it if you haven't already - you could be breaking the law, after all. And there is a bit of an attempt at an FAQ on the main menu to the right.
After another school shoot-out in America, Clinton wants to put tighter controls on guns. What did I hear you say? Unconstitutional? Eh? And what was that? Common sense? Oh right, I see - that'll be another war, right?
Here We Go
Wednesday, May 19th 1999
Judging from the music, the noise, the mass chair stands and the beers and beers, it was the last day. This means that the yearbook can start to fulfill it's purpose - to remind people of that time. Please start spreading the word about this site. We tried to 0wn people's shirts with the URL, but we only got so many.
One of the most popular quotes in leaving books was...
"Enjoy everything"
...and I totally agree with it. If you are never coming back to KHS, then this is the only thing you need to remember. If it's not quite clear, remember these as well:
"If you don't like something that's happening, stop making it
happen"
"Make as many people happy as you can"
That last one might seem obvious, but if people around you are enjoying themselves, it's going to be easier for you. Hooray!
New Page: F-Max
NIALL
Tuesday, May 18th 1999
Everybody has done their Spanish Orals now, which is a good thing. An even better thing is the discovery of NIALL. You can download a copy of NIALL here. This includes the original files and an example dictionary. It also includes a much better dictionary that is the result of about two hours of talk time. Just tell it to load n.dic instead of example.dic. Simple as that. Unfortunately, it only seems to be able to store 580 words. Perhaps there will be a better version one day.
An Apology
Sunday, May 16th 1999
Sorry about the mess over the last few days - the site has been transferred to Xoom to avoid anybody caring about the URL. The address is still Get.To/KHS, in case you're wondering.
The site can now be considered public. The EULA is still on the yearbook, but that's only for people who want to view it. Which should be everybody. It may even disappear over the next few weeks.
About the banner: that's so people know about KHS - NOT TO GET MONEY, OK? It's a free LinkExchange service which is good for the site (the 'previous' site received a load of hits through the Geocities banner). And anyway, the advertising based economic model of the Internet scains!
Modified Yearbook Page: Dictionary
Teachers Vote Against Performance Related
Pay
Saturday, May 15th 1999
This isn't too interesting - it's what we would have expected, but it means there is an overwhelming majority within the NUT (96%, I believe) in support of striking if performance related pay is to be introduced. Therefore, it should be our duty to ensure that it IS introduced.
Industrial Action, remember, is only a good thing for the extremes of having exams - those with no important exams will enjoy it because it doesn't matter one way or another to their education. Those with REALLY important exams will also enjoy it, because it gives them more time to revise and perhaps even puts the exam off altogether. Like a Spanish Oral, for example.
Yearbook News: The Science Faculty's Observational
Evidence
Saturday, May 15th 1999
Cruising past the science faculty window (as we are wont to doing), we couldn't help splitting our sides at the sight of somebody staring out through the door, spying on people on the field, through a pair of tiny binoculars. This has inspired point 18 on the EULA. We'd 'heard' rumours about this sort of thing happening, but the proof was too much! What right do they have to spy on those people? They've got teachers out there already to sort out any misdemeanors, so why do they need visual backup? Are they recording it?
New Page: Equations
Schools Consider Replacement for PE
Friday, May 14th 1999
This is a sample news item, as it says above. Please ignore. The Yearbook doesn't work yet and it won't until next wednesday, or at least until I put the old front page back in. Which won't be until next Wednesday.
PE is a dull and useless lesson at the best of times, and the government seems to be wising up to what has been obvious and clearly apparent to the rest of us for quite some time. So they're finally going to let kids under 14 decide exactly what they want to do (in terms of which sport they like playing best), instead of conscripting them into ranks of violent and unwilling pupils. What we want to know, however, is this: when are they going to come up with a replacement for PE teachers?