Week+1

Week 1

http://www.stumbleupon.com/home/

Stumbleupon.com is a site that I recently joined to further my knowledge on various topics. Originally I began simply looking through various artwork as a way to broaden my mind while adding no stress to my free time. I began to stumble through vivid scenery photography of places that although I may want to travel to, I may never see in person. The next site took me to a site featuring graffiti that thousands of people contributed to as it posted half a phrase to be completed by anyone who passed, "I wish for" I found this site particularly inspiring as i saw many of my own hopes written by others, as well as some very comical while others were very deep, and of course "world peace" was written more than once. As an animal lover, i quickly added this as an interest and came across a story about "Faith," a two legged dog that now travels the world as an inspirational story. The vast possibilities of sites that will pop up next is unbelievable.

I then added various literature based interests to stumbleupon. The sites available included everything from daily quotes, ebooks, and poems, to lesson ideas for teachers. One site I found particularly interesting was focused on literary tattoos. Individuals from all over the world posted pictures of various quotes covering their bodies. "So it goes" from Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five is one of the most frequently tattooed phrases, as over 100 tattoos appeared on this site. Although I'm not sure I would show that site to middle and high school students, it was amazing to me to see how passionate so many people are about literature.

I believe stumbleupon is a great site for students to visit, and like myself, spend hours seeing what is available on the web. I am able to find quotes from authors that I might have difficulty tracking down, as well as images to use when words fall short. By starting with one or two topics, you can easily broaden your initial knowledge, and even find related issues that you knew nothing about. Starting a search is simple, however finding relevant material to that search can be increasingly difficult given a google search can result in over 25,000 results, sorted by date, not relevance. Stumbleupon provides a way for individuals to look at one site after another that is not only relevant but also fascinating. Not only that, but being able to jump from a contemporary poem about loss to a view of a waterfall allows the mind to flow with the click of the "stumble" button.