Monthly Archives: February 2012
Badge: Today’s Leading Women
When strong women are discussed, historical figures such as Juliette Low are used as examples. Living examples of strong women usually include Hilary Clinton and Oprah Winfrey.
To connect with today’s women, we need to introduce women who are real to us. Women we can communicate with. Women our girls can follow as role models. This badge program features women who are making a difference today —who are changing our world.
Each step features one of these women. Explore her world, listen to her voice and learn about her life. Find one or more of these women you can identify with. If none speaks to you, explore the Web for other women to connect with. Share your findings with your kids or other adults.
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Steps
1. Ishita Gupta — ishitagupta.com / fearlessstories.com
Ishita is an author, blogger and speaker. She founded and runs Fear.less magazine which features authors, entrepreneurs, artists and many others — all centered around the theme of overcoming fear.
2. Marie Forleo — marieforleo.com
Marie helps women entrepreneurs with their businesses as well as their lives. She is an author, speaker, entrepreneur, Nike Athlete, fitness personality and dancer / choreographer. Her current project is “Rich, Happy & Hot™” which empowers women.
3. Susan Piver — susanpiver.com
Susan is a writer and teacher who also practices Buddhism. She did not go to college, but she is a success with her business, Padma Media, which works with authors to create book packages as well as consulting.
4. Danielle Laporte — whitehottruth.com
Danielle is a writer, speaker and business advisor. Like Susan, she didn’t go to college, which to her is a positive thing. She is interested in the truth, reality and the power of good feelings.
5. Patti Digh — pattidigh.com / 37days.typepad.com
Patti is a mother, writer and speaker on global leadership and diversity. She is a co-founder of The Circle Project (thecircleproject.com). Her passion is educating others on personal and societal costs of exclusion and discrimination.
6. Colleen Wainwright — communicatrix.com
Colleen is a writer and speaker who started as a TV copywriter for ads as well as acting in them. She now does marketing consultancy utilizing social media.
7. Jen Louden — jenniferlouden.com
The subtitle to Jen’s site is “Save and Serve the World.” Jennifer writes books on well-being and personal wisdom. She also hosts women’s retreats, studies yoga and meditation, and has been on Oprah.
8. Mama Gena — mamagenas.com
Women are the greatest untapped natural resource in the world. Mama Gena’s School of Womanly Arts trains women to use the power of pleasure to have their way with the world.
9. Jena La Flamme — pleasurableweightloss.com
Jena is a weight loss coach. Check out her blog to find out tips and helpful advice.
10. Sonia Simone — remarkable-communication.com
Sonia is a “relationship counselor for businesses” as well as a senior editor for Copyblogger (copyblogger.com). She offers free e-classes to market your business or yourself.
11. Gina Trapani — ginatrapani.org
Gina is best known for Lifehacker. She develops applications and writes about technology. She is incredibly busy, so you can follow one of her many projects to find out more about her.
12. Maria Thomas — www.mariathomas.org
Maria is an advisor and consultant who works to build branding with entrepreneurs and legacy businesses. She has worked with Amazon and Etsy to name just two of the organizations she’s helped.
13. TED — www.ted.com
“Ideas worth spreading” is TED’s tagline. If you didn’t find someone to inspire you from the list above, visit TED and find a woman who sees the world as you do, challenges your perceptions or even speaks to your soul.
14. Share your strong female role model.
The above list is a small sample of women I find inspiring or were recommended by others for this badge program. Share the women you follow online by replying to the badge program on our blog, larajla.com, or on Facebook, www.facebook.com/pages/Adult-Enrichment-Project/118595491548017.
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Sites to Explore
All sites for this badge program are listed in the steps above.
Badge: Today’s Leading Men
History is filled with many male figures. Especially our male youth can benefit from learning about strong men today. This is especially true if they can follow / communicate with them.
This badge program features men who are making a difference today —who are changing our world.
Each step features one of these men. Explore his world, listen to his voice and learn about his life. Find one or more of these men you can identify with. If none speaks to you, explore the Web for other men to connect with. Share your findings with your kids or other adults.
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Steps
1. Seth Godin — sethgodin.com / sethgodin.typepad.com
Seth is a writer, speaker, entrepreneur and more! He has been called “America’s Greatest Marketer”, pioneering permission marketing. He worked at Yahoo! when his first Internet company, Yoyodyne, was purchased by them. He pushed against the traditional publishing model with his “Domino Project” and his latest company, Squidoo.com, is ranked as one of the top US web sites.
2. Brian Clark — copyblogger.com
Brian is founder of Copyblogger and CEO of Copyblogger Media. He is an entrepreneur and formerly an attorney. Copyblogger is frequently listed as one of the top marketing blogs and Brian is frequently listed as one of the top online marketers.
NOTE: Brian has recently started Entreproducer (entreproducer.com) to help entrepreneurs in digital media.
3. Karl Staib — partybizconnect.com
Karl helps companies build great relationships one person at a time. He likes to throw “Twitter Parties” as part of his social media solution.
4. Sean Platt — ghostwriterdad.com
Sean has been a writer and entrepreneur since the age of 10. He is a co-founder of CIMedia and Creative Director at REV Media Marketing. His writing includes everything from children’s books to horror novels. He has also published on some of the largest blogs on the Web.
5. Richard Branson — www.virgin.com/richard-branson/blog
Richard founded Virgin as a mail order record retailer in 1970. Today, there are around 200 companies in the Virgin Group.
He is also very active in service including Virgin Unite, a not-for-profit entrepreneurial foundation.
6. Guy Kawasaki — www.guykawasaki.com
Guy’s blog is “How to Change the World.” He is a best-selling author, co-founder of “alltop.com” and has over 33 thousand followers on Facebook for his latest book, Enchantment. His experience has come from previously being the chief evangelist at Apple.
7. Mitch Joel — www.twistimage.com/blog
Mitch is a publicist and journalist. He has been called the “Rock Star of Digital Marketing.” He is the president of Twist Image, which has been named one of the top ten agencies in Canada for two years.
8. Jon Stewart — www.thedailyshow.com
Jon Stewart uses comedy to poke fun at politics on his “Daily Show” on Comedy Central. He is always up-to-date on the political world.
9. Pete Cashmore — petecashmore.com
At the age of 19, Pete founded Mashable, a site focused on social media news. He writes a weekly column on technology and social media at CNN. He is also one of Twitter’s most-followed members. He has numerous awards and recognitions in relation with the change he has initiated.
10. Jimmy Wales — jimmywales.com
Jimmy is the founder of Wikipedia. He is a technology visionary. “Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge. That’s what we’re doing.”
11. TED — www.ted.com
“Ideas worth spreading” is TED’s tagline. If you didn’t find someone to inspire you from the list above, visit TED and find a man who sees the world as you do, challenges your perceptions or even speaks to your soul.
12. Share your strong male role model.
The above list is a small sample of men I find inspiring or were recommended by others for this badge program. Share the men you follow online by replying to the badge program on our blog, larajla.com, or on Facebook, www.facebook.com/pages/Adult-Enrichment-Project/118595491548017.
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Sites to Explore
All sites for this badge program are listed in the steps above.
Badge: Connection Revolution
For a hundred years, the world has been consumed with mass — manufacturing, advertising and education. We’re at the beginning of a new revolution – the connection revolution. Your chance to change the world has never been greater. Let’s look at the mass and how it is moving to connection . . . and how you can become connected.
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Steps
1. Take a listen.
upmarket.squidoo.com/2012/02/08/we-are-all-weird
This interview with Seth Godin on his book, We Are All Weird, will start you thinking about the Connection Revolution. This interview is about 25 minutes. If you are interested, check out his book as well.
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Looking back — mass manufacturing
2. No choice.
How often have you purchased stuff because “it’s the next thing”? Have you gone Christmas shopping to find that one gift your child (grandchild) had to have? This is big business at its worst – creating an artificial demand to drive purchasing.
3. Full choice.
Do a search online for things you are interested in. Find small businesses that provide what the large ones cannot. These are “niche” businesses. While many “mass” businesses are struggling, these small businesses are thriving. Did you find any niches that were underrepresented? Can you picture yourself starting a niche business?
4. The music industry.
The music industry was controlled by corporations and middlemen with the actual artist not maintaining copyright to his / her music and usually making very little money. Compare it with music today. Many musicians can record their music themselves, eliminating the cost of the “mass” and doing what they truly want. Today’s musicians connect with people interested in their music and have to sell a lot less. Find a musician online that has a small following that you might purchase music from.
5. The publishing industry — newspapers.
Why purchase a newspaper when you can have the news sent to you? You can also decide what news interests you so you’re not overwhelmed with news. The decline in newspapers started before the Internet. How do you get your news? How much do you get from newspapers versus television versus the Web?
6. The publishing industry — books.
Amazon’s Kindle and other ebook readers are fueling the move from expensive print books to lower cost (and more easily stored) eBooks. Check out the Domino Project for a new take on publishing.
If you’re a writer, you can self-publish with sites like LuLu and Smashwords. With everyone able to self-publish, the quality of books will go down as the quantity goes up. Check out a few self-publishing sites and see if this is something you might be interested in doing.
7. SOPA.
SOPA is just one piece of legislation that big business is sponsoring to keep control, to keep the world the way it was, to keep “mass”. Explore other ways the government and big business are trying to maintain control of our lives.
8. Etsy.
www.etsy.com
Etsy is a marketplace for handmade, unique items. In the mass marketplace, it couldn’t exist. Today, anyone can start their own business. Look through some of the businesses on Etsy see if any of these fit your own interests.
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Looking back — mass advertising
9. Television advertising.
Television advertising is the voice of mass manufacturing – artificially planting the “must haves” of our lives. How have commercials changed? Sites like Hulu offer free viewing of shows, but commercials are now there as well. The difference is Hulu asks you if the advertisement is pertinent to you. Compare today’s commercials with those of ten, twenty or thirty years ago.
10. Social media.
Social media is all about spreading ideas. From Facebook to Pinterest, we can all connect with friends and spread our likes and dislikes. Even if we do not support a business with purchases, we can share information about it. Look back over your communications online. How many times have you looked at a small business on the word of your online friends?
11. Facebook.
www.facebook.com
Is Facebook the look of the future? Instead of targeting millions of households because you can afford to spend millions of dollars, Facebook allows advertisers to target those individuals interested in the items they are offering by using your likes, profile, etc. For a week, watch the advertising that comes up when you log into Facebook. How many of these ads interest you?
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Looking back – mass education
12. People as a cog in the machine.
Our current educational system is all about each person learning the same thing so each of us can be part of the machine of mass production. Look at the educational requirements for your state. Think about the classes each student must take to get a high school diploma. How many of these will really help them in the future? What classes would be a better fit for our kids?
13. No child left behind.
This legislation has managed to put a stranglehold on our educational system. The number of charter schools is growing to help the individual over the mass. Read about this legislation and the growing number of alternative educational choices for our youth.
14. Youth groups.
Scouting, sports groups and other non-educational groups are picking up the slack of our failing educational system. Each supports its own niche while some try to cover a variety of skills that our youth will need in the future. Look at one or more youth groups and see what it / they have to offer.
15. College degree.
The cost of a college degree often is more than the cost of a new car . . . sometimes more than a house. This puts a strain on the new graduate who needs a job to pay off the loans or his / her parents who postpone retirement due to the cost. A college degree means you can sit in a class and take a test, but how much translates to the real world? Look at your own life and explore what you learned and how much was a waste of your resources vs. how much you actually took into the real world.
16. Today’s changes.
Universities and colleges are looking for a new ways to provide education and experience. Unlike mass manufacturing and advertising, the educational system is working to move into the connection revolution. Programs like MIT’s Open Course Ware allow you to get education for free. Mozilla’s P2PU (peer-to-peer university) allows people to educate each other. Review the offerings from one of these or the other numerous free courses available online to see what you can find that interests you.
NOTE: One item higher education is looking at is earning badges that highlight skills learned instead of a certificate. Read about “badges for skills” to find out about one possible change to our educational system.
17. Educating our youth.
We need to work to educate our children on the new world . . . the connected world. To help share this idea, we need to understand the connection revolution. We need to give them a view of the world as it is now. As this revolution continues, the world will change and we do not know what the “next big thing” will be. Perhaps it is you or your kids who start the next big change.
18. Connection is key.
The only way to teach connection is to be connected. Look at one of the social media sites you belong to. Learn more about it. Follow what others are doing. Join the conversation.
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Sites to Explore
upmarket.squidoo.com/2012/02/08/we-are-all-weird
musiciansexchangeonline.com
www.makeuseof.com/tag/10-music-services-search-engines-discover-music-musicians-bands
thefutureofpublishing.com/industries/the-future-of-newspapers
www.thedominoproject.com
www.lulu.com
www.smashwords.com
www.etsy.com
www.bestoldcommercials.com
www.classictvads.com/classicindex.shtml
www.facebook.com
www.pinterest.com
www.edweek.org/topics/nochildleftbehind/index.html
ocw.mit.edu/index.htm
p2pu.org/en
wiki.mozilla.org/Badges
www.nytimes.com/2011/11/20/business/digital-badges-may-highlight-job-seekers-skills.html
trendwatching.com/trends/massmingling
www.dachisgroup.com/2011/11/the-connected-customer
www.cluetrain.com/#manifesto
Are you a writer?
If you are interested in writing, I suggest checking out Brian Clark’s latest endeavor — Entreproducer.
Here’s a link to the first post!
http://entreproducer.com/author-entrepreneur/#comment-112
Traditional publishing is no longer the way to go! Look at taking your writing and becoming a publisher of your own work.
NOTE: Brian is mentioned in one of our upcoming badge programs, Today’s Leading Men.
End of the Industrial Revolution
The world the industrial revolution built is crumbling.
You are doing a disservice to yourself and your kids by not learning something new — by not helping them find what they are passionate about.
The largest group of entrepreneurs are in the 18-24 age range.
The good news is it’s not too late — for them or you.
Badge: Quilling
Quilling is a paper craft that’s been around for hundreds of years. The tools you need are minimal and the final effect is very cool. You can use quilled items for cards, jewelry, ornaments and more. Let’s start rolling!
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Steps
1. Introduction
Quilling, also known as paper filigree, is a paper craft that involves strips of paper that you roll, shape and glue to create art. It might be as simple as a flower bud or a complicated three-dimensional ornament. This craft can be very easy as you can purchase pre-cut paper strips or it can be very economical by making your own supplies and tools.
2. History.
Many countries claim to be the originator of quilling. Unlike many old crafts, quilling did not vanish over time. Instead, resurgence has kept this craft alive. Read about the history of quilling and its growing popularity today.
3. Explore the Web.
From lessons to patterns to very intricate art, you can find a lot of examples of quilling. Explore the Web and find one or more items that you would like to try yourself.
4. Tools.
You can do quilling with only three items.
- Paper
- Glue
- Needle
Of course, there are many other tools out there that make it easier to quill as well as do more complicated filigree. Look at the tools you might use. Decide if you want to invest in this craft or start with your three main items only and see if you enjoy quilling before making a larger investment.
5. Simple shapes — rolls.
With the Simple Shapes Worksheet, make one sample of each of the thirteen rolls. Glue your samples onto the sheet for reference. If you need more help with the shapes, go to YouTube for video instructions.
6. Simple shapes — scrolls.
With the Simple Shapes Worksheet, make one sample of each of the five scrolls. Glue your samples onto the sheet for reference. If you need more help with the shapes, go to YouTube for video instructions.
7. Simple shapes — spirals.
A spiral may also be called a tendril. Unlike most shapes that tend to hold the same spiral, these are long, twisting pieces of paper. You might think of spiral curls as an example. Create a spiral / tendril and attach it to your Simple Shapes Worksheet.
Slide your completed worksheet into a sheet protector so you continue to use this reference sheet.
8. Making items with simple shapes.
Use your basic quilling knowledge and make simple items such as a flower or balloon. Single shapes can be placed on cards, scrapbook pages or even made into pendants and earrings. For jewelry pieces, make sure to seal the paper first to stiffen it and keep it clean.
9. Advanced shapes — rolls.
With the Advanced Shapes Worksheet, make one sample of each of the two rolls. Glue your samples onto the sheet for reference. If you need more help with what the shapes, go to YouTube for video instructions.
10. Advanced shapes — scrolls.
With the Advanced Shapes Worksheet, make one sample of each of the five scrolls. Glue your samples onto the sheet for reference. If you need more help with the shapes, go to YouTube for video instructions.
11. Advanced shapes — eccentric.
With the Advanced Shapes Worksheet, make one sample of each of the seven eccentrics. Unlike the shapes you’ve created so far, eccentrics follow the same shape guidelines but you control where the center of the roll is placed. This gives your final quilled piece a more “artistic” and less “haphazard” look. Glue your samples onto the sheet for reference. If you need more help with the shapes, go to YouTube for video instructions.
12. Technique — husking.
Husking is the next step after eccentrics. Where you control the center of an eccentric, husking is wrapping the paper around points to create a shape. Husking is popular for leaves to give them a more structured look. Try creating a husking shape. Place it on your sheet or write notes about any tips / tricks you want to remember.
13. Technique — fringing.
Fringing is cutting down into the side of the strip to make a fringe. Fringing can be done by hand, but it is very tedious. Fringe a strip of paper, then roll it and loosen up your fringe. Place this on your Advanced Shapes Worksheet as well.
NOTE: The cost of a fringer may not be worth it for you if you don’t plan to use it frequently. The time savings is enormous if you choose to get one.
14. Making more advanced items.
Follow the simple pattern ideas, but use the advanced shapes you created. Compare the looks and decide which you like more.
15. Changing it up!
Traditionally, paper is used for quilling. However, you can find quilled items where corrugated cardboard and felt is used instead of paper. Try creating one or more of the shapes above with a material other than paper.
16. Share your knowledge.
Show someone else how to quill. If you’re working with a large group, a tinker toy works great to roll paper on as everyone can see it.
17. Share your work.
Share what you’ve created with others. You can send cards you’ve made or even photos of quilled items you’ve completed.
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Supplements Available
SUPP_Quill_AdvancedShapeWorksheet.pdf
Sheet to make sample advanced shapes for reference.
SUPP_Quill_BasicInfo.pdf
Basic tools and tips for quilling.
SUPP_Quill_SimplePatterns.pdf
Flowers, balloons and butterflies to get you started.
SUPP_Quill_SimpleShapeWorksheet.pdf
Sheet to make sample simple shapes for reference.
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