title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Claire Beauchamp Randall Fraser - The series' main character. Claire was a British combat nurse during World War II who traveled back through time and originally met Jamie Fraser in 1743 Scotland. Trained as a surgeon in 1968 Boston, she traveled back in time to reunite with Jamie Fraser. Married to Jamie and mother of Brianna, foster mother of Fergus, and stepmother to Marsali.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: James "Jamie" MacKenzie Fraser - Laird of Fraser's Ridge, North Carolina. Former inmate of Ardsmuir Prison. Claire's 18th century husband who was a Scottish Jacobite leader, later printer & smuggler, and foster father of Fergus-Claudel Fraser, stepfather of Marsali MacKimmie Fraser, and biological father of Brianna and William (although William was conceived out of wedlock and does not know that Jamie is his real father).


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Brianna “Bree” Randall Fraser MacKenzie - Jamie and Claire's daughter born in the 20th century and raised by Claire and Frank Randall. Graduates from MIT after transferring from the Harvard University history program. An "inventor" who likes to make things that she knew in the 20th century. She marries Roger and they have two children: a son, Jeremiah, known as "Jemmy", and a daughter, Amanda (Mandy).


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Roger MacKenzie Wakefield - Jamie and Claire's son-in-law who, like Brianna, was born in the 20th century. An Oxford history professor who leaves his life and career behind to follow Brianna. Married to Brianna and father of Jemmy and Mandy.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Jeremiah "Jemmy" MacKenzie - Roger and Brianna's son (there was some doubt about his paternity but this is now resolved).


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Fergus Claudel Fraser - One-time French pickpocket and spy. Jamie and Claire's foster son. First appears in Dragonfly in Amber. Married to Marsali.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Marsali Mackenzie Fraser - Laoghaire's daughter and Jamie and Claire's stepdaughter. First appears in Voyager. Married to Fergus and mother to Germain, Joan, Félicite and Henri Christian.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Ian Murray - Jenny and Ian Murray's son and Jamie's nephew. Was married to 'Emily' Works With Her Hands of the Mohawk, but returns to the Ridge with only Rollo, his half-wolf canine companion.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Lizzie Wemyss - Brianna's bond servant. Joseph Wemyss' daughter. 'Married' to the Beardsley twins, and pregnant by one of them but unsure which one.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Josiah "Jo" Beardsley - an identical twin who was raised, malnourished, by a cruel man named Beardsley after his family died crossing the Atlantic as indentured servants. He moves with his twin to Fraser's Ridge on New Year's Eve. Falls in love with Lizzie Wemyss.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Keziah "Kezzie" Beardsley - an identical twin who is somewhat deaf. Runs a tannery with his twin. Falls in love with Lizzie Wemyss.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Tom Christie - A former inmate of Ardsmuir Prison. Malva and Alan's Father. In love with Claire. Arrives at the Ridge at the end of "The Fiery Cross".


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Colonel Lord John William Grey - The former governor of Ardsmuir Prison. Jamie's long-time friend, they first met in 1745 during the Jacobite rising. Stepfather of William Ransom, 9th Earl of Ellesmere.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Jocasta MacKenzie Cameron Innes - Sister of Ellen MacKenzie Fraser, Colum and Dougal MacKenzie. Jamie's blind aunt who owns River Run Plantation.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Stephen Bonnet - An outlaw, pirate, thief, trader, rapist, and smuggler who first appears in "Drums of Autumn". Smuggles goods along the Carolina coastlines. He was shot by Brianna at the end of "The Fiery Cross". Fate unknown.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: Amy McCallum - A young widow and a new resident of Fraser's Ridge. Mother of Aidan and Orrie McCallum. Roger MacKenzie tries to help her which causes talk on the Ridge that he and Amy are having an affair.


title: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

text: "A Breath of Snow and Ashes" debuted at #1 on "The New York Times" Hardcover Fiction Best-Seller List in 2005 and won the Quill Award for Science Fiction/Fantasy/Horror.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Richard Dale Snyder (born August 19, 1958) is an American business executive, venture capitalist, attorney, accountant, and politician who served as the 48th governor of Michigan from 2011 to 2019. A member of the Republican Party, Snyder previously served as the chairman of the board of Gateway from 2005 to 2007. He co-founded Ardesta, LLC, a venture capital firm, and HealthMedia, Inc., a digital health coaching company, both based in Ann Arbor, Michigan.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Snyder was considered a possible Republican Party candidate for Vice President of the United States in 2012, although ultimately Paul Ryan was selected. On February 3, 2014, Snyder announced his candidacy for re-election as Governor of Michigan in 2014. He was elected to a second term in the November 2014 vote, defeating his major challenger, Democrat Mark Schauer. Snyder was term-limited and could not seek re-election in 2018. He was succeeded on New Year's Day of 2019 by Democrat Gretchen Whitmer.


title: Rick Snyder

text: He gained national attention during the Flint water crisis, in which he was accused of mishandling the situation that exposed 6,000 to 12,000 Flint children to lead. A report by the University of Michigan School of Public Health concluded Snyder "bears significant legal responsibility" for the Flint water crisis. On April 16, 2020, an article was published in "Vice" giving details of evidence of corruption, and a cover-up by Snyder, including details of how he was warned repeatedly about the dangerous effects of the decisions he had made about the water supply to the city of Flint. In January 2021, Snyder was among those charged for his role in the crisis.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Snyder was born to Dale F. and Helen Louella Snyder in Battle Creek, Michigan, where he was raised. His father owned a local window-cleaning company in Battle Creek, and was of paternal Dutch descent. He has an elder sister. When he was 16, he took a business class at Kellogg Community College on weekends. By his senior year at Lakeview High School in Calhoun County, Snyder had earned 23 college credits.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Snyder visited the admissions office of the University of Michigan in November 1975 and spoke with the admissions director, who recommended that Snyder attend Michigan and create his own degree. Snyder received a Bachelor of General Studies in 1977, a Master of Business Administration in 1979, and a Juris Doctor in 1982, all from the University of Michigan. Snyder is also a Certified Public Accountant (CPA).


title: Rick Snyder

text: He resides in Ann Arbor, Michigan with his wife Sue and their three children and has a vacation home near Gun Lake. The couple were married in 1987 at Cherry Hill Presbyterian Church in Dearborn, Michigan. Snyder has indicated he is a practicing Presbyterian.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Snyder was employed with Coopers & Lybrand, from 1982 to 1991, beginning in the tax department of the Detroit office. Snyder was named partner in 1988. The next year, Snyder was named partner-in-charge of the mergers and acquisitions practice in the Chicago office. He served as an adjunct assistant professor of accounting at the University of Michigan from 1982 to 1984.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Snyder joined the computer company Gateway (based in Irvine, California) in 1991 as the executive vice president. He served as president and chief operating officer from 1996 to 1997. He remained on the board of directors until 2007. From 2005 to 2007, Snyder served as the chairman of the board. During 2006, Snyder served as interim chief executive officer while a search for a permanent replacement was made. His tenure on the Gateway board ran from 1991 to 2007 until Gateway was sold to Acer Inc. Snyder stated that he did not vote for outsourcing while he was a Gateway board director and he worked to bring jobs to America as the interim CEO of Gateway.


title: Rick Snyder

text: In 1997, Snyder returned to Ann Arbor to found Avalon Investments Inc., a venture capital company with a $100 million fund, along with the co-founder of Gateway, Ted Waitt. Snyder was president and chief executive officer of Avalon from 1997 to 2000. He then co-founded Ardesta LLC, an investment firm, in 2000 along with three co-founders, which invested in 20 start-up companies through 2011. He was chairman and chief executive officer of the company.


title: Rick Snyder

text: In 1998, Snyder angel funded and co-founded, with University of Michigan (U-M) School of Public Health professor Victor Strecher, Ph.D., HealthMedia Incorporated (HMI), a developer of digital health coaching applications that implemented tailored questionnaires to gather personal information with the goal of creating customized health promotion plans for individuals. The U-M's Office of Technology Transfer played an integral role in helping HMI get started with Vic Strecher as the founding CEO and the U-M's publicly funded Health Media Research Laboratory (founded and directed by Strecher and now called the Center for Health Communications Research) providing the new company with exclusive research and development findings into health-related computerized tailored messaging and the exclusive licence to sell that content (UM spawns spinoffs, patents). Despite these university-based start-up and R&D advantages, HMI got off to a poor performance start and in 2001 Snyder replaced the founding CEO (Strecher remained on the HMI board) and personally rescued the company from insolvency with more of his own money. After multiple rounds of more additional financing through venture capital (Arboretum Ventures, Ardesta, Avalon Capital Group, AvTech Ventures, Chrysalis Ventures, Princeton Fund) and yet never achieving profitability, HMI was sold in 2008 for a reported $200 million to Johnson & Johnson. The sale of HMI transferred the ownership of all the personal health information accrued from their millions of users to Johnson & Johnson and played a key role in the negotiated price. At the time of the reported $200 million deal, U-M President Mary Sue Coleman was on Johnson & Johnson's board of directors and the U-M secured millions of dollars with its equity stake in the company. When campaigning for Michigan governor in 2010, Snyder was quoted as saying, "That company (HMI) is one of the best success stories in the state." (Office of Technology Transfer – University of Michigan) (The Ann Arbor Chronicle | Live at PJ’s: It’s HealthMedia!). Following Snyder's election as Michigan governor, Johnson & Johnson then folded HMI into a subsidiary (Johnson & Johnson Health and Wellness Solutions) and is no longer operating in the state of Michigan.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Snyder serves on the boards of the Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village (a National Historic Landmark), the Michigan chapter of the Nature Conservancy, and several boards associated with his alma mater the University of Michigan. He was also first chair of the Michigan Economic Development Corporation in 1999 under Republican governor John Engler and was also the chair of Ann Arbor SPARK.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Snyder competed with Oakland County Sheriff Mike Bouchard, state Senator Tom George, United States Congressman Peter Hoekstra, and Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox as candidates for the Republican gubernatorial nomination. Bill Ford Jr., chairman of the Ford Motor Company, endorsed Snyder for the Republican nomination for governor. He campaigned as "pro-life, pro-Second Amendment, [and] pro-family," with a focus on the economy. His campaign emphasized his experience in growing business and creating jobs in the private sector, saying that his opponents were mainly career politicians. Snyder favors the standard exceptions on abortion for rape, incest, and saving the life of the mother (he signed legislation banning partial birth abortion in October 2011); he opposes federal funding of abortions; he would not ban embryonic stem cell research; he supports upholding traditional marriage, but would allow civil unions.


title: Rick Snyder

text: In August 2010, Snyder won the primary to secure the Republican nomination with a plurality of 36% of the vote. In the general election in November, Snyder faced Democratic nominee Virg Bernero, the mayor of Lansing, and three minor party candidates. In October 2010, Snyder's campaign total exceeded $11.6 million, outpacing his opponent. Snyder released his tax returns for 2007 and 2008. Snyder won with 58 percent of the vote.


title: Rick Snyder

text: With Snyder's election in 2010, Republicans gained a majority in the Michigan House and increased the Republican majority held in the Michigan Senate. Snyder was the first Certified Public Accountant (CPA) to be elected governor of the state and at the time, the only CPA to serve as a governor in the United States.


title: Rick Snyder

text: In January 2014, Snyder launched his campaign for a second term as governor. He was unopposed in the Republican primary and faced Democratic former United States Representative Mark Schauer for the general election. Snyder was considered vulnerable in his bid for a second term, as reflected in his low approval ratings, however, Schauer suffered from a lack of name recognition. He garnered approximately 51% of the vote in the November 2014 election, defeating Schauer and earning a second term.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Snyder was inaugurated as governor on January 1, 2011, at the Capitol in Lansing. His first executive order as governor was to divide the Department of Natural Resources and Environment into two distinct departments as they were a few years before: the Department of Natural Resources and the Department of Environmental Quality.


title: Rick Snyder

text: On January 7, 2011, Snyder announced he was appointing Michigan Supreme Court Justice Maura D. Corrigan to head the Department of Human Services and appointed Michigan Appeals Court Judge Brian K. Zahra to fill the resulting Supreme Court vacancy. Snyder delivered his first State of the State address on January 19, the earliest Michigan State of the State since Governor John Engler's 1996 address on January 17. He endorsed the Detroit River International Crossing for the first time publicly in the address, which was received favorably by Republicans. Snyder appointed Andy Dillon, a pro-life Democrat, and formerly Speaker of the House, to serve as state treasurer in his administration.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Snyder presented his first budget to the legislature on February 17, 2011, calling it a plan for "Michigan's reinvention," and saying it would end Michigan's deficits. He described the budget as containing "shared sacrifice" but added that his budget plan would create jobs and spur economic growth. The $46 billion budget reduced $1.8 billion in spending, raised taxes by eliminating tax exemptions on pensions, while at the same time abolished the state's complex business tax, replacing it with a significantly reduced flat tax on the profits of C corporations. This shift in tax burden led State Senate Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer to criticize the budget, saying that it did not involve "shared sacrifice," but instead was balanced "on the backs of our kids, working families, and our seniors" and "picks out who he's willing to leave behind." Snyder supported the government backed rescue of the American auto industry. This reflected the view of a 56% of Americans in 2012 who supported the 2009 auto bailout according to a Pew Research Center poll (63% support in Michigan).


title: Rick Snyder

text: On March 16, 2011, Snyder signed a controversial bill into law that gave increased powers to emergency managers of local municipalities to resolve financial matters. The bill was repealed by voter initiative in November 2012. However, weeks later in December 2012 Snyder signed a revised version of the bill back into law.


title: Rick Snyder

text: On December 22, 2011, Snyder signed into law The Public Employee Domestic Partner Benefit Restriction Act, which prevents the same-sex domestic partners of public employees at both the state and local level from receiving health benefits. In January 2012, the ACLU filed a lawsuit against Snyder and the state of Michigan in federal court on behalf of five Michigan same-sex couples, each with one spouse working for local public schools or municipalities in Michigan. The suit alleged that the law violates the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. On June 28, 2013, a federal judge struck down the law. He has also engaged in trade missions to Europe and Asia, focused on attracting attention on companies such as Chrysler.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Following approval from the legislature, Snyder signed the fiscal year 2012 budget in June, the earliest it had been completed in three decades. In May 2012, Snyder joined a bipartisan effort urging the U.S. Congress to pass a measure to affirm that States can collect sales taxes on online purchases.


title: Rick Snyder

text: As governor, Snyder abolished the state's complex business tax in favor of a flat tax, and signed a bill which raised taxes by eliminating tax exemptions for pensions. For years Snyder had said anti-union legislation was not on his agenda, when on the morning of December 6, 2012, during a lame duck session of the Republican-controlled Michigan legislature, Snyder called a joint press conference with the legislative leadership to announce fast-track right-to-work legislation. The legislation passed both houses of the Michigan legislature that day, without committee votes or public hearings. A $1 million appropriation added to the legislation made it ineligible for repeal via referendum. On December 10, President Barack Obama visited Daimler AG's Detroit Diesel factory in Redford, Michigan, and told employees the legislation was about the "right to work for less money." The law effectively provides that payment of union dues cannot be required as a condition of employment. After a required four-day wait between the houses of the legislature passing each other's bills, Snyder signed the legislation into law on December 11, 2012, making Michigan the 24th right-to-work state in the United States as part of a plan to attract business and jobs to the state. The Employee Free Choice Act, as it was named, has received mixed results in polls.


title: Rick Snyder

text: A Market Research Group poll conducted in March 2012 showed Snyder's approval rating rising to 50% among likely voters, which matched that of President Barack Obama, placing Snyder among the most popular Republican governors in states carried by Obama in the 2008 election cycle. Snyder was briefly mentioned as a possible pick to be the Republican Party candidate for Vice President of the United States in 2012. His business executive background and 'positive' style were cited as political assets, with his deeds seen as strengthening the case for electing a business executive candidate as President of the United States. He was also mentioned as a potential Republican Party candidate for President of the United States in 2016.


title: Rick Snyder

text: In December 2012, Snyder signed legislation requiring facilities where at least 120 abortions were performed annually to obtain a state license as freestanding surgical facilities. Planned Parenthood had urged Snyder to veto the bill claiming it unnecessarily increases costs.


title: Rick Snyder

text: In January 2013, Snyder traveled to Israel to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He was last in Israel in 1999 as a venture capitalist. "I had a chance to see the start of high-tech boom in Israel and that's great to see. This is really a startup nation. They've done a great job of being entrepreneurial, innovative, and that's a major part of their economy now and the good part is we can learn from that."


title: Rick Snyder

text: In March 2013, Snyder announced a financial emergency for the city of Detroit and appointed an emergency manager, Kevyn Orr. As a result of emergency manager appointments under Snyder's watch, over half of the state's black population lived in cities where the local government was appointed rather than elected by the voters.


title: Rick Snyder

text: On December 27, 2013, Snyder signed a bill into law which nullified Section 1021 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012, which contained a controversial provision that allowed the government and the military to indefinitely detain American citizens and others without trial.


title: Rick Snyder

text: On January 23, 2014, Snyder announced plans to offer visas to 50,000 immigrant workers with advanced degrees to help jumpstart the Detroit economy. The program's advocates claimed the program was expected to bring an influx of new jobs and a more stable tax base.


title: Rick Snyder

text: In June 2014, Snyder appointed a 15-member commission for improving and reforming Michigan's public defense efforts for the poor in the criminal justice system in order to effectively meet and ensure the rights safeguarded by the Constitution.


title: Rick Snyder

text: On September 10, Detroit reached a deal with three Michigan counties over regional water and sewer services that was hoped to eliminate one roadblock to federal court approval of the city's plan to adjust its debt and exit bankruptcy. The deal with Oakland, Wayne and Macomb counties created a regional water and sewer authority, but allowed Detroit to maintain control of its local system. The deal was crucial to adjusting the city's $18 billion of debt and exiting the biggest-ever municipal bankruptcy.


title: Rick Snyder

text: On December 18, the Governor issued an executive order to establish the Michigan Department of Talent and Economic Development to house a new state agency, Talent Investment Agency, created from the merger of Michigan State Housing and Development Authority, the Workforce Development Agency, the Governor's Talent Investment Board and the Unemployment Insurance Agency. Over objections from the state legislature, the department would come into effect 60 days after the start of the next legislative session.


title: Rick Snyder

text: In November 2015, Governor Rick Snyder declared his opposition to permitting Syrian refugee relocation to the state of Michigan.


title: Rick Snyder

text: A compilation of online surveys showed that Snyder's approval rating was below 40 percent in April 2018.


title: Rick Snyder

text: From 2011 to 2015, Snyder appointed several individuals as Emergency Managers for Flint, Michigan. In 2014, emergency manager Darnell Earley was responsible for changing the source of drinking water for the city to the Flint River, which has trihalomethanes (TTHM) in it. It was later discovered that the water was too corrosive, and leached lead out of the service lines that was then ingested by the people of the city. In September 2015, a study by the Hurley Medical Center found that the community's children were being poisoned by the lead. While Flint transitioned back to its prior source of water in October 2015, lead levels in the city's water remain above the federal action level.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Amid allegations that the Michigan Health Department was stalling water treatment expert Marc Edwards' effort to obtain public records, journalists have asked when the State of Michigan knew about the lead poisoning. Details were released by the "Detroit Free Press" and "The Detroit News" on 26 February 2016 that Valerie Brader, Snyder's senior policy adviser and deputy legal counsel, and his chief legal counsel Mike Gadola had expressed concerns to him about Flint's water in October 2014, nearly six months after Flint had begun using the river water to save money, despite Governor Snyder claiming he was unaware of the issue until very recently.


title: Rick Snyder

text: A petition from Angelo Scott Brown, a Flint pastor and former Democratic Party gubernatorial candidate, to recall Snyder was denied by the Board of State Canvassers. Filmmaker and Flint native Michael Moore has called for Snyder's arrest on charges of corruption and assault, and has started a petition on his website.


title: Rick Snyder

text: On November 13, 2015, four families filed a federal class action lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan in Detroit against Snyder and thirteen other city and state officials, including former Flint Mayor Dayne Walling and ex-emergency financial manager Darnell Earley. The complaint alleges that the officials acted recklessly and negligently, leading to serious injuries from lead poisoning, including autoimmune disorders, skin lesions, and "brain fog."


title: Rick Snyder

text: On December 15, 2015, Mayor Weaver declared the water issue as a citywide public health state of emergency to prompt help from state and federal officials. Snyder apologized for the incident. Snyder declared a State of Emergency on January 5, 2016, for Genesee County, Michigan.


title: Rick Snyder

text: On January 16, 2016, Snyder requested that the federal government declare a state of emergency in Flint.


title: Rick Snyder

text: According to "The Detroit News" and NPR, "...in March 2016 Snyder released a new 75-point action plan to address the contamination crisis, calling for a “much higher standard” for drinking water regulations but stopping short of advocating for complete replacement of all underground lead service lines in the city. The plan included short-, intermediate- and long-term goals, including making infrastructure improvements; creating a data-sharing agreement with state and federal environmental agencies; and setting up a protocol for a “drinkability declaration” for Flint water."


title: Rick Snyder

text: In mid-April 2016, Snyder initiated his own 30-Day Flint Challenge. "The plan was to drink solely Flint tap water for an entire month to show residents that the water was safe and that he cared about the people." However, the Detroit Metro Times reported that the governor left town on April 23 to spend the week touring Europe for trade discussions, breaking his promise.


title: Rick Snyder

text: In July 2018, Drs Hernan Gomez of the University of Michigan and Kim Dietrich of the University of Cincinnati, toxicology and environmental health experts, published an Op-ed article in the New York Times titled “The Children of Flint were not ‘Poisoned.” In the essay article the authors referred to the findings in a study "“Toxicohistrionics”: Flint, Michigan and the Lead Crisis" published in the June issue of The Journal of Pediatrics. According to their opinion and the study, there was a small increase of children whose blood lead levels surpassed the Centers for Disease Control reference level (from 2.2 percent to 3.7 percent), but none were at a level that required urgent medical treatment."


title: Rick Snyder

text: On April 16, 2020, an article was published giving details of evidence of corruption and a cover-up by Snyder and his "fixer" Rich Baird, and saying the statute of limitations on some of the most serious felony misconduct-in-office charges would expire on April 25, 2020. The article was published by Vice News, written by Jordan Chariton and Jenn Dize, the co-founders of "Status Coup", with photos by Brittany Greeson. Responses from Michigan state authorities denied that a deadline was approaching and said that criminal prosecutions would follow.


title: Rick Snyder

text: On January 12, 2021, It was announced that nine former government officials including Rick Snyder would face charges resulting from the Flint water crisis. Snyder was charged with two misdemeanors of willful neglect but he pleaded not guilty to the charges. Following its practice of paying the legal costs for state employees charged with a criminal offense, the administrative board of Michigan approved an up to $1.45 million contract with Warner Norcross & Judd law corporation to defend the former governor Snyder.


title: Rick Snyder

text: Just before leaving the governor's office, Snyder formed a new Ann Arbor based company called RPAction LLC whose staff consists of former officials of the Snyder administration.


title: Rick Snyder

text: On June 29, 2019, Snyder accepted a soon-to-be appointment at Harvard to share his knowledge of state and local government. On July 3, he tweeted that he was "turning down" the offer: "It would have been exciting to share my experiences, both positive and negative; our current political environment and its lack of civility makes this too disruptive. I wish them the best."


title: Rick Snyder

text: Snyder endorsed Democrat Joe Biden during the 2020 United States Presidential election, alleging that "President Trump lacks a moral compass. He ignores the truth" and that the president "also demonstrated that he does not fully appreciate policy matters, including public health, the economy and foreign relations, nor does he seem to want to learn."


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: Francisco de Orellana Bejarano Pizarro y Torres de Altamirano (; 1511 – November 1546) was a Spanish explorer and conquistador. In one of the most improbably successful voyages in known history, Orellana managed to sail the length of the Amazon, arriving at the river's mouth on 24 August 1542. He and his party sailed along the Atlantic coast until reaching Cubagua Island, near the coast of Venezuela.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: Orellana founded the city of Guayaquil in what is now Ecuador, and died during a second expedition on the Amazon.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: Born in Trujillo (various birth dates, ranging from 1490 to 1511, are still quoted by biographers), Orellana was a close friend and possibly a relative of Francisco Pizarro, the Trujillo-born conquistador of Peru (his cousin, according to some historians). He traveled to the New World (probably in 1527). Orellana served in Nicaragua until joining Pizarro's army in Peru in 1533, where he supported Pizarro in his conflict with Diego de Almagro (1538). After the victory over De Almagro's men, he was appointed governor of La Culata. He re-established the town of Guayaquil, previously founded by Pizarro and repopulated by Sebastián de Belalcázar.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: In 1540 Gonzalo Pizarro arrived in Quito as vice governor and was charged by Francisco Pizarro, his older paternal half-brother, with an expedition to locate the "Land of Cinnamon", thought to be somewhere to the east. Orellana was one of Gonzalo Pizarro's lieutenants during his 1541 expedition east of Quito into the South American interior. In Quito, Gonzalo Pizarro collected a force of 220 Spaniards and 4000 natives. At the same time, as second in command, Orellana was sent back to Guayaquil to gather troops and horses. Pizarro left Quito in February 1541, just before Orellana arrived with his 23 men and horses. Orellana hurried after the main expedition, eventually contacting them in March. However, by the time the expedition had left the mountains, 3000 natives and 140 Spanish had died or deserted.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: On reaching the River Coca (a tributary of the Napo), a brigantine, the "San Pedro", was constructed to ferry the sick and supplies.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: Gonzalo Pizarro ordered him to explore the Coca River and return after finding the river's end. When they arrived at the confluence with the Napo River, his men threatened to mutiny if they did not continue. On 26 December 1541, he agreed to be elected chief of the new expedition and conquer new lands in the king's name. Orellana (with the Dominican Gaspar de Carvajal who chronicled the expedition) and 50 men set off downstream to find food. Unable to return against the current, Orellana waited for Pizarro, finally sending back three men with a message, and started constructing a second brigantine, the "Victoria". Pizarro had in the meantime returned to Quito by a more northerly route, by then with only 80 men left alive.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: After leaving the village on the Napo, Orellana continued downstream to the Amazon. The 49 men began to build a bigger ship for river navigation. During their navigation on Napo River, they were threatened constantly by the Omaguas. They reached the Negro River on 3 June 1542 and finally arrived on the Amazon River.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: At a longitude of about 69°W, Orellana and his men were involved in a skirmish with Machiparo's natives and were chased downstream. Continuing downstream, they consecutively passed the Rio de la Trinidad (possibly the Rio Juruá), the Pueblo Vicioso, the Rio Negro (named by Orellana), the Pueblo del Corpus, the Pueblo de los Quemados, and the Pueblo de la Calle at about 57°W. There they entered the territory of the Pira-tapuya.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: The name 'Amazon' is said to arise from a battle Francisco de Orellana fought with a tribe of Tapuyas. The women of the tribe fought alongside the men, as was the custom among the tribe. Orellana described the river as "the river of the Amazons", referring to the mythical Amazons of Asia described by Herodotus (see "The Histories" [4.110-116]) and Diodorus in Greek legends. A skirmish with these South American warrior women reportedly took place on 24 June 1542 while Orellana was approaching the Trombetus River, in the neighborhood of the at the junction with the River Madeira.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: At about 54°W, they stopped for 18 days to repair the boats and finally reached the open sea on 26 August 1542, and checked the boats for seaworthiness. While coasting toward Guiana, the brigs were separated until reunited at Nueva Cadiz on Cubagua island off the coast of Venezuela. The "Victoria", carrying Orellana and Carvajal, passed south around Trinidad and was trapped in the Gulf of Paria for seven days, finally reaching Cubagua on 11 September 1542. The "San Pedro" sailed north of Trinidad and reached Cubagua on 9 September.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: From Cubagua, Orellana decided to return to Spain to obtain from the Crown the governorship over the discovered lands, which he named New Andalusia. After a difficult navigation, he touched first the shores of Portugal. The king received him in a friendly way and made him an offer to go back to the Amazon under a Portuguese flag. Orellana's exploration produced an international issue. According to the Treaty of Tordesillas, the majority of the Amazon River should belong to Spain. However, the mouth should be ruled by Portugal. Orellana refused the Portuguese offer and went to Valladolid.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: After nine months of negotiations, Charles I appointed him governor of New Andalusia on February 18, 1544. After captivating the Spanish court with tales and alleged exaggerations of his voyage down the Amazon, Orellana obtained a commission to conquer and settle Nueva Andalucia. The charter established that he should explore and settle the Amazonian lands with 300 men and 100 horses, and found two cities, one in the mouth and another in the basin's interior.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: The commission was accepted on 18 February 1544. However, preparations for the voyage were frustrated by unpaid debts, Portuguese spies, and internal wranglings. Sufficient funds were raised through the efforts of Cosmo de Chaves, Orellana's stepfather. However, the problems were compounded by Orellana's decision to marry a very young and poor girl, Ana de Ayala, whom he intended to take with him (along with her sisters). Orellana's creditors relented and allowed him to sail only on the arrival of a Portuguese spy fleet at Seville. On reaching Sanlucar he was detained again, the authorities having discovered a shortfall in his complement of men and horses, and that large numbers of his crew were not Spanish. On 11 May 1545, Orellana (in hiding on one of his vessels) surreptitiously sailed out of Sanlucar with four ships and disappeared from view.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: On 11 May 1545, he left Spain with four ships, supplies to build two riverboats, perhaps 300 men, at least 24 horses, and his young wife. Before leaving land, he looted a farm for cattle, pigs, and chickens, which he salted. In the open sea, he waylaid a caravel and looted its supplies. At the end of May, he reached Tenerife and spent three months there putting his ships in order. He then sailed to the Cape Verde Islands where an epidemic killed 98 of his men and 50 or 60 deserted. With this loss, he abandoned one of his ships after salvaging what he could. He left about the middle of November. The crossing was difficult, and one of his ships became separated and was never seen again. With it went 77 men, 11 horses, and supplies to build one riverboat. He lost several anchors and had to replace them with cannons.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: He reached the Brazil coast, sailed a hundred leagues until he found fresh water in the sea, which he assumed came from the Amazon. He landed on 20 December 1545 with two ships, 11 thin horses, and perhaps 100 men. Since the natives were friendly and there was plenty of food, his men suggested that they stop and rest and build the riverboat. Orellana overruled them and set off to find the main branch of the Amazon five days later. After sailing more than 300 miles he made camp and started building the riverboat. This took from January to March. They were forced to cannibalize the smaller of the two ships. The natives were hostile, there was little food in the area, and they had to eat all their dogs and horses. Fifty-seven men died.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: Orellana sent the newly-built boat off to find food, but it returned with no food and several men dead of hunger or wounds. He set off with the remaining ship and the riverboat. After traveling 75 miles southeast, the ship was wrecked on a riverbank. Orellana continued with the boat, leaving many men at the shipwreck camp. After nearly a month, he returned to the shipwreck, reporting that he had gone 500 miles and not found the main river. Orellana was now in poor shape, both physically and mentally. He set off again with the boat. Seventeen of his men were wounded by arrows. According to his wife, he died "from illness and grief." The survivors went downriver to the sea where they were driven by the South Equatorial Current to the Spanish base at Margarita Island west of Trinidad.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: After Orellana left the shipwreck camp, the 28 or 30 men there began building a boat from the wrecked ship, which took more than three months. The boat was ill-built and leaky. Some indigenous people guided them to "a place where the Amazon splits into three arms". Finding no sign of Orellana, they went downriver. Ten men jumped ship, preferring life with the natives to a leaking boat. Reaching the sea, the current carried them northwest. In late November, the 18 survivors reached Margarita Island, where they met the other 25 survivors and Orellana’s wife.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: Orellana's first expedition was chronicled by Gaspar de Carvajal. The BBC documentary "Unnatural Histories" presents evidence that Carvajal's chronicle, "Relación del nuevo descubrimiento del famoso río Grande que descubrió por muy gran ventura el capitán Francisco de Orellana" ("Account of the recent discovery of the famous Grand river which was discovered by great good fortune by Captain Francisco de Orellana"), rather than being a hugely exaggerated fantasy as previously thought, was correct in its observations that an advanced civilization was flourishing along the Amazon in the 1540s.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: It is believed that the civilization was later devastated by the spread of smallpox and other diseases from Europe. The evidence to support this claim comes from the discovery of numerous geoglyphs dating from between 1 and 1250 AD, and "terra preta" resulting from indigenous activities. Some five million people may have lived in the Amazon region in 1500 in dense riverbank settlements such as that at Marajó, and inland. By 1900 the population had fallen to one million, and by the early 1980s it was fewer than 200,000.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: Gaspar de Carvajal, the chaplain of the first expedition, wrote a chronicle "Relación del nuevo descubrimiento del famoso río Grande que descubrió por muy gran ventura el capitán Francisco de Orellana" ("Chronicle of the new discovery of the famous Great river discovered by great good fortune by Captain Francisco de Orellana") which was partly reproduced in Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés's "Historia general y natural de las Indias", initially published in 1526 but continually revised until the author's death in 1557, who included in addition statements by Orellana and some of his men. Carvajal's manuscript was published in 1894 by the Chilean historian José Toribio Medina, preceded by a biography of Carvajal, in his book "Descubrimiento del río de las Amazonas".


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: A modern retelling of Orellana and his crew's epic journey, with source material primarily provided by Carvajal, is written in Buddy Levy's "River of Darkness".


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: De Orellana's voyages served as partial inspiration for the film "Aguirre, the Wrath of God" (1972). An earlier script, penned by director Werner Herzog, also deliberately included De Orellana in the movie, but he was ultimately left out.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: De Orellana's role in the search for "El Dorado" also forms part of the plot of the film "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" (2008).


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: William Ospina's 2008 novel "El país de la canela" ("The Cinnamon Country") includes a novelized version of Orellana's trip.


title: Francisco de Orellana

text: One of the campaigns of "" is called "El Dorado" and is about the quest of Francisco de Orellana and Francisco Pizarro to find "El Dorado", the legendary Lost City of Gold, thought to be hidden somewhere in the vast Amazon rainforest. The campaign is based on De Orellana's first exploration.


title: Formative assessment

text: Formative assessment, formative evaluation, formative feedback, or assessment for learning, including "diagnostic testing", is a range of formal and informal assessment procedures conducted by teachers during the learning process in order to modify teaching and learning activities to improve student attainment. The goal of a formative assessment is to "monitor student learning" to provide ongoing feedback that can help students identify their strengths and weaknesses and target areas that need work. It also helps faculty recognize where students are struggling and address problems immediately. It typically involves qualitative feedback (rather than scores) for both student and teacher that focuses on the details of content and performance. It is commonly contrasted with summative assessment, which seeks to monitor educational outcomes, often for purposes of external accountability.


title: Formative assessment

text: Formative assessment involves a continuous way of checks and balances in the teaching learning processes. The method allows teachers to frequently check their learners' progress and the effectiveness of their own practice, thus allowing for self assessment of the student. Practice in a classroom is formative to the extent that evidence about student achievement is elicited, interpreted, and used by teachers, learners, or their peers, to make decisions about the next steps in instruction that are likely to be better, or better founded, than the decisions they would have taken in the absence of the evidence that was elicited.


title: Formative assessment

text: Formative assessments give in-process feedback about what students are or are not learning so instructional approaches, teaching materials, and academic support can be modified to the students' needs. They are not graded, can be informal in nature, and they may take a variety of forms.


title: Formative assessment

text: Formative assessments are generally low stakes, which means that they have low or no point value. Examples of formative assessments include asking students to: draw a concept map in class to represent their understanding of a topic, submit one or two sentences identifying the main point of a lecture, or turn in a research proposal for early feedback.


title: Formative assessment

text: Michael Scriven coined the terms formative and summative evaluation in 1967, and emphasized their differences both in terms of the goals of the information they seek and how the information is used. For Scriven, formative evaluation gathered information to assess the effectiveness of a curriculum and guide school system choices as to which curriculum to adopt and how to improve it. Benjamin Bloom took up the term in 1968 in the book "Learning for Mastery" to consider formative assessment as a tool for improving the teaching-learning process for students. His subsequent 1971 book "Handbook of Formative and Summative Evaluation", written with Thomas Hasting and George Madaus, showed how formative assessments could be linked to instructional units in a variety of content areas. It is this approach that reflects the generally accepted meaning of the term today.


title: Formative assessment

text: For both Scriven and Bloom, an assessment, whatever its other uses, is only formative if it is used to alter subsequent educational decisions. Subsequently, however, Paul Black and Dylan Wiliam suggested this definition is too restrictive, since formative assessments may be used to provide evidence that the intended course of action was indeed appropriate. They propose that practice in a classroom is formative to the extent that evidence about student achievement is elicited, interpreted, and used by teachers, learners, or their peers, to make decisions about the next steps in instruction that are likely to be better, or better founded, than the decisions they would have taken in the absence of the evidence that was elicited.


title: Formative assessment

text: The type of assessment that people may be more familiar with is summative assessment. The table below shows some basic differences between the two types of assessment.


title: Formative assessment

text: Among the most comprehensive listing of principles of assessment for learning are those written by the QCA (Qualifications and Curriculum Authority). The authority, which is sponsored by England's Department for Children, Schools and Families, is responsible for national curriculum, assessment, and examinations. Their principal focus is on crucial aspects of assessment for learning, including how such assessment should be seen as central to classroom practice, and that all teachers should regard assessment for learning as a key professional skill.


title: Formative assessment

text: In the United States, the Assessment For Learning Project has identified four "core shifts" and ten "emerging principles" of assessment for learning:


title: Formative assessment

text: Feedback is the central function of formative assessment. It typically involves a focus on the detailed content of what is being learnt, rather than simply a test score or other measurement of how far a student is falling short of the expected standard.


title: Formative assessment

text: The time between formative assessment and adjustments to learning can be a matter of seconds or a matter of months. Some examples of formative assessment are:


title: Formative assessment

text: Meta-analysis of studies into formative assessment have indicated significant learning gains where formative assessment is used, across all content areas, knowledge and skill types, and levels of education. Educational researcher Robert J. Marzano states:


title: Formative assessment

text: While empirical evidence has shown the substantial impact formative assessment has in raising student achievement, it is also "recognized as one of the most powerful ways to enhance student motivation". Believing in their ability to learn, contributing learning successes to individual efforts and abilities, emphasizing progress toward learning goals rather than letter grades, and evaluating "the nature of their thinking to identify strategies that improve understanding" are all manners in which motivation is enhanced through an effective use of formative assessment. However, for these gains to become evident formative assessment must (1) Clarify and share learning goals and success criteria; (2) Create effective classroom discussions and other tasks which demonstrate evidence of student understanding; (3) provide feedback which can and will be acted upon; (4) allow students to become instructional resources for one another; and (5) stimulate students to become owners of their own learning.


title: Formative assessment

text: Some researchers have concluded that standards-based assessments may be an effective way to "prescribe instruction and to ensure that no child is left behind".


title: Formative assessment

text: In past decades, teachers would design a unit of study that would typically include objectives, teaching strategies, and resources. The student's mark on this test or exam was taken as the indicator of his or her understanding of the topic. In 1998, Black & Wiliam produced a review that highlighted that students who learn in a formative way achieve significantly better than matched control groups receiving normal teaching. Their work developed into several important research projects on Assessment for Learning by the King's College team including Kings-Medway-Oxfordshire Formative Assessment Project (KMOFAP), Assessment is For learning (Scotland), Jersey-Actioning-Formative assessment (Channel Islands), and smaller projects in England, Wales, Peru, and the USA.


title: Formative assessment

text: The strongest evidence of improved learning gains comes from short-cycle (over seconds or minutes within a single lesson) formative assessment, and medium to long-term assessment where assessment is used to change the teacher's regular classroom practice.


title: Formative assessment

text: It is important for students to understand the goals and the criteria for success when learning in the classroom. Often teachers will introduce learning goals to their students before a lesson, but will not do an effective job in distinguishing between the end goals and what the students will be doing to achieve those goals. "When teachers start from what it is they want students to know and design their instruction backward from that goal, then instruction is far more likely to be effective". In a study done by Gray and Tall, they found that 72 students between the ages of 7 and 13 had different experiences when learning in mathematics. The study showed that higher achieving students looked over mathematical ambiguities, while the lower achieving students tended to get stuck on these misunderstandings. An example of this can be seen in the number formula_1. Although it is not explicitly stated, the operation between these two numbers is addition. If we look at the number formula_2, here the implied operation between formula_3 and formula_4 is multiplication. Finally if we take a look at the number formula_5, there is a completely different operation between the 6 and 1. The study showed that higher achieving students were able to look past this while other students were not.


title: Formative assessment

text: Another study done by White and Frederiksen showed that when twelve 7th grade science classrooms were given time to reflect on what they deemed to be quality work, and how they thought they would be evaluated on their work, the gap between the high achieving students and the low achieving students was decreased.


title: Formative assessment

text: One way to help with this is to offer students different examples of other students' work so they can evaluate the different pieces. By examining the different levels of work, students can start to differentiate between superior and inferior work.


title: Formative assessment

text: There has been extensive research done on studying how students are affected by feedback. Kluger and DeNisi (1996) reviewed over three thousand reports on feedback in schools, universities, and the workplace. Of these, only 131 of them were found to be scientifically rigorous and of those, 50 of the studies shows that feedback actually has negative effects on its recipients. This is due to the fact that feedback is often "ego-involving", that is the feedback focuses on the individual student rather than the quality of the student's work. Feedback is often given in the form of some numerical or letter grade and that perpetuates students being compared to their peers. The studies previously mentioned showed that the most effective feedback for students is when they are not only told in which areas they need to improve, but also how to go about improving it.


title: Formative assessment

text: It has been shown that leaving comments alongside grades is just as ineffective as giving solely a numerical/letter grade (Butler 1987, 1989). This is due to the fact that students tend to look at their grade and disregard any comments that are given to them. The next thing students tend to do is to ask other students in the class for their grade, and they compare the grade to their own grade.


title: Formative assessment

text: Questioning is an important part of the learning process and an even more important part is asking the right types of questions. Questions should either cause the student to think, or collect information to inform teaching. Questions that promote discussion and student reflection make it easier for students to go on the right path to end up completing their learning goals. Here are some types of questions that are good to ask students:


title: Formative assessment

text: Wait time is the amount of time that is given to a student to answer a question that was posed and the time allowed for the student to answer. Mary Budd Rowe went on to research the outcomes of having longer wait times for students. These included:


title: Formative assessment

text: Formative assessment is valuable for day-to-day teaching when used to adapt instructional methods to meet students' needs and for monitoring student progress toward learning goals. Further, it helps students monitor their own progress as they get feedback from the teacher and/or peers, allowing the opportunity to revise and refine their thinking. Formative assessment is also known as educative assessment, classroom assessment, or assessment for learning.


title: Formative assessment

text: There are many ways to integrate formative assessment into K–12 classrooms. Although the key concepts of formative assessment such as constant feedback, modifying the instruction, and information about students' progress do not vary among different disciplines or levels, the methods or strategies may differ. For example, researchers developed generative activities (Stroup et al., 2004) and model-eliciting activities (Lesh et al., 2000) that can be used as formative assessment tools in mathematics and science classrooms. Others developed strategies computer-supported collaborative learning environments (Wang et al., 2004b). More information about implication of formative assessment in specific areas is given below.


title: Formative assessment

text: Formative assessment, or "diagnostic testing" as the National Board of Professional Teaching Standards argues, serves to create effective teaching curricula and classroom-specific evaluations. It involves gathering the best possible evidence about what students have learned, and then using that information to decide what to do next.


title: Formative assessment

text: By focusing on student-centered activities, a student is able to relate the material to his life and experiences. Students are encouraged to think critically and to develop analytical skills. This type of testing allows for a teacher's lesson plan to be clear, creative, and reflective of the curriculum (T.P Scot et al., 2009).


title: Formative assessment

text: Based on the Appalachian Education Laboratory (AEL), "diagnostic testing" emphasizes effective teaching practices while "considering learners' experiences and their unique conceptions" (T.P Scot et al., 2009). Furthermore, it provides the framework for "efficient retrieval and application"(T.P Scot et al., 2009). by urging students to take charge of their education. The implications of this type of testing,is developing a knowledgeable student with deep understanding of the information and then be able to account for a students' comprehension on a subject.


title: Formative assessment

text: In math education, it is important for teachers to see how their students approach the problems and how much mathematical knowledge and at what level students use when solving the problems. That is, knowing how students think in the process of learning or problem solving makes it possible for teachers to help their students overcome conceptual difficulties and, in turn, improve learning. In that sense, formative assessment is diagnostic. To employ formative assessment in the classrooms, a teacher has to make sure that each student participates in the learning process by expressing their ideas; there is a trustful environment in which students can provide each other with feedback; s/he (the teacher) provides students with feedback; and the instruction is modified according to students' needs. In math classes, thought revealing activities such as model-eliciting activities (MEAs) and generative activities provide good opportunities for covering these aspects of formative assessment.


title: Formative assessment

text: As an ongoing assessment it focuses on the process, it helps teachers to check the current status of their students' language ability, that is, they can know what the students know and what the students do not know. It also gives chances to students to participate in modifying or planning the upcoming classes (Bachman & Palmer, 1996). Participation in their learning grows students' motivation to learn the target language. It also raises students' awareness on their target languages, which results in resetting their own goals. In consequence, it helps students to achieve their goals successfully as well as teachers be the facilitators to foster students' target language ability.


title: Formative assessment

text: In classroom, short quizzes, inflectional journals, or portfolios could be used as a formative assessment (Cohen, 1994).


title: Formative assessment

text: In primary schools, it is used to inform the next steps of learning. Teachers and students both use formative assessments as a tool to make decisions based on data. Formative assessment occurs when teachers feed information back to students in ways that enable the student to learn better, or when students can engage in a similar, self-reflective process. The evidence shows that high quality formative assessment does have a powerful impact on student learning. Black and Wiliam (1998) report that studies of formative assessment show an effect size on standardized tests of between 0.4 and 0.7, larger than most known educational interventions. (The effect size is the ratio of the average improvement in test scores in the innovation to the range of scores of typical groups of pupils on the same tests; Black and Wiliam recognize that standardized tests are very limited measures of learning.) Formative assessment is particularly effective for students who have not done well in school, thus narrowing the gap between low and high achievers while raising overall achievement. Research examined by Black and Wiliam supports the conclusion that summative assessments tend to have a negative effect on student learning.


title: Formative assessment

text: Model-eliciting activities are based on real-life situations where students, working in small groups, present a mathematical model as a solution to a client's need (Zawojewski & Carmona, 2001). The problem design enables students to evaluate their solutions according to the needs of a client identified in the problem situation and sustain themselves in productive, progressively effective cycles of conceptualizing and problem solving. Model-eliciting activities (MEAs) are ideally structured to help students build their real-world sense of problem solving towards increasingly powerful mathematical constructs. What is especially useful for mathematics educators and researchers is the capacity of MEAs to make students' thinking visible through their models and modeling cycles. Teachers do not prompt the use of particular mathematical concepts or their representational counterparts when presenting the problems. Instead, they choose activities that maximize the potential for students to develop the concepts that are the focal point in the curriculum by building on their early and intuitive ideas. The mathematical models emerge from the students' interactions with the problem situation and learning is assessed via these emergent behaviors.


title: Formative assessment

text: In a generative activity, students are asked to come up with outcomes that are mathematically same. Students can arrive at the responses or build responses from this sameness in a wide range of ways. The sameness gives coherence to the task and allows it to be an "organizational unit for performing a specific function." (Stroup et al., 2004)


title: Formative assessment

text: Other activities can also be used as the means of formative assessment as long as they ensure the participation of every student, make students' thoughts visible to each other and to the teacher, promote feedback to revise and refine thinking. In addition, as a complementary to all of these is to modify and adapt instruction through the information gathered by those activities.


title: Formative assessment

text: Many academics are seeking to diversify assessment tasks, broaden the range of skills assessed and provide students with more timely and informative feedback on their progress. Others are wishing to meet student expectations for more flexible delivery and to generate efficiencies in assessment that can ease academic staff workloads. The move to on-line and computer based assessment is a natural outcome of the increasing use of information and communication technologies to enhance learning. As more students seek flexibility in their courses, it seems inevitable there will be growing expectations for flexible assessment as well. When implementing online and computer-based instruction, it is recommended that a structured framework or model be used to guide the assessment.


title: Formative assessment

text: The way in which teachers orchestrate their classroom activities and lesson can be improved through the use of connected classroom technologies. With the use of technology, the formative assessment process not only allows for the rapid collection, analysis and exploitation of student data but also provides teachers with the data needed to inform their teaching.


title: Formative assessment

text: In the UK education system, formative assessment (or assessment for learning) has been a key aspect of the agenda for personalized learning. The Working Group on 14–19 Reform led by Sir Mike Tomlinson, recommended that assessment of learners be refocused to be more teacher-led and less reliant on external assessment, putting learners at the heart of the assessment process.


title: Formative assessment

text: The UK government has stated that personalized learning depends on teachers knowing the strengths and weaknesses of individual learners, and that a key means of achieving this is through formative assessment, involving high quality feedback to learners included within every teaching session.


title: Formative assessment

text: A complex assessment is the one that requires a rubric and an expert examiner. Example items for complex assessment include thesis, funding proposal, etc.


title: Formative assessment

text: The practice of common formative assessments is a way for teachers to use assessments to beneficially adjust their teaching pedagogy. The concept is that teachers who teach a common class can provide their classes with a common assessment. The results of that assessment could provide the teachers with valuable information, the most important being who on that teacher team is seeing the most success with his or her students on a given topic or standard. The purpose of this practice is to provide feedback for teachers, not necessarily students, so an assignment could be considered formative for teachers, but summative for students.


title: Formative assessment

text: Researchers Kim Bailey and Chris Jakicic have stated that common formative assessments "promote efficiency for teachers, promote equity for students, provide an effective strategy for determining whether the guaranteed curriculum is being taught and, more importantly, learned, inform the practice of individual teachers, build a team's capacity to improve its program, facilitate a systematic, collective response to students who are experiencing difficulty, [and] offer the most powerful tool for changing adult behavior and practice."


title: Formative assessment

text: Developing common formative assessments on a teacher team helps educators to address what Bailey and Jakicic lay out as the important questions to answer when reflecting on student progress. These include:


title: Formative assessment

text: Common formative assessments are a way to address the second question. Teachers collects data on how students are doing to gain understanding and insight on whether students are learning, and how they are making sense of the lessons being taught. After gathering this data, teachers develop systems and plans to address the third and fourth questions and, over several years, modify the first question to fit the learning needs of their specific students.


title: Formative assessment

text: When utilizing common formative assessments to collect data on student progress, teachers can compare their students' results. In tandem, they can also share the strategies they used in the classroom to teach that particular concept. With these things in mind, the teacher team can make some evaluations on what tasks and explanations seemed to produce the best student outcomes. Teachers who used alternate strategies now have new ideas for interventions and for when they teach the topic in upcoming years. Teacher teams can also use common formative assessments to review and calibrate their scoring practices. Teachers of a common class should aim to be as consistent as possible in evaluating their students. Comparing formative assessments, or having all teachers evaluate them together, is a way for teachers to adjust their grading criteria before the summative assessment. Through this practice, teachers are presented with an opportunity to grow professionally with the people who know them and understand their school environment.


title: Formative assessment

text: To make the practice of teacher teams, common formative assessments, and power standards the most advantageous, the practice of backwards design should be utilized. Backwards design is the idea in education that the summative assessment should be developed first and that all formative work and lessons leading up to that specific assessment should be created second. Tomlinson and McTighe wrote, "Although not a new idea, we have found that the deliberate use of backwards design for planning courses, units, and individual lessons results in more clearly defined goals, more appropriate assessments, and more purposeful teaching." More specifically, intervention and re-teaching time must be factored into the schedule. It is unrealistic to think that every student will get every topic perfect and ready to take the summative assessment on a prescribed schedule.


title: Formative assessment

text: Several models have been developed to refine or address specific issues in formative assessment. For example, Harry Torrance and John Pryor proposed a model that aims to provide a pattern and balance for assessment activities based on 14 categories. The classification allows for detailed analysis as well as guidance for practices being observed. While there are comprehensive models of formative assessment, there are also some frameworks that are specifically tailored to the subject being taught. This is demonstrated in a model that balances personal, social, and science development in science instruction and the framework that focuses on listening comprehension and speaking skills when assessing and instructing English language.


title: Sophie Fiennes

text: Sophia Victoria Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes (; born 12 February 1967), better known as Sophie Fiennes, is an English film director and producer. She is the sister of actors Ralph Fiennes and Joseph Fiennes, director Martha Fiennes and composer Magnus Fiennes.


title: Sophie Fiennes

text: Fiennes managed the UK based dance company "The Michael Clark Company" from 1992 to 1994 and began making her own films in 1998. With Peter Greenaway she worked on films and TV projects including "Drowning by Numbers", "The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover" and "Prospero's Books".


title: Sophie Fiennes

text: Made for ZDF/Arte is about Les Ballets C. de la B.'s dance performance VSPRS. A the dimensions of ecstasy and trauma that form the core of the performance are captured, whilst interviews with Platel and the dancers themselves are also included.


title: Sophie Fiennes

text: Fiennes' documentary "The Pervert's Guide to Cinema", is written and presented by the philosopher and psychoanalyst Slavoj Žižek.


title: Sophie Fiennes

text: Fiennes and Žižek then filmed a followup, "The Pervert's Guide to Ideology". The format is similar, with Žižek speaking from within reconstructed scenes from films. This time the films include "Full Metal Jacket", "Taxi Driver", "They Live" and "The Sound of Music".


title: Sophie Fiennes

text: Fiennes is the daughter of the photographer Mark Fiennes and the novelist and painter Jennifer Lash. She is the sister of Ralph, Martha, Magnus, Joseph and Jacob Fiennes. In an interview with the "Evening Standard", Fiennes said that "We were the branch of the family everyone was slightly embarrassed by."


title: Glen Johnson

text: Glen McLeod Cooper Johnson ("né" Stephens; born 23 August 1984) is an English former professional footballer who played predominantly as a right back.


title: Glen Johnson

text: Johnson began his career at West Ham United, spending time on loan at Millwall, and was signed by Chelsea for a £6 million fee after West Ham's relegation in 2003. He helped Chelsea win the 2004–05 Premier League title and the 2005 League Cup Final. In June 2006, Johnson joined Portsmouth on loan for the 2006–07 season. Following a successful season on loan at Fratton Park, Johnson joined Portsmouth permanently for a fee of around £4 million.


title: Glen Johnson

text: Johnson played 99 times for Portsmouth and played in the 2008 FA Cup Final as Portsmouth beat Cardiff City 1–0. Johnson moved to Liverpool in the summer of 2009 for a £17.5 million fee. Johnson spent six seasons at Anfield making 200 appearances which included victory in the 2012 League Cup Final. He joined Stoke City in July 2015 on a free transfer, and made 64 appearances over three seasons before retiring.


title: Glen Johnson

text: Johnson was capped 54 times by the England national team from 2003 to 2014. He was selected in England's squads for the 2010 and 2014 FIFA World Cups and UEFA Euro 2012.


title: Glen Johnson

text: Known as Glen Stephens at the time of his birth, he took his mother's surname following the separation of his parents. His parents Wendy Johnson and John Stephens named him after former England midfielder Glenn Hoddle. He was born in Greenwich, London, and grew up in Dartford, Kent, where he attended Temple Hill Primary School and then Leigh CTC School. He was raised by his mother and grew up with his younger brother and older half-sister.


title: Glen Johnson

text: At one stage of his childhood, he lived in a hostel as his mother had nowhere to live. Johnson credits his mother with helping him develop a football career, saying, "She had a tough time, bringing up three kids as a single parent with no help apart from the goodwill of close friends, and there were times when we had nowhere to stay. At one point we were homeless and staying in a hostel, but once mum got herself on her feet after a few hard years, and passed her driving test so she could take me to football every week, that gave us a fresh start."


title: Glen Johnson

text: Johnson was a product of the West Ham United youth system managed by Tony Carr from the age of nine, becoming a 15-year-old first year scholar in 2000. He signed a three-year professional contract with the club on 1 August 2001, close to his 17th birthday. In the 2001–02 season, he made regular appearances for West Ham reserves, but was unable to break into the first team. He eventually signed an initial four-week loan deal with local rivals Millwall on 17 October 2002, making his First Division debut in an away loss against Norwich City on 19 October. His loan was twice extended by a month, before he was recalled early to Upton Park after having spent seven weeks at The Den, his final appearance in a Millwall shirt coming in another away defeat to Crystal Palace on 7 November.


title: Glen Johnson

text: Johnson's Premier League and West Ham debut came on 22 January 2003 in another away defeat to a London club, this time against Charlton Athletic, when he came on for midfielder Édouard Cissé. He made 15 League appearances and one FA Cup appearance in 2002–03, becoming a more significant member of the West Ham team as the year went on. He even signed a new four-year deal to remain in east London on 18 March 2003, appearing keen to help keep the club in the top flight. However, his last outing in a Hammers shirt was to come on the final day of the season, 11 May 2003, in a 2–2 draw away at Birmingham City which condemned the Hammers to relegation to the First Division.


title: Glen Johnson

text: Two months after West Ham United's relegation, Johnson joined London rivals Chelsea, signing on 15 July for a fee of £6 million. The first purchase under the ownership of Roman Abramovich, he made his debut on 13 August in an away win against Žilina in the 2003–04 UEFA Champions League, and his first Chelsea goal came in the corresponding home leg two weeks later. His league debut came on 17 August in an Anfield win against Liverpool, but he had to wait until 9 November for his first league goal, netting the opener of a 5–0 victory over Newcastle United. He made 19 league appearances in 2003–04 as Chelsea finished as runners-up.


title: Glen Johnson

text: In Chelsea's FA Cup fifth-round match against Newcastle United in the following season, goalkeeper Carlo Cudicini was sent off late in the match, and with no substitutions remaining, Johnson went in goal. Although he did not concede, Newcastle were already 1–0 up and went through at the expense of Chelsea. He picked up a winner's medal when he came on as a second-half substitute for Chelsea in the 2005 League Cup Final, a match which Chelsea won 3–2 against Liverpool after extra time. He also made 16 appearances, enough for a medal, as they won the Premier League title in this season, but he was to miss out on a medal for their success in the next season after managing only four appearances in the league.


title: Glen Johnson

text: Johnson joined Portsmouth on a season-long loan in June 2006. On his return to Chelsea, Johnson started the 2007 FA Community Shield, which Chelsea lost to Manchester United, and the opening Premier League match of the season at home to Birmingham City.


title: Glen Johnson

text: On 31 August 2007, Johnson signed for Portsmouth on a four-year contract for a fee believed to be £4 million. He was handed a start in the first match after his transfer, a 3–1 defeat at Arsenal, and became the club's regular right back. On 20 October, Johnson scored his first goal in over three years, against Wigan Athletic in a 2–0 win, after dribbling from the halfway line. He helped reach the 2008 FA Cup Final against Cardiff City where Johnson played in a 1–0 victory. Shortly after Johnson's cup success, he and Portsmouth substitute goalkeeper Jamie Ashdown had their winner's medals stolen from their hotel rooms. After the medals were not returned, the FA remade medals for Johnson and Ashdown.


title: Glen Johnson

text: On 22 November 2008, Johnson scored a 30-yard screamer with his left foot against Hull City, a goal which won "Match of the Day"'s Goal of the Month award for November, and later won the Goal of the Season award. Johnson seemed to have ended speculation that he would move to Liverpool for a rumoured amount of £9 million by signing a four-and-a-half-year contract with Portsmouth on 9 January 2009, although speculation once again suggested that Johnson could make a big money move to Liverpool in the near future; this was reaffirmed in late April 2009 On 22 April 2009, at the age of 24, Johnson was the youngest member of "The Times" "Top 50 Portsmouth players" list. Johnson was included in the PFA Team of the Year for 2008–09 despite Portsmouth finishing in the bottom-half of the Premier League, just seven points above the relegation zone.


title: Glen Johnson

text: A Portsmouth representative confirmed on 13 June 2009 that a "sizeable bid" had been received for Johnson, with Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester City being mooted as possible suitors. On 16 June 2009, Portsmouth agreed a bid believed to be £18.5 million from Liverpool. However, two days later Portsmouth confirmed they had also accepted a bid from Chelsea and it was up to the player as to who he wanted to join. Liverpool were believed to have tabled the £10 million bid on the basis that they were still owed £7 million by Portsmouth from the purchase of Peter Crouch in the summer of 2008, with Liverpool willing to reduce the fee owed on signing Johnson. On 22 June 2009, Liverpool announced the transfer and on 26 June 2009, Johnson signed a four-year contract. Johnson made his Premier League debut on 16 August 2009 in a 2–1 defeat by Tottenham Hotspur.


title: Glen Johnson

text: On his home league debut for Liverpool on 19 August 2009, Johnson put in a man-of-the-match performance against Stoke City scoring his first goal for the club while also getting an assist in a match where he caused countless problems for the opposition defence. On 29 August, Johnson scored his second goal for Liverpool in a 3–2 win against Bolton Wanderers. On 30 December 2009, Johnson sustained a tear of the medial collateral ligament in his right knee during a league fixture against Aston Villa, which then-Liverpool manager Rafael Benítez said would keep him out of action for at least a month. On his return from injury in March, Johnson returned to form, scoring his third goal for the club against Sunderland at Anfield. Johnson went on to make eight more appearances for the rest of the season, including helping Liverpool reach the semi-finals of the UEFA Europa League where they were knocked out by Atlético Madrid. Johnson played 35 times and scored three goals in his debut season with the Reds.


title: Glen Johnson

text: Johnson made a slow start to 2010–11 and in November 2010, Johnson received criticism from manager Roy Hodgson, who felt his performances during that time had not been of international standard. Johnson held clear-the-air talks with Hodgson and the pair played down their dispute. Johnson scored his first goal of the 2010–11 Premier League on 20 November 2010 against West Ham United at Anfield in a 3–0 win, after returning from being out with a groin strain. On 5 January 2011, Johnson started and played the full 90 minutes against Blackburn Rovers at Ewood Park in a rather disappointing 3–1 defeat. Johnson then suffered an injury against West Bromwich Albion at The Hawthorns, but recovered before the end of the season to play in the final four matches of the season, including a 5–2 win over Fulham at Craven Cottage. Johnson made 35 appearances for Liverpool in 2010–11 as the team finished in 6th position.


title: Glen Johnson

text: On 6 July 2011, Johnson signed a contract extension at Liverpool, the length of which was not disclosed by the club. On 20 November 2011, Johnson scored a solo goal against his former club, Chelsea, at Stamford Bridge after being set up by Charlie Adam. This proved to be the decisive goal, with Liverpool winning 2–1. On 26 February 2012, he helped Liverpool to win their first trophy since 2006 as they won the 2012 League Cup Final against Cardiff City, playing the full match, hitting the crossbar in the opening minutes and scoring his penalty in the penalty shoot-out, winning his first trophy for Liverpool. Johnson played 29 times in 2011–12 under the management of Kenny Dalglish as Liverpool finished in 8th position but qualified for Europe due to their League Cup win.


title: Glen Johnson

text: On 9 December 2012, Johnson scored Liverpool's first goal in a 3–2 win over his old club West Ham. He played 43 matches in 2012–13 as Liverpool finished seventh and reached the round of 32 in the UEFA Europa League, losing out to Zenit Saint Petersburg. Johnson played 30 times for Liverpool in 2013–14 as the team narrowly missed out on the Premier League title. On 29 November 2014 Johnson scored the only goal for Liverpool in a 1–0 victory over Stoke City. On 24 May 2015, Johnson announced that he would leave Liverpool at the end of the season. On 10 June, Johnson was released by the club.


title: Glen Johnson

text: Johnson joined Stoke City on 12 July 2015, signing a two-year contract. He made his debut for Stoke on 9 August 2015 in a 1–0 defeat against his former club Liverpool. Johnson was Mark Hughes's first-choice right back in 2015–16 until he suffered a season ending knee injury against AFC Bournemouth on 13 February 2016. Johnson played 29 times for Stoke prior to suffering his injury and the team went on to finish in ninth position. Towards the end of the campaign Stoke suffered from a loss of form and Hughes cited Johnson's absence as one of the main reasons. Johnson signed a one-year contract extension with Stoke in April 2017. Johnson made 25 appearances in 2016–17, as Stoke finished in 13th position.


title: Glen Johnson

text: Johnson struggled for playing time in 2017–18, making just ten appearances, as Stoke suffered relegation to the EFL Championship. He was released by Stoke at the end of the season.


title: Glen Johnson

text: During his time with the England under-21s, Johnson was handed his full England debut on 18 November 2003 against Denmark, coming on as a substitute for the injured Gary Neville after 16 minutes.


title: Glen Johnson

text: Following a poor performance in England's friendly in Denmark in August 2005, he lost his position as Neville's understudy in the squad to Luke Young, who played in both the subsequent World Cup qualifiers. Johnson did not make any further England appearances under Sven-Göran Eriksson or his successor Steve McClaren, but was named in Fabio Capello's first squad in January 2008.


title: Glen Johnson

text: In 2010 Johnson played in the 2–0 victory over Andorra, and made four assists in the subsequent 6–0 victory against the same team for which he was named man of the match. Johnson scored his first goal for England in a friendly match against Mexico on 24 May 2010 at Wembley Stadium, which ended 3–1 to England.


title: Glen Johnson

text: In February 2011, Johnson began England's new calendar year by assisting Ashley Young's winning goal in a 2–1 victory over Denmark in Copenhagen.


title: Glen Johnson

text: On 16 May 2012, Johnson was named in new England manager Roy Hodgson's UEFA Euro 2012 squad. After missing England's 1–0 friendly win against Norway through injury, he played in England's second warm-up match, a 1–0 win against Belgium at Wembley Stadium. He featured in all three of England's group matches at the tournament, helping England to win their group with a draw against France, and wins against Sweden and Ukraine. On 24 June 2012, he started for England in their quarter-final fixture with Italy, in which they were eliminated on penalties.


title: Glen Johnson

text: On 12 May, Johnson was named in the 23-man England squad for the 2014 FIFA World Cup. During England's group stage match against Uruguay, Johnson made a run down the right wing, received a pass from Daniel Sturridge and speared a cross into the penalty area to Wayne Rooney who scored, although Uruguay went on to win 2–1.


title: Glen Johnson

text: In 2007, Johnson set up the Glen Johnson Soccer School alongside Sam Taylor, a former player of West Ham United. The football school is based in Dartford, Kent, and its primary focus is training and development within local schools and one of his students is currently at West Ham United.


title: Glen Johnson

text: In January 2007, it was reported that Johnson and his former Millwall teammate Ben May were caught at a B&Q store in Dartford, Kent, attempting to steal bathroom fittings. They both received £80 fines. Johnson described the incident as "comical" because it was a misunderstanding — "Ben was doing up his bathroom so we went to B&Q and found one of those sets where you get everything in one box. But he wanted a seat with a slow-close lid, so we took out the seat and put in another one. What we didn't know was that the new seat was £2.35 more expensive. We went through the till, paid for it and then the security guard stopped us and said he had been watching on CCTV. We just burst out laughing. Where's Jeremy Beadle then? But he said, 'No, this is serious, the police are on their way.' The police turned up and they were laughing. I said to the security guard, 'Can we not just pay the £2.35?'" He said, 'No, this is a serious offence.' So the police gave us two options: go to court and fight it out, or pay an on-the-spot fine. We couldn't be bothered going to court so we paid the fine but doing that made us look guilty".


title: Glen Johnson

text: In 2007, Glen Johnson founded Johnsons Real Estate with his brother, Lewis Johnson. The Johnson Real Estate web site states 'Glen was the founder of Johnsons Real Estate in 2007 and has spearheaded the team ever since.' He is currently the Chief Executive Officer of Johnsons Real Estate.


title: Glen Johnson

text: In December 2013, Johnson was banned from driving for six months after he was caught speeding in North Wales; he later lost his appeal against his conviction.


title: Ghost Army

text: The Ghost Army was a United States Army tactical deception unit during World War II officially known as the 23rd Headquarters Special Troops. The 1100-man unit was given a unique mission: to deceive Hitler's forces and mislead them as to the size and location of Allied forces, while giving the actual units elsewhere time to maneuver. Activated on January 20, 1944, the Ghost Army arrived in Europe in May shortly before D-Day and returned to the US at the end of the war in July 1945. During their tenure, the Ghost Army carried out more than 20 deception campaigns, putting on a "traveling road show" utilizing inflatable tanks, sound trucks, fake radio transmissions, scripts and pretense.


title: Ghost Army

text: Their story was kept a secret for more than 50 years after the war, until it was declassified in 1996. The unit was the subject of a PBS documentary "The Ghost Army" in 2013. In February 2022, members of the Ghost Army were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal, citing their unique and highly distinguished service.


title: Ghost Army

text: The Ghost Army was created by U.S. Army planners Ralph Ingersoll and Billy Harris, and led by Colonel Harry L. Leeder. Inspiration for the unit came from the British units who had honed the deception technique for Operation Bertram during the battle of El Alamein in late 1942.


title: Ghost Army

text: The unit had its barracks at Camp Forrest, Tennessee, and was fully formed at Camp Pine, New York (now Fort Drum), before sailing for the United Kingdom in early May 1944. In Britain they were based near Stratford upon Avon, and troops participated in Operation Fortitude, the British-designed and led D-Day deceptions of a landing force designated for the Pas-de-Calais.


title: Ghost Army

text: Some troops went to Normandy two weeks after D-Day, where they simulated a Mulberry harbour at night with lights intended to draw German artillery from the real ones. After this the entire unit assisted in tying up the German defenders of Brest by simulating a larger force than was actually encircling them.


title: Ghost Army

text: As the Allied armies moved east, so did the 23rd, and it eventually was based within Luxembourg, from where it engaged in deceptions of crossings of the Ruhr river, positions along the Maginot Line, Hürtgen Forest, and finally a major crossing of the Rhine to draw German troops away from the actual sites.


title: Ghost Army

text: Ghost soldiers were encouraged to use their brains and talent to mislead, deceive, and befuddle the German Army. Many were recruited from art schools, advertising agencies and other occupations that encouraged creative thinking. In civilian life, ghost soldiers had been artists, architects, actors, set designers, engineers and lawyers.


title: Ghost Army

text: Although the 23rd Headquarters Special Troops consisted of only 1,100 soldiers, the contingent used equipment pioneered by British forces such as dummy tanks and artillery, fake aircraft, and giant speakers broadcasting the sounds of men and artillery to make the Germans think it was upwards of a two-division 30,000-man force. The unit's elaborate ruses helped deflect German units from the locations of larger allied combat units.


title: Ghost Army

text: The unit consisted of the 406th Combat Engineers (which handled security), the 603rd Camouflage Engineers, the 3132 Signal Service Company Special, and the Signal Company Special.


title: Ghost Army

text: The visual deception arm of the Ghost Army was the 603rd Camouflage Engineers. It was equipped with inflatable tanks, cannons, jeeps, trucks, and airplanes that the men would inflate with air compressors, and then camouflage imperfectly so that enemy aerial reconnaissance could see them. They could create dummy airfields, troop bivouacs (complete with fake laundry hanging on clotheslines), motor pools, artillery batteries, and tank formations in a few hours.


title: Ghost Army

text: Many of the men in this unit were artists, recruited from New York and Philadelphia art schools. Their unit became an incubator for young artists who sketched and painted their way through Europe. Several of these soldier-artists went on to have a major impact on art in the postwar US. Bill Blass, Ellsworth Kelly, wildlife artist Arthur Singer, and Art Kane were among the many artists who served in the 603rd.


title: Ghost Army

text: The 3132 Signal Service Company Special handled sonic deception. The unit coalesced under the direction of Colonel Hilton Railey, a colorful figure who, before the war, had "discovered" Amelia Earhart and sent her on the road to fame.


title: Ghost Army

text: Aided by engineers from Bell Labs, a team from the 3132 went to Fort Knox to record sounds of armored and infantry units onto a series of sound effects records that they brought to Europe. For each deception, sounds could be "mixed" to match the scenario they wanted the enemy to believe. This program was recorded on state-of-the-art wire recorders (the predecessor to the tape recorder), and then played back with powerful amplifiers and speakers mounted on halftracks. These sounds were audible away.


title: Ghost Army

text: "Spoof radio", as it was called, was handled by the Signal Company. Special Operators created phony traffic nets, impersonating the radio operators from real units. Different Morse Code operators each have their own individual style of sending; the Signal Company operators mimicked a departed operator's style so that the enemy would not detect that the real unit and its radio operator were long gone.


title: Ghost Army

text: To complement existing techniques, the unit often employed theatrical effects to supplement the other deceptions. Collectively called "atmosphere", these included simulating actual units deployed elsewhere by the application of their divisional insignia, painting appropriate unit insignia on vehicles and having the individual companies deployed as if they were regimental headquarters units. The same few covered trucks or lorries, with just two troops in the visible seats near the rear to appear to be full of motorized infantry, would be driven in a loop to look like long convoys. "MPs" (military police) would be deployed at crossroads wearing appropriate divisional insignia and some personnel would dress as divisional generals and staff officers visiting towns where enemy agents or scouts were likely to see them. A few actual tanks and artillery pieces were occasionally assigned to the unit to make the "dummies" in the distance appear more realistic.


title: Ghost Army

text: The Ghost Army Legacy Project, under the leadership of Rick Beyer (producer and director of "The Ghost Army" 2013 PBS documentary), campaigned for Ghost Army recognition for six and a half years, through four Congressional terms.  Senators Ed Markey (D-MA) and Susan Collins (R-ME) co-sponsored S. 1404, and Representatives Annie Kuster (D-NH) and Chris Stewart R-UT, co-sponsored H.R. 707. The House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to pass H.R. 707 on May 18, 2021.  The Senate bill, S. 1404, had 71 co-sponsors, four more than the required number to move forward in the Senate.  Senator Catherine Cortez-Masto (D-NV) was the 67th Senate co-sponsor.


title: Ghost Army

text: Following a unanimous vote for passage by the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, on the evening of December 15, 2021, the full U.S. Senate passed S. 1404, the Ghost Army Congressional Gold Medal Act. On January 19, 2022, the House of Representatives also passed S. 1404.


title: Ghost Army

text: On Tuesday, February 1, 2022, President Biden signed into law: S. 1404, the Ghost Army Congressional Gold Medal Act, which provides for the award of a Congressional Gold Medal to the Ghost Army, in recognition of their unique and highly distinguished service in conducting deception operations in Europe during World War II. President Biden expressed gratitude to Representative Kuster and Senators Markey, Portman, Collins, and Blumenthal, among many others, for their leadership.


title: Ghost Army

text: The American Legion, the National World War II Museum, the American Veterans Center, the National D-Day Memorial Foundation and others supported the Ghost Army of WWII Congressional Gold Medal effort.


title: Around the World (Daft Punk song)

text: "Around the World" is a song by French electronic music duo Daft Punk. The song was written by the duo and released in April 1997 as the second single from their debut studio album, "Homework" (1997). It became a major club hit around the world and reached number one on the dance charts in Canada, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States. It also peaked at number one in Iceland and Italy. The song's only lyrics are "around the world," repeated 144 times. The music video was directed by Michel Gondry and choreographed by Blanca Li. In October 2011, "NME" placed it at number 21 on its list "150 Best Tracks of the Past 15 Years".


title: Around the World (Daft Punk song)

text: The key hook is a steady bassline and a robotic voice singing "around the world" in continuous chains. Daft Punk recalled that the song "was like making a Chic record with a talk box and just playing the bass on the synthesizer". The phrase occurs 144 times in the album version and 80 times in the radio edit. It is composed in the key of E minor and a tempo of 121.3 BPM.


title: Around the World (Daft Punk song)

text: Upon analysis of the song, Michel Gondry noted its distinctive structure: "I realized how genius and simple the music was. Only five different instruments, with very few patterns, each to create numerous possibilities of figures. Always using the repetition, and stopping just before it's too much." He also noted the similarity between the bassline of "Around the World" and that of the Chic song "Good Times". In 2017, computer scientist Colin Morris analyzed 15,000 "Billboard" Hot 100 hits for repetitiveness, based on compression algorithms. "Around the World" was found to be the most repetitive of the songs analyzed.


title: Around the World (Daft Punk song)

text: A cover version of "Around the World" was released in 2006 as "Around the World Again" by Nicky Van She and Dangerous Dan. A remix of the will.i.am song "I Got It from My Mama" included a sample from "Around the World". Daft Punk did not approve use of the sample, however, and as such subsequently refused will.i.am permission to release the remix. A music video was produced with the sample included, however. A song titled "Around the World" was released by rapper P.M. that contains a sample of "Around the World". Señor Coconut released a cover of "Around the World" on his 2008 album, "Atom™ presents: Around the World with Señor Coconut and his Orchestra".


title: Around the World (Daft Punk song)

text: "Around the World" was featured in one episode of first season of MTV animated series "Daria". It was also used in the video games "Dance Central 3", "NBA 2K13" and the trailers for Ubisoft E3 2007 "Rayman Raving Rabbids 2".