Hands-on with reality

This is the year we are going to focus on the engineering disciplines. The aim is to learn about the engineering process and to start noticing the great engineering solutions which are all around.

We begin with civil engineering. Why? In our history readings we finished reading about Ancient Egypt and China, and  we are nearing the time of the Roman Empire - all times full of examples of superb engineering advancements. Let's not forget that grandpa and grandma are here on hand to reinforce the conversation backed by two-lifetimes of professional experience.

We have started with learning about bridges. The following books have been remarkably well put together and full of insightful and inspirational directions. We have learned about the basic types of bridges and we have conducted some of the experiments in order to learn more about the weaknesses and strengths of the different solutions. We have also learned about the importance of considering the available materials and the environment.

These are the books with which we began to gain appreciation for the diversity of structural solutions.  This book offered us an opportunity to bring out the map and check out the locations of this marvels of human ingenuity.

We continued by focusing on the Brooklyn Bridge. The history of the bridge is remarkable and inspirational. The books we used were considered wonderful by civil engineers.







We are going to watch the following DVDs. We have the VHS but it will be a hassle to hook up the VHS player so DVDs it is. I have watched these films about 5-6 years ago, or maybe more, and I am excited to watch them with new eyes, ears and intention.








Ballet girl is interested in the solar system. She and a friend are going to try to build a model of the solar system for the science fair in February. There are plenty of solar system kits on the market, and plenty of home-made alternatives, but I am keen on taking advantage of the mountain of legos we own. Everything can be prototyped with legos. Here are a bunch of links - NASA link and MIT link - which I hope we use for this year's science fair.


I recommend this series of books to get brief exposure to engineering process and the different engineering disciplines. We are going to read the civil engineering book this month. Next month, we may continue with looking at buildings, and I will concentrate more on materials.






January is the month I dedicate to learning about money. Money is a very subtle concept that we do not ponder often, but it is unquestionably one of the greatest inventions of humankind. We will talk about what money means and as we proceed in history we will talk about the importance of money in all historical episodes.






As far Portuguese goes, we just finished Pippi Meialonga which we loved. We are going to move to Os Egipcios and then to the first adventure of Lobinho. I am delighted that both kids are paying attention during reading time and can answer questions on the spot.







This month the kids are going to play at Smith Crossing retirement home in Orland Park which I am very happy about since the next concert opportunity is in May. In May during this year's IMA competition Ballet girl will play Minuet in G-Allegretto by J.S.Bach from Easy Classic to Moderns Vol 17, a selection at the Junior 1 level. This will be followed by the Piano Guild Auditions we will review all of Ballet Girl's book 2 and hopefully, the year will conclude with the book2 graduation.

We attended a ISO concert in December which featured holiday favorites. The way the little man experienced the music during the performance impressed a lot of people. He also went up to the singer to let her know that while he enjoyed her singing, he found her singing to be very loud.  We attended a fundraising concert for the South Suburban Youth Orchestra last week which we loved and which further inspired Ballet Girl to pick up the violin. We are probably going to attend the High School Musical presented by the Lockport Youth Theatre at the end of the month.

Ballet girl said that her school is going to distribute Charlotte's web for this year's One-School-One-Book initiative. I was surprised because her teacher has been reading it to the kids as a read-aloud during snack time already. Ballet girl asked me to start reading it because she is not always there for snack time. I and the kids love this edition because it has colorful pictures. I found an interesting list of questions.