August 2020

Goodness! This was a stressful month. Frankly,  it flew by like a blur.

I taught four science classes during August. The first focused on the properties of air, the second focused on static electricity, the third focused on sound and the fourth focused on rockets.

For the properties of air, we spoke about matter. I demonstrated that air has weight and occupies space.

For static electricity we covered what matter is made out of: atoms. What atoms are made out of: protons, neutrons and electrons. We covered how electrons can leave the atom, and how free electrons can jump (shock). We talked how we can protect ourselves from static electricity: by using special clothes and boots, by touching metal when leaving a car, by being inside during a storm, or making ourselves into a small ball if we are outside. I demoed how charged balloon attracts another balloon, or pieces of paper, or pieces of salt and pepper, or dripping water, or a can of soda.

For sound: we build a popper, a whistle, a popsicle kazoo, a straw kazoo,  a paper flute and noise makers with balloons. We talked about vibrations, how sound waves travel, how our ear works and how to protect it.

For the rockets we reviewed the forces that need to be overcome for a rocket to leave Earth. We made rubber rockets, balloon rockets, straw rockets, and skewer rockets.

We also benefited from some classes that we offered by other people working in my company. S. took an improvisation class, a painting class, a song writing class and a book club. B. took a Lego class. 

We also went on a week long vacation to Michigan. It was very pretty and we needed that vacation very much. Bryant Park is great. Haserot Park on the Old Mission Peninsula is possibly the only public park there. It is very pretty, and not busy on the weekends. The Empire Beach was my favorite in 2010 and 2014, but the beach portion has shrunk substantially. I am not sure why but I was unpleasantly surprised. I do not recommend it.

I starting reading a lot of books, and did not finish any. Grit, It's even worse than you think, So you want to talk about racism, Just Mercy(we also watched the film)(I recommend this TED talk by Bryan Stevenson), The New Jim Crow, Port Chicago 50, Stella by the Starlight, Bob. I need to read Roll of Thunder, Hear my cry and The Birchbark House.

We also continued to homeschool. We are somewhere a third of the way in 5th grade and 7th grade.

August 2020 Homeschool Update:

5th Grade:

Math: PreAlgebra Ch 1

English: IEW 10, 11, 12, EIW-Lessons 1-8, Novel - Front Desk

Portuguese: Simple Past Tense, Simple Present Tense, Lessons

7th Grade:

Math: Geometry-polygons, Competition Math - number theory, Counting & Probability - tricky counting and probability

English: IEW 6, 7 ; Novel - Lu, Hello Universe, Just Mercy

Portuguese: Simple Past Tense, Simple Present Tense, Lessons

Read Aloud: Ghost, Sitting Bull

Social Studies: Just Mercy (Movie)

Movie related to a book: The One and Only Ivan

Exercise: Bike, Basketball, Run, Swim, Hike

Here are our 5th and 7th grade curricula:

5th grade Curriculum:

Music: Daily Piano and Cello practice

Arts: Paper & Scissors recreation of battles

English Writing: IEW- Medieval History and Essentials in Writing 5

English Spelling: All About Spelling 5 & 6

Literature: One book a month (three novel studies - Old Yeller, The Giver, Hatchet), one month focused on non-fiction texts, one month focused on fiction short stories and poetry.

Math: AOPS Pre-algebra and Geometry

Portuguese: Brasileirinho, reading, Gramatica Ativa 1

Social Studies: focus on American history from perspectives of Native Americans and Immigrants, critical look on American history and traditional look on American history.

Science: We will focus on hands-on science using books such as:  Explore Gravity (Physics, Forensics, Blood Bullets and Bones,  Rocketry, Exploring the Solar System, Beyond the Solar System, The Apollo Missions, Scientists in the Field Series (The Manatee Scientist, Sea Turtle Scientist, Inside Biosphere 2, Eclipse Chaser, Mission to Pluto, The Mighty Mars Rovers, etc.)

PE: workouts at home, bike, play outside, basketball, swim, hike, walks

7th grade Curriculum:

Music: Daily Piano and Violin practice

Arts: Whatever she finds on the internet

English Writing: IEW- Modern History

English Spelling: All About Spelling 6 & 7

Literature: One book a month (three novel studies - Roll of Thunder Hear my Cry, The outsiders, The Westing Game), EIL 7

Math: AOPS Algebra, Geometry, Counting and Probability, Competition Math, ACM prep, and MathCounts prep

Portuguese: textbook, reading, Gramatica Ativa 1 & 2

Social Studies: focus on American history from perspectives of Native Americans and Immigrants, critical look on American history and traditional look on American history.

Science: We will focus on hands-on science (making observations, taking measurements and drawing conclusions)  using books such as:  Explore Gravity (Physics, Forensics, Blood Bullets and Bones,  Rocketry, Exploring the Solar System, Beyond the Solar System, The Apollo Missions, Scientists in the Field Series (The Manatee Scientist, Sea Turtle Scientist, Inside Biosphere 2, Eclipse Chaser, Mission to Pluto, The Mighty Mars Rovers, etc.). We have a subscription to MEL Chemistry and will follow the experiments for an introduction to chemistry.

PE: workouts at home, bike, play outside, basketball, swim, hike, walks

The good book during the beginning years

I was fortunate to grow up with only good books. The astounding quantity of school books of low quality was unheard of when I was starting to learn to read. Until recently, I did not appreciate that. Having a daughter who is an emerging independent reader revealed that troubling truth to me. I had to beg her teachers to direct her towards shorter, meaningful stories. I was also troubled to find that the students do not read the same text. How, I ask, can these children learn to discuss a book, to share an opinion, to share discoveries, when they do not read the same text? I am baffled.

I was hoping that I can rely on the educators to help pick good books; alas, this is also in my court.

I have decided that I will ask my daughter to read shorter books with which she is already familiar.
The list I have in mind is the following:

• The enormous crocodile (level N) (November 2015)
• The magic finger (level N) (December 2015)
• Grace for President (N) (January 2016)
• Frindle (R) (January 2016)
• Miss Rumphius (level O) (January 2016)
• Mouse called Wolf (level O) (February 2016)
• Pippi Longstockings (level O) (March 2016)
• The mouse and the motorcycle (level O) (April-May 2016)
• Esio Trot(S) (July 2016)
• The Twits (S) (August 2016)
• Dr. Dolittle (September 2016)

In addition, once a week I will ask her to read a fable by Aesope, re-read it, narrate it and we will discuss it. The following day, I will ask her to re-read it and copy one page from the fable. Since the fables are short, I expect to teach her narration fairly easily this way. I want to prepare her for longer narrations and dictation from real literature pieces which we will begin next year.

I wish parents and educators would come together to rid the market of garbage. The magic of the reading experience is not in the quantity of pages read but in the quality of the message consumed. Look at how long the constitution is-it is quite short!

This week I also went to the Parent-Teacher conferences for both kids.

• The K-teacher told me that mirror image writing is developmental and should be resolved by the end of second grade. In first grade, in the second quarter, kids are marked off by having the d's and the b' reversed. How are these two practices consistent? 
• About the grading. Why write on second graders' spelling papers % correct, when the students do not understand the concept? Given that first the students will be introduced to fractions, why not simply go with reporting the fraction of correct answers from all. 

The themes for this month have been:

1. Evolution - We have dwindled on the subject for a while but I will at it for another month. It is very important as it can allow me to show the kids how science is done-how pieces are put together, how sacrifices are made, how fights are fought, how one person cannot do it all, how history interferes, etc. All important lessons, to be repeated and reiterated many times in the future.
• We read about Jane Goodall. We read about the ideas of Darwin-why evolution, the discoveries in the geological record, why natural selection. We also are reading a book about apes which we find very interesting. It talks about Chimps, Gorillas and Orangutans.
• I read "The Lucy Man", and am currently reading "The origins of man" and "The cartoon guide to genetics". I will narrate the information to the kids in shorter format next month. 
• We watched "Chimpanzee" and "Born to be wild", and we will see "Mountain Gorilla". So far the kids have enjoyed these types of films, some of which we have seen in the science museum theatres.
2. Ancient China
• We did not read much this month on the subject. We just watched a DVD we borrowed from the library and I recapped for them the main messages. Overall, we are golden on Ancient China. Before jumping to the Roman empire, we will revisit some old stories to link the two great empires and emphasize their similarieis and differences.
3. Free Style:
• Picture books never fail. We read "How Santa got his job" and "How Santa lost his job", "Dear Primo" and "Same, same but different". We talked about how people can be different because of where they live but how they can remain curious and respectful towards each other. We also talked about how the little things one learns to do can add up to something big, and how sometimes the biggest ideas can fail.It is good to have a plan B.
• "A long, long line" and "Thse darn squirrels" are our new wonderful finds. The former is surprising and cute. The first one is fantastic for budding engineers and is plain funny and good natured. Picture books are a real treasure that we take away from children too early!
• We continue to read The one and only Ivan. It is a hard book to read. Maybe I picked it too early but I thought it makes sense in the context of evolution-this Ivan thinks like us, feels like us, but is overpowered by us; yet, we perceive very little of him. We are half way and I intend to be done in the next week with it.
• I also read "Crenshaw". I was thinking of reading this for December. Goodness gracious, no! Such a bad book! Yes, the style works great for Ivan, but fails big time here. Sorry. The glove that fits them all is only a glove.
• I also read "The war that saved my life". I found this a very harsh book. I was uneasy throughout. It is very well written, the message is wonderful; in fact, all messages are wonderful. Definitely for a mature reader, somewhere higher middle school, high school. I am very happy I read this book even if I was left depressed.
4. Movies - Thanksgiving became Nerd Weekend
• We watched "The revenge of the nerds", "Spaceballs", and the three "Back to the future" movies this month.
• We also watched "Annie"
• I intend to have a Star Wars spectacular in the next few days, but I am waiting for the library to supply me with "New Hope" so that we can follow Machete Order. Nope, we did not like the Satr Wars movies. I have to confess that they never meant much to me, I managed to sleep through them consistently (the Matrix too). I am not surprised that my kids did not like them. 
5. Magformers:
• We got two sets which we love. One is the robot and the other is the rinabo 60-piece. Both are fabulous and allow for hours of free play. Both are challenging as none offers diractions just pictures of good perspective so that you can experiment and figure out the shape. 
• In addition, we received a free puzzle book, which we love. I used it to demonstrate how people imagined the constellations. I have never enjoyed the staring at the sky and trying to figure out where some group of stars is, but to understand how it came about is worthwhile. With the puzzle, we also learned that more than one solution to a problem is possible. This is quite a break-through, quite an advanced step for little kids, who only think of one solution and happily move on.
6. ThinkFun games:
• I am a big fan. Nowadays there are so many gadgets that are advertised as teachings kids how to program. Oh it is so easy to give in especially when understanding how invaluable the skill of programming is. However, I do not see better introduction to programming than the ThinkFun games, which teach you in a sneaky way, to follow a bunch fo rules to achieve a goal. 
• I would like to take that a step further. Science works in the following way. We are aware of partial information and we seek the rules that lead in a continuous way from one piece of information to the other. I value these games tremendously. I think they make a great gift.
• The games teach a lot of patience. 

 

Old favorite makes a come back

A year and a half ago, we read four of the Mercy Watson books-Mercy Watson to the Rescue, Mercy Watson goes for a drive, Mercy Watson fights crime and Mercy Watson as a princess. Sunlight boy loved the silly stories. Ballet girl not so much. The big cousin boy really liked when Mercy caught a robber. Yesterday, I wanted to read to the kids a funny story, something very silly, something which is not an informative text, which is not part of a more elaborate text; and then I remembered Mercy. You should have seen the excitement in the house. Fireworks were everywhere and when Mercy went to the rescue did not disappoint. I ordered all of the books from the library, so we will read these instead of Babe, the gallant pig which I read and found utterly dull.

While I was looking at other books by the same author, I came across this new book which is to come in August 2014 and is on pre-order for around $9 on amazon.com. I have to confess, I did read The tale of Despereax by the Kate DiCamillo, a book which is very popular among homeschoolers, and I found it very complicated and not suitable for the age groups to which homeschooling parents were reading it (kids my kids' ages).

Speaking of homeschooling parents I have to mention this. A lot of stay-at-home moms are plain obsessed with exposing their children to 'great literature' which is literally a bombardment of their kids with read-alouds. One of the things I absolutely disliked about literature class in school, both in the US and in Bulgaria, was that we were expected to read books at the speed of light. While I understood it at the time, I fully realized it when I experienced it as a member of the work force with long commute- namely, that enjoying literature requires time and patience, otherwise it is not an experience but a race. So, of everything, I'd rather expose my children to less, but good literature and attach to the exposure ample room for experience of the books we read-reenactment, pondering, drawing, questions, solutions, alternative, opinions. None of this can be accomplished in the time frames kids are given these days. And with the speed and the rate of reading, kids are inevitably going to mix and match the stories and the authors and the narrative techniques and richness. Less with more is more. Please read, but not as a conveyor belt, read to experience the reading. There are too many books in the world. You will not be able to read them all. And what was 'classic' three hundred years ago is not 'classic' today, and this is completely fine. The books had their impact in their time, now it is time for new books to impact us in new, relevant ways. With this I confess that I do not like:
Greek Mythology which I view as soap opera ancient Greek style, the archaic styles of Charles Dickens, Jane Austin, Shakespeare, Victor Hugo, and the boring contents of Lord of the Flies, Catcher in the Rye,  To kill a mocking bird, Frankenstein, The great Gatsby, Of Mice and Men, MobyDick which is the alternative spelling for extremely boring, and of course let's not forget that all Dostoyevski books are over-rated. Plus none of these books were written for kids as the intended audience, they were written for bored aristocrats and adults who found discussing and reading aloud literature a good pass-time. Literature is taken out of context in the classroom and bears no meaning to the students, it is just another hurdle to hump over. Oh, sigh!