Test Taking

Wordery

Webster_27s_Dictionary_advertisement_-_1888_-_Project_Gutenberg_eText_13641

Words, words, words – this past week, new vocabulary words have been emerging willy-nilly.  We have clocked in a fair amount of time defining unfamiliar words, phrases, and concepts.  Thank you Wikipedia and Google Images!  Last night, I presented my son with a vocabulary matching quiz, to see if the words had been explained well enough. (YAY!  Big smiles here. Phew.)

  • From “The Young Reader’s Shakespeare: Hamlet” by Adam McKeown:  coronation, goblet, immortal, liege, parapet, specter, avenge, revenge, and vengeance
  • From “Flora and Ulysses” by Kate DiCamillo:  arch-nemesis, euphemism, treacle, and villain
  • From “The Little Prince” by Antoine de Saint-Exupery (translation by Katherine Woods):  baobab (a tree…real or imaginary?)
  • From our new novel, “The Way to Stay in Destiny” by Augusta Scattergood (a book BTW that we are LOVING), we had to do a bit of a side study on the illustrious Hank Aaron.
  • From Mozart’s “Overture to The Abduction from the Seraglio”: seraglio

baobab

Editor’s comments: there is such a thing as a baobab tree (it is VERY weird and ridiculously large, and we can see why the little prince worked diligently to make sure this tree didn’t take root on his little planet), and everyone should take a listen to the “Overture to the Abduction from the Seraglio” – five and a half entertaining minutes (we love the rambunctious cymbal smashing)!

“Overture to the Abduction from the Seraglio” – take a listen!

 mules turkey rooster combs

From our Farm Unit – last night we learned quite a bit about mules. During the course of the past few days we’ve learned about turkey breeds, the three reasons to breed goats (milk, meat, fiber), and we’ve learned about draft horses. This book (“Farm Anatomy” by Julia Rothman) is just dynamite.  There is something new and easy to understand every single night.

Best Farmer Brown story problem from the past week: Farmer Brown has been glad it has been raining, because his cows, sheep, and goats drink a LOT of water every day (we learned this from our “Farm Anatomy” book!). If each sheep needs one to four gallons of water daily and he has a herd of 60 sheep, what is the least amount of water they need during the course of a week?

Last night’s music theme: March’s Marches. Last year, during March, my son and I listened to a different march every night. In truth, the concept ran thin about day 18. Even accounting for the wide variety of marches (military, wedding, graduation, coronation, funeral), 31 marches are a lot of marches. Last night, I presented my son with our list from last year and he selected three to listen to:

  • “The Radetzky March”, by Johann Strauss, Sr., composed in 1848. Such an A+ march; we never get tired of hearing this.
  • “March of the Siamese Children”, from “The King and I” by Rogers and Hammerstein (1951): elegant, and we love listening for the low, reverberating gong tones.
  • “The Washington Post March”, written in 1889, by John Philip Sousa.  Interesting aside: it is said that when Sousa was 13, his father signed him up as an apprentice in the United States Marine Corps band, to keep him from joining a circus band (a parent’s gotta do what a parent’s gotta do).   The link below leads to a neat video, starring the US Marine Corps Band and a nice explanation of the piece by the band leader:

Welcome to the best part of my day!

– Jane BH

A Test of Faith
...possibly my worst photo ever. Sorry! The subject matter wouldn't cooperate.

…possibly my worst photo ever. Sorry! The subject matter wouldn’t cooperate.

A test of faith – This past week we completed our “Religions of the World” unit, using an Usborne book as a reference.  It was time to test and see what my son had retained.  I set up the iPad for a multiple choice quiz, and presented him with 30 questions regarding Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, and Sikhism.  Chalk up another A+.  Yay!

Incidental learning: Thermometers – While we were driving around the other day and the car thermometer read 37 degrees, I wondered if my son knew about temperatures.  So that night, we began a small study of temperatures and thermometers. We found a neat website: www.metric-conversions.org, offering loads of interesting facts with brief, understandable explanations.  We learned the difference between Celsius and Fahrenheit and how to convert from one to the other.  We learned that only the Bahamas, Belize, the Cayman Islands, Palau (Palau? We had to find this on the globe), the USA and its territories use the Fahrenheit system.  Consider us informed on the matter.

New academic unit – I am sorry to write that the chemistry unit we began crashed and burned by night number three. Darn book. When I don’t know what the author is talking about on page one, I start to think that this is not a book for us.  After shunning the chemistry book, we tried out a book on “Oceans of the World” and found conflicting sentences in the first paragraph, so we bypassed that resource, too.  This does not mean we are through with these units, it just means we are seeking the right books. (So many, many sub-standard learning materials out there.  How do they even get published?  Sigh.)

Not to be discouraged, we read through a few pages of “A Young Reader’s Shakespeare: A Midsummer Night’s Dream” by Adam McKeown.  Excellent!  We are loving this book. We are going slowly so we can keep all the characters straight.

3 books

Novels – Two worthy Newberry award recipients: “Hatchet” and “Flora and Ulysses”

  • Continuing on with “Hatchet”, by Gary Paulsen.  There is nothing original I can say about this important book.  There is a reason it is on so many reading lists.
  • “Flora and Ulysses”, by Kate DiCamillo (everything she writes is so great).  Things we’ve had to investigate while reading this book: CPR, near-death experiences (seeing the “white light”), the words “malfeasance” and “cynic”.  I love books that push us into further learning.

fleur de lis

Our music theme last night focused upon the work of French composers – I provided my son a list of compositions by the French composers that we are familiar with: Bizet, Debussy, Delibes, Gounod, Offenbach, and Saint-Saens.  He selected:

  • “The Infernal Galop”, (the “Can Can”) by Jacques Offenbach, what’s not to like?
  • “Clair de Lune”, by Claude Debussy, the soothing music we needed.
  • “March of the Toreadors”, (from “Carmen”) by Georges Bizet…a rather unusual rendition with bottles and a guy on skates.  Why not?

Welcome to the best part of my day!

– Jane BH

Affordable Housing Forever

crab 1 crab 2 crab 3

Our study of invertebrates concluded with an in-depth look at hermit crabs, one of nature’s super-star recyclers.  My son learned that hermit crabs take over shells left behind by snails…the snail dies and disintegrates, but the shell remains in prime condition for hundreds and hundreds of years.  As the hermit crab grows, he houses himself in larger and larger shells.  We learned that the posterior of the hermit crab is soft and curvy so it can easily back into a shell (miraculous and yet, a teeny bit repulsive).  We bid a regretful farewell to Susan Middleton’s book, “Spineless”.  Terrific resource.

Our Farmer Brown story problem last night – we calculated the number of stitches in a pair of striped boot-socks that Farmer Brown just knit for himself (seriously, more than 6,000 stitches).

A new unit! Chemistry.  I need a pair of Farmer Brown’s socks because I am quaking in my boots about this chemistry unit.  I did serve as a lab assistant for my high school chemistry teacher, but as I recall, my primary responsibility was to manage donut orders for all of the science teachers. We are using a DK book, so I know the images will be fantastic.  We’ll just see how this goes.

Maestro Matching – I gave my son two matching tests last night – first we matched symphony composers with famous compositions. Then I gave my son a list of composers and he placed them in chronological order.  Yay!  A+.

 drucker

Music: Last night was VIRTUOSO NIGHT showcasing clarinetist Stanley Drucker! While listening to “Exploring Music with Bill McGlaughlin” on the car radio last week, we heard Mr. McGlaughlin talk about clarinet player, Stanley Drucker.  AWESOMENESS: in 1948, at age 19, Stanley Drucker was appointed principal clarinetist of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra (let’s just think about THAT for a moment), and he retired in 2009.  The math: Stanley Drucker served as principal clarinetist for the NYPO for 60+ years!!!!!!!! (this really calls for 60 exclamation points!).  This is the sort of thing that grabs our attention, and listening to him play flew to the top of our priority list.

  • First, a short youtube video celebrating his 60 year tenure with the NYPO:

  • Then we listened to Mr. Drucker play Brahms’ “Clarinet Sonata No. 1 in F Minor”.
  • Then we listened to the “Doppio Movimento” movement (the “Simple Gifts” variation) of Copland’s “Appalachian Spring”, played by the NYPO.  The clarinet is paramount in this piece.
  • Finally, we watched a show-stopping performance of Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue”, with Leonard Bernstein conducting AND playing the piano, and Stanley Drucker beginning the piece as no one else could:

Welcome to the best part of my day!

– Jane BH

Imagine That

Back to Kansas – Last night we finished reading “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz”, but we weren’t ready to put the book away until we discussed the concept of IMAGINATION.  We defined imagination (forming mental images of things not perceived by the senses) (then we had to discuss the definition) and we acknowledged the relentless imagination of author L. Frank Baum:  winged monkeys, a magical golden cap, a tin man, a country of movable china figurines, Winkies, Munchkins, Quadlings, and on and on.  We thought Baum’s imagination well matched with the imagination of contemporary illustrator, Olimpia Zagnoli. Enjoying all aspects of this book was such a worthy use of our time.

 cat mouse      oz book      cyclone

Math Surprise – A few nights ago my son had to multiply 9 x 16 and I was stunned by the speed with which he arrived at the answer.  Like in 0 seconds.  Was this a fluke?  Was my hand guiding his answer?  Last night, I set up multiplication and division problems that were difficult enough for me to have to figure out ahead of time.  I used a multiple-choice format on his iPad, so I would not be directing his hand.  He again answered swiftly and correctly, calculating in his head.  The bummer here is that if he is a bright as I think he is, this will place me as the WEAKEST INTELLECTUAL LINK in our family. DRAT.

snowball

Last night’s “Farmer Brown Story Problem” revolved around Farmer Brown’s idea to store snowballs in his large freezer (with the intention of bringing them out for surprise treats on the Fourth of July).  We had to review the concept of cubic feet.  We figured out how many snowballs would fit into one cubic foot and then it was easy to calculate how many snowballs would fit into Farmer Brown’s 18 cubic foot freezer.

Poems of Tribute – last night we acknowledged the 7th anniversary of my father (my son’s grandfather) passing on, by reading a few poems that honored this really neat man.

- the kind of grandfather that would take a kid fishing -

– the kind of grandfather that would take a kid fishing –

  • Because he loved deep-sea fishing, we read “Sea Fever” by John Masefield
  • Because he grew up in San Francisco, we read “Fog” by Carl Sandburg
  • Because this seemed like a message a grandfather would give to his grandson, we read “If” by Rudyard Kipling

Music of Tribute – we selected melodies that would have pleased my son’s grandfather .

  • Because he was a UC Berkeley alum, we listened to “Fight for California”

  • Because he had been an Army engineer during WWII, we listened to “The Army Song”

  • Because we needed to say goodbye again, we listened to “Ashokan Farewell” by Jay Ungar

Welcome to the best part of my day!

– Jane BH

FINISH THE POEM

Test Taking.  I am still laughing about last night’s multiple-choice quiz, FINISH THE POEM.  Really, it was a silly test to take, and yet it did provide information regarding my son’s retentive abilities, so it was a worthy use of time.  My son was presented with lines from 15 familiar poems, with the last word missing. He scored 100% and I am pleased with the grasp he has on poems that we have read over the years.

Examples:

“Will you walk into my parlor?”, said the spider to the __________”

(A)  bee       (B)  fly       (C)  ladybug

“The woods are lovely, dark, and deep, But I have promises to __________”

(A)  keep       (B)  fulfill       (C)  reap

Reasons for giving my son a multiple-choice or true/false quiz:

  • I want him to be comfortable with all types of tests
  • I want to see if have I taught a subject adequately
  • both types of tests are potentially handy as communication devices

New Words.  From our novels and academic readings, we came across two unfamiliar words: ASHRAM and BANDICOOT. Cool words. We looked them up immediately.

Last night’s Farmer Brown story problem:  Farmer Brown has a apple orchard, so he was understandably excited when he scooped up an apple-cider press at the county auction. We 1) took a look at cider presses via Google images, 2) discussed the concept of an “auction”, and 3) sat rapt as we watched an auctioneer on YouTube. Then we calculated how many jugs of cider Farmer Brown will have to sell before he breaks even on his new contraption.

Music Time:  Our selections exemplified “wistfulness”:

  • Tchaikovsky’s “Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture – Love Theme” – This is the “go-to” background music for movie scenes where two people in love – separated by a meadow or the like – run toward each other. If you can get the slapstick possibilities out of your mind, this is the heart wrencher of heart wrenchers.
  • Jay Ungar’s “Ashokan Farewell” – You can just feel the yearning in this stunning piece for fiddle, guitar, and bass. Well chosen as the theme for the Ken Burns’ PBS series, The Civil War.
  • Irving Berlin’s “What’ll I Do” – The simplest of words masterfully arranged.  Wistful, wistful, wistful.

Welcome to the best part of my day!

– Jane BH