1923

Going Nowhere Fast

Last week I replaced my 2009 laptop (and really, it was the oldest and slowest thing in the Apple store that day) and I have apparently entered glitch city.  We’ll just see how this post progresses. (*&#$$%!!*)

doldrums

Going Nowhere Fast – our science concept of the week: THE DOLDRUMS.  We located these “no wind” areas on our globe, and imagined being stuck in a sailboat for weeks, praying for any sort of breeze.  We also learned the colloquial (vocab) meaning of “the doldrums”.

Switcheroo – My son and I took a hard look at the books we were reading for pleasure and we didn’t like what we saw: books that were were taking way too long to get to the plot.  We decided to bail, and try some new books. We are pretty happy with our new choices (both about boys going to school in Great Britain):

ribblestrop

    – “Ribblestrop”, by Andy Mulligan.  So far we find this book to be quite imaginative, humorous AND it moves right along.  We like it!
     – “The Brilliant World of Tom Gates”, by L. Pichon. Presented as if written by a chronic doodler, this is fun to read (along the lines of “Diary of a Wimpy Kid”) and fun to look at.

Catherine the Great – of the “A Wicked History” series IS great! (Every book we have read in this series has our full attention – so well organized, well written, with a wealth of very interesting information. “Wicked History” books so trump traditional text books.)  But back to Catherine – hey, she had her good points (like being insistent about bringing Russia up to modern scientific standards) and she had her bad points (she was the classic power-hungry politician), and she really did have to depose her husband.  He was just awful for Russia.  This is good reading!

french snail

Story Problem from Le Fictitious Local Diner – To bring attention to new French items on the menu (French Toast, French Fries with Béarnaise Sauce (vocab concept), and French Onion Soup), the diner is sponsoring an “Escargot (vocab) Race”.  The race track will be set up on a card table and the winning snail will have to travel 5 inches from start to the finish line.  Anyone showing up will be given a complimentary beret (vocab), and those showing up with a snail are automatically entered in the race which is sure to be a white-knuckler. First prize is a $50 diner gift certificate.  If 60 people show up and each beret costs $3, how much will the diner spend on berets? If two-thirds of the people that show up pay $5 for a cup of onion soup, how much will the diner gross from the soup sales? How much will the diner net, after the cost of the berets and the first prize certificate are deducted?

ranking

Order! Order! – My son is learning how to rank things, like “which composer lived first”, or “which state did we live in first, second, third, fourth, and fifth”…I would like my son to be able to rank preferences  (“which food do you like the best, next best, next best, worst”, “which color should we paint your room: first choice, second choice, third choice”). This is not the first time we have worked on ranking, but we are having a bit more success this go around. Yay!

doldrums map

Music for the Doldrums – maritime music that could move us out of the doldrums:
     – “Sea Songs”, composed by Ralph Vaughan Williams in 1923, fully orchestrated in 1942.  This is an invigorating 4-minute arrangement of 3 British sea songs:

     – “We Sail the Ocean Blue”, from “H.M.S. Pinafore” by Gilbert and Sullivan (1878).  This jaunty (vocab) (a LOT of Gilbert and Sullivan music can be described as “jaunty”) (but we like “jaunty”) video is adorable:

     – “Sailing By”, composed by Ronald Binge in 1963, this is the music that is broadcast by BBC Radio before the shipping reports.  It is a most relaxing slow waltz and could prove helpful for lowering the blood pressure of those who have hit the high anxiety level while stuck in the doldrums.

Welcome to the best part of my day!
– Jane BH

Garden Par-tay

  cicadas on leaf

Cicadas Party – Every summer, it gets really loud in our backyard garden.  It sounds like a golf course sprinkler system going full blast, but it isn’t that, it is the CICADAS!  Last night my son and I did a mini-study of Cicadas.  We learned that cicadas sing their song during the hottest part of the day; we learned that the males make all the noise; we learned that people actually eat these insects (deep fried or stir fried) (gag).  We watched this well filmed video of a male cicada making his rattling noise (7 out of 10 on the repulsive scale).  In truth, my son wasn’t terribly interested; I sort of had to force him to watch this…good thing the video only lasts a minute:

Vocabulary update – two items:

First, I went through the list of vocabulary words we have accumulated over the past year (see “The Wordery” in menu area) and selected 15 words.  I presented the list as a quiz with multiple-choice options.  Happy report: 100% correct!  So pleased with my son’s vocabulary retention.

Second, our Rasputin and Einstein books and our current novel (“Surviving the Applewhites”) have presented us with more unfamiliar words and concepts: crude, dynasty, fasting, heir, hemophilia, icons, monarchy, stage mothers, Swiss neutrality, recluse, and thesis.

plums

The Farmer Brown story problem – Farmer Brown is going to be on local TV, showing everyone how to make his grandmother’s prize-winning Damson plum jam!  After the demonstration, he is going to give everyone in the audience (3 girl scout troops), a pint sized jar of the jam.  There are 16 girls in each troop.  If Farmer Brown’s recipe makes 2 quarts of jam, how many times will he need to multiply the recipe?  Farmer Brown does NOT want to disappoint the girl scouts.

ship

Our music theme from last night was inspired by “The Clipper Ship, Flying Cloud”, printed by Currier & Ives in 1852. A few years back, my son and I did a study on American illustrators, and we both loved learning about the firm of Currier & Ives (Currier, the accomplished lithographer and Ives, the finance brains…the selling pitch was, “the Grand Central Depot for Cheap and Popular Prints”).  When we finished our study, my son picked out “The Clipper Ship, Flying Cloud” as a poster to put up on his wall.

Music to accompany “The Clipper Ship, Flying Cloud”:

  • “Sea Songs” by Ralph Vaughan Williams, composed in 1923.  This is a 4 minute march bringing together 3 British sea songs. This video clip shows the Houston Youth Orchestra from two years ago.  Exceptionally well done for a youth orchestra.

  • “Overture to HMS Pinafore” by Gilbert and Sullivan, from their very popular comic opera, which premiered in 1871.  Jaunty!

  • “Over the Waves” by Juventino Rosas.  We often get this piece confused with “The Skater’s Waltz”, and guess what? The Skater’s Waltz (by Emile Waldeufel) was written in 1882 and “Over the Waves” was written in 1888.  (Perhaps another story for another time.)  ANYWAY,  take a look at this video!  The composition is played with surprising delicacy by the intimidating looking Central Military Band of the Russian Ministry of Defense.

Welcome to the best part of my day!

– Jane BH

Two Different Worlds

germany globe rasputin einstein russia globe

Two Different Worlds – we are reading about the extraordinarily weird Grigory Rasputin and the extraordinarily brilliant Albert Einstein.  The two were born only 10 years apart (Rasputin 1869, Einstein 1879), but WHOA, what different worlds they lived in.  After each night’s reading, my son and I have much to discuss – first the family background, the education, and the character of each man (we haven’t gotten to their contributions yet) and then the comparison between cultures.  Grossest tidbit from last night’s reading – Rasputin’s teeth were brown. Yeecks. BTW, both sources of information are well researched, well written, and captivating.

Thinking about Letters – last night I brought out the old family dictionary, so my son could see that there is a non-electronic means of finding the definition of a word.  Then, I asked my son to guess which letter of the alphabet is at the beginning of the greatest number of words (he guessed “E”), and which letter is the beginning of the fewest number of words (he guessed “Z”). Thus begins a 13 day miniature side-study. We are counting the number of pages for each letter; two letters per evening. So, in 13 days we will know!

pluto new

Focus on Pluto – we are keeping abreast of the New Horizons spacecraft that was launched nine and a half years ago with the task of flying by Pluto, sending back images and information.  So exciting!  After traveling some three BILLION miles, the FASTEST spacecraft ever is due to pass Pluto NEXT WEEK.  It is already sending images.  We marvel once again at the brainpower that can successfully manage these far-reaching projects with such precision.

rice treats

Story problem from Le Fictitious Local Diner – The diner is gearing up to make some big bucks at  the county fair – their plan is to sell 3,000 Rice Krispies Treats at their booth during the weekend-long fair. The diner chefs are working from the recipe on the back of the Rice Krispies box, which uses 6 cups of the rice cereal to make 12 large square cookies.  How many cups will the diner use to produce their goal of 3,000?   If a regular sized box of Rice Krispies can make two batches of the treats, how many regular sized boxes will be needed?  Delving into the arena of common sense:  is it likely that any grocery store would have this many boxes of Rice Krispies?

black wreath

Our music theme a few nights ago – “The Sad Song Scale”.  We listened to, and ranked these tear-jerker compositions on a sadness scale of one (“bummer”) to ten (“unrecoverable heart-crushing despair”):

  • “Symphony No. 3 in F major” (third movement), composed by Brahms in 1883.  We ranked this a most worthy 10 on our sadness scale.  SO much desolation.  This piece has been well positioned in several movies.

  • “What’ll I Do”, by Irving Berlin, composed in 1923.  Earns an impressive 6 on our scale.  Sad AND clever. That is sort of hard to pull off.  Kudos Mr. Berlin!

  • “Serenade”, by Franz Schubert.  A solid 9 on the scale.  Written in 1828, during the final year of his life, despondent because he knew he was dying of Syphilis. Blog followers know that my son and I are enthusiastic Itzhak Perlman admirers and this performance is another reason why.  Perfection.

Welcome to the best part of my day!

– Jane BH