Susan Goldman Rubin

Salient?

state-map

Salients and Peninsulas – We are a fifth of the way through our “Where is That?” states-in-the-USA activity, and my son is learning more than just the location of the states.  Two nights ago we learned about salients – and SURPRISE, we have lived in three of nine salient states:  Texas, Oklahoma, Florida, West Virginia, Connecticut, Idaho, Nebraska, Maryland, and Alaska.  We learned that SALIENT is the correct geographical term for a PANHANDLE (side learning excursion – I had to show my son a real pan handle).  We learned that a panhandle is surrounded by land, and a peninsula (where Big Peaches – star grandmother – lives) is surrounded by water.  We also considered the customary definition of salient (meaning “most important”, “most noticeable”) (vocab).  And my son also learned that panhandling (vocab) has nothing to do with pans or geography.

pans

Story Problem from Le Fictitious Local Diner – speaking of panhandles, the diner management team decided it is time to replace all frying pans.  The chefs are delighted!  8 small-sized skillets are to be ordered at a cost of $25 each, and 8 larger fry pans are to be ordered at a cost of $75 each.  How much will the diner spend for shipping (if shipping is 15% of the total order)?
A. $25      B. $80      C. $120      D. $200 (answer at bottom of post)

History is coming alive – Yay! Candace Fleming’s “Presenting Buffalo Bill – The Man who Invented the Wild West” has us on the edge of our seats.  We are currently reading about Will Cody’s pre-teen years in the Kansas territory, where his family was caught in the territory’s “slavery/no slavery” struggle (a shameful blot on the pages of American history – teams of pro-slavery thugs from Missouri terrorized homesteaders who did not want Kansas to be a slavery state).  As Will’s father was an object of death threats from the pro-slavery faction, and was often out of state, in hiding, a very young Will Cody had to provide the primary financial support for his large family.   Working for a shipping company that delivered goods to military posts in Colorado and Utah, Will had his full share of wild west adventures (stampedes, shoot-outs, starvation).  What’s going to happen next???

better-tokyo-sculpture           better-blue-brushtstroke

Roy Lichtenstein – two take-aways from Susan Goldman Rubin’s excellent book, “Whaam! The Art and Life of Roy Lichtenstein”:

1)  What is a win-win situation?  How about when a corporation commissions (vocab) artwork that will be accessible to the general public?  We love Lichtenstein’s sculpture, “Tokyo Brushstroke II” commissioned by an architectural firm in Japan, and the crazy-gigantic-five-stories high mural, “Blue Brushstroke” commissioned by The Equitable Life Assurance Society in Manhattan.  The win-win?
– thousands and thousands and thousands of people get to enjoy the artwork
– excellent PR (vocab) for the corporation
– the artist gets paid!
2)  We are never too old to try something new:  Roy Lichtenstein learned to play the saxophone in his mid 60’s! OF COURSE, we were enthusiastic about devoting an evening to a sampling of saxophone sounds:

  • Harlem Nocturne, composed by Earle Hagen and Dick Rogers in 1939, played to perfection by the Duke Ellington Orchestra. The saxophone brings the sultry:
  • The Pink Panther Theme, composed by Henri Mancini in 1963.  This is OLD footage, with Henry Mancini conducting.  The saxophone brings the relentlessly sneaky:
  • The Prologue to West Side Story, composed by Leonard Bernstein for the 1957 Broadway production. The saxophone doesn’t take center stage in this piece, but does set the tone for a collage of NYC sounds and rhythms:

Welcome to the best part of my day!
– Jane BH
(story problem answer:  C. $120)

It’s All Fun!

roy-whaam

Giant Cartoon Art – We are currently reading through “Whaam! The Art & Life of Roy Lichtenstein” by Susan Goldman Rubin.  This book is filled with examples of his pop art of the 1960’s that both shocked (“this is art?????”) and rocked a generation.  Each of Lichtenstein’s paintings was inspired by published comic book drawings of others, and I like that the author addressed the issue of copyright. My son likes looking at photographs of Lichtenstein’s art on display, with people standing near the paintings, so he can get an idea of exactly how large the paintings are.

bill-polka-dots

Buffalo Bill and his Wild West Show – Hot off the press! Candace Fleming’s “Presenting Buffalo Bill – The Man who Invented the Wild West” was just published in 2016.  We are only a few nights into this book and we are loving every minute.  Oh my! Buffalo Bill – what a man with BIG vision and what a risk (vocab) taker!  This book is part of our Native North American unit – we are impressed with the author’s excellent research and sensitivity regarding Lakota tribe members who were part of the Wild West Show (and this has provoked a short side study of the Lakota tribe).

Game ON – the other night, my son grabbed a pen, and I knew he wanted to communicate something – so I supported his wrist and here is what he wrote, “I want to play hangman.”!!!!  Really?  Well, OK!  We have been playing hangman about 2 times a week for a month or two, but I had no idea he was liking this spelling game.  I am relieved that his handwriting has improved to the point that I can read it.  Huge communication progress!

50 Days of Fun!  I am stretching the definition of “fun”, but this is sort of diverting:  we have started playing, “WHERE IS THAT?”.  I place a blank map of the USA on the desk and I ask my son to ink a dot in the middle of a particular state.  After he finds the correct state, we (hand-over-hand) color it in. Could this be a gateway activity – first the USA, then maybe the countries of South America?  Then WHO KNOWS???

And if that weren’t enough – I have added a new resource tab (look on title block) – “The Bookshelf”.  This is where I will keep a running list of the books that have worked particularly well for my son and me.

box-lunch

Box Lunches at Le Fictitious Local Diner –  Everyone knows that box lunches (vocab concept) are by definition FUN!  And here is a twist: the Local Diner’s box lunches are vegetarian, and include a bottle of kombucha that comes with it’s own teeny paper parasol.  FUN!  The lunches are apparently delicious, and the response has been enthusiastic:  during the first week 30 boxes were sold on Monday, 20 on Tuesday, 40 on Wednesday, 10 on Thursday, 40 on Friday, and 20 on Saturday!  Each box sells for $9.  If it costs the diner $4 to put the box together (including the box and the napkins, etc), what was the diner’s profit for the first week?
A. $800    B. $160    C. $1,440    D. $60 (answer at bottom of post)

Music – It was time to learn more about the SNARE DRUM – Yay percussion instruments!

snare-drum

First, we needed to see how the snare drum was constructed.  We learned that a band of narrow wires stretched across the bottom of the drum gives it that muffled rattly sound. We listened for the snare drum in:

– Blue Tango, composed by LeRoy Anderson in 1951, and was ranked by Billboard as the number one song of 1952!  Sassy.

– Scotland the Brave – this pipe and drum corps classic is considered to be one of three unofficial national anthems of Scotland.  BTW, in Scotland, the snare drum is called a side drum.  BTW, we are the sort of people that really like the music of bagpipes.  This footage is just so great:

– Bolero, composed by Maurice Ravel, as a one-movement orchestral piece for ballet, in 1929.  From everything we have read – and can readily believe – playing the snare drum in this piece is a musician’s nightmare.  Seventeen-plus minutes of the same rhythm over and over and over and over.  But what a fine, fine performance by the Vienna Philharmonic, conducted so carefully by Gustavo Dudamel:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9CMPOz1SaQ

Welcome to the best part of my day!
– Jane BH
(Story problem answer: A. $800)

Textbooks – if we ruled the world

We want textbooks that make us pay attention  –

  • by captivating us with quirky information
  • by taking us behind the scenes, so that we gain a sympathetic understanding of the facts
  • by luring us in with intriguing graphics

textbooks 5

We want textbooks that we cannot wait to open each night.  Books like these:

  • Usborne Books – “Explorers”: so excellent
  • DK Eyewitness Books – “Gandhi”: perfection
  • Peter Sis Books – WHOA. Works of art with great information. We learned so much about Columbus, Darwin, and Galileo from the Sis books.
  • Bill Nye Books – information peppered with funniness and energy
  • Stephen and Lucy Hawking Books – “George’s Secret Key to the Universe” and “George’s Cosmic Treasure Hunt”, both make staggering concepts easy to understand by deftly weaving them into story format.
  • “Music Was It” by Susan Goldman Rubin – such an interesting biography of Leonard Bernstein
  • “Professor Astro Cat’s Frontiers of Space” by Dominic Walliman and Ben Newman – anybody who reads this blog knows that we LOVE-to-the-power-of-10 this book.
  • “Moonshot” by Brian Floca – spectacular book about the flight of Apollo 11
  • “A Child’s Book of Art” by Lucy Micklethwaite – my son LOVES this book. He reads it every day, and we are on our third copy.
  • “A Really Short History of Nearly Everything” by Bill Bryson – quirky information delivered in enthusiastic Bryson style

tip jar

Last night’s story problem from “Le Fictitious Local Diner” – There are 3 waitresses working the morning shift at the café, and on Saturday, they split a tip jar that contained $57.  The 4 waitresses that work the afternoon shift split a tip jar that contained $78.  Who went home with more tip money – a morning or an afternoon waitress?

 tea cups

Last night’s music program celebrated TEA TIME. We learned about theme and variation and the concept of orchestration by focusing upon the classic American sweetheart melody, “Tea for Two”.

  • First, “Tea for Two”, written by Vincent Youmans and Irving Caesar for the 1924 Broadway smash-hit, “No, No, Nanette”.  ADORABLE (and makes us want to know what a sugar cake is).

  • Second, “Tea for Two” as interpreted by Dmitri Shostakovich in 1927. Long story short: Shostakovich won 100 rubles by re-orchestrating “Tea for Two” in less than one hour, after listening ONE TIME to a recording of the song. It SPARKLES!

  • Next, in 1939, jazz pianist great, Art Tatum put his spin on “Tea for Two”. FANTASTIC.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKb0Sc2lYVU

  • And then, oh my gosh, The Lawrence Welk TV Show (1951-1971) featured “Tea for Two” SIXTY SEVEN times during the course of its long broadcast run. I just don’t know what to say about this variation; I am still stunned on so many levels. On the plus side, my son was mesmerized by the two musicians demonstrating such skill on (the duck-billed platypus of instruments) the accordion.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpDaD6BFdx8

 Welcome to the best part of my day!

– Jane BH